The BIG News

We're Pregnant!

July 14, 2011:  I had a positive pregnancy test this morning, but the line is SO faint that it's hard to tell if I am imagining it or if it is real.  Chris is out of town in Hays for his summer classes so I text him a picture of the test to see if he thinks there are two lines or not.  He thinks there are two lines too.  Can you see it two lines?   That night, we went to the midnight premier of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II.  I think it's ironic our first child shares Harry Potter's middle name and we find out we're pregnant with our second child on the same day as the premier of the last Harry Potter movie.

July 15, 2011: To avoid further "what-if" moments, we take a digital pregnancy test.  It results in less ambiguity.  I'm having a little trouble believing that I'm pregnant.  With Ledger, I "felt" pregnant from the first day of my positive test.  This time, I'm not really having any pregnancy symptoms, yet.

Now: No need to worry now. I've been ridiculously nauseous for the last four weeks.  I'm so tired that I feel like I've been hit by a bus.  It seems like my worst time of day is from 4pm-8pm, which is also the busiest time of day when I'm trying to get work wrapped up, get home, get dinner served, and spend some quality time with Ledger and Daddy.  Unfortunately, my quality time has been severely limited.

I have already had my first doctor's appointment and saw our little "blinking bean" on ultrasound.  The doctor prescribed me an anti-nausea medication, but it hasn't helped that much.  My prenatal vitamins have been adding to the nausea -- especially the DHA (fish oil) pills.  Yuck!  Fortunately, I found some awesome gummy prenatal vitamins that actually taste good and have made it easier to get those important vitamins down.

For the concrete stuff, our predicted due date is March 27th which makes me 9... ALMOST 10 weeks along.  (Which means that I have 3-5 weeks of morning sickness to get through.  Blah.)  I have promised myself I will do a better job of blogging about this pregnancy -- more for my own recollection than to keep you entertained.  So bear with me the next 7 months.  :)

August, August... Another Month Gone

This has been another crazy month.  During the second week of August, Ledger started with his new child care, Chris started back to school, and I had to work full time while Dr. Ewy was gone.  It was a very tiring and hectic week for everyone.  Ledger had a very rough week adapting to all of the change.  Since that time, we've had a LOT of family birthdays and more very busy days.  Ledger has finally fallen in love with his new child care situation and has started requesting to go to "Grandma Jamie's house".  Here are some fun pictures of our kid over the last few weeks.

Hot Springs Vacay

At the end of July, we took a Powell family vacation to Hot Springs Village, Arkansas.  Dad and Millie rented a spectacular lakeside condo for us all to share.  We arrived on Friday afternoon and Josh quickly tried out our dock on Lake DeSoto for fishing.  Ledger was very interested in the rubber worms that Uncle Josh used for bait, but wasn't quite brave enough to touch them.

On Friday, we rented a pontoon boat and went cruising on Lake Balboa.  We thought Ledger would want to tube, but he cried when he was out there.  So Chris and Ledger challenged us to take them on a "big boy" ride.  Well, we tried, but the pontoon boat tops out at about 20 mph, which makes it nearly impossible to have a thrilling tube ride.  So the boys spiced it up a bit on their own.

The lake was super warm -- like bath water.  We all enjoyed cruising around the lake and checking out the multi-million dollar mansions on the lake front.  For lunch, we anchored the boat at a little uninhabited island and floated together in the warm water.  We ate sandwiches from the cooler and had a awesome time.  On the way back to the dock, Ledger fell asleep on BoomMa.

On Saturday, BoomPa and Josh got up and went to play golf.  BoomMa, Emmy, and the Michels all got dressed in our swim gear and headed to the pool.  We swam for a couple of hours and then met up with the golfers for lunch at a local pizza joint.  The food was spectacular.  I'd recommend it, but it was scheduled for closure in 1 week.  Go figure.  We had a family nap time followed by family dinner and an overall fantastic last full day of vacation.

Where Did July GO?

July was incredibly eventful -- packed with fun with family and HOT HOT weather.  It's hard to believe that it is August already and with Chris starting back to school next week, our summer is officially over.  So please allow me to play a little catch up and tell you about what we've done this month:

Cousins

Ledger's cousins Jonas (4), Ronan (2... almost 3), and Brogan (3 months) were here to visit for the entire month of July.  We spent a lot of time at the lake together, including 4th of July.  Jonas and Ronan both brought awesome toys -- trains and Cars toys which automatically made them the "cool" cousins.  Since it's been such a hot month, the only way for us to really enjoy any time together was at Great-Grammie's pool in Lindsborg.  And BOY did we have fun!  Jonas and Ronan are "no fear" swimmers -- they just jump in and go.  Ledger is a little more hesitant, especially about "jumping in".  But once you put on his water wings, he wants to try to keep up with the big kids!  And, of course, each swimming session has to end with a popsicle! :)

 

Poker Run with Perkins'

July 23rd marked the annual Central Kansas Yacht Club Poker Run.  For the second year in a row, the Perkins and Michel families were a boat stop and had a good time.  We were having such a good time that we pretty much forgot to take any pictures.  Go figure.  Emily's little pregnant belly has finally popped out and we found out that she will be having a GIRL!!  My first niece!!  We keep trying to explain to Ledger about the baby in aunt Emmy's belly and he seems to be catching on.

Grandpa Steve's Birthday

As in previous years, we dressed Ledger up in a plaid, short-sleeved, button-down shirt just like his Grandpa Steve wears in celebration of his birthday.  This year we ate at Daimaru steak house and even followed-up with dessert at Braums.  YUMM!!

Phew!  I'm tired from just putting the photos in this blog.  It's been a very busy month.  We ended the month with a big Powell-family vacation to Hot Springs Village in Arkansas.  I promise that my next blog post will be all about our excellent vacation and include some pictures.  If you can't wait, you can check out the pictures here.