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we took some pictures of evan, my brother nick and i for my parents for christmas since the most recent pictures they have are our senior pictures. we've slightly aged since then. it took some convincing for my brother to agree because he's all boy and boys apparently hate the camera. but he's even smiling in that first picture! and look how cute he is!!! about a week before this he 2nd degree burned his poor hand and it was like negative 500 degrees outside and i felt so bad for him! the background is 150% real and it was the prettiest day i've ever seen in my whole entire life. we drove up to the highest point in town that was shrouded in fog and frost and every tree, grass, pine cone and plant was frosted. it. was. amazing. and freezing but i have this little internal heater so i wasn't too cold.

i know everyone has already seen this picture, but here it again, and i don't even care. it's just such a good picture of the THREE of us. ;] i was just having a good face and hair day. plus that new sweater. and those jeans have since been retired. but hey. i made it to almost 27 weeks in my pre-pregnancy clothes. pretty proud.
and can you even handle that background? probably not.

26

this week is week 26. which means there are only 14 weeks to go. which means i may enter into panic mode at any time. BUT. we had a great christmas and even the baby got a little spoiled with a hand made quilt from ethiopia (major heart eyes at that!) and some other african toys that i always said i was going to buy but never did and my mom saw them and snatched them right up. and a baby food maker (!!! YES.) and socks and hats. LITTLE BABY SOCKS that are undoubtedly going to be eaten by my washer. BUT THEY ARE THE CUTEST EVER. spoiled rotten. i love it.

but the best present was our ultra sound we had this morning. i woke up 30 minutes before my appointment to keep baby asleep for as long as possible so we'd get a good spinal picture (AND WE DID, THANK GOD) and the amazing tech who was not at all creepy and so, so incredibly nice (we've determined the last guy was not even an employee. just some creep off the street.) took that picture immediately which was a good thing because then the baby woke up and was all about rolling around and sucking on its fingers and opening and closing its mouth. i'm so in love.

little hason has given me major baby fever which makes me so super excited for our own little baby. the best part is that little hason likes to be swaddled with his hands out, up by his face. and i sleep with a hand in my face. and OUR BABY had both hands by its little face. and then chewed on its fingers for a good few minutes (but NO thumb because no thumb suckers around here. the end). and if you look closely you can see the little hand. sweetest little hand i ever did see.



[all that white stuff in my hair is actually snow falling down. i don't have dandruff. we had a white christmas and it's still snowing. i love!] at 26 weeks i've pretty much outgrown any non maternity clothes. which is a super bummer because I HATE MATERNITY CLOTHES. could they possible be any uglier? but my mom did get me a pair of yoga pants and i have not taken them off and i really don't plan to. sorry for everyone around me.

and the baby is in full kick mode these days, especially when you push on those little feet. i make evan feel those kicks all day long so we never get anything done. but he loves it. he also painted the nursery (and i actually woke up to him doing that one morning. SWOON.) and it is amazing. i can't wait to start filling it up with all our goodies so that i can just hang out in there and wait for baby.

merry christmas

little babies

we got to hang out with my baby nephew today. i could just eat him up. i absolutely love being an aunt. even though i haven't had any real auntly duties, i get to say, "I'M AN AUNT!" and do so proudly. and evan is just the cutest with him. WHICH MEANS he's going to be such a good dad. heart is successfully melted.

i fell in love with him all over again because we finally got to hold him after 2.5 weeks in the NICU and now he's finally home! 4 pounds, 11 ounces, 18 inches AND HOME! i could have just sat there all day and stared in his sweet little eyes but evan made me leave so we could come home and look at things for our baby. OUR BABY. let it be known that nothing will ever get done when we have our baby because i AM going to just sit in a rocking chair and stare. and stare. and stare some more.

little baby hason theodore, i adore you.

and you can't be in this family unless you're a bears fan. just look at hason's little hand, he's like "BURRRS. HOLLA." [actually they call that his "rodeo" hand because he's always got one hand up. little baby bull rider.]

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my heart is just breaking for CT and those precious kids and that little town. i have heavy boots. and i don't know what else to say. is there anything to say?

but i know my god is bigger than this.
"he will wipe every tear from their eyes. there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." revelation 21:4
"he heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds." psalm 147:3
"blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted." matthew 5:4

i'm so sad this happened so close to christmas. it's not like there is an ideal time for this. but so close to christmas. ugh. it's like how people should just start being nice to each other. including me and my judgmental and grudge-holding self.


i'm also 25 weeks this week and i'm just thankful for this place in my life. as much as i feel guilty for being able to say that and live that, i'm so incredibly thankful and joyous. we have another ultrasound next week to remeasure the baby but if these kicks and hiccups say anything at all, i think baby is outgrowing the tiny little space i provide. i also bought this print today in honor of CT for the nursery. and i kind of want to get this one, too. i'm going to teach this babe all about loving our neighbors and being the change in this world. there is no other way.

24.4

today was a good day. just an all around good day. which has not been the case for most of the days in my last few weeks. having good days is a little difficult when it is a hormone free-for-all inside your body and there is also a little tiny bby in there claiming everything as its own. i just don't feel like me, and although i'm seriously loving being pregnant now that this getting fatter business comes with kicks and punches and dance parties and not just tight jeans and the inability to bend over and a bladder the size of a teaspoon, i'm still adjusting to all these changes and trying to be mature and use my words but sometimes i retreat into my infant stages and cry and cry and cry and for now that's just going to have to be okay.

and i'm currently reading "eat. pray. love." after much refusal because i had only heard about it after the movie and although i've never seen it, i want movies to be popular because of books, not the other way around. but it was recommended to me about 903 times and so here i am, half way through and i.love.it.

but the point is not that.
the point is this quote:

"but i felt a glimpse of happiness, and when you sense a faint potentiality for happiness after such dark times you must grab onto the ankles of that happiness and not let go until it drags you face-first out of the dirt--this is not selfishness, but obligation. you were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight."

like my sweet friend amber who sent me a handmade necklace (she makes the coolest necklaces. i want to squeeze her.) and a sweet card. and my friend danielle who sent evan and i a christmas card. and my friend kristin who sent me sweet emails. and my lovely friend allie who brought me a rocking cradle baby bed [technical term] that i just want to curl up in a take a nice long nap.
these things make me so happy.

sometimes not everything goes wrong. sometimes that law of life is just plain wrong.

and also if there is a place where time goes to die, i'd like to go there for a minute and bring back all of my time and hang out with it for a bit longer. i'm somehow, miraculously at 24 weeks and 4 days which is practically almost 25 weeks.

i'm going to be a little sad when i'm not pregnant anymore and i no longer have this little bump. i LOVE my bump. i'll be sad when i'm not pregnant anymore and it's not just me and this babe and i have to share this babe with evan and our families and everyone else. this closeness that i get to experience is so amazing and so special and i just want a little more time at this stage. because this will be our only first baby and i tend to live life in the fast lane so i'm really trying to slow down and live life and enjoy this even smaller life that is currently residing on top of my bladder yet somehow with a foot in both of my lungs and one wedged between the vertebrae of my spine. ;] such a cute little destructo it is already. i really don't mind the aches and the pains because that means more back massages for me and no dirty looks when all i want to do is take 5 naps in one day and STILL go to bed at 9:00. i'm not quite sure how you can love someone so much, and i haven't even met this little babe yet. i'm sure it helps that i love my baby daddy [except he does not like when i call him that so that's basically his new name because don't ever tell me NOT to do something, c'mon.] with my whole heart and soul. but seriously, this kid is loved and it's still growing taste buds over here. grow, baby, grow!

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/i hate those stupid inflatable christmas lawn ornaments. my neighbors have one and i just want to stab it. that shit is ugly and not christmas at all.

/i hung some ornaments from the window in our kitchen. just  some little bby left over bulbs from some string. well, they fell down. RIGHT as we were going to bed. evan has a BB gun in our room because he's tough and so he took that out to find the intruders, which took him like 15 minutes (nothing was broke, thank you, sweet baby jesus < get it? because christmas? i know).

/let's talk about baby hiccups. my hiccups are out of control and this baby apparently inherited that with hiccups like 43 times a day. i get instant hiccups whenever i eat spicy food and usually if i drink soda (like when evan made me eat the spiciest jalapeno of.my.life and i was hiccuping for 10 minutes while every.other.restaurant.patron stared me down with daggers because i'm loud) and this baby is going to have loud hiccups, too.

/i have pretty much given up on putting on my socks and shoes. i painted my toes for what will be the last time this weekend and i now hand that torch to evan who must promise me to keep my toes perfectly manicured. he has already perfected putting on my socks and shoes. WHAT? i'm just preparing him for an infant.

/i always wake up in the middle of the night to pee and the other night i woke up in tears because my feet hurt so bad. i could hardly walk the 5 steps to our bathroom. i was half asleep and tired which was mostly the problem but they did hurt. evan woke up early the next morning to give me a foot massage before i had to get out of bed. [that's on my super secret list of reasons i know he loves me.]

/our church's outreach team [evan's job] is volunteering at a christmas store this weekend where we're selling toys to low-income parents for cheapy cheap. because we want to "teach a man to fish, not feed him for a day," type of thing. so we're letting them buy their presents rather than handing presents out. BUT! evan and i get to go shopping for the gifts. UM how awesome is it going to be pushing 15 carts FULL OF TOYS around toys r us?! christmas is my favorite thing ever.

/we were super, super mega blessed this weekend with a brand new vanity and counter top for our bathroom. it wasn't free but it was basically free. i want to cry every time i think about how generous people can be and how thankful i am for these people lowering my stress level about 50 notches.

/i love my new blog design. i love simplicity. except what is not simple is how blogger won't let me change the color of my links. cool, blogger.

/my christmas tree is the prettiest/best tree in the whole wide world. also christmas trees basically threw up in my house this christmas because that's the only decorations i put out. but i put out like 55 of them. go big or go home, right? my brother and i built one out of pallets and it's amazing. when i say "my brother and i" i mean mostly me. me and my power tools, y'all! (just kidding. danger.)

23 weeks

soooo.....I'M AN AUNT!!!

it was a sort of scary emergency c-section for my sister-in-law on monday evening, 4 weeks before her due date but baby is here and healthy and doing good. but he's only 3 pounds, 11 ounces. TEENY TINY. evan and i went shopping for premie clothes tonight and we found ONE. literally, 3 stores, ONE onesie. all the newborn things are for 8.5 to 12 pounds. my gosh. he's doing good and oh my goodness he is cute! i know that newborns are not, let's be real here. but they made one cute baby. i'm in love. and his name is hason theodore after their grandpas. and i just want to hold him and cuddle him in one of those fleece body suits. so little hason needs to gain some weight so i don't feel like i'm going to break him. < good mom in training.

also evan's mom posted a status about baby hason on facebook but failed to mention stan and/or kalcy (HIS parents) and so i will not tell you how many texts evan got (and comments on her status) asking if it was our baby. i do not want to know how big a baby would be if it was almost 4 pounds at the halfway mark. but thank you for your concerns. hahaha



anywaaaaay. i'm going to write a book and it is titled "the things no one told you about pregnancy." there's also going to be a special section in there for nurses to read because nurses sure do know how to double your BP when they're like "if this happens again...go straight to the family birth center." I AM TWENTY THREE WEEKS, WE ARE NOT HAVING THIS BABY JUST YET, MADAM.

my book has 3 chapters so far. pretty much every other day i text my friend allie who has 3 kids and i'm like "story that i would never put on my blog because my family reads this and that would be awkward" and then she laughs at me and is like "response that i can't share because my family is still reading my blog."

seriously, your body is wacked the heck OUT when it grows another human. but how insane is it that we can do that? sometimes i just stop and i'm like OH MAN. it's one of those things i can't think about for very long or my head feels like it might explode. that, and how long eternity is. YOU CANNOT HANDLE IT.


umsoyeah. they moved my doctor's appointment up this week because we thought something not good was happening but then it was fine. but the nurse literally told me that if it did happen i would need to go straight to the family birth center and i was like OMGGGGG. but then i went to my appointment and we looked for the heart beat and did you know that babies loathe dopplers? holy smokes. the baby kept moving away from it until she basically pinned it down to get a good reading and then the baby kicked and punched it and then punched me all. afternoon. long. because it was not happy. 23 weeks and already sportin a 'tude. i don't even care because baby kicks and movement are the coolest things in the world. i can't even explain the joy and excitement and happiness it brings me to feel all that.

and even though the baby is measuring a little on the small side (perhaps small babies run in evan's genes, mr. 3 pound 11 ounce hason.) my stomach is measuring right on track for 23 weeks. so they're not worried at all, which is easy for them. but calms me down A LOT. especially hearing that whooshing heart beating away at 144 bpm. SPEEDY. i think evan and i both exhaled that gigantic breathe we had been holding all morning when we heard that heartbeat. even though i'd been feeling kicks and movement and everything was essentially normal. there's just something about that heartbeat. and the temper tantrum that follows. favorite. =]

also can we talk about how i'm craving soda like non other? i don't even drink soda normally, when i am not pregnant. seriously. i hate the way it makes my mouth feel and i hate the empty calories and sugar and junk. AND I WANT IT ALLLLL. i don't even know where it came from but all i want is a dr. pepper. 652 of them. and fountain, only. which is the only reason why i have not consumed 800 sodas at work, because they're canned and i refuse. [i'm the only montanan who says "soda" because it is not called a "pop."]

so that's that. lots of kicks and movement and potty breaks every 15 minutes and a lot of shortness of breath and smaller meals because this baby is definitely in charge around here. and things are good.