Mothers Day -- Kendal Mission Call

Today has been an eventful day.  Technically its my "first" Mother's Day.  I've never really enjoyed this holiday.  I've always thought that it's pointless.  I shouldn't need a designated day to tell my mom that I love her.  Another reason that I was pretty bitter is because I wasn't a mom yet.  Now that we are expecting our first child, I'm a little bit more excited.. but I still feel like there shouldn't be a designated day.  It should just be a given. 

We enjoyed our day by attending church.  The seniors in our ward gave their graduation talks today.  These kids grow up so gosh dang fast!  I stayed in my ward during Sunday School and then I left to attend sacrament with my family in my home ward.  Kendal was giving a talk on mothers, and where he won't be her for much longer, I wanted to hear him speak.  He did a nice job!  He's such a funny kid.  After I attended church, I hurried home so that we could eat lunch with D's family.  We had hamburgers, frog eyed salad and baked beans.  My mom in law was so sweet and bought me a new decoration that I can hang outside.  It's so gosh darn cute!  After we hung out with them, we headed on down to my families house for dinner.

Kendal turned in his mission papers a few weeks back.  We've been patiently waiting for a couple of weeks for his call to come.  It hasn't been easy!  Poor kid has been so patient. Yesterday he checked the mail and it was finally here!  We had his friends over and my grandma Bonnie and cousin Kobe came down from Idaho.  We did a Facebook live and Instagram live post so that other family members could see it.  He got called to the North Carolina Raleigh Mission! --- SPANISH SPEAKING!!  He was so excited.  He wanted to speak Spanish so bad.  I don't blame him.  He's such a good kid.  

Link to video is here. 

When we got home from being with my family I had a little bit of a crying session.  I blame it on the baby (that's my excuse for a lot of things right now ;) but Dev says its just who I am.  I feel like everything is changing so fast.  I don't feel prepared for everything that is about to happen.  I feel like Kendal, Jason and Lindsie are just growing up so fast and it breaks my heart. I told D that so much is going to change in the next 5 years.  Kendal will leave on his mission, we're going to have a baby, K will come home from his mission, Jason will graduate, J will go on a mission, Lindsie will graduate and there's even a SLIGHT chance that L could be married too!  Sean and Allie will hopefully have a kid and who knows, we may even lose someone in there too.  I feel like my life as been pretty steady and constant.  We do the same thing, every day, no changes.  But then it was like 2018 came and its like my life just took off.  I'm very emotional about it.. (that's the part I'm blaming on pregnancy!) Hopefully I will be able to get my act together and just have faith that everything is going to be okay.  I hope that everyone had a great Mother's Day.  I am so grateful for my mom and for the things that she has done for me.  I feel like I'm quite 'prepared' to be a mom, and I owe it to her. (And all the freaking children she had! Haha ;) I'm grateful for my mom in law and for the role that she played in raising my amazing husband.  I hope that all the women in my life were able to enjoy their day! 

*** I'll get pictures uploaded tomorrow ***

First Trimester!

February 16^th:  Oh my gosh.  I AM PREGNANT!  I have been feeling extremely tired, peeing every half hour, bloated beyond belief and had a gut feeling.  I just didn’t want to trust myself!  When I took the first test—I was still half asleep and I was as blind as a bat.  When I saw the second line come up on the pregnancy test, I literally almost fainted!  I couldn’t believe it.  Because I didn’t have my eyeballs in, I ran into the bedroom and yelled, “Devin! Wake up!”  I ran over to him and I showed him the pregnancy test.  He looks at me and says, “Wait, you’re pregnant?”  I had to go to him to make sure that there really were two lines! I just couldn’t believe myself.  He told me after everything had happened, that he thought he had slept through the alarm.  He saw the 17 as the minutes, and thought it said 7:17 AM.   Since I still doubt myself, I went to Smith’s before work and bought a two pack.  I took both of those when I got to work and they were very positive.  I was just so giddy!!

Devin and I had decided that we were going to tell our parents.  I know that it’s super early, but we wanted them to enjoy this moment with us too.  A couple of months ago, I pinky promised my dad that I would tell him before my mom.  I take my pinky promises very seriously.  I had asked my dad if he was able to talk and he said that he was at lunch.  I sent him a picture of one of my tests and he says, “Yay! Does mom know?” I told him..no.  He said that I probably ought to tell her, or he could do it for me if I’d like.  I knew she was going to kill me for even telling dad before her, so I decided it would probably be best if I told her.  I called her and I told her and she says, “Can we tell dad?”  I had to break the news to her that he already knew.  I thought she was going to reach through the phone and strangle me! Haha.  I didn’t want any of my siblings to know quite yet, but when I was about to tell my mom, I was telling her to not yell, not say anything and she says “are you pregnant?” and Lindsie was standing right there. So now she knows.  Then I decided to tell Allie so that both of them would know. 

Devin and I went grocery shopping after work.  I decided that I would like pizza for dinner and we called his parents to see if they’d like any.  LaDawn told us that they too were planning on picking up pizza so we asked if we could bum off their oven.  Devin wanted to just call his dad grandpa when he walked in the door.  So when Jedd walked in from work, Devin says “Hey, Grandpa!”  Both Jedd and LaDawn kind of looked shocked.  Almost like they didn’t believe us!  Derik walked in and when D called him Uncle Derik he totally thought that he was joking.   He was just like, “oh yeah, very funny!”  

Saturday (17^th) I took another pee test.  Because, why not?  Still positive!  So needless to say, I am a terrible secret keeper.  I ended up telling my brothers that Sunday (18^th) and then my grandma too.  The only reason that I told my grandma, is because she lives with my parents.  I didn’t want her to find out she was the only one that didn’t know about it in the house. 

The thing that I regret the most is: taking a test in the morning, on a Friday.  Work was a drag!! Luckily for me, our office closes at 3:30 PM on Fridays.  

February 19^th:  I made my first appointment!! I was trying to decide between two different OBGYNs—Dr. Anne Blackett or Dr. Kimberly McCulloch.  I tried calling Dr. Blacketts office first, but they were closed for the holiday.  I was kind of in the back of my head wanting to go to Dr. McCulloch, so I was a little bit relieved when I called Dr. McCulloch’s office and they answered.  My very first appointment is scheduled for April 5^th at 4:00 PM!  I put it at the end of the day so that I could just go home afterwards.  

March 8^th: I’ve been feeling pretty decent the last couple of days.  Considering that I have been nauseous.  I hit 6 weeks.  At this point I don’t know if I am really 6 weeks or if I am a week or two behind.  I just know that it’s been 6 weeks since the first day of my last period.  I’ve tried to get myself to work out, but I am just so gosh dangit tired.  I’m grateful that the time change is Sunday and that it’s getting warmer.  I can stand to put on thermals/sweats and go on a walk with Aggie.  So that’s been helping.  Yesterday I wasn’t hungry at all.  I drank my shake and ate a hardboiled egg for breakfast, salad for lunch, and I drank some chicken broth for dinner.  Sometimes the thought of food just makes me nauseous.  

Today I bought Peanut’s first books!! I was out shopping with Ashlee (coworker) for my other coworker, Amanda’s, baby shower.  I saw these two books and they were $5.00 each at Kohl’s.  The books that I bought are Sleep Tight, Sleepy Bears and Goodnight Little One.  Both of these books are written by Margaret Wise Brown.  I am so excited!  Devin and I really don’t want our kids to have to be entertained by technology from the time that they exit the womb, so I really want to collect books for them.  I am a firm believer that “old school” isn’t always bad.  

March 12^th:  I feel so sick.  This weekend has not been kind to me.  Today makes 7 weeks—peanut is the size of a raspberry.  I have been pretty nauseous off and on, and now I feel like I have the flu.  I’m pretty sure I have a fever.  I knew coming in that being pregnant would be hard, but having the flu/fever on top of it, just isn’t working.  Peppermint oil is still saving my life at this point in time.  I just stick a little bit on the tip of my nose and voila! I can’t eat much of anything.  Especially broccoli!  I’m like seriously dry heaving right now even just thinking about it.  Almost 3 weeks until my first appointment!  I talked with my mom, its normal to feel like I feel.  I feel like if I say anything out loud, I’ll jinx myself.  I know God doesn’t work that way.  I’m afraid of there being no heartbeat.  That’s my biggest fear.  I just so badly want this baby to be healthy.  I’ve been saying many, many silent prayers.  I’m grateful for the peace that they bring to me.

March 14^th:  I have been cramping the last few days and it’s caused me to worry.  I don’t feel like I should be cramping enough that it wakes me up in the middle of the night.  I’ve been trying all freaking morning to get in with my doctor.  Finally they were able to get me in at 2:30.  When we got there, I had to give the front desk some information and then they took me back to have my first ultrasound!! The tech that I worked with was so sweet! She was just the nicest thing in the world.  First thing that she found was the baby!  Oh my gosh my heart just melted right there.  You could see the little heart beat fluttering on the screen and it was just so surreal!  Devin had the biggest smile on his face!  Little peanut’s heart rate was 157. Gratefully, we only saw one too.  That was a huge relief.  She said that I am measuring right on schedule at 7 weeks and that everything looked good so far!  She did find a cyst on my ovary that ovulated.  She said it should disappear but that it can definitely cause pain and be uncomfortable.  She printed us off a picture of our cute little peanut and it was such a relief to know everything is ok!  My next appointment is still scheduled for April 5^th. 

March 16^th: Today Devin’s cousin, Kira, got married.  We drove down to the Payson Temple and it was a beautiful day!  I bought these things called “sea bands” and they’re an acupuncture type of band that you wear and it sits on a pressure point.  Let me tell you something!  That thing works.  I almost threw up in the sealing room of the temple.  Do you know how bad that would have been?!  I just kind of pushed the little knob deeper in the pressure point and BAM! Took the nausea away instantly.  It was beautiful.  

March 18^th:  We told the rest of our grandparents today!  The only people we had left to tell was Grandma Shirley and grandma and grandpa Jackson.  We went over to Grandma Shirley’s and showed her a picture.  Her reaction was so cute!  She had to sit down.  She was so excited.  I called my grandma when we got down to my parent’s house and asked her what she was doing around Halloween.  She was so confused. Lol! I told her she needed to make sure her schedule was free around then so that she could come and hold our baby!  Devin says her response was his favorite.  “Holy awesome!” haha!  Next I called grandpa (he’s in Boise working right now) and he was excited too! It’s nice to know that our grandparents know.  We’ll probably tell the rest of our family after the appointment in April.   

March 25^th:  Happy Birthday, Devin!  Yesterday we went down to Ogden to see if we could find anything at Babies R Us.  Since they’re closing all their stores, they were having a big liquidation sale.  When we got there, there was like nothing.  It was kind of a waste of a trip. We were able to salvage the trip by buying a couple of gifts for Devin’s birthday today.  We ate at El Paisa grill in Ogden.  OMG. My pregnant butt was in heaven!! That was the first time I have eaten street tacos that taste like I am back at my favorite little spot in Juraquilla.  It was a nice day to spend with Devin, just the two of us.  I felt so bad.  His birthday is today and I have felt like garbage.  I dry heave all day long.  I’m achy, nauseous, I just feel like garbage.  I feel awful.  I wrote in Dev’s card like literally while I was lying in bed.  I put it on his pillow while he was brushing his teeth!  I hope that I can feel a little bit better, and be able to make it up to him.  

March 26^th:  I have not felt good all freaking day.  I am miserable!! I had lunch bunch today at work, so I brought tostadas for about 8 or 9 of us to eat for lunch.  While I was cooking, I wasn’t feeling that fantastic, but I figured it was just pregnancy symptoms.  (I made sure that I didn’t have a fever or anything while cooking.) I think I’ve thrown up 4 times.  After I ate, I felt pretty good.  Until about 2:45.  I was so cold!! Ashlee felt my forehead and said I was hot, so I assumed I had a fever.  My whole body just ached.  I decided to leave at 3:00 and go home and try and sleep.  I took some Tylenol and took a nap.   I took the rest of the food I cooked over to my parents and we had tostadas for dinner.  I’m feeling much better, just glad to know I’m not so sick from being pregnant.  

March 30^th:  Ok, the funniest thing just happened.  I was talking to Ysabel’s daughters Janelle and Nohelly in Spanish.  I asked Ysabel if they knew if I was pregnant and she said no.  I told them that I have a baby in my tummy and that I’m pregnant.  Nohelly looks me dead in the eye and says “Why aren’t you fat?!” hahaha I needed that laugh today.  It was so cute and so funny and to be honest with you I’m just glad that she didn’t call me fat.  I explained to her that the baby was really small and that as the baby grows, my tummy will grow with it.  She looks at me again and is like “Uh huh.  You’re supposed to be fat.”  I couldn’t help but laugh!  It was so funny!  From the mouth of babes! 

March 31^st: I wrote another blog post about things that happened this weekend – since it was General Conference/Easter, I wanted to have its own separate blog.  You can find it here.  I am attaching the link here, because I think it will cut this little story short. Haha.  As mentioned in the other blog post, Devin and I worked really hard in the yard today.  When Devin was at priesthood session, I went and spent some time down at my parent’s house.  While I was down there, I got super nauseous.  Like…really bad.  My left leg was kind of tingly, and my left kidney felt like someone was stabbing it with a knife.  Since this happened towards the end of the meeting, I just took some cranberry pills from my mom and then went and met Devin.  His family tradition is to go to Wendy’s and get food/frosty’s.  This time, since it was the final four for college basketball, they bought Fredrico’s Pizza.  I couldn’t even eat it, which is so sad because it’s my absolute favorite.  I went and I threw up in their bathroom and then I sat in there and cried.  I was in so much pain.  Devin wanted to take me to the ER right then and there, but I convinced him to wait a little bit.  I took a lot of ibuprofen in high school because of my knees, so I know that my kidneys aren’t the best kidneys in the world.  I figured it would pass, and I’d be just fine.  I stretched out on the couch and fell asleep.  When I woke up, the pain was gone.  I was still nauseous though.  Devin took me home and I brushed my teeth and I tried to go back to bed.  The sharp, stabbing pain came back.  I drank some lemon water (I think I’ve posted the recipe before) and I rubbed some lemon oil on my left side and said a prayer! I was able to fall asleep and convince Devin that if the pain was back in the morning, I wouldn’t fight him.  I’d let him take me to Instacare. (Lot’s cheaper than ER!)  I haven’t had any pain since!!

My sickness is still there, but it’s not really morning sickness.  I call it bedtime sickness.  Every time I lay in bed at night, I get nauseous and could throw up.  I try to fall asleep as fast as possible so it will pass.  Usually that helps.  

April 5^th:  TODAY IS BABY APPOINTMENT DAY!!! I am literally COUNTING DOWN the minutes until I leave to go get D.  22 minutes from this exact moment.  I am just filled with so many different emotions.  I’m sweating from excitement.  I’m nervous as heck.  I just worry so much about if the baby is ok, and if it’s developing how it should be.  It just stresses me the heck out.  I’m getting more and more nervous though as time approaches.  I pray and pray and pray that everything will be ok! Well, I’ve got a couple of minutes before I got to go get Devin, so hopefully the next post is POSITIVE!  

Just got back from my appointment!! OMG.  Little peanut is so cute! We met with Dr. McCulloch and I think she’s nice.  She talked to us for probably 10 minutes and then we went and did an ultrasound!  We heard the heart beat!  It was such an exciting moment to hear the little heart thumping instead of just seeing it on the screen.  I started to cry!  I asked her if she gets people in there who cry a lot, she said yes, but she likes happy tears!  It was beating at 185 bpm.  I can’t believe how much it has changed in the last 3 weeks!  I will be seen every 4 weeks until week 30, then I’ll go every 2 weeks until week 36, to which I will go weekly until baby is born!! This is getting so real! I think it will become a lot more real once I can feel the baby kicking.  I think our baby looks like a monkey right now.  It’s so neat though that you can now see arm and leg buds.  Right now our due date is for October 29-31.  (29^th due to my period, and 31^st by size of baby.)  My next appointment is on May 3^rd at 2:45.  I did get my blood tests back already, they were posted very quickly on the health website that they use.  From what I can tell, everything looks good!! 

April 9^th:  This past weekend was rough.  Physically and emotionally. Friday night, Devin and I were just sitting around, watching TV.  I got up to go to the bathroom, and when I was wiping, there was a lot of blood.  You can only imagine the panic that swept through my body.  Devin was so calm (as usual) during this little nightmare I had.  It wasn’t a ton of bleeding, but it was more than just “spotting”.  I texted a really good friend of mine, (who also happens to be pregnant!) and she called and talked to me for a little bit and helped calm me down.  It’s nice to be able to have someone to talk to, who is going through the same thing that you are.  I called the on call doctor, who asked me some questions and we both determined it wasn’t bad enough that I needed to go to the ER right away.  If I started to bleed again, he did want me to go in.  Jedd came over and helped Devin give me a special blessing since my dad was in Provo for a volleyball tournament.  What a blessing it is to be able to receive those! 

Saturday I just kind of relaxed.  I tried not to do too much and just kind of laid low.  I called the office and scheduled another ultrasound for Monday, per the on call doctor.  Sunday was just a relaxing day and again, kept it low key.

Today Devin and I went in for another ultrasound.  The ultrasound tech was so nice!! He made sure that little peanut was looking good and everything with me was ok too.  He said that he thinks it was the cyst that I had that popped and caused me to bleed a little bit.  We saw the heartbeat again, which was such a huge relief!  172 BPM.  He gave us some of those cool 3D ultrasounds, and peanut definitely looks like an alien. Haha!  After looking at the ultrasound, I think we’re having a boy!  Devin still thinks a girl – but I think he’s saying that just so he doesn’t get his hopes high.  I feel much better knowing that baby is ok.  I know that it’s probably going to cost me peanuts kidney to pay for all of this…but we’re trying! ;)

April 19^th:  Not a whole lot has been going on lately.  I’ve been feeling a little bit better.  Some days are still better than others, but I’ve been pretty good so far!  Tomorrow my mom and I are going to go to Woods Cross and buy our first piece of furniture for the nursery!! I found a really good rocker/glider on KSL for $80.00.  What a steal!  The person on KSL said that it regularly retails for $300.00.  They’re being very kind and holding it for me until tomorrow.   I keep telling myself to just “wait until your next appointment, make sure everything’s ok..” but I’m starting to realize that I need to just enjoy this moment.  So I’m going to start buying things for the nursery.  Whatever happens with the baby, happens.  

May 4^th:  Happy Star Wars Day!! I went to my appointment yesterday and everything looked great!  We didn’t get to see baby, but we heard its little heart beat thumping away.  171 BPM.  Doctor said that everything with me looked good.  My blood pressure and my weight all looked good. I am officially in the second trimester and I am definitely starting to feel alive again! Haha.  I have to be honest, I really wasn’t that sick in the first trimester.  I was just exhausted.  I really only got nauseous towards the end of it when I would take my prenatal vitamin.  But other than a few sick days here and there, I’ve been really blessed!  I had the wonderful opportunity of having a Pap smear done.  That was a party.  My next appointment is in 4 weeks, and then I’ll go in 2 weeks after that for my anatomy scan.    In my opinion, I think they should just do my anatomy scan at my 18 week mark.  I feel like the second appointment is unnecessary and just another way to get more money.  But oh well, I just do as I’m told.  

I’ve announced it to the world now so no need to make the blog posts longer than they need to be.  I’m so grateful for the place that D and I are in and hope that everyone enjoys Cinco de Mayo tomorrow… and May the 4^th be with you! ;)