February came and went....

...thank goodness, that may mean spring will come soon?!


After the last post I left you hanging on the certainty of whether we're having a boy or not. Well, turns out we are! Last week we had our 20 week ultrasound at the clinic, and we are so happy that the little one looks all healthy. He's measuring right on track and likes to move. I'm 21 weeks now, and can start to see movements on the outside of my belly as well, which is always fun :)


I am still feeling great with this pregnancy, and a small belly is starting to pop. This was my 20 week belly pic:





I think I show more than my 20 week belly picture with Andi.


I still enjoy running a few miles in intervals a few times a week, and will see how long I'll keep that up. With Andi I stopped running at about 28 weeks in pregnancy. I have no intent of pushing anything....it is already amazing how much things have slowed down: this fall, running 10 miles on mountain trails was easy, and now a few miles with walk/water/bathroom/ "mommy refill my sippy cup"/"mommy please fishies movie?" (i.e. can I watch the movie Nemo...again?) - breaks are enough. But, it makes me feel great, and I enjoy it :)

Andi is also starting to understand (maybe?) that there is a little baby brother growing in mommy's belly (she pats my belly and says: baby brother). It is still amazing to see how much she developes in just a few months, and will have to make sure to make a more detailed post of it soon, at her 2nd birthday coming up!
There have been some other small changes in Andi's routine, as I started a part-time job at the University Dept. of Atmospheric Science in the middle of January. For about 1.5 days a week Andi gets to go to Debbie's house, and has an absolute ball playing with Weston and Tyler ("Tyler laugh" = Tyler makes me laugh!) and practicing her big sister skills by making sure baby Asher always has a pacifier in his mouth, even if he doesn't want it. Most days she doesn't even want to come home with me! She is learning a lot from being around those boys, and is already becoming more independent ("Andi do it!" Putting on her coat, shoes, clothes etc.).... if only she would now also mimic their eating and would finally put a piece of meat and vegetables in her mouth! Oy, does she have a sweet tooth.

No sweets or any other type of food for her in the last few days though, as the poor girl has been battling the flu....no fun!

Trying to cool down after a fever spike.


Taking a nice nap on the couch. Rest is good.

Keep posted, as there may be some big news coming soon!!

..

Feeling Blue ...!!!....

Baby #2 looks to be a ...... BOY!!!

We had a fun ultrasound with Debbie again this afternoon, and even though she suggested we perhaps wait with an announcement until after our appointment with a doctor at the clinic in 4 weeks, I have full confidence in her ultrasound skills, so here we go! :)

Baby was moving around like crazy which made it a little hard to get measurements initially, but everything seems to measure on track.

In the above two pictures, in the upper right part of the picture you see a half moon shape ... that's the butt with two legs sticking to the right, and, is that a little turtle in between?

Baby's profile with hand to his face.

A hand with fingers.

A little foot! It measures 2.3 cms long!

I thought this was a cool picture, it s where the umbilical cord inserts into the belly!

This is another side view of the baby, with his butt up in the upper left side, and then head down in the lower right corner.

We also got to see some great images of his brain, and got to see how different parts of his brain are developing! Such a miracle.

Big sister in training!

We have a little announcement ... :0) ... Most of you know already, but Andi is a big sister in training!! Wohoo!! Praise the Lord!

I'm currently 13+ weeks along, almost in the second trimester. Apart from a few minor things (let's just say prunes have become my friend), I have been feeling great. I have not had a single day of nausea which feels odd, and sure different than the pregnancy with Andi (maybe this one's a boy? ;) )

I actually found out on Halloween (October 31st), and Andi and I had fun 'telling' Ben: Even though I had already made her a Dutch milk maid costume, I had quickly made her an exercise outfit with tights, sneakers and a leotard reading "Big Sister" in the front, and "In training" in the back. I told Ben I made Andi a second halloween costume, and he replied "Why would you do that, you spent hours making her Dutch costume?" Then when Andi walked into the room, Ben's face was priceless :)
We had been praying for a sibling for Andi for quite some time, and feel so blessed with this pregnancy. We appreciate your prayers over this baby and pregnancy, and hopefully he or she will make his/her arrival sometime around July 9th!

Andi's 2nd costume on Halloween:



No explanation needed :)


Even though I'm only 13 weeks along, I've already had 3 ultrasounds. At 7+ weeks we had a fun-ultrasound at the Heart to Heart pregnancy center with Debbie. What a treat! Because I had been taking Clomid I was a little bit anxious to find out if I was carrying multiples. Thankfully, even though I think Debbie would have thought it to be fun to see twins or triplets in there, I was sure a tad relieved when it showed only one :)
He/She measured about 1cm, and had a heartbeat of 126 bpm.

Then at 9+ weeks we had our first ultrasound at the Women's clinic. Everything looked right on track. Amazing to see how much a tiny baby like that grows in only 2 weeks! At this point the baby measured 2.4 cms and had a heartbeat of 171 bpm.

Then this morning I had just a regular checkup appointment at the clinic. However, when the doctor put on the fetal stethoscope, he was not able to find a heartbeat, no matter how much he searched for one. Even though he said that that is not that uncommon at early stages of pregnancy, he did for sure want to perform an ultrasound. Definitely a 'Breath-in-deep-and-trust-in-the-Lord!' moment! A long 10+ minute wait later, the ultrasound image showed up on the screen (and Andi recognized it saying "baby"!), I saw the baby's arm move right away, and the doctor was able to see the heartbeat. Praise God!

This was a very quick ultrasound, no measuring or pictures of any kind, but still, it was again awesome to see how much this tiny baby has developed in just those extra couple of weeks.

On the first day of 2011 ...

.... the Bryans cut up their first Elk!
Ahh to be married to an Alaskan/Wyoming burly mountain man ;) Even though I had seen friends cut up their elk/deer/antelope, I had never had the privilege of doing something like that myself, and it is most definitely not a common way to spend New Year's Day in any Dutch household!
It was a female elk (NL: edelhert), and we spent a good 3 hours with 4 adults (Ben and I, and Tom and Marilyn) cutting and grinding it up into mostly hamburger and a couple of steaks: 65+lbs of hamburger, 11 lbs of hamburger with pig fat (for the flavor) mixed in, and about 14 packages of steaks! Now that'll fill our freezer and feed us nicely until next hunting season!

Ben posing with the animal:


We cut it up in Tom's shop, nicely heated, stove crackling with fire, tunes, and we had a fun time butchering on this otherwise fridgidly cold and windy (-34 with the windchill!) first day of the year.

Getting everything ready:

Tom, Ben and I on the cutting station, and Marilyn on grinding and packaging duty:

These pictures are taken mostly at the beginning, when everything looked nicely clean still :)

There we go, a nice chunk of meat!

Andi was also hanging out in the shop with us. We brought in some toys for her to play with, and she did so great entertaining herself, and watching the adults cut up that elk.

It was however the day after all that New Year's Eve, up late, partying, so she did get quite tired after 3 hours.

However, more, more, and more meat had to be cut still! ....amazing how much meat comes off an animal like that!

....

Marilyn rockin' the grinder!

Happy New Year everyone!!

Dec. 5th: Sinterklaas

Andi is lucky to be 50% Dutch living in the US, because not only does she get presents with celebrating Christmas with the American side of the family, but she also gets presents celebrating Sinterklaas, the traditional Dutch time to do presents, on December 5th (we celebrated a little early this year). My parents send us a box every year with presents. We play the CD with kids' Sinterklaas songs (to Ben's joy), and then the fun begins. As per tradition, Sinterklaas writes a poem (about the gift and person receiving it) to accompany every gift, so we read those out loud before opening the gifts.





A picture of the good old man with his black Petes. Sinterklaas comes in on a steamship from Spain, and rides his horse over peoples' roofs to drop off presents in their chimney. The black Petes hand out candies (pepernoten) to the kids as well.

Ah were we spoiled! Not only fun presents (a big sheep for Andi!), but also lots of yummy treats: pepernoten, the traditional chocolate letter (the first letter of your name in chocolate), stroopwafels, and ...Mmm, my favorite ... a honking piece of Marsepein (Marzipain). Thanks mom! :)




Andi opening one of her presents.

Reading one of my poems :)

I got party decorations!

Ben reading one of his poems with Andi.

Ben got some warm gear :)

The following are some video's (more for my mom, the official sponsor of this year's Sinterklaas)


Andi Dancing to the Sinterklaas CD - she loved it!


Some more Dancing :)

Opening the box (oh kom er eens kijken!)

Opening a present with dad....a big sheep! She loves it!

Thanksgiving 2010 - Jackson, WY.

Before Andi, our annual Thanksgiving tradition was to go camping together. Goal was always one of the national parks in the region. Since camping in zero degree weather with a toddler doesn't really spell out "fun" to me, but we still wanted to have a little adventure get-away as a family, we decided to go with a cabin in Jackson, WY. Still close to a National Park :)
We had a lot of fun walking through town, we went swimming in the pool, played in the snow in Grand Teton National Park, got to see a lot of animals (lots of elk, deer, moose, a couple of buffalo, foxes, bald eagles, and even two wolves, which was a total treat!), went up in the gondola of Jackson Hole ski resort, and did what every other American does during Thanksgiving break: be lazy and eat :).

The antler arches in Jackson square:

Our Cabin:

The traditional shot by the National Park entrance sign:

Ben is demonstrating where the Tetons got their name:

Gorgeous views:

The fam playing in the snow:

Tetons by sunset:

Andi enjoying the gondola:

Ben and Andi in the gondola:

Andi practising her snowboard-pose ... she's a natural!

Lots of snow to play in!

:)

Walking in the snow.

First big snow!

A perfect wintery day yesterday, with the first big snow of the season. Also the first time really for Andi to get to go out and play in it! Last year she was only crawling, so she didn t get to enjoy much of the snow then (though she ate a lot of it then....I would put it in a bowl for her to play with inside). We bundled up and went out on the deck to play:


Snowflakes in my face :)


It's hard to walk in that stuff!


Making snowballs with mom and throwing them for Sage to go after.