21 Weeks

Today we are officially 21 weeks! This means that we are over the halfway point! I am still only barely showing and I'm not sure that strangers can tell I'm pregnant yet but my stomach is growing. I am starting to feel the baby move a little bit but it's not strong enough for Jim to feel yet. Hopefully it will be soon. I am feeling tons better now that I am past the morning sickness phase. It's good to have enough hormones for a healthy baby but I am grateful that I am no longer throwing up everyday. That was no fun. My e-mail updates from Baby Center say that the baby is 10.5 inches from head to foot. About half the size it will be when it's born. It's still a little weird to think that I have something that big inside of me. The baby is growing and developing and I don't really have to put any effort into it. It's amazing to me that my body knows what to do to create another human being. A baby truly is a miracle.

The time has come.....

I can no longer wear my pre-pregnancy jeans and have switched over to maternity jeans full time. For awhile I would wear maternity jeans sometimes and do the little hair elastic belt loop trick at other times. I have given into the comfort of maternity jeans though and they are here to stay. I currently only have two pairs so I feel like I am a little limited in my clothing selection each morning. The first pair I have is from Savers. I went and bought a pair of used jeans for $6 when my regular jeans were starting to get a little tight. Last week I bought my first new pair. I decided on the secret fit belly jeans from motherhood maternity. After looking at many reviews online, I found them to be very highly rated. So far I must say that the reviews are right. They are very comfortable and I like that the elastic also goes up high in the back. I also like that I can wear them all the way up or folded down.I like all the way up better though because then there isn't a line midway up my belly. So far I can still wear most of my pre-pregnancy shirts, which is nice. I have a few maternity shirts but other than t-shirts,most maternity shirts I have seen are fairly low cut. Anyway I am sure that I will be buying more maternity shirts soon. We will also be able to start picking things up for the baby in the near future. We find out the gender on Monday. Hopefully the baby is in a cooperative mood. We have been having little talks lately with the baby about how it's okay to be immodest and show us during the ultrasound. We are excited to know whether we will have a boy or girl.

Oompa Loompa Sighting?

This morning on the way to school we soon found ourselves waiting at a red light at an intersection in Provo, UT. This intersection is famous for some of the slowest pedestrians on earth, sometimes it appears that they are not even moving as they attempt to cross the intersection in the short light sequence. Today was no exception. At first glance, it appeared that another slow walker was going to cross in front of our truck. Upon further review, it appeared that this man was no regular pedestrian. He was a bit short for an older man. He was slightly on the heavy set side and swung his hands to the side as he walked. His skin was a little bit darker than the typical Provo resident. It took a moment to put it all together, but I soon realized that we were watching an Oompa Loompa strut his stuff down the streets of Provo. The bounce in his step was unquestionable; he had escaped from the chocolate factory. Hopefully we will see him again. If we only had a movie sound track CD in the truck, he would have broken into dance for sure.

Valentine's Day 2009

I love Valentine's day! I didn't always like Valentine's day...I think it's one of those holidays that is definitely better if you have someone to share it with. This was Jim and my 3rd Valentine's day as a couple. The first year we had only been dating about a month. He went all out though...I woke up to roses, see's chocolates, a poem he wrote for me, flower petals spread on the table, and I think a balloon. I loved it! This year he bought me a huge stuffed animal. It's really cute. I think it's a duckling but we think it looks like a baby eagle. He also bought me two sets of roses. He bought a dozen beautiful red roses (my favorite) and then later added a dozen white roses. (Yes he is the perfect husband.) The flowers were accompanied by a card, some chocolate, and breakfast.

We made heart-shaped pancakes for breakfast together. They turned out really well and we strawberries and whipped cream on them (YUM!) My cute husband also noticed that if he cut the strawberries a certain way that they looked like little hearts. He is so sweet.



I love celebrating Valentine's day because it reminds me of how lucky I am to have a husband that I am deeply in love with and who I get to be sealed to for time and all eternity.

Jim and I later that day at a luncheon for our friend Christa's wedding

What's in a name?

I have a feeling this is going to turn into mostly a baby blog. Sorry if that is boring for some of you. We won't find out the gender for a couple more weeks but it's never too early to start thinking of names...

If it's a boy:
We've had a boy name picked out since before we were even married. We want to name our first son Nathan James. I love the name Nathan and I love that it means "gift from God." I also love having the middle name James because he'll be named after his daddy, Jim is already a jr. though so we didn't want to use James as the first name.
Another boy name I like is Matthew. That is Jim and his Dad's middle name and I would love to use it as a first name for one of our sons.

If it's a girl:
This is a lot harder. I have tons of names I like but I don't know if I would really name my daughter any of them. It's a lot harder for us to agree on girl's names so if it's a girl, she may not have a name for awhile. Also the middle name has to be Julie or Julia because it's a family tradition for 3-4 generations on my mom's side and I have to keep it.

Here are some names we've thought about....
Alyssa-I used to love this and Jim really likes it too, lately though I don't love it so much
Brooklyn-I think this name is so cute. Jim thinks it's weird to name her after a city. He decided though he could live with it if he could call her Bronx Bomber as a nickname and buy her a little Yankees baseball outfit:)
Madeline (Madalyn, Madelyn?)-Can't come up with a spelling I like for this one

Other names I like but probably won't use for one reason or another: Kaitlyn, Lauren, Alexa (Lexie), Savannah, and Emma

Any ideas? Which do you like?

Ultrasound Pics

Here are our first looks at our sweet baby! It seems healthy so far and has a strong heartbeat. We will hopefully find out the gender on March 2nd.

Our Baby at 11 Weeks

The Baby kneeling at 16 weeks

Waffle Cookies

While looking for recipes to try from the cookbook my Grandma and Grandpa McLean gave us for Christmas, I came across this one. You mix the cookie dough like normal but instead of baking them in the oven, you bake them in a waffle iron. I made these mostly out of curiosity but they actually turned out to be pretty tasty! Tastes like a brownie with the texture of a cookie!

My Attempt at a heart shaped cookie for Jim

The finished product

The raw cookie dough

Blog Beginnings

I finally broke down and started a blog. I'm not really sure what to post yet but I for sure want a blog when the baby comes so I figured I'd start one early for those of you who have asked. Here is a little background on our family...My husband Jim and I have been married for almost a year now. We are so excited to be expecting our first child, due July 8th, 2009. We are both students at BYU and will probably be stuck in school forever. If all goes well I will graduate in Home and Family Living in December 2009 and Jim will graduate in Civil Engineering in April 2010. This is all up to the fates however and the people who decide which classes are offered which semester and what times those classes at at. Right now we are just enjoying life together and looking forward to welcoming our baby into our family.