Tyler Update

Tyler is awesome. He is doing really great in everything that he is doing and I am proud of him for all that he is accomplishing.
Here are some notables from the last few weeks:
Tyler passed both the graduate school classes he was taking for his Master's of Science in Engineering degree with an A in one (Building Modeling), and a B in the other (Controlls Engineering, by far the harder of the two classes). That's pretty awesome in my book. He is such a hard worker and was worked so hard to try and do well in these classes and he definitely did that!
Tyler had his last day with Captive Aire this last Friday. This is so bittersweet for our family. Captive Aire has really been a great employer and we were sad to part ways and Tyler really enjoyed working there and all the experience that he was able to get these last two and a half years while working there.
One door closes and another one opens: Tyler is starting to work full time this summer for the Integrated Design Lab (IDL). He does building modeling and analysis there to analyze a building's energy usage to help them find ways to be more energy efficient. He has a sweet deal worked out with them that if he works full time during the summer (40+ hrs/week) and part time during the school year (20 hrs/week) that they will not only pay him hourly for his time but also pay his tuition. With this opportunity, we will be able to make it through his graduate school program and into the Navy without accruing any additional school related debt! Something that we think is super awesome!
I have been impressed lately with how willing to help others Tyler always is. He is always looking for opportunities to serve and do good, rarely turns said opportunities down, and is always willing to help others and does it happily and without expecting anything in return. I really admire this in him. Recently he saw a couple on the side of the road near our house having car problems so he went out of his way to make sure that they didn't need any help. Turns out they were in need of some tools that we had so he was able to help them with what they needed even though it wasn't the most comvenient timing in the world. (It made us late for church as Tyler hadn't had a chance to get ready yet, but I was fine with that since we were trying to do good for others which is the essence of the gospel anyway! No point in going to church if you are not actually practicing what you are learning there!) Another example of Tyler being willing to help is the incident last night coming home from Burley with the car that rolled over that we stopped to help (see post previous to this one).
I'm so grateful for Tyler and his willingness to serve others and the good husband and father that he is to me, Ameilya and our sweet little girl on the way.

Memorial Day

This Memorial Day was a bit of an emotional one for me. Probably mostly because I'm pregnant but I think also because of Tyler joining the Navy and that looming here in the next year. I just felt a little more emotion because of the sacrifices that have been made by so many individuals and families to keep our dear country safe and to preserve our rights and freedoms.

God bless those who died in the line of duty, those who served honorably, and those who continue to serve.  We are forever indebted to them for the wonderful freedoms that enable us to enjoy our lives more fully.

For our Memorial Day we went to Burley to spend time with Tyler's aging grandma who is in a care facility there and also spent a little time with Tyler's uncle Randy and his kids. We had a really great time and were safe in our travels. (I forgot to take many pictures but I did take one of Tyler and Ameilya and Grandma Noble that I will post at the end)

We had the opportunity to be one of the first on the scene of a bad car wreck on the interstate yesterday. We saw what we thought was smoke but just turned out to be a cloud of dust from a car that went off the interstate and into a field. The car was very mangled and rolled several times. There was only one person in the car and he was miraculously able to walk away from the accident with what appeared to be a broken arm and cuts and scrapes on his hands. He is lucky to be alive. We tried to help how we could, no one besides us had a first aid kit and we were glad that we were prepared with first aid supplies that we could leave with the other people who were helping the injured man. We left the scene of the accident right as the police were showing up as there were several people that arrived to help before we did but we are glad that we stopped so that we could share our supplies with someone that needed them. We pray that the man in the car won't have any long term damage from the accident and will make a full recovery. It was a little scary for us to show up on the scene of a wreck and helped us to more fully realize that it is so important to be careful when driving and that our mortality might be taken from us at any time. We were blessed with safety in our travels and we hope you and your families were too. I just hope that we can all remember to be cautious in our driving and not take unnecessary risks while at the wheel.

This is the one picture that I remembered to take, Grandma Noble wanted to read a book to Ameilya. It was really sweet to be able to spend time with these three special people on Memorial Day. I love my family so much.

I won't say that I hope you had a "happy" memorial day, because I feel that somehow doesn't give proper merit to the purpose of the day. But I do hope you enjoyed your remembrance of those who have paid the ultimate price for our freedom and that you were safe in your travels.

Tyler

Shout out to my awesome hubby who just finished a super hard grad school class!

Tyler has been a champ getting through this semester. He has been studying like crazy. He just pulled an 86% on the final for his hardest graduate engineering class, Controls Engineering. His test score was above the class average. Yay, Tyler!

Pregnancy Update: 20 Weeks

We are halfway there!!!!!

I can't believe that we are halfway to meeting our newest little princess! This pregnancy is going by so fast. We have been so busy and that just makes it go by faster. We have been busy with: Ameilya, lots of yardwork (as we have 2 acres of land), 9 (yes, 9) violin and viola students, upcoming spring music recital for said violin/viola students, church callings (teaching temple prep, activity days, visiting teaching, relief society newsletter), keeping the house clean/preparing meals and the like. I think I need a bit of a vacation! Tyler's semester will be over soon so hopefully we will be able to go and do a few fun things even if we don't really get out of town or anything. 

Anyway, on to the pregnancy stuff. Which is what this post is supposed to be about anyway ;)

I made a comment on Facebook the other day about how I never knew what to say in these updates. So I decided to do something about it. I did a quick google search and found a pregnancy survey on thebump.com that has a bunch of questions that I can answer. Much easier than me trying to come up with what to say! I can't promise that I will do it every week but I will try to at least do it every other :)

What Fruit are you? Small Cantaloupe 

Due date:  23 September 2015

How far along:  20 Weeks Exactly

Next appointment:  11 May (This coming Monday)

Gender:  Female!!!

Total weight gain/loss: Gain of 10 pounds  

Exercise: ...the occasional run. yardwork counts, right? ;)

Stretch marks: No new ones

Swelling: not yet

Maternity clothes: yes, since about 12 weeks  

Belly button:  out

Sleep: so, so, so tired. Did I mention that I'm so tired?

Food cravings:  Captain Crunch Cereal, fruit

Symptoms:  Still nauseated. Nausea seems to be getting worse :(

Movement:  Yes! She sure is a wiggly little sweetheart!

Labor signs: Braxton Hicks contractions, nothing too serious

What I miss:  Being able to lay on my stomach

What I'm loving:  Strong nails, mine are usually very weak

What I'm looking forward to:  Meeting our little sweetie for the first time

Best moment this week: Ameilya pointing to my growing tummy and saying baby baby!

News: It's a girl!!!

Milestones:  We are halfway through this pregnancy!

Words of wisdom: Don't sweat the small stuff. I need to remember that this week!

In Case You Didn't Hear Yet...

We are having another baby GIRL!!! We are so excited to welcome another sweet little girl to our family. She is absolutely perfect, from the ultrasound today we looked at her heart and all her organs and everything is exactly as hoped. We are so happy that she is healthy and growing the way that she should :) From all the measurements that were taken at the ultrasound today, they were able to estimate that she weighs 11 ounces which is on the high side of normal. Normal for a baby at her age is between 9 and 11 ounces so she's a little on the big side. If she takes after Ameilya at all then she will probably be kinda big (Ameilya was 8lb 5 ounces!).
Here are some pics of our newest little girl from the ultrasound this morning:

And a tummy shot, I'm horrible at taking "selfies" but since Tyler was busy this is what you get ;) I am 19 weeks and 3 days pregnant today. 

We had a fun little gender reveal party today at my grandparents house where I cut into a cake (half was blue and half was pink since I made it the day before our ultrasound) that was pink to tell everyone that our baby is a girl. It was so much fun! Grandma went all out and made a really nice meal too, complete with her homemade potato salad, heavenly hash, fresh cut watermellon and cantaloupe, green salad, and BBQ shredded chicken sandwiches. It was all so good and I was tickled pink ( I'm so punny!!!) that she went to all that effort especially when I only gave her like 24 hours notice about the whole cutting the cake and getting together for lunch thing :) Thanks Grandma!!

I know that no one likes a complainer, but just for the record I would really like to not be nauseous anymore! I'm not throwing up anymore, been almost three weeks without throwing up but I still feel nauseated almost all day. Especially when I am tired. Other than that, feeling pretty good! Oh and I've totally been craving that cereal Captain Crunch. I've never really liked it before now but I was at the store one day and it just looked soooo good! So I bought one of those big Malt O' Meal bags and I'm hooked!! So ridiculous I know!! I might just be almost all the way through my second bag of it... lol