Since it's been a year...

I've been working on my blog books. In two weeks time I got 2014 and 2015 done. I sat down to do 2016 and realized how horrible I have been at documenting our lives the last year and a half.  I need to do better. The kids love reading these books, and they are fun for me too. I'm a terrible scrapbooker and I'm even worse at keeping a journal, the blog is the closest thing to either of those. Although, I want to be better at all of the above.

This last move has been really hard on me, I've found myself in quite a funk. I don't know if you'd call it depression or not, I don't feel depressed...but totally lacking motivation to do much of anything, blogging being one of them. My house stays clean, kinda, mostly because I simply cannot function with a mess.  I still enjoy being around people and doing things. But I just don't care about other things.

I've had a hard time finding my 'people' here. Sure I've got friends. But not really close friends...not friends that I can text at the end of the day and say 'dude, it's been a day. Want to go get frozen yogurt and walk around Target?' Know what I mean? Everyone needs their 'people'. Maybe because Target is an hour away, and while there is a frozen yogurt place here it's not always open...things are like that here, open for the tourist season and then closed the rest of the year. Or that we've not been here long enough to establish those kinds of friendships. Or maybe because most of the friends I do have have loads of family here (more on that later). I don't know what it is.  I've just had a hard time finding my place again. Don't get me wrong, I do have friends here, friends that I know have my back, friends that I meet for lunch. Good friends, but not deep friendships, if that makes any sense.

I've grown to love it here, I really have. It's beautiful! There really is no where on earth like it.  I really love the small town feel. I love that there is no noise and no lights. I never realized how busy Orem (or any of the other places we lived were) until I went home to visit after being here awhile. It is so noisy! So many lights, sirens, trains, and people. So many people. There are no street lights here. Sure, it's dark at night, but I can see tons of stars. I had to get a collar with a bell on it for our cat. He's black and I cannot see him at night. We like to have him in at night, too many coyotes around. I call for him and can hear coming him long before I can see him.  Not to worry though, that bell hasn't kept him from his ability to catch mice, birds, and even moles. He is quite the hunter, he's definitely earning his keep. There is hardly any noise. Every once in a while we'll hear a helicopter fly by. This is usually greeting with excitement from the kids as it's usually Dale and he is known for dropping candy out the window. The kids will go tearing out the door waving their arms and yelling at him. No matter how many times I tell them he can't hear them, they still yell up at him.

Yet, every time we leave and go somewhere and then come back, I don't have that 'coming home' feeling. I don't even have it anymore when visiting UT. It's almost like I don't have a home anymore.  Weird ha?

I have a hard time with the changing of the seasons. Going from light to darkness, and warm to cold has always been hard on me. I love the warm months, love that the days are long and the sun stays up late. Don't love the cold. Although, the beauty of the fall is something I love. Maybe we could just skip winter and go right back into summer...Oh well. The kids LOVE winter. They are so excited for skiing and tubing. There is a little ski hill not too far from where we live. Carter had a free pass last year, all 5th graders got a free ski pass, and went as often as he could. It's only open on the weekends and holidays as it is run by volunteers. It's not huge, a couple tow ropes and a poma lift. As well as a tubing hill. We spent many Saturdays up there. A family pass is pretty reasonable so we'll be getting one this year. Carter and Hanna had to earn half of their pass ($50) and have done that already. They are excited for the snow to start falling.  Trent loves to ski too and is happy to spend all day up there with them. He's talked about volunteering to help with ski patrol up there, as they don't have one. I'm happy to sit in the lodge or the ticket booth with my friend and chat while my family plays. Snow just isn't my thing.

About a year ago Trent and I talked and talked about if our family was complete. I had been having feelings that maybe it wasn't it for a long time. I couldn't decided if it was just me being a hormonal woman or if those feelings were in fact promptings. So we took it to the Lord. After much prayer and visiting the temple (which, might I add, is not an easy place to get to here. We are 3 hours away from a temple, if it wasn't for my amazing neighbor, and friend, we wouldn't have been able to go. She took our kids overnight so we could go) with Trent I'd just accept the answer he got. Truthfully, I didn't want to ever be pregnant again. He came to the conclusion that our family was in fact complete. I felt relieved that I was just crazy and didn't have to be pregnant or have a newborn again.  We set out to get rid of all the baby things we had left. We sold the crib. Sold the double jogging stroller and got a single. Most of the other baby thing I had already given to my sister and what was left when we left CO I gave to a friend. There was no more baby things left in our house. It was kinda sad actually. We had wiped out all baby related items from our home. With the exception of the pack-n-play which comes in handy when we have visitors. We were in a good place.  All the kids were sleeping through the night, they can get their own breakfast in the morning (which means I can sleep in sometimes...), they are all potty trained. In two years Drew would be in school, so maybe I could go back to school or spend some time volunteering at the kids school, which is hard to do now with Drew in tow. We are in a good place.

In May I found out I was pregnant. 15 pregnancy tests later I was still pregnant. Totally wish I was lying about that number, it might actually have been more. I spent way too much on tests, many different brands of tests. Surely they were wrong.  I was shocked. I couldn't believe it. We know what causes babies, also thought we knew how to prevent them.

I didn't know how to tell Trent. Truthfully, I was scared, don't know why. Did I mention I am crazy? We already talked about this. We decided we were done. Now this.  I waited days. Played thought it in my head how I'd tell him...I had no good plans.  He had drill that weekend, but came home on Saturday night. It was Stake Conference this weekend. He stopped in at the adult session on his way home from drill. He drills 3 hours away in Yakima and had to pass right though Wenatchee where our Stake center is. The member of the Seventy that was there talked about family councils and how important they were. So Sunday night after the kids went to bed Trent got out his notebook. We were going to have a family council, him and I. We sat down on the couch, he opened his notebook, he had an outline of things he thought we should talk about. Paused. Then asked if there was anything I thought we should talk about. I laughed. 'I'm pregnant.' I blurted. 'Oh' he said. And I laughed some more. He shut his notebook. And said 'well, I like babies.' We've not had family council since.

Sometimes I think we are so focused on what we want that even when we pray we aren't sincerely seeking what the Lord's will is for us. We are simply asking for conformation that what we want is correct.

A week before this Sunday, before I had taken $500 worth of pregnancy tests, I had a dream.  You know when you have to go to the bathroom in your dreams and you are searching all over for a toilet but you can never find one, I had some dreams very similar to this. I had to pee but before I could use the toilet I had to find a pregnancy test. I looked and looked and finally found one. I took the test, it was positive. But the weird part of this test was it had a gender indicator on it. Not only was the test positive it was a girl. It was seriously the weirdest dream. I told my friend at church all about the nightmare I had, it was so weird. But not the first time I had been told in a dream that I was going to have a baby.

The day before I took the first test I had gone to a baby shower. My friend has a little boy who was about 14 months at the time. He is a busy little boy. I commented to another friend that I really didn't miss that stage of life.

I got really sick really fast. It was so strange. With my other pregnancies I didn't start to feel sick until I was 8 weeks or so. Right around 5 weeks it hit hard. I was throwing up, some nights I could hardly get up off  the couch without wanting to puke. One night I lost my dinner right after I ate it. That had never happened before. Then one day all my pregnancy symptoms disappeared, I think I was right around 7 weeks. I thought for sure I'd loose the pregnancy. I know so many others who have had miscarriages, why not me. I convinced myself that this pregnancy wasn't going to stick around. I didn't know when, but it wasn't going to be sustainable. Not that I didn't want the baby, but telling myself that it wouldn't last and not getting attached seemed like the way to go since things were so weird. So we told no one. My pregnancy symptoms would come and go. Some days they were unbearable.  I remembering leaning over my bathroom sink one night after I had been throwing up, I was crying and thinking why did I ever want this. Trent was gone for a lot of this time. He had a work conference for a week, he was home for a week, then he was gone for two weeks for his yearly National Guard training. All the while I rode this emotional roller coaster. Certain that I would miscarry while he was gone and I would be by myself. Some days I felt perfect, other days I was vomiting all night long, always at night. I was so confused by it.

Since I was certain that I wouldn't sustain the pregnancy I never bothered to call and find a doctor here. Around 10 weeks in I figured I'd better at least get it checked out, just to see if it was still alive. I made an appointment to establish care and asked during that appointment if the provider would check to see if there was a heartbeat. I'm sure the doctor thought I was crazy...cuz haven't we already established that I am.  She was a little hesitant to even check because it can be hard to find so early. She even told me I wasn't allowed to freak out if we couldn't find one. I assured her I wouldn't. If it was there awesome, if not oh well, I had already convinced myself that it wasn't going to be there. The heartbeat was there, she found it as soon as she put the doppler to me. A strong heartbeat, 160 bpm. We got set up with an ultrasound up at the hospital for the following Monday (that appointment was on Thursday). We talked about genetic testing at this appointment, I turned it down. We would accept this child with or without problems. I set a new appointment to return in 2 weeks and headed out the door, certain that appointment wouldn't be necessary.

The ultrasound went well. It showed a healthy baby with a due date of Jan 12th. Happy April birthday to Trent, we are now expecting our 3rd January baby.

I went into the next appointment and my doctor talked to me again about genetic testing. Because I am over 35 our insurance would cover it. The genetic testing is different than it used to be. It is a blood test. Not a test that takes a sample of fetal tissue, which is all I had been familiar with. This blood test is only done in San Diego, it is shipped to them same day. So they only do the test first thing in the morning M-W. The test separates maternal blood from fetal blood and then tests the fetal blood. My doctor recommended the test because I am old and also because we live in a very small town. The nearest NICU is an hour away, it's a level 3 NICU. The nearest level 1 NICU is 3 hours away. So if there are any problems it is best to know about them before hand.  And as an added bonus we'd be able to find out the gender of the baby from this test. That convinced me.

We were headed out of town the next morning, but scheduled a time to come in for the test the day after we got back. I went into the clinic for the blood draw the morning after we got home. I have to take Trent in with me anytime I have a blood draw. No one is able to get a vein from me, I allow the tech 3 tires, then I tell them Trent can do it. Since Trent is well know as a provider in the area (I am not seen by a doctor at his clinic, that would just be weird) the doctor didn't mind him doing it. She said 'normally I don't allow husbands to do the blood draw but we'll make an exception for Trent.' He always gets it on the first try, every time. So after 3 failed attempts to get a vein, they let Trent do it. Now they always joke when I have a blood draw to make sure Trent can make it to the appointment.

That was Monday morning. The doctor called the following Wednesday with the results. She told us baby was perfect. Asked if we wanted to know gender...We were down at the lake with friends when she called...YES I wanted to know the gender!  I had had a dream the night before, in the dream we found out it was a boy. I was totally distraught, I told Trent I didn't want this baby and to give it back. Totally craziness, we would be more than happy to add another boy to our house. I love my boys. It was a crazy dream. So I was anxious to know the gender of the baby. She told us it was a girl!! I might have cried. I told all my friends sitting around me, I was so excited. Trent was there at the lake with us that afternoon too. But I told them not to mention it to the kids yet.

Speaking of the kids...they didn't actually know that I was even pregnant until after we got home from UT. The day I had the blood draw done was a Monday, so we figured for FHE we should tell them. I think I was about 13 weeks by this point. Some of our friends knew at this point, but the kids had no clue. We set all 4 of them on the couch and handed Hanna and Carter a piece of paper that I had folded in half. On the outside was written 'what is 3 inches long and will be arriving in January' on the inside was one of the ultrasound pictures and then we wrote 'your new brother or sister.' Hanna was so excited!!  She was screaming 'I'm gonna have a sister!' I didn't want to burst her bubble, but we didn't know at that point yet. They were all pretty excited. Carter got a little emotional. But they are all excited! I had said something to the effect that my belly was getting bigger because there was a baby growing in, and Hunter without a beat said 'yeah, we know it's been getting bigger!' It was a good laugh.

It was at that point that I started to care if this pregnancy stuck around. Before when they didn't know it didn't really matter, now they are so excited I didn't want to hurt them if it should die, cuz it's always a possibility.

I was so excited to tell them we were having a girl. As soon as we got home from the lake that afternoon I made some cupcakes. They thought they were for mutual that night. I had some cream in the fridge that I dyed pink and I managed to fill the cupcakes while the kids were upstairs. I frosted them then called them downstairs. We told them we knew the gender of the baby and to take a bite if they wanted to know too...hopefully the videos loaded ok...oh man, Hanna was so excited!!

She has been picking out baby clothes and bows ever since we found out. She picked out the car seat cover. Asks to go baby shopping all the time. Carter designed her baby blanket on the Minky Couture website. They want to help pick out everything for her.

We'll have plenty of shopping to do. I'm still just waiting. I've gotten a few things here and there, but still live in the 'what if'' world. We have plenty of things to get too...crib, car seat, swing, I think I'll skip a stroller...there's really no where to push a stroller around here anyway and we've got the jogger and the ergo so I think we'll be good there. I suppose by January I should have some of these things though.

A week or so ago I kept having another dream. This one was my mom. She kept asking me when I was going to tell her.  So tell her I did. I sent a text to my family. It said 'So I realize I've not told y'all about a growth that I have. We thought it would have resolved itself before now, but since it hasn't we thought you should know about it. The doctor fully expects that it will resolve itself by the end of January. Also, Hanna wanted me to tell you how excited she is, she is finally getting....' and then I sent the text. I followed up with this picture and texted 'a SISTER!'

I hold no hope she'll be here on or before January 12th, but I sure hope she'll arrive by the 22nd!  I am 27 weeks pregnant now, my 20 week ultrasound looked perfect. She looks like a perfectly healthy baby girl, and we can't wait for her to join our family!

Sheesh, if you read all of that pat yourself on the back...that may just be the record for the longest blog post ever!