Shock of A Lifetime!

Two heads, TWINS!

Twin B

Twin A

So I heard about early gender checks and I immediately wanted to do one even if it meant paying $50 just to find it out four weeks early. I mainly wanted to find out because I feel like it would make everything more real to us, especially being able to see our baby on the ultrasound. Anyways, last Wednesday, that unbelievably beautiful sunny day, we had our appointment. I remember I was in such a good mood all day cause I was so excited to find out.

So we went to our ultrasound and the technician took us back. She put some gross jelly stuff on my belly and we were able to watch our baby on the big screen in front of us. I had heard the heartbeat a few weeks earlier, but to see an actual figure there, was so amazing! Our little baby was stretching out its legs and it looked so human and real. The technician paused and said, "Just a minute." I thought, "Here it is, we are going to find out the gender of our first baby!" She went over and looked at another computer. She asked, "When was your last appointment? Did the doctor measure you?" I started to get nervous thinking something was wrong like I had gained too much weight too fast or something. She said, "Watch the screen, you need to see something...There's one baby, and there's another." My mind started racing like crazy. Could this really be happening? There were two babies inside of me?" Tia and I just kept looking at each other, then back at the screen, with huge smiles. Tears were coming down my cheeks and apparently I said, "Oh.My.Gosh." about fifteen times. Tia and I were so incredibly shocked and excited. I don't think I have ever been that surprised in my life. Then she looked at the genders and said there is about 90% they are both girls. One of my first (and recurring) thoughts is how huge I am going to get. Two babies! I wish we could have stayed for hours to watch our little babies, but we were really only in there for about fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes that changed our life!

We both had mutual right after the appointment so we decided to wait and not tell our families until after mutual. I had a really hard time being focused and pretending like I was listening to conversations at YW when my mind was racing at 100mph! Finally it was over, and we hurried to get ready to tell our families.

We first went to my house where we showed my mom the order of the ultrasound pictures the way we saw it. She gripped my wrist like crazy and after she screamed, she said, "I'm speechless. I'm never speechless." She was very excited and just as surprised as we were. Then I proceeded to call my siblings and tell them we had found out the gender..."We are having two girls." Almost everyone said, "Are you serious?" Anyways, it was such a fun thing to tell people.

After we were at my house, we went to Tia's parent's house. We made cookies for them because that's how we told them we were expecting in the first place. We uncovered the cookies all at once. Below is the video of their response. (I let it load all night and it didn't load, I will try again...)

Something that has been so fun is how nice everyone has been and how nice it is that so many people are excited for us. I think it is finally sinking in for us and it seems like it is real now. I am having a hard time thinking about anything but these little babies. I have gotten a bunch of books from the library on twins and can't seem to find out enough on the internet. That night, Tia and I looked up videos of twin babies on youtube and watched random ones for such a long time. We just kept saying, "We are having twins!" It is a little overwhelming at times, but we feel so blessed! If Heavenly Father blessed us with this, it can and will work. (Financially, physically, emotionally and mentally.) We feel so blessed and are grateful we have the next few months to prepare ourselves in all those ways. We know it will be a lot, but we are so excited to meet our little girls! They will be here sooner than we know it!

Have I Mentioned I Have The Cutest Neices And Nephews?

I do. Sorry to brag, but it's true. I love how different each of them are. They have such distinct personalities and are such adorable little kids in their own ways. Here is just a little bit about each of them and then there are pictures. See for yourself.

April: Three years old. She has beautiful dark eyes and such a feminine pretty face. Being the oldest in her family, she is a natural leader. My favorite quote from her when we were all sitting around was, "Okay, people..." I don't remember what came after that, but her tone made everyone laugh. She is very polite and has wonderful manners. She is such a pleasant, happy little girl. I forgive her for asking every time I came into the door while they were here, "Where's Tia?"

Taylor: Two and a half years old. This handsome boy is so much fun and has such a kind heart. I love watching him hold Kyla's hand in the car. He is an expert at puzzles, and loves anything that has to do with a ball. He is also very good at dancing and ever since he could barely stand, he would hold onto something stable, like a couch, and shake his bum to the music. Funniest thing ever. He actually refused to sit on Tia's lap at church a few weeks ago and wanted to sit on mine instead. Brownie points for that since I am usually the forgotten aunt that just comes with Tia. :)

Christopher: Almost two years old. This kid has the best facial expressions of all time. A few of my favorites are his sweet smile, an amazing glare (with furrowed eyebrows), and his look where he puts his mouth into an "O" and raises his eyebrows. He is the only grandchild that actually cuddles, something all his aunts want. He is very good at staying still to listen to a book. He is so sweet to his new baby sister and loves giving her kisses. I absolutely love his laugh.

Landon: A year and a half old. Although, he doesn't look like he is related to any of these other nieces and nephews, he sure loves playing with them. He loves running into people and wrestling them to the ground. He is such a boy and loves trucks and crashing things. His smile is so huge and can melt anyone's heart. You can't be around him very long without smiling yourself. He calls Tia, "Tita!"

Kyla: Almost one years old. She is such an amazingly happy baby. I love her waves and her big open-mouth kisses. She has beautiful long eyelashes and huge eyes. She is always fun to hold. She always looks adorable and is the perfect size for squeezing. :)

Brooklyn: A few months old. She wins for having the most awesome hair. I have never seen anything like her head of hair. She is such a sweet, calm baby and is so content to be in anyone's arms or on a couch somewhere. I could hold her for hours.

From left to right: Landon, April, Kyla, Taylor, Christopher (Brooklyn wasn't born yet)

Baby Brooklyn

Landon and "Tita"

Kyla, April, Taylor and me

Christopher and Tia

The boys: (L to R) Landon, Christopher, Taylor

The girls: (minus Brooklyn) Kyla, and April

My Blogging Struggles

Well, I have just put up two (now three) posts in a row tonight. I know, probably nobody does that, but I had time and I wanted to look more impressive than just doing one big fat post that doesn't all match. Since I am really going to do better and try to be regular in blogging, I have a few questions so my next blog post isn't so frustrating.

Question #1: I have been trying to put a picture behind the title of the blog and/or under my profile but when I upload it, the picture is ginormous. Becky said that there was a place I could pick the size. I probably spent about half an hour then gave up. See, this is why I have procrastinated getting on for so long!

Question #2: You see how the pictures of our home are centered and the words, "Our Bedroom" and "Our Kitchen" are annoyingly off-centered? I tried using the space bar to center the words two different times but when I published the post, they went back to the left.

And a few other excuses why it has taken me so long to update:

Excuse #1: I promised to have a happy post the next time I wrote. (I deleted my two other onery posts, because I got nervous it would get seen, but also because I realized how terrible it made me sound :) The whole time our apartment was being worked on, all I could think about was putting up a bunch of pictures/videos of our poor looking apartment. But I decided to keep my promise. See, I was just trying to be honest!

Excuse #2: I use a mac laptop (It is Timpview's) and I get really frustrated not being able to right click. It is also really difficult for me to upload photos/videos on the mac. I know, I'm lame. Anyways, I am here at BYU using a computer I relate with and that has right click.

So here's to another try in being diligent...

Back In Our Home

Tia and I love the apartment we have been living in since we have been married. I never dreamed of living in a place so nice when I was newly married. I think it has been a real tender mercy and we have been so blessed to stay there. We were reminded how much we need to appreciate it when about six weeks ago our apartment flooded. It didn't look that bad when I saw it for the first time even though there were certain parts of the ceiling that were caving in. However, the next day, people came and started working on it and tearing things apart. For a while, each time we went, it looked worse and worse. I kind of got bugged they seemed to be taking everything apart, until I realized they were being very careful to make sure everything was dry. Here are some pictures of one stage:

Our Kitchen

Our Bedroom

We were very lucky and got to stay with my mom. She was very nice to let us come and crash not knowing how long we would be there (I thought it would be just a few days). Anyways, we started moving our stuff back in this last Monday and worked on putting everything back together. We had to wash all our dishes and all our clothes and dusted/scrubbed every square inch of the apartment because it had gotten so dusty. I guess that's one way to make sure I do spring cleaning. We are so happy to have our cute apartment back!

Baby!

So we found out on New Years Day that we have a little one on our way! We feel so blessed and are so excited to welcome this baby into our little family. I am currently 15 weeks and feel like I am growing like crazy! Our baby is currently the size of an orange and about four inches long. It is crazy because it feels like for the longest time it was microscopic but it is definitely big enough for us to see with human eyes! Sometimes it goes by so slowly but on the other hand, we have a lot to do before it comes to us. I'm glad there are nine months to prepare for a huge change in our lives. Here are a few random things I have been amazed/surprised at that I have learned while I am pregnant.

• Nobody told me a symptom was losing all motivation and becoming extremely lazy. Most days I just want to lay in bed all day. That has probably been the biggest side effect and I am so grateful there haven't been worse things.
  
• The baby's development is amazing. Its heart started beating at five weeks old. I get so sick whenever I think of abortion, especially now that I know how fast a baby develops. The development process is amazing. It makes me think, "All things testify of Christ."
  
• That it is awkward for me to tell people I am pregnant. Why? It is such a nice thing! I was going to announce it to my Young Women's on Sunday but somehow I couldn't. I think I'm weird but I didn't expect it to be something difficult to tell. Hopefully I'll have the courage to announce it this Sunday.
  
• How I need to get used to people looking at my stomach.
  
• What an amazingly fun thing it has been to talk about with Tia and to get excited about with him.
• That even though I am hungry a lot more, I can't eat as much as I used to be able to. I also can't eat as many sweets as I used to. (That's a good thing!)
• How onery I can be. Yesterday when I was at the High School teaching I was going crazy and was so annoyed by the obnoxious kids. I texted Tia: "Ugh I am so onery. These kids are driving me crazy." I laughed at what he texted back: "Don't let them. It's all in the head...or the womb :)" I just need to make a conscious effort to be pleasant to everyone.

Here is a picture of our pregnancy test on New Years Day. It was the most exciting/shocking thing to see a + sign! Yay!

A New Update in 5 Days! Terrifying Experience

So the other night I was saying my prayers and you know when you feel something on your hand or your arm and you look and it's always nothing? It was just your arm hairs or something? Well as I was trying to stay focused with my prayer my hand really felt like something was on it. I kept trying to go and not open my eyes because it always is just my imagination. Well, I finally stopped my prayer and opened my eyes and there was a black spider on my hand, just a few inches from my face! I let out a loud scream, despite the fact that it was 11:45 pm and ran 100 mph into Tia who was doing homework in the next room. He looked scared for me and clearly my scream was as loud as it seemed after the fact. I explained and luckily after killing the critter (luckily I found him after moving like a crazy person in panic) I was able to go right to sleep. Ugh, it was such an unsettling feeling to look and see what I thought I had felt!

Christmas 2010

So this Christmas and New Years were more than amazing. Here are just a few of my favorite things (in a very unorganized order):

- Working for a school district which means I was off for almost two weeks
- Watching my cute nieces and nephews in our little nativity scene. Some were very serious and some were hilariously hyper.
- Being able to perform in the recital that us kids put on for my mom.
- The beautiful layer of snow we woke up to a few days before Christmas.
- Being able to go to two sealings over the break, Allie's and Lola's.
- Constantly having two different menus of food because of two families (I know, dangerous!)
- Time I was able to spend with Tia when we are not working.
- Watching all the men spend time together and get to know each other better.
- Ping pong.
- Taking around goodies to friends and neighbors.
- Attending the Messiah Sing In.
- Bench Press contest
- Attending three sacrament meetings the week before Christmas. Not that I don't usually love church, but it's special the week of Christmas.
- Making gourmet hamburgers for dinner for the family with Tia.
- Spending time with "the babies." Each of the grandkids are so different and unique physically and the way the act. They are so much fun.
- Playing duets with Chrissy.
- Watching everyone open gifts, especially ones we gave.
- Sleeping in until 11:45 one morning when I didn't set my alarm. Kind of embarrassing, but it made me happy.
- Singing around the piano.
- Hugs and kisses from the nieces and nephews.
- Watching movies in mom's room.
- Learning a family dance for Lola's wedding.
- Reading the last chapter of the Book of Mormon together as a family.
- Massage contest.
- Having a camera to help keep these memories forever.