90% Chance...

We're adding a BOY to the family!!

Last Tuesday, I had another ultrasound but this time it was with a radiologist (instead of my OB) for what they call Sequential Screening - which screens for the potential of baby having down syndrome. Everything went VERY well! The radiologist I went to was super informative and was kind enough to take a ton of pics for me, several of which were in 3D/4D. He was also kind enough to give us his prediction for gender and he thinks there's a 90% chance we're having a boy!

Almost looks like he's sucking his thumb

Aside from the fun news, the ultrasound gave us more good news that Baby Boy is growing just the way he's supposed to. The radiologist didn't find a single thing that he was concerned about and said things couldn't look better. He was able to see all 4 chambers of Baby's heart, which he said is pretty rare for this stage - so he has a strong heart :-)

 

Facial features still have some developing to do

Unfortunately, Del couldn't make it but the Doc sent me home with a DVD of the whole ultrasound. So I was able to show Del everything at home and I think things became more real for him. It was fun to finally share some excitement together :)

Next Doc appt is in a couple weeks with my OB and hopefully he'll be able to close a little bit of that 10% chance that the radiologist was wrong ;-)

Growing Baby & Belly

Today I had my 12 week check up appt which means the 1st trimester is about over! First, I got to hear Baby's heart beat by use of a doppler which told us the heart beat was about 165bpm - a perfect rate for this stage.
After the doppler we did a quick ultrasound which found Baby a little....camera shy?

I the above pick the baby has both hands up to his/her head almost like he/she's saying "no pictures please." hehe, taking after daddy already!
Next, is just a decent shot of the overall body. Which is being measured at about 55mm (just over 2 inches) from crown to rump.

I also decided it's about time to start with belly shots. In the last few days I've decided my feeling of being bloated or full has progressed to an actually baby bump since it's getting harder and harder to suck in!

Last but not least, Dellas and I have been having a blast the past couple of weekends with our new-found hobby: Kickball! My sister (who lives just 25mins from us) asked us to join their kickball team this season and we're so glad we did! It's a total blast and gets us out having fun together. Del's only objection is that our team color is PINK. And in order to be eligible to play you must wear a shirt in the team color with a number on it. So every weekend I get to see him lookin' studly in his pink.

Bros-in-law, Del and Jake

Well that's about all that's been going on in this neck of the woods. Del's busy as ever with work, and I'm just truckin' along glad the 1st trimester nausea stuff is over!

Ready or Not...

Here comes an addition to our little family!!

On or around October 31st, 2012 we will become 3 (or 4 with Oakley)!!

6wks: Baby is the grey oval area with the dotted line going thru

6wks: Baby's heartbeat. On the bottom on the pic is the heart rate monitor

With family and close friends having known a week or two it was bound to spread so we decided to just announce, although it's still a little early. I am only 7wks and 4 days and these u/s pics were taken last Tuesday at 6wks 6 days. I was able to see the heart beat flicker on the screen then after some searching we even heard the heart beat!! Doc says everything looks fantastic so far and he'll see me back in a month for another photo op.
I've definitely been feeling the symptoms for a good few wks now; Baby didn't waste any time announcing his/her presence to me! It's been hard finding things to eat because Baby can't seem to make up his/her mind on what's good. One minute I like something then halfway through eating it, it's no longer good. Going about my day has been inconsistent to say the least; one minute I feel fine, the next a wave a nausea hits and I need to eat. So I keep snacks handy all day long at work. I'm starting to fine tune my habits to reduce my nausea but I still don't feel like I have much control! Thankfully Dellas has been very understanding and helpful, even if it is with his cruel sense of humor ;-) like calling me "Nom Nom" because I eat so much.

But no need to continue boring you with details on nausea. We're VERY excited to be new parents and our families are ecstatic as well. We just hope and pray that everything continues to go well from hereon out and that we get to meet a happy and health Baby Clark this fall!

Adios Boise, Hello Issaquah

After the most wonderful week in Hawaii (check out last post), Dellas and I came home and had 3 days to finish packing and cleaning before we made our way to the Great Northwest on Thursday the 12th. As we were hopping into vehicles to head out, I walked past the moving van and saw this view:

Oakley ridin' shotgun with Dad

 Absolutely hilarious. I show this pic to Del and said, "Honey, this is what you look like driving down the road, just fyi." haha I got a kick out of it. Less than an hour into the trip I received a text message with this pic:

Del said Oakley sat RIGHT next to him the entire way. Often laying his head down on his shoulder until they'd hit a bump or until Del would intentionally hit the brakes to wake up his passenger.

We made the 8.5 hr drive, well more like 9 for Dellas hehe, to Olympia and stayed at Mom and Dad Vance's place for a night. On Friday morning, we loaded back up and drove the remaining hr to Issaquah. By Sunday evening we were about 75% unpacked and set up but with me having an extra day off on Monday, I was able to put some finishing touches on the place.

Living Room, as seen from the door to the backyard

Living and Dining rooms (and a piece of the kitchen, far left) as seen from the stairs

Now, here's where my book starts...Dellas started work bright and early last Monday morning (the 16th) and I started Tuesday. Late Tuesday afternoon it started snowing and didn't stop much for about 24 hrs. We awoke Wednesday with about 4-6 inches (not a ton but Seattle isn't known for being prepared for snow) and the entire Western side of the state was closing down. I went to work but my bank closed at 3pm before things got worse and because all of our customers were headed home instead of the Bank haha. Thursday morning we woke up with still the same amount of snow, but anything that had semi-melted had turned to ice and we were better off skating to work than driving. When Dellas headed in at 6:30am he called and told me to call work and say I'd be late in hopes it'd clear up or just stay home cuz there was freezing rain and the roads were horrible. I debated back and forth, but before I could get ready for work we lost power at about 7:30am so my boss said to stay put. (They ended up closing at 3pm again anyway)
Oakley and I hung out by our fireplace most of the day (thank goodness the fireplace, stove and water heater are gas!) and listened to the trees crack and break or fall all around us. I ventured out to let him play with a neighbor dog and as my neighbor and I talked we watched a huge branch crack and fall down about 20yards from us. Before calling it quits outside I snapped a few pics.

Ice and snow weighed down all the plants

Looking down our street on Thursday, after a plow came thru

Why they call it an "ice storm" freezing rain coats EVERYTHING

Broken branch behind our back fence

It started warming up on Friday so, even though our power was still off, we trudged thru the massive amounts of slush and both went to work. After meeting for dinner after work, we came home to power!! For about 15 mins....haha. So right after starting some laundry and the dishwasher we were back in the dark until midnight.

SO! After a total of 39 hrs in the dark, we're back in business. We got our internet hooked up yesterday and ran lots of errands. Today we're watching the wind blow and just glad it waited until the ice melted off the trees.

Welcome to Seattle! I guess... ;-)

Aloha Hawaii!

As I've mentioned in previous postings, the Vance family took an amazing Hawaiian vacation January 1-8. We arrived at The Dolphin House on New Years day and were welcomed by this:

and more importantly, this:

Our first full day was a lot of the above picture, at least for myself, my sister Julie, and my nephews. We weren't needed for the Costco/rental car errands so we got to relax in the sun. We definitely got the better deal!

Tuesday was the most amazing day ever! My parents booked a charter boat for just the 10 of us to take us out and find some wild spinner dolphins to swim with! Only about a 1/2 hr into the trip we found our pod of dolphins and started following them.

Dolphins come into shore in the morning to sleep, so the hope is to follow them until they find a place to sleep then you can jump in and swim all you want with them. Our dolphins were on a mission though. We played leap-frog with them for a couple of hours; getting just ahead of them for us to jump in w/our snorkel gear and have them swim right through us on up the coast. Then back in the boat to get back in front of them. Since the dolphins didn't seem to want to settle down, our boat captains decided to take us over to Captain Cook, one of the more popular snorkeling areas. On our way we came upon a couple of humpback whales!

Caught the tail as it went back in

Captured the full body breach!

We saw 2 different sets of humpbacks on our way to Captain Cooks which was incredible. We finished up the boat trip with some easy, gorgeous snorkeling and headed in.

Very happy family after the dolphin excursion!

The next day, we woke up with the news that mom had taken a bad fall while hopping over the small retaining wall from our house to the beach. We found out after the trip that she has indeed broken her nose! (She has since had surgery 1 of 2 to repair the damage and is doing well) Poor mom stayed home all of Wednesday to recuperate as best she could. So while she and dad hung back, the rest of us took the cars up the coast in search of awesome beaches. We found one that had a small lagoon but then out a ways was lava rock that broke the waves. Had incredible surf that day!

 We ventured further up the coast to Mahaiula Beach, part of Kekaha Kai State Park which was where we spent most of the day.

My nephews built sand barriers to keep the waves from getting us

On Thursday we took a family trip even further up the coast to Hapuna Beach. It was a pretty windy day and the surf was intense so we didn't last the whole day. We attempted some boogie boarding just long enough for Del to really tweek his neck and me tweek my back. So back in the car we went for a short drive to get a glimpse of the other side of the island - a much wetter, greener side.

 

Hapuna Beach

 The rest of the trip was unplanned. We all did our own things for a couple of days, whether it be swimming, snorkeling, or shopping. Del, my bro-in-law Jake, my nephews and I went out for one last snorkeling trip on Saturday and my goal was to see a sea turtle. And that I did! Within the first 5 mins of the snorkel Jake yelled "turtle!" so we headed for him and saw the small sea turtle gliding along about 10 ft below us. My nephews dived down closer to it and Bret almost got to touch it! It was only about 24 or so inches across, but it was a sea turtle!
We saw a few gorgeous sunsets. Not every night though, so the few we saw we soaked right up.

Sunset from our lanai

Nephew, Bret helping the sun go down

 Towards the end of the trip we went to dinner as a family and got a little dressed up and took lots of pics. Here's just a couple.

Dad with his girls :)

I like him sometimes

Hang loose!

 On the very last morning as everyone was packing things up, Dellas was sitting on the lanai watching the ocean when he saw a coconut fall right of a palm. He went and grabbed it and we decided to try and break into it.

 He picked the best kitchen knife he could find and started hacking away.

Cut off the end

 Once he got the end cut off he dug inside a bit to get to the coconut milk and we all tried a bit. It was good!

Look at Bret's face (one with cup in hand) then look at next pic

 As Del was trying to cut the coconut in half he encountered a problem...the knife handle broke off! Haha he managed to finish the job and we tried a bit of the coconut jelly or the insides but it wasn't as tasty as the milk.

 All-in-all it was an amazing trip!! I have lots more pics on Facebook if you have access. Thank you Mom and Dad Vance for such a fabulous family trip!! We couldn't have asked for a better one!!

Mini-Update

Hey all, just wanted to give a little update while I have a small break in the chaos.
Dellas headed over to Seattle yesterday to take a load of big stuff (trailer, jetski, etc) then spent this morning looking for places for us to live. We were very fortunate and got lucky on the 2nd place! I found a duplex in Issaquah on Craigslist so Dellas took a look and snatched it up!
It's a little dated, but it's 3br, 2.5ba and more importantly has a small back yard for Oak! Issaquah is one of the more expensive areas to live so we were a little worried about what we could find but I think this one will do nicely! I'll post pics later...

On another note, I was offered a job at my current bank's Bellevue branch and will start on January 17th! This allows me to take a week for our Hawaii trip and a week to move but come right back to a job with no lapse in pay or benefits! I only have 2 days left of work in Meridian so the girls are throwing a little going away party tomorrow at work but they won't tell me what all it's going to entail.
It's definitely a time for mixed emotions...getting ready to leave some fabulous friends and a lot of familiarity behind, but so excited to go to Hawaii on Sunday then come back to a place to live!

Things have been coming together nicely for us and we're so thankful. Dellas even said, "it's kinda scary how things are falling into place for us..." haha, not really sure why it's scary but oh well; it makes me feel like this was how everything is supposed to happen for us!

More to come after we relax with our toes in the sand for a week then make the journey over to Issaquah!

Our Fate is Decided

Well, many of you already know what this post is going to say, but I feel it's worth posting anyway! After 4 long months of waiting on pins and needles, Kiewit has decided our fate and are sending us to Bellevue, WA for Dellas to start work on the rebuilding of the 520 floating bridge across Lake Washington (which spans between downtown Seattle and Bellevue.) This job was one of Dellas' first picks so he's pretty excited. I, on the other hand, bypassed the excitement and immediately went into planning mode but didn't have long before family came into town to help us celebrate Del's graduation.

Now that we have him OFFICIALLY done with college we're starting to put together our plans and line up a place to live. Luckily, I'm familiar enough with the area to help eliminate certain places but it's still nice to have family who is local to help out.
This upcoming week will be spent enjoying time with Dellas' parents (and soon his brother) who are in town until after Christmas, while trying to tie up loose ends in Meridian. My last day at work isn't until the 30th so Dellas' job, from the 27th-31st, is to go to Seattle and scrape up some houses and hopefully pin something down before we head to Hawaii for a week on the 1st. We get back from Hawaii on the 8th and Dellas starts work the 16th. Somewhere in that mesh of activity we'll need to come back to Boise, pack up our house, haul it over, and hopefully unload it into a house! If not, I hope my family will let us crash in on them temporarily!
As for my job, I'm not sure yet. I'm checking into transferring with my current bank but also trying to weigh how long of a commute I want. So we'll see what happens there.

Everything that we've been thinking about and wondering about for the last 6 months is actually starting to happen now! It's a crazy, stressful, exciting, scary time for us but that's life! We'll be keeping everyone updated as things come together. I apologize ahead of time if I'm not the best blog updater over the next month but I promise it'll come!