Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Level 2 Ultrasound!

As I'm sure is pretty normal for anyone expecting a baby, we had been anxiously awaiting our big ultrasound to find out the sex of the baby, and to make sure he or she was healthy and growing properly! My doctor scheduled the appointment at 19 weeks. So on March 12th I got off of work early and headed to the hospital, where Kyle and my mom met me! 
I absolutely loved getting to see our little babe moving around in there. I still wasn't showing much at this point, and hadn't felt any really obvious movements from Baby, so it was really reassuring and amazing to see that there really was still a tiny human growing!! 
The ultrasound technician asked to make sure we wanted to know the sex, and that was the first thing she looked for! We were so shocked and so excited to find out that Baby is a boy! And on top of that, everything looks normal and healthy for the little guy. We are so blessed, and we cannot wait to meet him this summer!





Cutest ultrasound I've ever seen! :)

Mini Reunion with the Perrys

As a Christmas gift to the family, Brandon put together a trip for the long President's Day weekend! Originally we were all going to go snowmobiling, but the unusually warm weather and lack of snow changed our plans. So we all met down in St George to hang out together and also go hiking, caving, and rappelling! The weather was gorgeous, and the house we were renting had a heated pool. I didn't go caving because of being pregnant, but I did get to rappel with everyone:) It was a wonderful weekend, and so nice to be where it was warm! Plus, with living in Idaho, we don't get to see Kyle's family as much as he is used to, so it was awesome to get to spend time with them!






Florida!!

We had been planning a getaway to Florida for months! And finally the day came! We flew from Boise to Orlando on January 1st! It was so so beautiful the whole time we were there, which was a much needed break from the stormy inversion that was Boise.
In true Kyle and Mary fashion, we put 1600 miles on our rental car in the 10 days we were there! We had it all planned out, and the first thing we did after getting our luggage and car was to drive all the way to Miami, where we stopped for a bit before continuing to Homestead where we stayed the first night.





The next morning we headed into Everglades National Park! There were tons of alligators to see which was super cool. We drove to the very end of the park where it meets the ocean. 
Then we headed on down the Florida Keys! We had to catch a boat the next morning, so we stopped at a few places in the Keys but not everywhere. It was actually perfect because the beaches on the Keys weren't all that great. Perfect to stop and admire, but not much sand to speak of. We ate at a little hole in the wall seafood place and then camped that night in Key West! 





The next day was my favorite part of the trip! We got on our boat first thing and it took us 70 miles off the coast of Key West to the west, to Dry Tortugas National Park. Such an interesting NP! The entire thing is one single small island that is home to an old Civil War fort/prison. The fort covers almost the entire island. We got to explore the history there and walk all over the fort and see the old canons, etc. The beach around the island was fantastic, and we went snorkeling and found conch shells and I fell asleep sunbathing (I was like 9 weeks pregnant after all, and fatigue was my biggest symptom.) I got quite the sunburn, but that didn't start hurting until the next day, so it was still the most perfect day ever:) We got back to Key West in time to have a Five Guys burger (haha) and then we drove back up north towards Crystal River, FL. 







On Sunday, we drove in to Crystal River where we were able to go swimming with manatees! It was the coolest thing ever! The water was a bit chilly, but it was so worth seeing those amazing animals. There weren't tons, but we saw about 7 or 8 of them, including a baby with its mama. Such a fun part of the trip! 


Sunday night we drove back to Orlando, where we spent the next three days. A friend from Kyle's mission and us met up and stayed with a mutual friend who works at DisneyWorld, and we got to spend 3 days in the parks!! It was so much fun! It was Kyle's first ever time to DisneyWorld, and it did not disappoint. On Monday we went to Magic Kingdom and Universal Studios. Our NJ friends hadn't arrived yet, so we spent the first day just with our hosts, Sheila and Alex. It was great. We love Disney magic:) and my doctor even okay'd me to ride roller coasters, so that was awesome!
We met up with everyone that night at dinner! (By this point in the trip, my face was very swollen from the sunburn in Dry Tortugas...)






Tuesday was Epcot day! We got a little later start to the day than we wanted, but we still had such a fun time there. I adore the World Showcase, and even though we did most of it after dark it was still so great. Kyle and I ran through it all like little kids, kissed in France, got the most expensive ice cream of all time in Italy, kyle made Canadian jokes in Canada, we talked to a hilarious cast member who was sure we must have met on farmersonly.com because we were from Idaho, and just explored all the different countries:) 



From the Spaceship Earth ride... 

The last day of Disney we spent at Animal Kingdom! That park closes earlier than the others, and we had reservations for Sheila's luau dinner show that night, so it worked perfectly. Expedition Everest was me and Kyle's favorite ride of all the parks, so we did that one twice:) We also went on the safari which was cool, to see all the animals! 
Then it was time for the Luau! Kyle even got chosen to go up and dance on the stage for a minute and it was hilarious and awesome. 
After the show, we decided we weren't ready for Disney to be over, and we still needed some souvenirs, so we went to Downtown Disney! It was really fun, and we bought baby his/her very first anything, a Mickey onesie:)







The next morning we were off on our next and last adventure! We stopped by the Kennedy Space Center and the Cape Canaveral National Seashore on our way to St. Augustine and then spent 2 nights there. It was the coolest city we have probably ever been to together! It is like the oldest town in America, founded long before America was. There was a cool war fort, and the old main street was so much fun to wander. So many cool old buildings were all over. At night, all of the town had white Christmas lights turned on and it was seriously magical and so cute. There was also a beautiful lighthouse that we spent some time checking out. We ate outside at the most delicious place on our last night. It was a little but chilly while we were there, but even so it was the perfect way to end our trip. 

We absolutely loved getting to go on this adventure together! It really was the best to spend so much time together having fun. That Kyle is the best husband and best friend a girl could dream of!


Sunday, May 3, 2015

We have a secret!

On December 8th, I realized I was more late than normal, so I decided to take a pregnancy test. I could not believe it when I saw the little blue plus sign! I had made Kyle stand outside the bathroom door, and he said he heard me say "what?.." so he busted in! We were in shock, but so happy! We drove immediately to the grocery store (this was at like 11pm) to buy some of the nicer tests to confirm, haha. And they were positive as well!


I happened, luckily, to have the following day off of work, so I met Kyle on campus and we freaked out (in a good way!) together some more about it! It took a long time for it to hit us that we were really pregnant!


We went to my doctor on the 17th (Ky's birthday) to get a definite confirmation, and a recommendation on an OB-GYN. I found out that I was already 7 weeks along, and we decided to tell our families on Christmas!

We were spending Christmas with the Perry's, so we planned a fun way to tell them on Christmas Eve. This would be the 12th grandchild for Kyle's parents, so we made a little photo calendar with one grandkid's picture per page, and the front said, "When I Count My Blessings, I Count my 12 Grandchildren." We doorbell ditched the wrapped calendar with a tag that said "Open Immediately!" So they did, and LeeAnn thought that the calendar went to the wrong house! haha. But when she got to the month of our due date, it became obvious what was going on! Then we just had to tell everyone that it was us who sent the secret gift:) It was so much fun!! AND then a few minutes later, Kyle's sister announced that the calendar was actually invalid, because she was expecting as well! We have the exact same due date!! So crazy and so fun.




We had a white Christmas! It was so pretty and just amazing. We had planned to save our announcement for my family when we got back to Idaho, but then we were facetiming Masen on his mission, and just decided to have my parents go find the gift we had wrapped for them... It was a little tin with a baby sock in it, and inside the sock was our little positive pregnancy test from the doctor! So we weren't actually there in person when they found out, but I was so happy to have Masen hear about it live! And then when we did come home from Utah, we made my sister come over with her family to open "one last present!" and Kyle filmed that reaction to send to all my other siblings:) It was perfect! And it was so much fun to be able to have it be a Christmas surprise!



Baby's first ultrasound! Dec. 31st. 

Fall 2014!

We had a fun and busy fall! The last weekend of October was the BSU vs BYU game in Boise, so Kyle's parents came up to go with us. Even though BYU lost, we still had a lot of fun sitting with our fellow cougar fans. That same weekend we drove up to McCall and went to the cute pumpkin lighting.



we didn't do much for Halloween, but I did dress up for work which was fun!

One night we were bored and decided that we should go on the world's shortest road trip to Ontario, OR. So we got a few snacks and drove about an hour, just to take a selfie at the sign. Super spontaneous and actually really fun!
We also decided that the MDX was not the right fit for us, and it was making me nervous... so we traded it in and leased a new 2014 VW Jetta. Its a great little car! But it is a manual transmission so I had to learn how to drive it. haha!


For our anniversary, we went to dinner the weekend before the actual day, and then spent the night of the 18th with my mom for her birthday! It was fun. Kyle also did get me roses and brought them to me at work:)

Thanksgiving rolled around, and Kacee and her fam decided to make an extra trip up for the holiday week! We had a lot of fun! I had to work for most of the week, but Kyle and I still got to join the family in a day of sledding, and a lot of just being together and enjoying Thanksgiving!




Also, right at the beginning of December, I dyed my hair brown! It was a really fun experiment and I actually really liked it while it lasted!