29-31

It has been such an eventful couple of weeks, where to begin?!? 

As of right now I'm 31 weeks and still feeling good. 

She is moving all over the place!

I'm sleeping like a champ(go figure) and still waiting to be able to use my long Snoogie pregnancy pillow.

We had to get an additional ultrasound at the docs to verify some dates(long story) but everything is right on track and we got to see our little lamb in all her glory once again! The sonographer was able to get a perfect profile shot and Devin's comment was "She's got a ski slope!"(referring to the shape of her nose, which like mine, is upturned and resembles a ski slope) She will wear it well I think.

She also had her head down, and we are hoping that means she is a smarty pants and knows what direction she will have to be traveling here shortly.

Went to the store and bought more maternity shirts and bigger scrubs because the regular large clothes are not covering all of that business in the front.

I'm getting puffy hands and feet by the end of the day.

We signed up for an all-day birthing class at Labor and Delivery and I CAN'T WAIT! I've never got to be in a class with Devin and I get to spend 8 hours straight with him. Learning!  

Prepare for some Baby Shower cuteness overload! Karly and Marki were both the beauty and brains behind this shower and it.was. amazing.  They probably wanted to slap me from saying "Awwwww cuuuuutee" every five seconds but I could not help myself.

Here are the little mini pumpkin pie party favors that Karly made, cute AND delicious...

Some of the decor... it was a fall, burlap, pumpkin dream!The food table was amazing, and I have better pictures of it on an actual camera, but these will have to do for now.  They served all fall/apple/pumpkin flavored foods and the main dish was my ABSOLUTE favorite....corndogs and sweet potatoe fries!!! I about died when I saw that big beautiful tray of corndogs.  Those girls know me all too well.  Marki made pumpkin cream cheese homemade Oreos that were to die for.  And how cute is that fabric banner?  Those girls went above and beyond to make the shower special. Here are some of the fun gifts I got...  a little Scentsy lamb that has a scent pocket to help soothe the baby.  And Morgan made us the CUTEST car seat canopy...

This Pack-and-Play from the my mother and sister in laws was at the top of my Wishlist...check out all the soothing/vibrating/sound features...Marki, me, Morgan, and Karly.  Love these girls! We took lots of pictures with everyone, but those are on my other camera..

The cutest diaper bag on the face of the planet!!! The blanket it's sitting on was made by Marki, she is one talented lady!  My mom gave us all of our old childhood books for the babe to get her smarts on...

On top of all that I got some adorable outfits, blankets, diapers, and other essentials! Thanks to everyone who came!

So in a day full of fun surprises, I got yet ANOTHER huge surprise from my in-laws.  The plan was that Devin's family was going to throw me and Sara a shower in Moab on Thanksgiving break so of course I was not expecting them to make the 5-hour drive to St. George to attend this shower.  Well of course Devin was up to his scheming ways and all 3 of Devin's sisters and his mom and niece showed up at the door to surprise me!  Needless to say I was shocked, but then again not, because driving 5 hours out of their way to support their family members is so something those Dalton's would do! It was so fun to have everyone there to celebrate.  And the celbration didn't end at the shower.  We took our huge party out to dinner at Buca di Beppo and chowed down.  I had to include the picture on the right because poor Brit got her drink knocked over not once, but twice during the dinner! Someone also dropped a large meatball that splattered red sauce over everyone...good times! It was great to have all of our family together (minus Ryan and the boys, Andrew and Courtney) because it doesn't happen very often and it's always an adventure.

 After dinner we went home and roasted some s'mores around the fire pit.  It was one of those days that was perfect in every way and we will never forget.

 A few days before the shower was Halloween! Dev and I didn't get too festive, just passed out candy and let Otto harass the trick-or-treaters.  Here are our nieces and nephews in their costumes:

Macray the old lady, Payton the nerd, Breckin the ghost/zombie, Ean the rodeo clown, and Collin as Spiderman! 

He loves his costume, can't you tell?

In other news, yesterday I passed my Physics boards!  What a relief. It's amazing how much better I slept last night knowing that goal was checked off of my list! Now all I have to focus on is getting my final assignments and tests done for Weber classes then I can relax even more...

28

So so many changes in the last few weeks! I've obviously gotten bigger and I think things are headed south and when I say south I mean that it feels like she is dropping. I have been feeling a lot of downward pressure so I am assuming that's whats going on.  (Things may also be going south in the respect that everything will be getting more and more uncomfortable from here on out)  

I can feel those lower pelvic/abdominal muscles are starting to stretch out and I have to be careful to not stand up too fast because they can't uncontract fast enough.

Whenever I stand I have to go to the bathroom, apparently my bladder is running out of space down there.  

She is still kicking away and sometimes I can see it through my belly, or I can feel her head pushed up against my abdominal wall, very cool!

I accidentally sleep on my back a lot and I've heard that's a bad thing for either me or the baby? Or both of us?

Only been working out a couple days a week and I could just kick myself! I feel so much better when I do.  The colder temps make it more difficult to get up early in the morning and the fact that none of my workout clothes fit isn't motivating either.  I WILL turn that all around this week.   

I tried to paint my toenails the other day and THAT was interesting, couldn't quite reach.

Been doing some shopping for the little one! Not pictured is a buch of cute outfits my MIL sent me home with on our last visit.  Baby jeggings have got to be the cutest things ever invented!

    

Had a great experience at my last appointment.  I took my glucose test for gestational diabetes the day before the appointment, and the doctor walks in to our room to inform us that I BIG FAT FAILED IT! So off I went to the hospital to do the 3hour follow-up test, which I luckily passed (Dr said only 1 of 4 will fail the second attempt).  But still, what a downer it was.  For that whole day I felt like a failure at life and motherhood and school and work and wifery, all because of one stupid little test.  Just goes to show that I need to get better at handling little blips in the road because I've heard that motherhood can present those to you quite frequently. 

 On a happier note I ordered some crib bedding(the turquoise polka sheets below) ! Let the decorating begin (in 5-7 business days)! And I have my eye out for a rocker like the one below for the nursery.

 Devin has been busy busy in the garage refinishing some of the furniture that my parents were so nice to give us!  The nightstand is the one I had in my room growing up that Devin painted turquoise and distressed, LOVE how it turned out.  The changing table is the same one that my own messy bum was changed on when I was a babe! My mom is having a comeapart over the baskets on the shelves and how impractical they are, but the baskets are here to stay! Some Halloween decor...

We went to Moab for a long weekend at the cabin for the deer hunt...here is Otto helping me pack..

While in Moab we got to spend some time in my MIL's store, Forget Me Knot Flowers, all decked out for Halloween! If you can imagine it is even cuter inside...

We got to watch her in action and this was one of her creations!

 

As luck would have it Aunty Courtney was visiting Moab the same time we were there so we grabbed breakfast and talked for a bit before she drove back toTelluride.  (We retook this picture due to the sun in my eyes and I accidentally erased the retaken picture so this is the only one I have)We also got to see Devin's old friend Steven who has been back east playing baseball for the Twins!

I got to help out with some cookie frosting, and the text conversation shows that husband of mine knows me all too well...

  

For the week before the hunt Devin had been growing out his beard and it was the longest I had ever seen it! Unfortunately I do not have a better picture of it, and I also don't have a picture of everyone in their orange. But I do have a picture of the cookies, and that is WAY more important...

Covered in grout from finishing his sister's bathroom for her birthday present.  Hopefully our little girl takes some lessons from her pops and grows up to be handywoman!

Devin's Post

The last few weeks I have been having those mini anxiety attacks that all future parents get that are caused by the underlying question "How are we going to handle what is coming our way?" To be honest the only thought that calms me down when I am having those thoughts is knowing that I have Devin on my team.

He is the most dependable, solid, grounded person I know, and I know that he has and will get us through anything that comes our way.   He doesn't cut corners and everything he does, he does the right way in fact I have no doubt he could raise this baby on his own if he had to.  He doesn't let me get away with complaining and being down on myself, but instead encourages me to be tough and strong. Everything will work out because Devin will make it work out.

Not only am I so lucky to have the chance to be a mom, but I get to be a mom with a strong and good man on my side. 

25 and lots of mud...

25 weeks! I've defintley seen/felt a big change in size this last week, outward and onward! She is also moving much more regularly these days, and it's the coolest feeling ever!  Sometimes it keeps me up at night because I wake up feeling it and I want to just lay there and feel her move.  I am noticing some shortness of breath, especially when I am walking and talking at the same time or walking up stairs, or even during eating, it takes me a minute to catch my breath.  My hands and feet are a little swollen by the end of the day, so I pretty much never wear my ring anymore.  It's such a crazy thing to experience the funny little changes in your body that you have no control over.  I feel great and can't complain.   

Last weekend we traveled to Beatty, NV(2 hours up through the mountains of Vegas) for Devin and his friends to run the Tough Mudder! These boys have been talking about and training for this race for months and the race did not disappoint the participants or the wives of the participants.  Basically it's a 12 mile race that has 24 obstacles, crazy obstacles, throughout the course.  We weren't able to watch every obstacle because the course is so spread out over the mountains.  Fortunately we were able towatch the majority of them...

 

Team Ryno: Devin, Shane, Trevor, and Matt

Shane and Trevor decided that some facial hair would be appropriate for the Mudder...

At the very beginning all the participants had to hop(or be hoisted) over this wall.

This picture says a thousand words...As spectators we were VERY unprepared for the race.  We didn't realize this until we got there but in order to spectate you had to run to all of the obstacles which were up hills and rocks and some times there was no telling when Teamn Ryno was going to come to a particular obstacle so it made for some interesting down time.  We had to wait at one obstacle for what seemed like HOURS, in the sun, with no shade, no breeze, no food, little water, and 1 year old(who I should mention was a trooper through the whole experience and was perfectly content to sit in the rocks and play in the sand).  Since we had no shade, a diaper was the only thing in Karly's diaper bag that she could configure into a hat for Harper! Priceless...

They were all smiles here but the smiles didn't last long...they had to run up to the top of that hill behind them  three times!

Crawling through some tubes into a mud bath..

Crawling out of the tubes covered in scrapes

Traveling across a pond on ziplines

Shane jumping into the Artic Enema which is a huge ice bath that they jumped in and had to swim underneath a wall in the middle of the tank...

Shane and Devin exiting the Enema as quickly as possible...

Matt and Devin making their way across The Gecko...

....unfortunately Trevor did not make it across....

Approaching Everest which was a huge, slick halfpipe that they had to climb up...

Matt running up Everest...

 

At the end of the race fueling up on bananas and the best $4 PowerAde I've ever tasted!
They finished the race in 3 hours...

It was such a fun weekend and it was even more fun becasue we were able to experience it all with our closest friends.  After seeing how much fun they had us girls decided that we would join the men next April for the Mudder in Vegas, sans baby belly!

22 and 23

I just got to hold the cutest, chubbiest baby at work today and it got me all giddy cuz I realized we're gonna have one of our own pretty soon! Yipee!

I sort of fell off of the blogging wagon for a couple weeks but I am back on! First and foremost I should officially announce the gender, even though we have known for quite some time now... This is the picture that we sent to our families to announce the news...

Girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl!

The look on Devin's face has some traces of fear on it wouldn't you say? He has admitted that raising a girl intimidates him because he is scared of the unknown..."boys are easy, I was a boy, I know what to do with a boy, you just take them to the ball field or hunting, I don't know what I'll do with a girl." After seeing what an involved "parent"(because parenting a dog and a child will be the exact same experience, right?) he is when it comes to this little guy...

...I know our little gal is in good hands. MY parenting skills are the ones I'm worried about, but that's a whole other subject I won't get into today.  Luckily lots of people like to write books about parenting.  Unfortunately I haven't read much of these type of books as I have been trying to focus my attention on passing my Physics boards...

There have been many changes in the last few weeks... I started feeling some movement at week 21.  It began as what felt like little pokes against my abdominal wall, and after two weeks have progressed to harder punches in succession, what a cool feeling! She moves a lot after I work out and if my bladder is really full and at night and after I eat sometimes haha. I like that it's random because it's a fun little surprise every time.  My bellybutton has cut loose and there is no holding it back, tape and bandaids don't work, neither does layering, so I have just decided to just embrace it! My sweet mom hit up Gap's Maternity clothes sale and bought me a bunch of really cute/comfy shirts and leggings, best present ever! So this week I boxed up all of my other clothes that I've grown out of to make room for the new ones in hopes that getting dressed won't be such a chore/guessing game anymore. 

 

This week I've noticed I'm getting short of breath more easily.  Doing housework I had to take a few breaks in between vacuuming and dishes to catch my breath.  We had another Dr's appt and the hearbeat ranged from 60 to 150 bpm.  Dr said it is totally normal for it to fluctuate like that until about 28 weeks.  I'll admit it's kind of nerve-wracking listening to it sloooooowwww waaaaaay doooowwwnnn.  My uterus was measuring 21 weeks at 23 weeks which he also said is within normal limits, and from the look of things she probably won't be a 10 pounder like her mom and pops! Phew!

Devin played in a softball tournament in Green River (which they took first place in!) and I came down with some sort of sneezing, allergy, head cold thing and it kinda sucks not being able to pop some IB's and call it a day.  After a long day of watching softball this is what happened about five minutes after the inlaws and I hit the couch...

Snapped this pic of Baby Devin while we were home in Moab, handsome and happy little guy I must say!

Since summer is technically over I decided to make my favorite fall dish, white chicken chili and cornbread! It didn't quite it the spot like I had hoped since it was still 90 degrees outside..

 We have some new tenants living in our entryway...BATS! They fly in at night and leave us a huge pile of guano (I'm of course referencing Ace Ventura When Nature Calls) on either side of our front door, lovely.  I had given Devin permission to shoot them with his pellet gun but after seeing them up close that permission  was revoked.  I had no idea, but bats are kinda cute!

And they sort of keep in theme with our Halloween decorations so lucky for them it's Halloween season. 

 Devin has been keeping himself very busy and finished a lot of our projects around the house, like refinishing the changing table and building benchs for the firepit.  I will have pictures of them next time!