Baby Update

We are 17 weeks today and still feeling semi-normal, just the usual bloating feeling. No morning sickness or fatigue so far. Last doctor's appt was november 3rd, we listened to the baby's heart beat and had blood drawn. so far I've only gained 6 lbs. Doctor says I should start feeling the baby move in the next 2-4 weeks :) Our first real ultrasound is on November 14th, we should be able to see the sex of the baby that day! Up until this point I have been squeezing myself into my old pre-pregnancy clothes......not good for one's self esteem lol. I then went shopping for bigger pants, bought size 9 and they worked out for a couple weeks. Today is the day I've dreaded for awhile......maternity clothes shopping. Hopefully I find some things I feel comfortable in.

:)

Baby Jolly!

Baby Jolly is due April 14, 2012 Next appt is October 7th :)

Magnolia Fires

Please pray for all the families in magnolia that have lost everything, and for all the firefighters and emergency responders working this massive fire. Ryan has been in magnolia fighting the fires for the past 2 days. He didn't get to sleep at all last night, so when he got home this morning he tried to get a few hours in. From what we know the fire is headed towards stagecoach, still about 10- 14 miles from our house (per ryan). The sky is black, in fact looking down our street the smoke looks like it is coming from the back of our neighborhood. I made Ryan drive me down 1488 to make sure people weren't evacuating somewhat close to our house. One thing Ryan said is that the forest department's efforts to cut down trees and turn the dirt over to stop the fire has been pretty much useless. He said the fire is 100-200ft high and it's catching the tops of trees on fire. It even jumped across 1488. Please pray that no lives are lost and that these guys can get the flames under control soon. Ryan goes back to work Saturday and Sunday. He is expecting to be deverted back to the magnolia fires.

Honeymoon

For our honeymoon we decided to go to the Smoky mountains in Tennessee. Since we would have to break the drive into 2 days we decided to stay in Alabama and visit Ryan's cousins Jonathan and Caleb. The Alabama, Florida, and Mississippi family were here in Texas for the wedding so Uncle Ronnie and Aunt Sug both said that we could stay in their homes on our way to Tennessee. We left out a little late on sunday evening around 4ish, that left us arriving in Monroeville, Alabama at approx. 1am. This wouldn't have been so bad if our GPS would've been accurate. IT told us to turn into an empty pasture "Arriving at your destination"......we could tell right away that wasn't right so ryan drove about a 1/4 mile and found his Uncle Ronnie's driveway on the right lol the next day we met Jonathan, his girlfriend Shannon and Caleb for dinner. FYI mexican food is not the same everywhere.....I do believe there was wolf brand chili on my burrito. Monday night we stayed in Aunt Sug's house then headed to Tennessee Tuesday around 9am. Many potty breaks later we arrived in Tennessee around 4pm. The cabin was beautiful. It just so happen to be located on the top of Mt Bluff, this turned out to be very stressful for my new husband lol. After driving through the narrow twisting roads of the mountain we pulled into our cabin's driveway, Ryan proceded to inform me that I would be getting no dinner tonight....he was not leaving the cabin. His mind quickly changed when he saw "the look". We drove down to the main road grabbed a pizza and headed back. The following days we spent in Gatlinburg and pigeon forge seeing the exhibits and shopping. On Thursday we went to Cade's Cove and saw a wild black bear and her cub. On friday we drove to Nashville and stayed in the Opryland Hotel, and on Saturday made the 11hr drive home. Somewhere around Henderson, Texas a nice police officer pulled us over to give us a fast driving award.....otherwise known as a speeding citation ughhh. The optimist in me stated "well babe we can both do defensive driving, you for this here ticket, and mine will go towards an insurance discount"

At the aquarium we were able to pet certain fish.....we got yelled at for petting the hammerhead shark.....in our defence there was no sign posted!

Wedding :)

Let me start off by saying how perfect our wedding was! Both of us agree that all the stress was worth it ;) The weather was extremely hot, but what can you expect in August....I don't have all of them yet but here are a few pics!

Our Hotel room for our wedding night (Thanks to My wonderful in-laws)

Another Chapter begins!

On August 3rd I took a pregnancy test and much to my suprise it had 2 pink lines, 1 was very faint, but never the less there were 2 lines. I was a litte shocked, well actually I was really freaking out. So many questions running through my mind. How are we going to afford this, how did this happen, all my doctors have said I would have issues with fertility ever since my IUD was taken out....due to complications from the copper damaging my cervix. So while driving to work I called Shelia (My best friend) and she confirmed that 1 faint line indeed counts.....She said I was pregnant and of course was so excited. I stayed at work for half a day....I was pretty much useless, scattered brain to be exact. Long story short Ryan and I wanted to know for sure so after 3 more home pregnancy tests and 2 Blood tests later it was determined that we are approx. 7 weeks. On September 9th we will have our 1st actual appointment! I'm told we will hear the heartbeat :)

On another note, we only have 1 week until our wedding! Last minute things are coming together with the much needed help from our families! Thanks to Amy everyone will have cardstock fans to help make this August heat a little more comfortable. I didn't realize when buying them that they came in peices. She offerred to glue all 100 of them on top of arranging all the flowers for the wedding. She has been such a blessing in our lives! The rehearsal will be Friday at 7, with dinner to follow at vernons country catfish( hosted by the Jolly's) I couldn't have done it without everyone's help. Thank you all for everything!