one year later....

Oh my, it has literally been almost a year since I last posted. Every time I wanted to blog I just felt so behind that there was no possible way to recap all of it - and there is not. So we will just talk about the very most important parts!

I'm sure all of you know by now that Shane and I moved to Utah! We moved in July of  last year and we absolutely love it. It is so beautiful here and the opportunities for fun are endless. The weather is beautiful and you can actually be outside for more than 30 seconds without breaking out into a full sweat. We live in West Jordan and work at West Ridge Academy. It's a residential treatment center for youth. We are "mother" and "father" to a range of girls. They are punks, but we love them. We do miss Texas though, and we miss our families - But Utah is a great place to be missing them from.

Our ONE YEAR has come and gone - haha I think the last entry I posted it wasn't even our 3 month mark yet. So, needless to say, a lot has gone on as well as gone un-mentioned - sadly. We have had a blast though. Our first year was a breeze and we loved every minute of it together. We're out here, and all we really have is each other. My brother lives an hour away and our schedules don't coincide to often, so we don't see them much. Our cousin lives about 40 minutes away and their schedules don't really work with ours too often either. We go to church where we work - so there are no adults other than us and the other staff that work here... so really... all we have had for the past 9 months- is each other. And it has just been the best thing. We can make fun out of any situation we are in, as long as we have the other by our side. We have learned so much and grown so strong - It has really just been such a blessing. We wake up every day knowing we chose the right person to spend eternity with.

On our anniversary we didn't do much unfortunately. Money isn't necessarily growing on trees around here, but we still had a great time. We spent the night in a hotel in Salt lake city and just ordered a pizza to our hotel room haha. The next day we drove out to park city and just kind of drove around. We looked at all the homes out there and drove around main street - which is so interesting by the way. Just esthetically it is rather absurd, which makes it neat. We found and little burger place out there and had lunch- which was SOOO yummy by the way - wish I could remember the dang name of it. After that we just headed home, when we got here Shane surprised me with the awesome cake ball maker I had my eye on. He is so thoughtful. But all in all we just enjoyed spending the day together.

So the most exciting news as of late... drum roll pleaseeeeeee.... This eggo is preggo. Yep, were pregnant and we are super excited! I told Shane just a few days before our Anniversary. I wanted to wait until that day but, I just couldn't wait any longer - I had already known and kept quite for too long. When we were first married, we originally wanted to wait a few years, until he was at least into dental school and we got things a little more settled, but sometimes life doesn't always go how you think, but it goes even better. We were getting more and more baby hungry every month that passed by and I kept telling my self we need to wait, we don't have enough money, Shane's still in school, we haven't been married long enough... we had a million reasons to wait. Shane was on board and so ready to be a dad, I was the one that needed convincing. We started to pray about it, and after a few months we just knew. And a few months later, I had the best news to share. We had been trying so I was testing everyday that week (with little cheapie strips I had bought off line) and then one day, as I was about to throw yet another negative strip out...I glanced at it again and saw the faintest line. I seriously thought I was making it up. I was in shock and so happy. I had seen only one line on these things for so long, I was amazed that they DID actually have two lines that could appear. haha. It was very surreal. But I bit my tongue and kept my mouth shut. I didn't want to just hand Shane the test - I wanted to tell him in a special way and it was so faint at this point I didn't even know if he would believe it.  So I waited and waited, thought and thought. The idea finally came to me.  One day when he was at school I went out to complete the task. I found a stretch of road that had 4 relatively close walk way bridges over Bangeter highway - you know where people always write in cups? Welcome back elder, or will you marry me - cleaver fun things like that? Well. I picked him up from school and told him we were going somewhere special. We drove down Bangeter - "Whats that?" We were at a stop light and I pointed to the big writing on the bridge. It read in big red cup letters "SHANE...."  "HEY, it says my name?" I told him that was weird and that someone must have the same name as him. He knew I was lying. We continued to drive and we came to the next bridge "Happy 1 year". He read it aloud and said thank you- He thought that was the end and I was just celebrating our first anniversary. Again, We continued our drive. The next sign said "Guess what..." He continued to repeat the phrases trying to figure out what it could be.. Shane, happy one year... guess what?... over and over. Finally we reached our last bridge, we were turning on this next road to reach our final ending place. He squinted his eyes to try to read what the next sign said so far ahead "I'm pregnant"? He read it questionably."Whatt? no youre not..." He looked at me. "Yes, I am." He immediately lost it. He was so happy and over joyed. We had to pull over so we didn't wreck. It was seriously the best reaction I could have ever hoped for. This was the happiest I had ever seen him. I caught it all on my camera phone, but cut off on accident right after I told him...dang it. I would post it - But I don't think he would be too happy with me.. So I won't.:) After that we drove to babies R us just down the road and picked out a few little things to celebrate. When we got home, I showed him my stash of tests I had been taking to convince my self... he just laughed. He couldn't believe how many there were... I will be honest... I was a little excessive... But I really didn't believe it!

Since then we have had a few doctors appointments. They had to get me in early, and send me to a specialist because I was having pains. They were worried the baby was ectopic. We were so blessed to find out that our baby was in the right place and growing. What had been causing my pains was my uterus. I have kind of a weird situation. They aren't sure exactly which I have but I either have a Bicornuate uterus or  Uterus Didielphys. These are both splits in the uterus the difference is, just how far does the split go. It is very rare - so not a lot of doctors have dealt with it. It is just something I was born with, and how my uterus formed when I was a fetus. But anyways, this does pose some risks toward being pregnant and toward the baby. Mostly I am considered high risk. I have an MRI scheduled for Thursday of this week so that they will know more about my uterus and know if I have one or two kidneys in case I need to have a c-section to deliver. ( most of the time the babies are breech because there isn't enough room for them to turn as they naturally would - It's like growing a baby in half a uterus) This "condition" or whatever you might call it is usually related to having only one kidney - so that is also a reason for the MRI. But so far, we have been SO blessed. Every time we have gone to the doctor the baby has been healthy and moving around- and so far the baby is staying head down (cross your fingers for me....) I am so grateful to our Heavenly Father for even allowing us the ability to even get pregnant, I pray that everything continues to go well!!

But for the fun parts I am 15 weeks and in my second trimester! Yay! We have appointments during the beginning of May so I HOPE they will be able to tell us what we are having!! My guess is a boy! but that's just a guess - so don't hold me to it if I'm wrong!

 This is What I showed Shane when we got home after I told him the news! haha
(this wasn't all of them either....)

 This is what we sent our families to tell the them news!

 One of the better pictures we got at our last ultrasound! Baby is GROWING!

This is the little blanket and lamb we bought at Babies "R" Us on the day I told Shane

We went to the Red and White Utah game this last weekend! This is us on our way to the game in our Utah gear