My baby is SO good to me.

As mentioned in my previous post, I have had this sudden urge to get away and do as many fun things as we can together before our baby comes in April. Since I had a four day weekend coming up it seemed the perfect opportunity, so I spent all week last week brainstorming. Some of our really good friends, the Erkelens, from California, happened to be in St. George last week visiting Lindsey's parents, so we definitely wanted to see them. In the meantime, we learned that some good friends of ours here in Utah had discounted tickets for Phantom of the Opera and were heading to Vegas this weekend. Turns out Kyle was able to find a good deal himself, because he bought us tickets for the show and booked what I assumed was one of best deals he could find on a room in Vegas Friday night, and we headed for St. George Friday morning so we could spend the afternoon with our buddies.

I love St. George. Lindsey's parents have a beautiful home that is surrounded by red rock. We had fun catching up and learning about what we have missed out on in Yucaipa. Aside from her new ability to read (she's only 3 years old!) Macy seemed the same, but we couldn't believe how big Carsyn was! Kyle still keeps bringing it up. It has been a few months since we've seen them and sadly she didn't seem to remember us. Breaks my heart a little. Oh how I have missed this family!

The part of the drive just before St. George was always my favorite part when we made the trip from CA to UT, and it was fun to see again. We have to pass through AZ for about 20 minutes, and it is beautiful! As always, the pictures don't do it justice.

As we were driving along the strip in Vegas, I started guessing which hotel was ours. Before he had booked it, Kyle had me help by picking from 5 different letters. I picked "V" (for Vibber of course) but a few minutes later he told me he decided to go with "B" instead. Whatev. So all I knew was that there was a B somewhere in the title, and the only hotel I could think of was the Bellagio. I joked earlier that day that that one must be it. As we continued to drive along the strip and passed no hotels with a "B", I started teasing, "Is it the Bellagio?" "Must be the Bellagio." "Wait I know....the Bellagio!" As I said this, I was snapping pictures of it because the fountains were going off. (The Bellagio is known for it's fountains-they go off every 30 minutes during the day and even 15 minutes at night.) A few seconds later, I was completely shocked as Kyle made a right hand turn and I was suddenly staring at the backside of the fountains. I had told him a few days earlier that this weekend may be our last little hurrah for a while, so he I guess he decided to go all out. Awwwwww. It actually brought tears to my eyes. My mom put it well when she replied to my excited text and said, "You are spoiled rotten!" She meant it lovingly (I think) but it really is true. I don't deserve all the sweet things he does for me.

Nor do I really fit in situations such as these. We were a teeny bit embarrassed handing our little Honda off to the Valet workers who were among Escalades and limos. And 5 minutes after we arrived in our room, housekeeping knocked on the door to ask what time she should come and "turn the bed down". I think my response was, "Huh?" She repeated herself and I still didn't really know what that meant, and the rest of the conversation went something like this:

Her: "I will come back later to turn the bed down, and make sure you have clean towels, and the bathroom is clean"..... etc.

Me: "Oh, we just got here 10 minutes ago so everything is great, but thank you!" (And I thought, I'm pretty sure we can handle pulling the covers back on our bed....)

Her: "Well normally we come and at least turn the bed down and leave chocolates...."

Me: Chocolates? "Oh, we'll be leaving the room in just a few minutes so you can come back whenever you would like!

We left for the show ten minutes later and I was not about to make the long walk in heels, so I threw them in my purse. As we walked off the elevator I told Kyle I hoped that nobody would notice the flip flops underneath my dress pants. About 3 minutes later he whispered to me, "So far I've noticed 4 ladies staring at your feet."

View from our room

Phantom was amazing. The kind of show that gives you goosebumps all during it. I was especially impressed with the set and all of the special effects. It was my first Broadway experience and I'm so glad that we did it. Disneyland has an Aladdin show that's amazing and I didn't know how anything could get much better than that but it sure was. :) I wish I could have taken pictures. It made me want to go to all kinds of shows now. You know how after you go to a concert you have an even greater love for that artist and suddenly their songs seem even better? That's how I feel about this-I'm listening to the soundtrack of the movie as I write this. And we've both been humming it for days.

We arrived back at our hotel just in time to see the fountains again

Everything about the hotel fascinated me. Even the lobby. They have a large room (I guess you would call it a greenhouse) full of gorgeous flowers and trees that they change according to the season. You can't really tell, but the big apple was a work in progress. There was a man poking red roses into the back of it.

The Bellagio also has the world's largest chocolate fountain, which I had to capture for my mom. There was a certificate on the wall that said Guinness World Record proving it.

Saturday morning we went to the Las Vegas temple, a first time for both of us.

A great weekend wouldn't be great without some yummy food, right? Friday night on our way to the show we stopped at Chipotle, which is my #1 for restaurants these days. I can't get enough of it. If there was one in Provo it would be a dangerous thing. Coming home on Saturday, we reached St. George just in time to catch the end of the BYU game so we ate at Wingers (another favorite) where we knew it would be playing on several TVs. We then arrived home in time to watch the last quarter of the MSU game which was a smashing success. Great day.

I was hoping for a fun weekend and this FAR exceeded my expectations. Definitely a trip I will never forget! Have I mentioned how sweet my husband is???

14 weeks

I'm almost 15 weeks now, but this was taken last week. I hate pictures of myself, but decided I might appreciate these in the future. And if I keep my family updated, hopefully they will recognize me in December :)

Pictures

I've been waiting 18 months to be able to hang my beloved mirror on a wall!

These pics make the cabinets and flooring look kinda orangy but they're more brown

We don't really use this room-it will probably stay unfurnished for a while

Downstairs bathroom-off the kitchen

Upstairs guest bathroom

Office -not quite organized yet. (The other bedroom is next to it and will be the nursery)

Our room and closet. I will eventually fill it with clothes I have yet to unpack

Someday I'm going to do our bedroom yellow and gray but that's on the bottom of our list :)

Our bathroom. I have a project in mind for above the toilet but it requires buying towels that we don't really need....

Front door

Bonus room off the garage

Update

I'm really hesitant to say this because every time I do I seem to jinx myself, but I'm feeling a LOT better than I was a few weeks ago. I have my moments...like when I overeat (is that really just one word? I was fully expecting a red line underneath) even just a teeny bit. Or when I ride in the car for more than 10 minutes....or on a plane. You get the picture. I'm 14 weeks, and most likely we are going to cheat and get an early ultrasound in a couple weeks. Partly because we're excited to find out the gender, and partly because I want to make sure there's just one little peanut in there.

We are feeling pretty settled and loving our new home! I had a nice surprise/early birthday present when I returned home from MI-Kyle bought us a beautiful new bedroom set. It was on our list of things we didn't need right away, but I think he could tell that the lack of drawers for our clothing was getting to me. We still had them in boxes and totes because I didn't know where to put them. I've also had a really sore back, and the new mattress seems to be helping!

Last night our Bishopric came over to meet us. When one of them called and asked if they could, I thought maybe just the counselors so I was surprised to see all three standing at our doorstep. That meant a lot to us because we know they are very busy men. We chatted for a while, and before they left offered something so sweet. They asked if they could give Kyle a blessing, and then assist Kyle in giving me a blessing. Our house was filled with so much love from these men that we had just barely met. They were the nicest guys. It was really hard for me to leave California, mostly because of our ward and the great friends we made in it, and honestly I haven't been too excited to start attending a new one here. But now I feel a hundred times better, and am excited for Sunday!

Even thought I'm just barely in my 2nd trimester, I'm starting to feel like we don't have much time left before we have a new baby and our world is going to change. I really want to take advantage of the time we have left just the two of us. Don't get me wrong, I'm VERY excited for April, but I know things will never be the same after that. I have this sudden urge to get away and do as many fun things with Kyle as we can because I know it won't be as easy (or even possible) come April. So, since I happen to have tomorrow and Thursday off, we are planning a little getaway. We don't know for sure where, but we definitely want to stop in St. George and see the Erkelens who are visiting Lindsey's parents. Besides that, I have no good ideas. None. We talked about Vegas but we did that a few times when we lived in Cali, and unless we want to spend money (we don't) on a show or something, we don't know what we'll do there. Not to mention the 5 hour drive. Bleh. It's times like this when I REALLY miss California. We never ran out of new things to do, in fact we barely made a dent in our bucket list. If only the beach or Disneyland were an option this weekend....

Jillian

I have the priviledge of watching my friend Whitney's baby girl every day and I'm loving it! She's adorable and so much fun to watch grow and progress. She's smiling all the time and even starting to giggle. I started when she was 6 weeks (or maybe 7?) and she is already 12! The poor thing has been through a lot in the last 10 weeks of her life. She has what you could call a "bad case" of reflux, but after trying several formulas and putting her on a third medication, she is a much happier baby than she was a few weeks ago. She and her parents are all troopers!

When she's tired and ready for a nap, she buries her head in your chest/armpit. It's so sweet. And she melts my heart every time she grins at me. She can go from fussing to smiling in a split second. Sometimes it's hard for me to put her down, but it's the only time I can get anything done. Kyle adores her- he holds her everyday when he comes home for lunch. The other day someone asked us if we wanted a boy or a girl. I admitted I am sort of hoping for a boy because it would be fun to have the first boy in my family. Kyle told him, "I probably would have said boy at one time, but Kristen has been watching a baby girl and she's really cute." Awww. I could go on and on about how precious Jillian is, but I'll let the pictures do the talking...

And we're in.

Finally! We closed on our house on Monday and got our keys yesterday. It's hard to believe we've been in Utah now for 3 months. In a lot of ways I'm really going to miss staying with Kyle's parents. I have really enjoyed all the time we've had to visit with them. It's really sad to me that so many people have issues with their in-laws. I guess I am lucky because I don't have a single complaint. Mine could not be any greater! I am, however, looking forward to living out of cupboards and closets rather than boxes. Excited about my walk-in closet, a laundry room with cupboards....excited about all of my food I found in boxes yesterday-I forgot how much food storage we had in Cali. (I counted at least 15 boxes of cereal.) Excited about living in Provo where we are closer to our jobs and lots of other things....excited about my new shower curtains and some fun projects I am discovering on pinterest.....I could go on and on :)

Luckily I took some video of the house last week. Without it you would get a bunch of pictures that look like this:




















The first video is the main floor, the second is the bonus room off the garage, leading down from the kitchen. and the third is the upstairs with the bedrooms and laundry room. Oh, and a warning to my fellow pregnant friends: I may have moved the camera a little too fast at parts. Just sayin'. :)

I'll post pictures once we are settled!