For the first time in the 7 years Kolt & I have been together, we spent our first Christmas away from our family in Tucson. I was a little sad & missing family, but we made due with our Alaska friends. Christmas eve we went over to the neighbors house for dinner. They had invited us & 3 other couples & everyone brought a different dish. We had a great meal, Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, fruit salad, etc. It was fun & there were babies everywhere! Our neighbors have become good friends of ours, they have 2 little boys, 2 years & 8 months. The wife is in the Coast Guard & the husband stays home. Out of the 5 couples, including us, that were there, Kolt was the only husband who was active duty. The wives were the active duty out of the other 4 couples. Kolt & I got a kick out of how times have changed with the military & how it's not so uncommon for the female to be active duty & the husband to stay home now. But we had good food & good company & a good night. After dinner Kolt & I came back home to relax & we decided to open a baby gift from my sister, Mandy. We also exchanged gifts with Kolt's friend Cooper. He bought us our first box of diapers. Mandy gave us some wipes & a baby blanket. The neighbors gave us a little frog booster chair for the dinner table for when the baby gets a little bigger. We LOVE all of our baby gifts so far.
Christmas morning we woke up & Kolt made a breakfast casserole that we usually eat every Christmas morning at his mom's house. We had Gunner open his gifts so that he had something to keep him busy. Then Kolt & I took turns opening all of our gifts. I think we each got everything we wanted plus more. The rest of the day was very relaxing. We stayed in our pajamas all day, I slept while Kolt watched tv. In the afternoon, Kolt made our Christmas dinner. Ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing, & green bean casserole. It was delicious. I had baked homemade chocolate chip cookies the night before & had also made some of my mom's homemade fudge for desert.
Last week I had a doctor's appointment for a check-up. The Dr. had been trying for several weeks to hear the baby's heartbeat but couldn't get anything. She was tracking me at 12 weeks as of last Friday, which she assumed just from info I had given her. After yet again, no heartbeat, she sent me over for an ultrasound. Almost immediately we heard a fast little fluttering heartbeat & saw our little baby on the screen. It was moving a little which just consists of a little wiggle like motion right now. The ultrasound tech measured the baby & told me I was 9 weeks & 1 day. No wonder the Dr couldn't hear the baby's heartbeat. The doplar that the Dr. uses usually doesn't pick it up until about 12 weeks. So, we now have a much more accurate due date of July 26, 2012 & I am 10 weeks as of today. They printed up a few pics for us but a couple were kinda blurry. I am posting the best one. The baby is upside down so the head is at the bottom.
I know, I know, once again, I've been slacking on the blog front, but I promise I have a good excuse. WE'RE PREGNANT!!!!!!!!!! I think all of our family knows so I figured it's safe to post it on here now. So please forgive me for the lack of updates, but I have seriously been so tired & this past week very sick. It has been very hard working full time when all I want to do is sleep & I haven't been able to eat much. Food sounds so good to me, especially food I can only get in Tucson or the lower 48, like Chipotle, Eeggee's, Lucky wishbone, Olive Garden, & Casa Del Rio, however, when I do smell any kind of food or actually have a bite, it makes me sick. I have been told this will pass & then I will eat a lot, but Sitka is not a good place for a pregnant woman. There are no good restaurants here. I usually go to work & then come home & go to sleep, I wake up to eat dinner & then go back to bed. Some days when I'm off work I will sleep all day in the living room. Thankfully, I have the most AMAZING husband to help me. Kolt has been absolutely wonderful so far, picking up all of my slack around the house & trying to give me the things I need or crave. He has been so patient with my out of the blue breakdowns over the fact that I can't eat or that I don't feel good. We had our first Dr's appointment last week & I met my Dr & her nurse & I absolutely love them both & therefore will not be seeing any other doctors. The Dr. thought I was about 8-9 weeks, so now I am roughly 9-10 weeks & possibly due around July 4th. She tried to pick up the baby's heartbeat but since it was early, she only had it for a second & it was not something Kolt or I would have been able to hear & understand. We have an appointment again next week to go back so she can try & monitor the heartbeat again. I'm not sure what else they will do at that appointment. I have not had any sonograms or ultrasounds or anything yet but I did do some blood work at the appointment last week. They provided me with tons of information & resources as well. My "morning sickness" didn't kick in until the day after the appointment but once it did, it didn't go away. I haven't been getting sick I just constantly feel sick & therefore have not been eating a lot. I have been trying all sorts of different suggestions & recommendations from the nurse & from friends & family as well. On top of my constant nausea, I have a bladder infection, which is apparently common for pregnant women, & I now also have a bad cold. Needless to say, I'm not a happy person right now, but I've been doing my best not to take it out on Kolt & I think I've done a pretty good job so far, haha. The Dr did recommend that I get a flu shot since I am pregnant, even though I don't usually get one, now I'm just scared as to how my body will react to it & that it might make the nausea worse.
So other than our pregnancy news, nothing much going on here. We are getting ready for Christmas but there isn't much to do this year. We are working on ordering & shipping gifts home for everyone. We do plan on coming home next year for Christmas with the baby. We had about 2-3 weeks of snow here, I think it was a total of 32 inches, but it hasn't snowed in about a week & it has been raining so most of it has cleared out, however, the ice was really bad right after. I hope that some of you have been able to watch the Coast Guard Alaska show on the weather channel. Tonight's episode had a Sitka search & rescue & I think the next few weeks will also be showing Sitka's air station.
