Meet me in St. Louis!

This last Tuesday through Thursday we had ourselves a little getaway.  Joshua, Paul, and I packed our bags and headed down to St. Louis. 6 hours and 4 stops later, we arrived. 

We had such a wonderful time, here was our itinerary:

Stop #1:  Have dinner with friends!

 First, we visited some friends' Jerkery.  They make the best beef jerky. ever.  You should check them out!

Best of all, it's nitrate free = pregnancy-safe, oh yeah!

 Then we had a lovely dinner, loved talking with them again!

Stop #2: Amazing hotel with full hot breakfast that we got for dirt cheap on Travelocity (yay for secret deals).

Stop #3: City Museum of St. Louis

 All ready to play!

I can not say enough about how incredibly AWESOME the city museum is.  It is basically a huge playground for adults with lots of kids in it.  We played and played for 6 hours and still didn't do everything.  I'm sure I provided additional entertainment for museum patrons by being the pregnant woman army crawling and climbing after her husband and 15 year-old brother in law.  Nice.

 There was this huge skate park place you could use as slides, you should have seen Joshua go down this.  It's so vertical at top his face dropped, made me happy to skip this portion...

 This bus was hanging off the roof, didn't inspire much confidence in Paul's driving.

There was even a Ferris Wheel on top of the roof, such a beautiful view! Can you spot the arch?

(Just kidding, don't look for the arch, you couldn't see it from the roof)

More climbing...

I was determined to climb this big wall thing, it was so much fun.  Joshua proudly said that I was probably the only pregnant lady ever to climb it.  I don't know if that's good or bad...

Us in the huge cage at the top of the wall.

Here you can see the whole wall with the cage on the roof.  There was a rope swing hanging down from it, which was also really fun.

Joshua and Paul in the caves. 

I really think that getting to go here for them was equivalent to if I ever got to go to the Wonka factory.  Every where you looked there was something to play on, nothing was off limits to them.  If you look to the left of Paul's foot, you'll see a little hole that was just one of the THOUSANDS of tunnels you could go through to get to all sorts of places.  And yes, many of them were that tiny...  I actually couldn't fit through one of them with my preggo belly....

This was the tree house portion that had all of these metal wire-tubes connecting the tree tops near the ceiling.  It was awesome.

There was also a huge out door area with even more things to crawl through, slide down, and play on:

Yes, I actually athletically scooted through this 3 story tunnel.  And yes, that wire is as thin as it looks...

Notice the big-kid ball pit underneath.  How cool is that?

The last thing (thankfully) that we did was run on this hamster wheel thing.  Unfortunately, Joshua took it as a personal challenge to make it even harder:

Can you hear the guy gasping in the background?  This is why:

Yeah.  Guess who got all teary-eyed.  The man with a hole in his shin, or his exhausted, pregnant wife...

Oh well, I guess I'll have to get used to people getting hurt with a son on the way.  I'm sure I won't be as upset then, right?  Right....

So, in Summary.  If you have kids, or are one, you MUST go here. Not only will you win parent (or wife) of the year award, you will also get in a crazy amount of exercise and surprise yourself with what you can do! 

Stop #4: Hotel Pool

Stop #5: HuHot: YUM!

Stop #6: Ted Drewes

  Kind of an overrated custard shop if you ask me, but they did have a decent banana split...

Stop #7: Anheuser-Busch factory tour  (No, I didn't drink the beer samples.  I had root beer!)

Us in front of the Clydesdale ring.  I think those horses live better than most people, just sayin'.
 

The wagon of beer.  Apparently it takes 5 hours to hitch up the horses...

A humongous thing of fermenting beer.  Gross.

I'm sure this tour would be more interesting if you liked beer, but the grounds of the factory were beautiful, and they did a good job of keeping it interesting.  It was fascinating to see everything that went into production and packaging.  Plus, we got free pop and pretzels at the end.  We heart free stuff...

 


I think this may have been one of the best mini-trips ever! I may have to start scrap booking if we keep going to all of these fun places.  Does anyone know a good on-line scrapbook site?


Kendall

Jitter Bug...

As promised, I have the ultra sound pictures to put up, yay! 

Cute little profile

 Objects often projected at my bladder.  But I can't help but forgive him, look at those toes!

He's been so much fun lately, I can't get enough!  This is what people must remember when they say that they love pregnancy.  Little mister has been moving and shaking a TON more.  It's a lot stronger and a lot more consistent than it was even a week ago.  I feel him pretty consistently through out the day now.  I love picturing him making little baby stretches and movements in my belly.  I think I'm in love! :)

Little fingers and thumb, can't wait to kiss them!

And it gets even better, Joshua's been able to really bond with him too.  At night, Joshua will talk to him, and he goes crazy!  I used to put Joshua's hand on my stomach and then baby would stop kicking, I bet Joshua was thinking I was crazy...  But now when Joshua talks to him, he kicks all the way through so that Joshua can feel him a ton.  It's such sweet family bonding time!  Then, Joshua will sing to him and he'll stop moving like he's asleep, how precious is that? He's starting to become more real to us each day, and we feel like a family more and more.  It's so cool that I get to carry this little guy, I totally love it! :)

Also, we went to the midwife today.  His heart rate is in the 140's and sounds good, go baby! :)

Kendall

A Blog a Day Keeps the Doctors Away...

I'm blogging two days in a row, I feel so accomplished.  I really want to get up to current and I have a ton of time at work, so I'm taking advantage of it.  Can I just say how much I love my job again?  I really, really do get paid to sit here and be productive on my own tasks.  I want this to be my grown-up job, but I think that may not be realistic...

On the 4th of July, Joshua and I got to help in the 4's and 5's class at church.  There were only 14 kids, it was glorious! :)  We were able to play with the kids more and create some awesome lego masterpieces.

We got some expert opinions on the finishing touches. 

Joshua made me this special ship thing.  I hid it behind my tissue box, because the kids always hide their legos in random places.  I have to admit, I do laugh at their hoarding issues. :)

After church we got to hang out with my family at my parent's house.  We grilled and had a great time.  My nephews (all 5, apparently we have trouble producing girls in this family...) absolutely LOVE Joshua.  They always fight over who gets to sit by him, it's cute.  That day, they all got to fight for who got to sit ON him.  That will teach him to relax!

Can you feel the love?

Not yet?  Well here's some more! :)

After Joshua successfully escaped the dinosaurs at my parent's house, we went to Valley Stadium to watch the fireworks after the Menace game.  I swear they have the best show in Iowa.  The finale honestly makes my heart drop it's so intense.  We went on the field last year, but were outside the stadium this year.  We still felt like we were in a war some, it was pretty fun.

This was my attempt to take pictures of some of the fireworks.  Needless to say, Joshua and I thought my time might be better spent just enjoying the show...

So, that was our fabulous July 4th celebration.  We then proceeded to get sick, which is always a little less fun without drugs.  I was down for a good week, while Joshua was down for a day.  (I'd like to blame it on the drugs, but he didn't take any either, he just always is only sick for a day.  You'd think he could take one for the team... )  But, it was nice that he was well, because he had plenty of time to take care of me.  He went and picked out movies for me at the library.  He picked a season of Monk, what a guy! I really loved watching it, he knows me so well.

I might like him a little...

Whew, we're almost current.  I promise!  You can take a potty break here if you need though, I know how it goes...

This last weekend we were so blessed to be part of a wedding for our good friends, Mike and Sheri.  Joshua was the best man and I got to help all over and light candles.  I am not kidding, I have ALWAYS wanted to light candles at a wedding.  I really feel like I made the wedding. :)  Actually, they had a beautiful wedding. The couple asked a few guests to bring a flower to contribute to the brides' bouquet.  We were afraid we couldn't make it in time for the wedding, so Joshua took off on this baby:

This was a free ride at Hy-Vee there, can you believe it? The best things in life really are free!  

We actually were early for the wedding, not late, I promise.  We just picked up the flowers and lunch at Hy-Vee before heading to the church, so I got to walk in with this entourage...

I think the old ladies in the parking lot were whistling...

I love going to weddings, they remind me how cool marriage is and how blessed we are.  It must have reminded Joshua too, because on Monday he brought me these beauties at work:

*Sigh*

So, that brings us to current, wow.  So, currently we have Joshua's little brother, Paul, with us for a couple of weeks.  We just picked him up from the airport last night.  It cracks my mother-in-law up that the first thing you see at the airport are the people's legs.  I just noticed that, it's totally true.  I'm not really a legs girl myself, but the airport designer must have been.  Oh well, to each her own... Anyways, we're so excited to spend time with Paul and have some great activities planned.  Plus, it's really good practice for me in being outnumbered by boys.  Paul wasn't even here a whole day when this broke out:

 Ahhh... Brotherly love!

My apartment may never be the same...

Hope everyone has a great week!

Kendall

The post of the century...

So, I've been MIA from blogging for a while.  I had a sort of excuse a bit ago, but then I just was busy.  I was going to post about this WONDERFUL pizza we made, but my phone with the pictures of it was stolen.  So, that didn't work.  So, I'll have to make it again and post, shucks... :) I did get a new phone, though.  Which is pretty exciting since it's the new iPhone.  I'm hoping have the phone will make it easier for me to take pictures to put up on here, since it has a 5 megapixel camera (as good as my actual camera) and a video camera.  So this post will have lots of pictures, since I've been trying to remember to take some as I go for this. Go me!

So here's the list of things that have been going on:

1) I've been finishing up human development this last month, which has kept me very busy.  But, I gave my presentation this morning, so I am DONE!  For a whole month, I will have no homework.  Wow, that feels great.  I'm really happy with the way the class went, though.  I really was on top of everything, and did my best. It was really satisfying, and I hope will pay off. At any rate hopefully we'll see less of this:

Poor guys has been staking out at my school for the last month...

2) So, almost a month ago, Joshua and I were able to celebrate Father's day for the first time for him.  We had a really great time.  I got to plan a day of surprises for him, which for the first time actually ended up being surprises. He's always getting into things, that man... :)

First we went to AllPlay in Des Moines.  Which was really fun, and pretty well priced.  We played laser tag with just the two of us, which was SO much fun.  Joshua dominated, but I got in some pretty decent shots.  Then Joshua did this laser maze thing that was like breaking into a museum, it was really cool.  Joshua was suspiciously really good at it.  I wasn't about to embarrass exert my pregnant self by trying crawl on the floor.  For the final thing Joshua did the climbing wall, and of course he chose the hardest course.  He's pretty talented at climbing, so it was fun to see.  I'll admit, my heart dropped when he let go to come back down at the top, a lot.  But, miraculously he lived through it:

*I had a video of him climbing the wall, but I can't load it. I'll try later*

After all the fun, Joshua got to pick anywhere he wanted to eat.  He chose Bravo Cuchina, so yummy.  After Bravo, we went to Dairy Queen, as if we needed more food.  We split his favorite, a banana split:

I found a really good deal on the Holiday Inn by the airport, so we stayed the night there.  I was excited because it had an amazing pool where we played water polo.  It was so fun, and we felt like we were getting away, even though we were only a few miles from home.

3) I have decided that instead of working really hard on the baby's room, I want to update our room.  I like when things coordinate, but haven't had a lot of time to decorate our room.  Since our little man will probably be spending a lot of time in our room the first bit anyway, I've decided to make it nice. BUT, I want it to be cheap, so I've been on the look out for things.  Joshua and I both really like the color blue, so we've decided to do different shades of that.  We went to Target and found a blanket we really like for our bed cover.  I didn't get this on sale because I needed it urgently.  I haven't been sleeping well since it's too hot and I'm pregnant, so I thought this would help instead of our comforter.  (It has!) We found 2 gallons of a really pretty aqua at Lowes in the mis-tint section for pretty cheap, step 2.  Then, one day I was really stressed so Joshua suggested we go to "Putz" at Target.  Which is one of my favorite things to do and one of his least, so I thought that was royally sweet. :)  Anways, on our excursion, we found three valances for $.46 a piece.  You can't beat that, they're normally like $30.00!  I was so excited, and they match perfectly!

The Valance

The quilt with a demonstration of my pillow sleeping arrangement.  Yes, it takes 4....

4) I'll end with a pregnancy report for now.  There's lots more to write, but I don't want it to take a year to read...  As of today I am 25 weeks along, only 15 left, woohoo!  I can't wait to meet this little guy.  I can feel him kicking pretty consistently now, he's a lot stronger.  Joshua has even been able to feel him a couple of times.  It's hard though, usually as soon as Joshua puts his hand on my stomach the baby stops kicking.  Little rascal...  :)  Tiredness has started hitting me again.  I could sleep 12 hours a night if I let myself, which I don't, usually...  I was having a really hard time sleeping about 3 weeks ago, but I have increased my pillows from 1 to 4 and have switched out our comforter for a light blanket.  It has really worked, and I'm able to sleep much better.  Which means poor Joshua has been able to sleep better. My nightly need to go to the restroom has increased from 1 to 2 times per night in the last 2 weeks.  Speaking about increase, my appetite has definitely increased.  I have been pretty good about not eating when I'm not hungry and trying to be healthy, so it hasn't been out of control.  Joshua just has to remember sometimes to not try and keep up with his pregnant wife. ;)  Poor guy is used to eating more or the same as me, that'd be a shocker. At the last doctor's appointment at 22 weeks, I measured around 24 weeks.  I hope that trend doesn't continue, but I'm not going to hold my breath.  Everything so far has been good and healthy.  It's so much fun being pregnant and seeing my belly grow with our son.  The only two negative things have been swelling in my left foot, which is not too attractive, and round ligament pain.  If I try to walk at any pace faster than leisurely, it feels as if the baby is trying to bite through my round ligament.  He's not, right? Just kidding, I called, he can't.  Actually, I did call, but I didn't ask the biting question. There is not much they can do for it, so I'll just have to hold off on speed walking for a while.

Okay, so I guess this post didn't have THAT many pictures, but it did have some.  And hopefully subsequent ones should have even more...

I'll trying to post in not too long, we've been busy, so I want to get everything in while I remember.  I need to upload my belly pictures from my camera and scan the 18 week ultrasounds to share. So, that will be a reason to come back and read my blog! :)

Kendall

Going Public

So, I think I have decided to go public with my blog.  I was just using it for my own journal of sorts to remember stuff.  But, I think it would be fun for people to be able to keep up with us through it.  It will also help keep me accountable to doing it more.  So, we'll see how it goes.  So, if you're here reading this, welcome!

On to more important things, today is a special day for me and this Irishman: 

 Isn't he handsome?

Today is our 22nd monthiversary!  We really don't do something to celebrate every month, but it's still fun to think about how long we've been married.  I has been such a crazy journey, one that has pushed me to grow in so many ways.  There have been times of hurt and sorrow, and there have been times of overwhelming joy and beauty.  I don't think that any other relationship that I have been in has brought me through such a wide spectrum of emotions.  Through everything, it has been such a wonderful comfort and privilege to have Joshua beside me.  He is the silliest, sincerest, sweetest, smartest, most sensitive man I have ever known (I may or may not have a thing for alliteration).  I am one incredible blessed girl.

So silly, but pretty darn cute, if you ask me..

But, since this blog is now public, I will stop with the gushy details of our wonderful marriage. :)

A couple weeks ago, Joshua and I went down to Texas for a bit.   While in Longview, we went to visit this little place in the woods that no one probably knows about.  To us, it is very special.  I once made a list with my friend, Kelly Popp, of things I wanted to do before I graduate.  Well, one of those things was to grafitti something.  Joshua somehow found out about this. :) On my birthday, while we were dating, Joshua took me to graffiti a left over, torn up slab of concrete in the middle of nowhere.  It was so perfect, because we weren't hurting anything, but still got the experience.  We were surprised to see how much two years had faded the paint.  It was starting to look more like cave drawings than anything.  So, we etched over the "I Love you" with a key.  It was terribly romantic. :)

This is after we scraped as hard as we could with the key... 

Quick pose after the hard work.

In other news, this baby has really started kicking a lot.  It's so fun to get to feel him.  I think I actually felt him have the hiccups this morning, but I'm not sure.  Joshua has actually been able to feel him once, which was so exciting for us!   We start birthing classes on Saturday, I can't believe the time has come for that already, so exciting!  We're going to do a 13-week intensive class that meets on Saturday mornings.  It's more geared towards natural options.  Joshua and I are really wanting to try and do this as naturally as possible, so we want to feel prepared as much as we can. 

Well, I'm at work, so I should probably start doing homework, like I told myself I would.  This is my first real shift at the library.  I totally love this job.  They really do pay you to do homework or whatever you want to do.   So far, the people I have talked to seem really nice, so that's a bonus.  Yay for working! :)

Om-a-ha!

A couple weekends back Joshua and I went to Omaha to meet up with our good friends, Mike and Sheri, for Mike's birthday. We were just planning to go to the zoo with them, but Joshua came up with the WONDERFUL idea to make it a weekend. So, we went down on Friday, stayed in a hotel Friday and Saturday nights, then left on Sunday.

Joshua planned for Friday to be a Mother's day present to me. I love when he plans all sorts of activities to surprise me with. Love. It. So, we started out on Friday morning with him taking my garage sale-ing. I love going to garage sales, but won't go by myself, so it was great to have his wonderful company. We ended up getting several different little boy outfits, so cute! :)

Then we headed to Omaha. When we got to the city, we needed water bottles, so I spotted a Target so we could run by and pick some up. Little did I know, that Joshua had actually planned for me to pick that Target out. He surprised me by having us set up our registry. Something that isn't very high on his "love to do" list, but super high on my. It was so fun, we signed up and went and scanned a few things. I was completely surprised, little trickster! :)

After our mad-dash registering (we were running a bit late :), Joshua took me to get a pre-natal massage. Let me tell you, this is definitely on the top 10 list to a woman's heart. It was very nice and relaxing. What a thoughtful fellow.

We then rushed over (once again, we were a little behind schedule) to an independent movie theater to watch the film, Babies. It was really cool, it followed for different babies over their first year from four different cultures: Mongolia, the U.S., Tokyo, and Africa. It was really interesting. We even got snacks, which we never do, so that made it super special. The movie didn't really have any talking in it, so it was nice to have popcorn and root beer at times to keep us going. :)

We then leisurely drove to dinner, which was SO fantastic. Joshua found Ted's Nebraska grill, which is probably one of the best restaurants I've ever been to. They're signature item is buffalo, so you can get everything with beef or buffalo. We chose buffalo, of course. It was so yummy! I got a buffalo cheeseburger with the best french fries I've ever had. Joshua got the buffalo filet that was the best steak he had ever eaten. He hadn't even known steak could taste like that and melt in your mouth. It was really fun. They had these snack things that they brought to our table that were called "half-sours." They were cucumbers that had been half-way through the pickling process. It was fun to try something new.

After dinner, we went to e-creamery. Not that we had room for dessert, but could we really say no to ice cream, since it was on the agenda? Could you? I don't want to know. :) We shared a banana split, which was okay, but kind of over priced and the people were grumpy. But it was a cool experience. Apparently you can order e-creamery ice cream online with whatever you want in it and make your own label. Pretty cool idea. :)

Then we went to our hotel which was really nice, and Joshua got a fantastic deal on it. It was a La Quinta, which also had a continental breakfast. Something to know about Joshua and me: we LOVE continental breakfast. Don't ask us why, maybe we feel like we're getting more for the money or they make us feel like we're staying in a fancier place. Who knows? :)

The next day we did the zoo all day. It was really fun, and really hot. I should have drank more water, but it's hard to get enough in. I was glad we thought to bring the sunscreen though, neither Joshua nor I got fried, go us! We then went to spaghetti works for dinner, then walked around. A good time was had by all!

Sunday, we slept in, then hit the town for one last spot of fun. We first went to find these big slides cut into the side of a hill in a park. We then fought little kids off to get to go down afore mentioned slide. Just kidding, we did wait in line. We were then only adults in line, both times.... But, it was so fun, and worth looking out of place. We then went to hot shops, which is a huge warehouse that a ton of artists rent out for studio space. It's really fun, because you can see art in progress, and finished products. You are also able to purchase art. It was a really cool experience. After the sight-seeing, we were ready for lunch. Joshua and I were really feeling the need for some health-food, since we'd eaten a lot that weekend. So, we went straight to Ted and Wally's, a local ice cream shop... It was probably the best ice cream shop ever. I got a cookie sundae that was wonderful. We sat outside and enjoyed the beautiful day and wonderful company. :)

It was a perfect weekend: good friends, lots of surprises for me :), great activities, and the most wonderful husband, ever. :)

It's a Boy!!!!

So, I'm officially outnumbered! But, I'm more than okay with that, I love little boys! *sigh* The above ultra-sound pic is from our 9 week ultra-sound, but I'll load the 18 week pics here shortly. We're so excited to have a boy as the oldest, since Joshua loved being the oldest. I only get a little sad when I see all the adorable girl clothes. :) But boy clothes are actually really cute. We can't wait to meet our little man! I found baby chucks at Babies-R-Us, so I will definitely be hitting those up soon.

Pregnancy is going really well. I wish I had kept up blogging with it, but I was so busy and SO tired! I've been feeling pretty well lately, still tired though. Maybe the 2nd trimester stamina will hit me soon, the appetite sure has! I started feeling him move around week 17 and a half, but wasn't really sure what it was. The last couple of days I've really felt him moving, which is really fun. Whenever Joshua talks to him near my belly, he just goes crazy. I'm sensing a daddy's boy already. :) I'm excited to see Joshua be a dad, he's just so amazing with kids, it makes me melt. Not that I'm mushy gushy or anything, of course.

I called today to try and sign up for a really intensive 12 week birthing class that's really supposed to help you do things naturally. The lady said the class I wanted was full, but she may be adding another class, so I'm really hoping for that. I didn't realize how quickly the classes sign up, but hopefully we'll get in... It would make me feel so much more prepared. I'm still thinking whether or not I am wanting a doula, we'll have to see.

It took until this last ultra-sound for me to really feel pregnant. But, I've really started growing, since about week 16, I've started showing, so that's been really fun. I had a bit of a scare this weekend. We went to Omaha for Mike's birthday and went to the zoo. We walked around all day and it was really hot. The next day while I was walking around Hy-Vee, I started cramping. It wasn't on and off, but like a solid cramping feeling for about 20 minutes. I called my midwife who told me to go home and rest and push fluids like crazy. She thinks it was from dehydration, but talk about scary! Since then, I've felt the baby moving and I have felt better, so that's a praise!

We're starting to think about the baby room, woohoo! We bought the quilt that we really liked at Pottery Barn and and I bought the crib today. We need the crib since we'll be doing respite for a little boy June 10th-14th, and he's only 10 months. I'll admit though, I was excited for the excuse to get the crib! :) I was going to just look for one on Craigslist, but I couldn't find one and would have had to spend around $100 for something I didn't like. Target had the crib that I had actually picked out as my favorite a while ago on sale for $130, so I got that one and am really happy. Joshua is really good at picking out colors, so we talked about what to paint the walls today. I think we might paint them light blue, which will be the one non-gender-neutral act of ours, I like it.

One week from today, I'll be 20 weeks. Half-way baby! That's really exciting. I hope the second half goes quicker. I love being pregnant, but I can't wait to see what God gave us! :)