Spokane Trip: July 7th BBQ

Ok, so admittedly I have gotten to the point where we are so far behind on the summer blog posts that it is daunting just to try and begin to catch up, but as I want to keep a record, here goes nothing!

The week of July 7th through the 13th my sister Charlie and her two children were visiting in Spokane while my brother in law got things finalized to move with the Coast Guard from Alaska to Michigan.  We don't get to see her and her family much, so everyone met up in Spokane to spend the week there.  The first thing we did was have a family barbecue on my Mom's side Saturday evening.  Here are the highlight pictures from the gathering.

This is my sister Charlie with her two children, Kirsten and Nathan, and our Grandfather.

My two nephews Wyatt and Nathan.

The four of us sisters.  Awesome that we all accidentally dressed in black and white.  And don't judge how I look, I was trying not to melt...

My sister, Jennifer, her son, Wyatt, and Wyatt's dad, Dan.

My Mom and her Father.

This picture is funny to me because if you look closely Ellie is sucking on her tongue (a tired indicator for her) even while she plays.  The girl was BEAT.

All of the cousins that were there for the barbecue.  Pretty good considering we were only missing two.

It was great to see so much of the family for the first time in a while, despite the heat.  Hopefully we can see them more often than once every few years!

Family Pictures

This last week Ellie and I were in Spokane where all 3 of my sisters, their kids, and our parents were for the first time in 2 years.  As this usually only occurs once every 4 years or so, we always get family pictures done  when we're all together.  My only disappointment is that Steve had summer school all week when we had to get pictures done, so I don't have any pictures of the 3 (really 4 anymore) of us.  But, I'll share a few of the bigger group shots and the pictures we got of Ellie and I.  Try not to judge the weird faces Ellie was making or the fact that she'd obviously been crying at times.  She was having a ROUGH day.

Here is the whole group of us, minus all three husbands.

 The four of us girls.

Some shots of all the grandkids - minus those not yet born of course!

I won't put pictures up of other's individual shots, but here are the ones we got of Ellie.

Like I said, it was a rough day for her...  Off and on.

(I feel I should explain here Ellie was singing a song about a turtle eating up soap and she was doing the actions.  So cute)

Where as I have no explanation for this ferocious and cute expression.  I just remember falling down laughing when we got it.

And lastly, the shots of the 3 Bennett girls we got for Daddy.  It's about time the photo of us in his office didn't have a 6 week old Ellie in it...

There is something fitting about Ellie's holding a football in this picture.  That ball was all that kept her happy for a chunk of photos.  Poor girl, but at least we have some pictures to remember this fun time while Ellie talks about the "baby tummy".

And the Gender is....

Today we had our 20 week ultrasound.  The baby was not crunched up in one tiny part of my uterus refusing to be measured (Ellie).  However, it also didn't show us what it was right away like Ellie did.  We had another long ultrasound with a baby who felt like keeping its back to the machine and refusing to let them get all they needed pictures of (Ellie).  So, in 6 weeks we have another ultrasound because we didn't get to see the baby's face even once and the doctor didn't get a clear enough picture of the heart to satisfy him that everything is good there.  He did say that nothing looked wrong, so that's good, and baby is big again, measuring in the 95th and 98th percentiles for different measurements.  The doctor told us he has learned not to trust those completely, and we both agreed and believed them at the same time because Ellie always measured big during ultrasounds, and she still is in the 98th percentile for her age group of girls.

Oh, and right at the very end of the ultrasound, we did get to find out what we're having.  And we will see if we continue to make big tall girls, because Ellie is going to have a little sister!  This pregnancy has been so completely different than Ellie was that we were a little surprised it's another girl, but not at all disappointed.  We are excited for Ellie to have a sister to play with and we have both loved our girl and look forward to loving two girls now!  And, we look forward to putting our bins and bins of stored pink and purple to good use again rather than buying lots of new things.  What can I say, I'm cheap...

Steve says this means he needs to buy more guns, but I have a sneaking suspicion he would have said the same thing if it was a boy and then he'd just need more guns so he could go shooting with his son.  If this girl loves Daddy half as much as Ellie does though, I'm sure he'll still get to shoot with her, because we have learned with Ellie that with a Daddy's girl, everything he likes she likes too.

Beyond that, everything is going pretty well minus a few major back spasms (thank goodness for muscle relaxers, icy hot patches, heat pads, and hot baths!).  Our doctor has said my weight gain is right in the normal range and not worrisome at all which is a good sign for our doing all we can to avoid preeclampsia again, and we were reassured today that the severe type I had called HELP syndrome is very rare in general and reoccurence is even less likely, so we are healthy and ready to take what comes.  Now to pull out all the pink and purple!  As we move... again...

(Oh, and the major downside of the baby's back being to us - not a single picture of baby to share!  All we got were a few shots of fingers, legs, and spine.  Lame.  Stinking stubborn Bennett genes.... and maybe a few Rose ones too...)

The Belly

So, I keep meaning to take belly shots of this pregnancy, and yet.... The only pictures I have are from right before our first ultrasound at 9.5 weeks along.  Until today.  Ok, granted, we are now 17.5 weeks along, but at least I finally got it done!  Yup, I'm pregnant.  In fact I had my first moment yesterday where I caught my reflection in a store window and went woah....  I no longer just look fat (yay!), I look - pregnant.  Dumb, I know, but it still doesn't quite sink in for me most of the time.

  From the front.  (Jeans actually kind of hide the belly some - it's way more noticeable in a dress or skirt, which makes it all seem like a huge difference to me on Sundays.)

The other fun part is that this baby is really strong.  I don't feel it all the time, but starting at about 14.5 weeks I could feel the baby a couple times a week and now it's more like a couple times a day.  In fact, this morning Steve came to cuddle with me during the snooze session on his alarm, and I cuddled up and went back to sleep, but apparently Steve wasn't so lucky.  I must have been out of it, because Steve said the baby didn't want his hand on my stomach and kept hitting and kicking it repeatedly!  I love feeling the baby move, it's so reassuring and makes it all seem real somehow, and I love that now Steve gets to feel the baby too.

Oh, and less than 3 weeks till our next ultrasound when we hopefully get to find out whether this little strong one is a boy or a girl!

Counting and Twinkle

So, this is going to be quick because I need to get ready for work, but I took these videos today and wanted to share then with family.  It blows my mind what Ellie can do without our really knowing she has the skills till she starts doing it!  For instance, she just started counting to 4 or 5 a month or two ago without our having ever worked on it!  And she keeps adding numbers so that now she can count to ten at 20.5 months old.  Maybe that's not that unusual, but it blows my mind.

Oh, and she LOVES music right now.  Especially, Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree (nursery song from church), but she knows at least half the words to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, so here she is helping me sing today.

Yup, she's pretty much amazing.  And SO MUCH FUN!

Ellie's first Hockey game

Ellie is quite the sports fan, something I'm proud of.  The way I figure it, if I can get her to like the things I like (roasted meat, firearms, and sports) then she's more likely to like guys who like what I like.  If she likes guys that like what I like, then she's much less likely to bring home some vegan, metrosexual, liberal, hippy, environmentalist loser that I'd have to "make disappear".

The Tri-Cities has a hockey team the Tri-City Americans (kind of a AA type club), and a couple of months ago Nicolle won tickets for a game.  It was time for a momentous occasion, Ellie's first hockey game.  

Now football is my favorite sport, bar none; but hockey is my favorite sport to watch live, bar none.  Why?  The atmosphere at a hockey game HAS to be what it was like to be in the Roman Colosseum watching the gladiatorial games.  During the game a player took a slap shot puck (traveling at about 120 mph) right to the face, the crowd's reaction?  "BRUSH IT OFF YOU FREAKIN PANSY WE HAVE TO WIN THIS GAME!!!!!!!!!!"

The game was going great, and Ellie was really enjoying it.  We got to the third period, and I was worried that Ellie wouldn't get the full hockey experience.  What was missing?  WE HADN'T SEEN A FIGHT YET!  My worries were assuaged half way through the third when two players dropped gloves and went at it.  During the fight I kept whispering in Ellie's ear "Lets see some of those pansies from Twilight do THAT!  Sweetheart, those are REAL men."

 

When the game was over the Tri-City beat Everett 7-2.  The game was great, and it was a great family night.  Live hockey, ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!

 

Easter: Take 2 - Preston

I know, I have fallen way behind on the blog updates.  I want to make sure I record the fun memories we had going to Preston on April 2nd through the 8th.  We headed out of Spokane Monday and drove to Preston where Grandma and Grandpa Bennett got the news about Ellie becoming a big sister.

Then on Tuesday we had beautiful weather so we headed to Logan to Willow Park where they have a great little zoo and park.  Ellie loved seeing all the animals.  She was so cute too, because she had to say "Hi!" to all the animals we looked at and chatter at them some before we could move on.

Taking a quick break from all the walking.  Ellie loves to climb on things and let you know she's sitting, but I won't say the word it sounds like she says each time she says sit.  Let's just say we need to work on our ssss instead of shhh.

Here she is totally fascinated by the "peeyock".

After the zoo Ellie had fun on the slides with Daddy and Papa, playing in the bark, and then we forced her to tolerate a swing for a few minutes.  Man that girl hates swings!

Wednesday Steve, Ellie, and I had the day mostly to ourselves.  Ellie enjoyed playing with the dogs, riding one of the horses that is housed at Ray and Reva's right now, and going for a four-wheeler ride.  

After taking this picture I climbed on too and held Ellie around Steve so that she was doubly secured.  We also didn't go very fast, but she loved having the wind blow over her the whole time.

This is what a similar four-wheeler ride looked like later on that week.

On Thursday we headed down and spent the day in Ogden with Steve's sister Kathy, her daughter Amanda, and Kathy's new fiance's son, Max.  We went to the Tree House Museum and out for lunch before heading back to visit Steve's sister Lori for a while and head back to Preston.

Here are pictures from the children's museum.  Ellie loved the drums in the music area, the colored blocks on the light table, and the play kitchen.  She had a blast!

This was Ellie PASSED OUT as we left Ogden.  She played so hard and hadn't napped at ALL!  I love that she fell asleep while she was eating - you can see the apples in her mouth still.  I was a little nervous and kept checking to make sure I could hear her breathing.  She woke up and finished eating her apple slice in her mouth and then went right back to sleep.

That night Kathy, Amanda, and Ryan came to Preston and stayed for the weekend with everyone else, so we had a nice lazy play day on Friday and Reva helped me with some domestic projects I couldn't have done with out her help.  We made a CUTE new blanket for Ellie when she gets her toddler bed and Reva told me what to do and I made her famous cinnamon rolls.  This is one of the trays before Reva frosted them.  They're pretty much amazing.  

Then Saturday we split up men and women.  The girls headed to our niece Erin's bridal shower, and the guys kept her fiance Jordin busy with brauts and shooting.  After everyone had reunited and Ellie had napped, we began our Easter festivities.  Amanda was a great help with Ellie dying her first Easter eggs.

And Ellie even enjoyed painting one.

Then both girls enjoyed an Easter egg hunt.  After already having experienced the joys of hunting eggs about a week earlier, Ellie knew just what to do and needed no assistance.  She especially loved opening up eggs that had jelly beans in them!

After the egg hunt the girls took turns riding the horse again.  Amanda is big enough she got to ride on her own.

But Ellie always had a few escorts.  Here's the whole gang from that weekend minus myself.

After all those festivities, it was just about bed time, so Ellie went and snuggled up with Kathy and Amanda for some bed time reading.

The next day we went to church with Steve's folks and then hit the road to get home so Steve and I could both get to work on Monday.  It wasn't the most relaxing Easter, but we got to enjoy so much fun the week previous it wasn't a big sacrifice.  We always have such a great time when we visit family, and it was doubly exciting this time to get to go down and share our big news with everyone!