20 weeks.

I am definitely starting to show—it is more obvious with some outfits than others.  This shirt accentuates the bump nicely.  I haven’t had to get into my maternity clothes yet, but I’m sure that will happen pretty soon.  Baby Girl Harris has been moving around for over a month now.  Her movements are becoming more pronounced.  I can feel very definite kicks, but Brian hasn’t been able to feel them, so she must still be too tiny.  I’m feeling much better most days.  I’ve started walking for about an hour each day.  I’d like to keep that up through the rest of the pregnancy.  I’ve started cooking again, and am mostly doing vegan again.  I love knowing that our baby is getting healthy food now.  Poor girl was probably so done with pop tarts.  Twenty more weeks!  We can’t wait to meet her!! 

Sugar and spice and everything nice…

That’s what little girls are made of!

This little lady will be making her way into our life at the end of May, and we can’t wait!

For those of you who would like proof, feel free to study the anatomy below:

Both Brian and I had placed our bets on boy, but boy were we wrong!  We couldn’t be happier!  I think the chandelier I was hoping to put in the nursery (regardless of the sex) will have a greater chance of happening now…especially after Brian bought the (expensive) pink golf balls to celebrate. 

Happy Birthday Clark!

Clark is 2 years old!

It seems like a lifetime ago—not just two years.  He is such a cute and happy boy!

Skamania.

New Years Eve we went to Skamania Lodge (located up the gorge and across the river) for a yummy buffet dinner.  We were celebrating several fun things—New Years Eve of course, our sister-in-law’s birthday, and Brian getting his CPA—yay Brian!  I’m so proud of him!  He’s such a hard worker and very, very smart!  It was an appropriate place to celebrate Brian’s accomplishments since Brian absolutely loves their Friday night seafood buffet.  In fact, it’s where he proposed to me almost 18 months ago.  He really wishes that I would agree to a Skamania Lodge clause in my vegan diet.  Tempting.

Lucy, Brian, DeWin, Barbara, Chris, Heather, Daren, Jared

O Christmas tree.

Though Brian and I have spent two married Christmas’s together, this was our first in our house.  It was so fun to be able to pick out a tree together and decorate the house. 

Picking out our tree was a feat.  Brian grew up going to Christmas tree farms to cut down a tree with his family.  We thought that would be a fun tradition to continue.   We tried a nearby farm we heard good things about.  Our first task was figuring out what kind of tree we both like best.  They turned out to be different ones unfortunately.  Brian likes very full Noble Fir and I like the more sparse Noble.  We looked for a very long time with no luck—for either variety of our favorite tree.  So, we decided to try another farm down the road.  Again, lot’s of looking, but no finding.  It was cold, very windy, and we had to get home to get to our ward Christmas party, so we finally decided to head home and try another time.  On our way home, and just a few blocks away from our house, we saw some pre-cut trees being sold in a lot.  We figured they couldn’t be better than the ones at the farm.  Boy were we wrong.  We loved the first tree we looked at! 

  

I think we ended up picking out the perfect tree—not too full and not too sparse. 

We just love our tree! 

Here are a few of the other decorations we put up:

These are a our stockings made by my mom.  I love that they say “Mom” and “Dad” on them.  Next year we’ll have a third stocking!

My star trees—supplied with ornaments over the years by my parents.

This was my favorite nativity growing up.  My mom made it in 1980, the year before I was born.  I love it!

Oranges.

Last night Brian and I were shopping in the produce section of Costco trying to decide on which brand of oranges to get when we met a lady who took grape tasting to a whole new level.  I picked up a box of oranges from Chile and she told me that they weren’t good—apparently they really dry and mealy.  I’m thinking that she must have bought them before and hadn’t liked them.  Nope—she had just opened up the box, peeled the orange, and tasted it right there in Costco.  While I was glad I hadn’t picked the oranges from Chile, I was in awe at the nerve she had.  I quickly went over to Brian, told him what had happened, and from afar we watched her open two more boxes of oranges, peel them and apparently decide they weren’t good enough to purchase.  I think in the end she chose Sunkist—but even those she picked through until the whole box was filled with good oranges, replacing bad oranges with better oranges from other boxes.  As we were leaving the produce section we saw her taste a tomato—no joke!  

I’m back!

I feel like I checked out of life for about 3 months, but I’m back to myself…almost.  I started feeling pretty sick at 4 weeks of pregnancy, and it just got worse and worse.  For about 10 weeks my diet consisted of strawberry pop tarts, ginger ale, and Hunts vanilla pudding snacks.

I tried a few different medications—Zofran caused such bad headaches and the headaches caused horrible nausea, so I tried Reglan, but I got insomnia and didn’t sleep 4 nights in a row.  My only true relief from morning sickness was when I was sleeping, so that obviously wasn’t going to work.  So, after playing around with those meds for a few weeks, I decided to wait it out without any pharmaceutical assistance.  Around 14 weeks I finally started feeling better.  Brian and I went to Fairfield for a week for Thanksgiving and I didn’t vomit once.  I think my parents may have questioned how sick I ever really was because I was so healthy the whole week.  They had expected me to lay in bed all day and not be able to eat anything without corn syrup in it.  I ate so well that week I think I finally gained back all the weight I had lost from the past few months. 

I still have bad days—but far fewer of them.  I’m loving healthy foods again and I have cooked real dinners for the past week.  I think I could live off oranges! 

Right before we left for Fairfield I had a doctor’s appointment.  Brian was able to come, meet my midwife, and see an ultrasound of our little baby.  They wouldn’t confirm the gender of the baby, but we have a hunch.  We can’t wait until January when we’ll find out for sure. 

Here’s our little baby:

 

We’re already so in love with this little person!