Ultrasound

Well, as many of you, if not all of you know we had our ultrasound on Tuesday. And...we are having a little baby girl! I am happy and somewhat relieved to announce that I am, in fact, not giving birth to the devil as previously suggested by a member of my immediate family...who will remain nameless. (shhh, I have been a little "moody" lately) My mom, sister, and grandma came with Dan and I to the ultrasound. It was a full crew - very fun! Well, not so much fun for me until the end. I misunderstood the ultrasound tech (who really was one of the sweetest ladies) and thought there was a problem and was incredibly worried/stressed the whole time. I don't know why I didn't ask for clarification until the end, but I was just trying to process the whole thing - which turned out to be unnecessary. However, so far everything with her is going well - and we are very thankful for that, she is actually developing right on schedule. She was on Tuesday exactly 21 weeks and 0 days developed and that is exactly how far along I am - or was on Tuesday. The ultrasound tech did a quick 3-D picture of her little face for me (I think because she felt so bad for the misunderstanding - although I was, somehow, the ONLY one in the room who misunderstood) and to actually see her was a very surreal thing. It still has yet to really sink in that in a short time I will be a mother...oh my goodness!! So right after the appointment the girls and I went to the fabric store to pick out some cute material for some receiving blankets. I am hoping to not procrastinate preparing this little girl's nursery, so I...I mean WE need to pick out colors and get on the ball!

Calling all Moms!

Who has used or has friends that have used cloth diapers? I am trying to convince Dan of the cost savings...I think he is almost there. Also I would love any suggestions on brands, types, etc. Jumping the gun maybe, but it is a much bigger upfront cost than disposables :) Any and all suggestions are welcome, would love the comments most if there aren't calling me crazy!

I love DAN!!

Nothing is better than a husband who will run to the store first thing in the morning when it is freezing cold outside to get milk for your cereal and then goes down stairs to play guitar hero and sings along while he is jamming....Yes, honey you DO rock! Today is going to be a good day!!

Heart Beat

So yesterday we had an OB appointment. This was our second one. Dan came, I told him I think husbands are supposed to go, right? Anyway, we got to listen to the heartbeat. It took what seemed like a few minutes to find it, although I am sure it was less than 30 seconds...my midwife said, "don't worry, the baby is really small so sometimes they are hard to find." Well hurry up, please! She found it and our baby's heart is beating within the normal range of 120-160 :) She did tell us what it was exactly but I can't remember...does that make me a bad mom? I had a couple ladies ask me what the heart rate was and I felt guilty that I could only say, somewhere between 120 and 160. Still feels a little surreal, out of body, are WE really having a baby? I've had a couple pretty good days - sickness wise, just sick at night which is a good thing! Definitely looking forward to a better 2nd trimester when I actually re-start some sort of exercising! p.s NYC Marathon is this Sunday, and I secretly...or not so secretly couldn't be happier that I am not running! Good luck to my gymnastics amiga Sarah G, run like the wind!!

This is what I have been doing

So I realize I haven't blogged in a while. I've been busy...busy with "morning" sickness and keeping secrets/lying. It's been a long couple months, but now I don't have to keep the secrets or lie any longer! Let me correct some of my responses and answer some of the most commonly asked questions.

No, I don't have a weird strain of the flu that lasts an abnormally long time. I DO know what's wrong and I'm not feeling better. My training is not going well. The 13 miles I ran last week wasn't hard...because I didn't do it! And although my midwife said I could run the marathon, I think I will just defer until next year.

I am just over 12 weeks along. I am experiencing morning sickness, it hits the worst in the evening. Baby Ricks' is due date is May 4th, but we are holding out for a cinco de mayo baby. We are going to find out the sex. We don't have names picked out, in fact that part really stresses me out, so I'm not even thinking about it yet. We don't have a preference for a girl or a boy-honestly, and I have no motherly instinct as to which it may be - although the Chinese calendar and my friend Roxana from work (who did a quick examination of my hand) both say it's a boy. I do have cravings...but only for a Sonic Limeade. And yes...my Mom is excited!!!

Andy's Birthday

My little brother turned 22 in August. This is our family's classic party shot, around the kitchen table. My other brother Ty was in town (well in Pueblo - - for IFS training before he goes to pilot training) with his wife Makamae, and Dan's parents were visiting from Rexburg. The cute girl next to Andy is his girlfriend April. We love April, she is lovely girl!

I don't know what was up with my camera, makes the pictures look yellow. This is another one of Andy and April.

This is another of our family's classic photo shots...the stair shot. I think this is one of the funniest pictures ever! April brought her dog Jax then with my parent's dog Maizey and Andy's/my parent's dog Sage and our little Brindi, pretty impressive we could get them to stay put long enough to snap a few pictures. My favorite is Jax...you can barely see is head, I just imagine what he was thinking...WHY are we doing this? Anyway, Happy Birthday Andy! I am pretty sure I still owe you a present...maybe a pair of new shoes...since those soles are finished!

2nd annual

Welcome to Dan's parents to Colorado Springs again for the 2nd annual trip! See how cute Dan's dimple is :) After we picked them up from DIA we headed over to Boulder and ate at Chipotle - Blaine and Rita's first trip there!

We ate mexican food twice that day...Amanda's Fonda in Manitou Springs for dinner. It's the best! Seriously, if you come visit us, we will take you there! In the picture with Blaine and Rita are Dan's aunt Cheryl and cousin Scott who just got back from his year long tour in Iraq.

We took Brindi with us on a hike. We hiked the Palmer Trail, it is one of our favorites! If you come visit us we will take you there too :)

Blaine and Rita are so adventurous!

Giving Brindi a drink of water. She is such a good dog and she loves hiking! Good, because we are going to do a lot of it over the next years!

Looking forward to next year!!

this is my present?!? thanks bro

So last weekend my little brother Ty was in town and helped us move some furniture around in our workout room and spare room. While we were working he found a Christmas present that my older brother Jay gave me a few years ago. I got such a great laugh then, I thought I would share it with the blogging world.

Katie Burgess,

International Star Registry is proud to inform you that your loved one, Jay Burgess, has purchased the rights to name a star after you, Katie Burgess. The star chosen for you is the twenty second star from the sun in the Piedes solar system in the Anorxa galaxy.

As part of the special deal, you are also the proud new owner of the Katie Burgess star. As owner of said star you have been given all rights to any and all natural resources found, including coal, rubies, diamonds, etc... and in the event of an inter-galactic war, you have the responsibility to protect said star and any possible inhabitants from total annihilation.

As owner of this new star, we know that you are very excited and want to thank the person who bought you this star as he is quite possibly the coolest person in the world.

Sincerely,

International Star Registry

Included in my present was a picture of the sky with my star circled and titled..."your star".

I always thought it was kinda funny that people did this for real. Who actually has the authority to give the right to sell stars to people? Jay did get me a real Christmas present, but I have to say that my whole family laughed for a long time and still laugh now when we talk about my star that I have to protect from total annihilation...thats A LOT of responsibility.

My Friend Janet

This is kind of a strange thing to write. Its wierd putting this in writing, telling you about my friend Janet, in a past tense. I've never actually done this since she passed away almost 4 1/2 years ago. I first met Janet 11 years ago. We met at Southern Virginia College where we decided to go to school and play soccer. Janet was one of the first people I met there. We quickly became great friends, teammates, and roommates. Janet is apart of most of my college memories. Even after we both graduated from college we kept in touch. Along with our fellow friend/roommate/teammate Adrienne, I went down to North Carolina a couple days after she had giving birth to her first son, Kaiden, the end of October 2004. It was so wonderful to see her as a mother and how much she loved that little boy. I remember just watching her as she held him with such natural ease and loved to play with his hair to form a little mohawk. That was the last time I saw Janet. It was just a few months later that I got a call from Adrienne with the horrible news. So I will get to the point of me posting this.

Janet with Kaiden at their home in Durham.

On April 26th, 2005 Janet was murdered in her home in Durham, North Carolina. Kaiden was in the house with her but wasn't harmed. As I am sure you can imagine this was a very hard thing to deal with and try to make sense of. A lot of us were able to gather together in Buena Vista, Virgina where we all attended college, for her funeral. It helped to be together along with her family, however most of us are still void of any closure. We have accepted or are continually trying to accept the fact that there may never be any resolution to our friend's murder. However, just recently I received some exciting news. On Wednesday, August 26th, in a just a few days, they will be airing Janet's case on ABC's Primetime Crime. Please tune in to see her story - check your local listing for the time. I don't know how much of the episode will be dedicated to Janet and I don't know if this will bring any new leads to the detectives. This is what I do know, due to my testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that we will see Janet again, that family relationships and friendships can and will endure beyond on the grave.

"O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" -1st Corinthians 15:55

We got her!!!

We are so excited! We went to meet her tonight and the couple liked us so much they let us adopt her right then and there! The "mom" was really sad to give her up, but they live close so we promised they could visit anytime. She is even cuter in person and has such a fun personality. She is a 4 month old boxer lab mix but really looks part tiger. I do believe she is going to be a good fit for Dan and I. They named her Selena, which is pretty, but doesn't roll off my tongue very easily, so we are thinking Selena for her middle name, but are looking for a first name. We are sort of leaning towards Brynn or Brindy, but are definitely up for suggestions..so share your ideas! We are so excited to be able to take her hiking and running and biking and for her to really be a part of our family. Thank you to Dan's older brother Jamie who cured him of his dog allergies so we could get a dog! I will definitely keep you updated on her training and cuteness, but for now I gotta go, I want to play before she gets to tired!

still in the running

This is the little boxador puppy that I am pretty sure I mentioned in a previous post. I got a call the other day from her owner to tell us that we are still in the running. We get to meet her on Monday! I hope we do well on the "interview" :). Her family is moving out of the country soon and obviously can't take her with them, so...thats where we come into play. I think she is so cute, I mean look at her little face! Dan has been reading Ceasar Millan's (the dog whisperer) book, The Pack Leader. We are totally getting ready, hopefully WE like HER and SHE likes US! Although I still hate to get a dog before a baby, but hey such is life.

Christmas in August?

On my day off last week I was feeling very crafty, so I went to a couple material stores to see if I could get inspired. I went into our (me and my mom, not me and Dan) favorite quilt shop and it was so busy - I found my favorite quilt lady - as I call her and found out they were having a huge sale...then she said, yeah, I haven't seen your Mom in here :) Told you it was our favorite. Too bad my Mom was out of town...or maybe it was secretly a good thing, I would have spent mucho more money with her to help me decide on material for a new quilt! Anyway. I got some baby blanket flannel which I choose not to post in case the recipient of a baby quilt looks at my blog. However I did see this really cute Mary Engelbreit Christmas material.

This "layer cake" is cool because you don't have to go searching for material that goes well together and they have already done that for you!

I think I am going to make a Christmas Tree skirt.

P.S. Too any of you fellow bloggers out there that have their favorite craft-type idea blogs that you would like to share, let me know! Thank you!

the fruits of our labors

We planted 3 squash plants, only 1 grew, but it seems like it will be providing us quite a few beautiful yellow vegetables. We had our first homegrown squash on Friday night. It was delicious! Why did I not like squash as a kid??

Action shot of Dan "harvesting". As you might be able to see, we haven't done a great job weeding our garden. I'll do better next year, one step at a time.

My attempt at a self portrait. Despite the man at bicycle village telling me I have abnormally long arms...I guess they aren't long enough.

Dan is much better at it :)

update on Annie

No Annie, you aren't allowed on the couch....oh well, you look so cute. We were cooking dinner one night and hadn't seen her for a few minutes started calling her name, Dan walked over to our family room, and this is what he found...I hope we do a little better job when we discipline our children.

Friday night we were playing in the backyard, this is the best picture I could get of her before our camera ran out of batteries. Yeah it's not a very good picture but oh well. She was going nuts! Running SO fast around in circles, she had Dan and I cracking up! If you look close you can see that she is in mid-stride. For a little dog she can really haul!

I love our backyard. We all still working on parts of it. We (as in my parents and us) put the mulch in around the grass last summer and we put more grass seed in the summer, its coming in ok. The rest of the grass looks great, lots of rain this summer and Dan has been fertilizing it quite a bit. Next spring we are going to get a few more trees to go along our back fence to get a little more privacy - eventually.

ward campout

We had a ward campout last week, and this is the only picture I took, lame. It really wasn't cold at all, Dan was just being funny. It was a great time, not over planned, good food, good friends, bugs, little kids building a "fire" unsupervised...but without matches, so we were safe.

small obsession

I love my OPI nail polish, I love painting my nails. I don't know why all the sudden I have this obsession, but I do. I will let you in on a little secret...I am not very good at painting my nails. I can't paint "in the lines" so I just practically paint my entire finger and then spend the next day peeling the excess off. Dan makes fun of me.

We kinda want a dog

Well this is my Grandma's dog, Annie. Dan and I are going to dog-sit her while she is out of town. She is such a great little dog! Dan was recently treated for his dog allergies by his brother Jamie who is a chiropractor, and seems to be "cured" after spending Sunday afternoons around Annie, as well as my parent's 2 dogs, Sage and Maizey, and not having any reactions...but we thought it would be a good idea to really see if he is cured before we get a dog, so my grandma is lending us Annie for a few days. This was all brought on by getting an email from a lady in our ward whose son and daughter in law need to find a new home for their boxer/lab mix puppy...she is so cute, I mean SO! Dan is pretty in to the idea as well, looking online every night for another puppy in case we don't get the "boxador" puppy, which I hope we will, but you never know. Wish us luck!

no 4th of July stuff yet

I am very disappointed in my fellow bloggers. The below video is one of the funniest videos I have ever seen, and very few of you are watching it. Maybe I just choose to believe that more people are visiting my blog than actually are, but seriously, if you have 1 minute and 14 seconds watch it, you won't be sorry, plus it will probably prompt one of those laughs that makes you remember how much you love laughing!! And then leave a note so I know you did, geez, I am being so bossy!

"Ken Leee" - nuff said!

baby blankets

I have so many people around me having babies! Don't get excited, we have no announcement to make...other than these cool blankets :) My Mom helped me figure out how to make them, and although that are not complicated I think they turned out so cute!

This one was for my sister-in-law Alaina, who just had her first baby. She had a little girl named Ariah whom we get to meet this week along with another new nephew Cruz (sorry that you didn't get one Cruz, this is a new found ability)!!! I found this super cute material and even though there is very little pink - I thought it was perfect! Hey, girls like green!!!

This one is for my friend Janeen who just had her first little boy David a couple of days ago!

I just hope that these blankets are useful as I think they are cute!

Freaky Potatoes

So the big question is... How long have they been in there?  How long do they have to be sitting in a cupboard before those arms start growing?  And how long does it take the arms to get that long?  Our estimation: 4 months.  

I was checking on what I needed to get at the store for dinner.  I think we may have potatoes...

AHHHHHHH!  I laughed for 10 minutes.  The little branch arm thingys started growing out of the holes in the bag.  It was quite startling.

It may not strike you as funny as it did me.  I had never seen anything like that before!  I just wanted to include you in my little domestic discoveries!  

New Bathroom

So remember how I told you in a previous post that we never get really good before pictures...yeah, well while I was at work one Saturday Dan demo'd our guest bathroom upstairs without taking a before picture...the nerve!!!  Anyway, this is kinda in the middle, after the carpet was ripped out, but before the painting.  It is nice to have the carpet out, considering who knows how dirty it was!  

This is me putting down the cement board getting ready for the tile.

Our pretty tile floor.  We were up LATE finishing it.   The tile baseboards are my favorite!  Dan and I re-did the tile in the shower a couple years ago.  That was probably our first project together...we were only dating at the time...but I knew I was investing in my future home!

Dan has got skillz!  I really love that his know-how gives us a chance to work together.  I love having a house!!  I will post another picture once we get the whole bathroom put together.

Future Garden

So we are trying to fix up our yard little by little.  This is our side yard about a month and a half ago.  See all that rock, yeah, we sifted that huge pile to get the dirt out and moved it to the other side of the yard to be dealt with later-thats another blog post, maybe in the fall.

About 3 weeks ago...

And today!

My mom and dad came over to help us finish.  We loaded up all of the old mulch, sod we dug up last summer, basically trash into the back of my dad's truck to be taken to the dump tomorrow.  Roto-tilled to loosen the dirt/soil/sand.  Then divided the areas with a couple railroad ties.  Now we have the beginnings of our garden.  I am hoping that Dan's farming blood will help our little garden flourish.  Now we just need to plant.  I also want to plant some flowers back there so I can have fresh flowers in my house!  I love peonies, but need some variety, so if you have ideas let me know!

Bolder Boulder

So here goes my cramming for the Bolder Boulder.  You'd think I would have overcome my procrastinating problem, nope!  I really wanted to finish in under 60 minutes (its a 10k).  Not that hard for many people, but definitely an accomplishment for me.  Problem is I wait so long to really start training.  Part of it I will blame on the weather :)  I am hoping that the little bit of mountain biking and hiking along with the sporadic running will have some positive impact.  So I have two weeks.  Here goes nothing!  --Julina, are we doing this or what?!?

Can we vote off the Judges?

Can we vote off the judges?  I am so sick of all the judges on American Idol...except Paula.  First to go, Kara.  She is so annoying, I don't even know why they added her.  Next Simon.  He is so pompous and it is really starting to get to me.  Then Randy, yo yo dog, a little pitchy is spots, not the right song choice for me...for you.  Does it actually count as judging when you say the same thing over and over again.  Oh and as long as we are voting people off, first Adam.  I am so over him and I wasn't always an Adam hater.  Then Allison, although I am glad she sort of told Simon off tonight.  Danny and Kris in the final and I kinda want Kris to win, but wouldn't be mad if Danny won.  Adam is full of himself I can't even stand it.  The one thing I am the most mad about is that I watched it on Tivo so couldn't vote.  Sorry this is just me venting.

The Incline-the most trespassed trail in America

The incline is a funny trail, if you can even call it that.  It is just a set of stairs (made of rail road ties) in Manitou Springs, that is technically closed to the public, although no one pays a bit of attention to the "No Trespassing" sign.  There is a gain of about 2,000 feet in just a little over one mile.  Some local nuts do the incline a couple times a week when the weather permits.  We are not like that, and we are definitely not breaking any world records getting up to the top.  In our opinion anytime under an hour is a pretty respectable.

In the car, Dan is seriously driving on 1-25 at that exact moment.  Yes, we have matching visors.

This is just at the beginning, hadn't hit the really steep - 68% grade - yet.

A look from the top down.

I like this shot because it makes it look so much steeper and scarier than it actually is.

Dan and I at the top.  A nice lady offered to take our picture.  I felt kinda funny, like a tourist or something.  Dan and I have both been up the incline numerous times, but everything we do now, I think, oh, we need to take pictures so I can put this on our blog!