It's a.....

We're having a GIRL!!!!!

This morning at our 20 week appointment we found out God has blessed us with a little baby girl. She is healthy and weighs 12 oz., which is right on track for how far a long I am. I am also healthy, doing great, and have gained 6 lbs. at this point.

Going into the appointment I was expecting them to tell us we were having a boy. Why? Because it seems all of my friends have had or are having boys and both of our families have LOTS of boys. Joe was hoping it was a girl and had thought that it was going to be a girl. I was quite surprised when we were told it was a girl. I was partly surprised because as soon as the tech put the doppler on my stomach she happened to hit right between the legs with a clear shot. She said "you're having a girl." I thought she was kidding because it seriously hadn't been two seconds since she had started. She told us she was 100% sure it's a girl because of the angle she was able to see the sex organs. To quote her she said, "There are no boy parts down there." We are both excited! :)

This first picture is a profile of our little girl. :) The one below it is one of her face straight on. It looks a little creepy because it mostly is emphasizing her skull. 

It was amazing getting to see all that we did. I am so grateful we have the technology we do. As you can see, the baby looks like a baby now. It was neat to get to see the heart beat again, her bones, and all of her organs. It was awesome to see the baby move on the screen while feeling it at the same time.

My clothes are slowly starting to get too small. A few of my pants still fit and some of my shirts do. I have upgraded to mostly maternity shirts at this point. They are just more comfortable. I know from the picture of my belly you wouldn't guess my clothes don't fit. People keep being surprised with how little my belly is, but I think people don't realize that you don't 'look' pregnant for most of the pregnancy. I feel great. I'm still able to workout on a regular basis. I haven't felt tired during the day or anything like that. I'm sure as things progress I will! No crazy cravings, although I do enjoy spicy food even more than I did before getting pregnant. Garlic bothers my stomach, so I try to avoid it. (Sorry Berni's!)

Thanks for all of your prayers and excitement during this time in our lives!!!!

Crab'n on the Bayou

Every place Joe lives he likes to pick up a new 'sport'. Since we're in FL and live on the water he has started fishing and just recently bought a crab trap. This morning he checked our trap after filling it with the bones leftover from buffalo wings last night. There were two stone crabs inside. Stone crabs have large claws with the best meat. They are regulated though, and have to be a certain size to be able to be taken. Only one of the crabs had a claw big enough. Here's the crab we kept. Their claws are quite strong, enough that it can bruise your bone! Joe was smart and grabbed some tactical gloves before engaging with the crab.Here is the claw he took. It measured about 5 1/2 inches long. So we boiled the claw and made a scramble with the meat.

This is our resident Heron. We see him almost everyday around our 'backyard'. He was out on the dock when Joe went to check the crab trap.

Welsh Rabbit

Joe and I have established what you might call a 'tradition' in our family for Saturday mornings. We sleep in (if I have my way :) ) and Joe pretty much always cooks a big breakfast for us, usually making some kind of delicious egg dish. Often it is some kind of scramble. This last Saturday he wanted to branch out and try something new. He made Welsh Rabbit. Unlike the name implies it doesn't call for rabbit. The sauce that is used is a rarebit sauce, which often is mispronounced as 'rabbit', hence the name. The sauce is cheddar cheese, beer, worcheshire sauce and red pepper. The other components of the dish are english muffins, canadian bacon and poached eggs. We didn't have any canadian bacon, so we had sausage on the side instead. Joe also poached his first eggs for this recipe. They turned out well. Over all the dish was great and has inspired Joe to continue to try new recipes for Saturday morning.

Valentine's Day

For Valentine's Day we went to The Melting Pot for dinner. It was delicious and quite the treat. We went all out, getting the 4 course meal, which included cheese fondue, salad, meat course and dessert. It would be hard to pick a favorite of them all. Of the 6 different kinds of meat, the salmon was the best. It was fun getting to cook the meat and veggies in the broth and then dipping them in 1 of 6 different sauces. Dessert of course was great too, although we were pretty full by the time it came. We went with the 'Flaming Turtle'. :)

Winter Adventures in KY

Joe went TDY to KY for a week and I got to go with him. (It's a great perk of not having a job!) It was fun to get to stay in a nice hotel, see family and visit Louisville on the governments dime. We said it was almost like a vacation. Part of the reason I wanted to go with Joe is we got to see family during the visit. My youngest brother Daniel goes to school in TN. We saw him on the drive up and back. Here we ate dinner at the Davy Crockett Diner. You can't really tell in the picture, but they are standing in front of a huge, wooden statue of Davy. We got to eat out at lots of unique places in Louisville. Joe and I always try to find the local spots to get the full flavor of the city we're visiting. Here we're at Lynn's Paradise Cafe, which was featured on the Food Network. Unfortunately we didn't get to eat there because of the power outage (more about that in a minute). My favorite spot on the trip was the Highlands Coffee Shop. They had DELICIOUS coffee.

When we were driving up to KY on Sunday it started to snow a little. We figured no big deal. Monday it snowed more and got really cold, down into the teens. Tuesday we woke up to a few inches of snow. At this point it wasn't really too big of deal. Then Tuesday night a big winter storm came through the state bringing ice during the night and then snow Wednesday morning. The ice caused trees to break off large limbs and power lines to snap down. Over half of the state lost power. Luckily our hotel didn't, but Joe ended up not working because the people he was working with didn't have power at home. The picture above and the following are ones we took Wednesday and the rest of the week. We definitely got our fill of winter weather this year!

The worst part about the storm was all the ice, although it was beautiful to look at on all of the trees. The ice was about an inch thick. This tree had cherries on it.

Joe is down cleaning off our car. There was a few inches of snow and then underneath was a thick layer of ice.

The view from our hotel room the morning after the storm. You can't really tell, but it's snowing.
Despite the crazy weather we were able to spend time with Joe's family and his cousins. It was a good trip. If your spouse is able to travel with you for a TDY I highly encourage you to do so.

Christmas, New Years and Visiting Family

We were blessed this year with being able to visit both of our families around the holidays. First we flew up to KY to see Joe's family. All of his extended family (well except for Cassy and Paul) live in KY and so they always have a big family get together to celebrate the season. This year it was at Carrie and Steve's house. They are great party planners and we had a blast. These are all buy 2 of the cousins. Bottom l to r: Joe, Tom, Andrew, Nick; Middle l to r: Carrie, Cassie, Katie; Top l to r: Jamie, Cameron, Allison

The Brown side of the family: Greg, Joe, me, Tom, Jenny, Katie and Jeff.

Carrie and Steve have a great basement where we hung out and played games including the infamous "Japs on the roof" (ask Joe about that one). In picture is Carrie, Jamie and Johnena

After spending Christmas with the Browns we headed to WA to spend New Years with the Drake family. Here we got to have some snow! It was great to get to spend time with Joshua and Daniel, especially since we don't seem them too often.

We went up to Point Defiance Park one day where we toured around Ft. Nisqually, checked out the logging museum and took in the sights around 5 mile drive. Joshua, Joe and I went ice skating another day. The guys showed me up. I hadn't been ice skating in I don't know how long. We also got to go see Daniel and his band, The Bombadil Project, perform up in Seattle. It was the first time Joe and I have seen them in concert. We were pretty impressed.

One morning my Dad, Joe and I went on a nature walk in Graham. We learned how to identify types of trees, brush and berries. This isn't a great picture because I have my eyes closed, but I wanted to include it because of the size of the leaf I'm holding. The area was full of Douglas Fir trees and there were leaves from them laying all around. We don't get nature like that around here.For New Years Eve we went to First Night in downtown Tacoma. The city shuts down the main streets for pedestrians and has all kinds of entertainment all night long from street performers, jugglers and musicians to a viewing of short films. I think the highlight was the juggling act we saw. They were entertaining and really good jugglers.
It was COLD that night. This picture was to capture how bundled up I was in particular. I had gloves, a scarf, a hat and my sweatshirt hood up. I think I had about three layers on as well. FL has thinned my blood out.
Last, but not least, was Christmas for Joe and I. We actually celebrated in the middle of the month, since we'd be gone through early January visiting family. This year we upgraded from the 3 foot tree we'd been using to a 7 1/2 foot tree. It is pre-lit, which made it quite easy to assemble, but a bit tough figuring out how to get it back in the box!

We're having a baby!

By now this is old news to most of you. We wanted to document it in our blog anyway and to let everyone see the picture from our first ultrasound!
I found out I was pregnant the day before Thanksgiving through a home pregnancy test. We of course were both really excited, although it took a little bit for it to really sink in. Since then I've seen the doctor twice. The first time we got to see the baby and hear it's heart beat. That is an amazing thing. Everything is going great, the baby and I are both healthy. I currently am 14 weeks pregnant, in my 2nd trimester and feeling great. I did have some morning sickness (although I never threw up) and other symptoms mostly through out the month of December. The baby is due Aug. 3rd.

We will continue to keep you updated with pictures, etc. as they happen.

This is when our baby was 7 weeks old. It was amazing to see the baby's heartbeat. The top right portion of the blob is the baby's head. Right in the middle where it indents a little is where we saw the heart beat. We'll have our next ultrasound in March when we find out if we're having a boy or a girl!