Only about three weeks out of date...

All in all, the drive from Kansas to Washington went very smoothly for us.  All our hotels were booked ahead of time, so we were able/forced to plan ahead quite a bit.

Our first day was the shortest, at about seven and a half hours.  We had planned to spend Saturday morning packing up the car, and hit the road after lunch.  We knew it would be a very long afternoon/evening on the road, but we knew we'd need the whole morning, and figured that if the first day is the toughest, then each day afterward would be that much easier.

  Packing up the absolute essentials here.

We are such good Cajuns.

Jam-packed and jelly-tight

Unfortunately, between computer issues and two mad dashes out to ship boxes that wouldn't fit in the van, we didn't leave until 5:00.  PM.  With seven and a half hours between us and our first pre-booked hotel.

With all the excitement of packing, Hollie hadn't napped yet that day, so as soon as we got going she passed out which allowed us to go several hours without stops.  Eventually she woke up, and we got out our surprise brand-new toy for the road...

This is one of those magnetic doodling boards that has a little pen to draw with, and a eraser knob that slides up and down the side the clear it off.  She was hooked.

We had dinner in the car, and at about 10:00 Hollie fell asleep again, so we arrived at the hotel at about midnight.  That's only seven hours...including at least one stop that I can remember...yeah, we went fast.

Hollie woke up as we got into the room, but after a chance to stretch her legs and check things out, she was out again.  I fell asleep in the bed with her...until about 4:30am when I woke up with the feeling that someone was needing a little more space...

Yes, she is right in the middle of a queen-size bed there.  Rather than try to move her, I found my way over to Daniel's bed, only to find him sleeping diagonally across it.  Out. of. luck.  Hollie may look just like me, but some things are undeniably Daddy.  Lucky for both of them, I can sleep in very small non-human shaped spaces, even at 35-weeks pregnant.  :)  I love you two.

The next day was Sunday, so after some online guess-timating, we found a church about three hours away, with a mass time in about three hours.  We only arrived about five minutes late, which makes no sense when much-too-often we show up later than that when we live fifteen minutes away!  

Wyoming.

Blaaaah.

Even with that hour-long stop, it was still an easy day and we arrived at our next hotel early in the evening.

Monday was interesting.  We planned to stop in Deer Lodge, Montana, to see my mom's aunt, and then visit a college friend of ours who lives in Missoula, which was our next overnight stop.

Not very far into Monday morning, we hit a road closure.  Interstate's flooded.  A few minutes of fooling with the GPS, and we have an alternative route.  About two minutes later...signs saying that route is closed.  For snow.  Before we get too far off-track, we stop at a gas station for a real paper map and directions.  Guy at the gas station gives us a third route, which is going to put us two or three hours behind.  Not that we have a choice.

So, we get going.  Next...construction.  The road is gravel, and there is a 35 mph speed-limit.  For like 35 miles.  Maddening, but we get through it.

Fortunately after that, the day was smooth sailing.  Hadn't seen my mom's aunt since our wedding, and our college friend in...probably longer than that.

And these views...

        

...certainly didn't hurt, either.

The next day, Tuesday the 24th, was our last.  It was a fun, relaxed day, with beautiful weather and stop in the good-humored town of George, Washington.

And here we are!  Whew.  There you have it.  You're welcome.

A real pain in the...

...fingers.

That's my life this weekend.  My one-hour glucose tolerance test (for gestational diabetes) came back not good.  A little backstory...I took the same test while pregnant with Hollie and failed, then took the more accurate three-hour test and it was completely normal.

But this time around, because it is so late in my pregnancy, and GD nearly always means an induced early delivery...we're skipping the three-hour test and moving right along to the finger-pricking.  I get to monitor my blood sugar all weekend, and if on Monday it's all been good, I think they're going to let me stop, and we'll call that one-hour test a fluke.  If I understood correctly.  Yesterday was a bit of a whirlwind.

Besides meeting with a nurse to learn to use the meter, and a dietitian to talk about how I have to eat now, we had an ultrasound!

Everything looked great.  We got a beautiful view of the heart beating...a more detailed view than I have ever seen.  Got to count some fingers, too.  The face...reminded me instantly of the way Hollie looked in her ultrasound just days before she was born.

Daniel found out the gender...100% certain this time!  He told me afterward that he thinks I'm "going to be very happy" but of course that doesn't give me any clue whatsoever.

The other goal for the day was to determine a new due date, based on the ultrasound.  The plan was to visit our doc right afterward to discuss.  Unfortunately, by that point it was late in the day and when we arrived, he still hadn't gotten our ultrasound notes from the lab...so we left without an answer, and a new appointment for Monday.  :(  GAH.

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We had an awesome trip down to Portland last weekend to see Daniel's brother and his family.  Hollie and her cousin Juliet are so great together.  They are a little more than five months apart in age, and every time they see each other the gap seems smaller and smaller.  They have both learned to hug nicely by now, which is WOW...so cute.

At one point I watched them come across Daniel's brother's hat, and Juliet pointed it out as "Baba's hat!" which Hollie corrected - "No, Uncle T-----'s' hat".

Juliet's little brother Levi, and his enormous eyes, are beyond adorable.  Such a cutie.

The main reason for our trip was Daniel's brother's graduation from the Montessori Institute!  That sure is some cool stuff.  Congratulations, bro-in-law!

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That's all for now.  Happy weekend!

Settling in

One of the first things that I could not wait to do when we arrived here in Mukilteo is unpack all the baby clothes.  I had to go through all of them in Wichita, to decide what we were taking, but I knew it was pointless to wash and organize it all (though I really wanted to) because I knew I would have to wash them again after they sat in a box on a truck for a week anyway.

So after we got here that Monday night [over] two weeks ago, literally the first thing I did on Tuesday morning after Hollie and I had breakfast was set up the bassinet.  Then I waited anxiously for Friday, when the boxes of clothes that we shipped showed up at the door.  Within two minutes the clothes were spread out over the floor, and Hollie and I just sat down and looked through them and talked about the new baby.  

So then they sat and sat and sat in a pile in the bassinet because for some reason I could not ever remember to pick up baby detergent at the store!  Unbelievable.  My nesting urge was being completely thwarted by my scatterbrained-ness.

Finally got my hands on some detergent and yesterday got all the neutral colored clothes washed, folded, and put away...with help...

Look at this little monkey.  She wanted to try on all the clothes, but figured out pretty quickly that wasn't going to work.  She settled for this swaddling blanket with velcro tabs...it just barely fit around her shoulders!

Gotta make sure the swing still works, too.

Daniel and I just had our third anniversary (cue: awww) and we hadn't really planned on doing anything, but at the last minute Daniel got one of his coworkers (who has kids...but they're back in KS) to watch Hollie for the evening so that we could see a movie.  The movie (Bridesmaids) wasn't great, but it's always nice to get somewhat dressed up and have some fun.

Hollie had some fun too, apparently.  She told her babysitter all about how Daddy had built her little table (a recent purchase from Ikea), and when she ripped her doll a little bit she reassured him that Mommy would fix it.    

New belly picture - 36-ish weeks.  I forgot to mention - at my first appointment with the new doc, he decided to push my due date back a few days based on that first trimester ultrasound.  At my next ultrasound (tomorrow!) we will come up with a new official due date.

I still have stories and pictures of our long drive, and also from our weekend trip down to Portland, to post...but that's enough for today.  More tomorrow!

Exploring

We've had an interesting first week in Mukilteo.  Haven't figured out how to convince spell-checker that "mukilteo" isn't misspelled.

Over the weekend Daniel's two older brothers, T and C, visited and taught Hollie all about bouncing tennis balls off the walls and tables.  I guess that's what uncles are for!

While they were here, Daniel and T decided to go out for a jog to see the coast.  Hours later it's getting dark and we get the phone call: "Help!  We're lost!"  A half-hour with Google maps later, C went out to pick them up.  Once they were back at home, slightly worse for the wear, we got to hear the whole story, which involved following a creek into the woods, crawling under a fence into a construction site (despite posted warnings of video surveillance) to try and find out where they were (unsuccessfully; no one was there), Daniel carrying T on his back over a gravel road (T had gone barefoot), and from there wandering residential streets for a main intersection to assist our Google maps search.

Crazy boys.

But wait, there's more.

A few nights later, after the uncles were gone, Daniel went out by himself to run errands at two stores.  He didn't take our GPS because he had been to both stores before.  Deja vu - it's getting dark and I get the phone call: "Help!  I'm lost!"  This time it only took about five minutes for me to figure out where he was, but by then his phone had very little battery life left so I had to give him turn-by-turn directions to the store and just hope that he knew his way from there to the second store, and from there, home.  Thankfully he did.  And when he got home we got a good laugh together when he looked at the map and saw how far off course he had gotten.  Waaaay out there!

To be fair, the same thing has happened to me more than once since we've been here.  Even though the GPS generally stays in my car, I tend not to trust it sometimes...

Anyway.

For Memorial Day, we visited a park on the coast where we had lunch with a few of Daniel's coworkers.  It was a chilly, overcast day (our new "normal", really), but it was gorgeous.  Check these out...

Hollie had a great time at the beach: 

walking into the icy water up to her ankles and throwing little rocks into the waves,

climbing over the driftwood,

collecting sticks and shells,

but the only part she's still talking about today is this train...

 

We walked across this little bridge while a train went underneath, loud and fast enough to made the bridge shake under our feet.  Daniel and I were both caught off guard by the effect and admitted to feeling inexplicably nervous despite how cool it was...but Hollie on the other hand absolutely loved it.  She alternated pressing her face into the chainlink fence to watch, and literally dancing around as if the roar was music to her ears.  

Now, at least once a day I hear,

"Wanna see more loud-loud train, Mommy!'

Pregnancy update time-

I feel huge.  And hungry all the time.  Having a few contractions a day.  Baby's still moving like crazy, trying to break out.

Hollie seems to really be getting used to the idea.  Every morning (and throughout the day) she demands to sit down with Mommy to see and hug and snuggle the belly.  Sometimes she tries to use it as a chair, but that doesn't work out.

We've started telling her that the baby is going to come out to see us soon.  She made it clear how well she had absorbed this idea when we were at our first appointment with the new OB yesterday.  When the nurse came to get us from the waiting room, Hollie stood right up and said "Get baby out!"  Daniel and I were speechless for a second (we hadn't even been talking about it at that particular moment), but this great nurse took it in stride and said, "Hmmm, maybe not today, but soon!"

The new doc is great.  It seems that this office consists of one doctor, one nurse, and one receptionist.  It seems very flexible and relaxed - they squeezed me into their schedule on very short notice, and it was evident  how far they had gone out of their way for me, but they made it work.  They took a quick ultrasound just to check on the heart and see that the baby's head is downward, and everything looked fine.  We'll have a longer, more detailed ultrasound when we go back next week.  :)

Later that afternoon we took a tour of the childbirth center at our new hospital.  Very different from the one in Wichita where Hollie was born!  Smaller rooms with some variation in the layout and amenities - some had showers and some had tubs, most had a couch for dad but one just had a recliner...and the whole place had an overall out-dated look.  "Cozy" is the word that came to mind.  But I honestly, I liked it and have no qualms about delivering there.

I'm going to cut myself off here...more later.

34 and 35 week belly pictures are up!        

Luuuucy...

...we're home!

Yep.  2,000 miles.  Three and a half days on the road.   We are very glad we made the decision to drive instead of fly.  Our route took us through western Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, and finally Washington…a part of the country that we would probably have never seen otherwise.  Granted, 90% of it was boring, flat, nothingness, but the 10% up in the mountains made it worthwhile.  Awesome.  Stopping to see some friends and family along the way didn’t hurt either. 

Stories (and photos) from the trip will have to wait.

Luckily, the apartment was available when we arrived, so we didn't have to stay another night in a hotel.  Unpacking and repacking just that one suitcase every day was starting to make me crazy.  

It's a beautiful apartment complex and neighborhood.  Very upscale.  Feels awkward, as if we're "living above our paygrade", but I think we'll survive.  Our apartment is very open and the provided furniture is really nice.  I'll put up pictures when we've finished unpacking and organizing and things look halfway decent.

I'm loving the weather!  This place looks like a rainforest, but surprisingly the humidity isn't noticeably different from [some days in] Kansas.  The weather forecast had me a little nervous - a solid week of rain following our arrival.  And it did keep up a drizzle for our entire first full day here (didn't keep us from getting out for a much-needed walk!), but since then we've seen the sun at least a few times a day.  It is wonderful.  High temps have been in the 60's, but when the sun comes out the air warms up just enough - not too hot.  And no wind.  No! wind!  We are going to get so spoiled.

Daniel is in his third day at the office.  So far they have just been working out the kinks in getting everyone's computers and stuff working, but next week I think they're really going to get started.  It sounds like a nice place - big windows with views of the Sound and Whidbey Island, and only about a mile from the apartment.  

Well, Hollie's been doing great.  Her sleep seems to finally be getting back to normal.  During the drive she got into a pattern of going to bed really late and waking up really early (only sleeping about six hours) and taking two long naps in the car...and continued that for our first two days here.  This morning however, after waking up at 5:45, she and I went and sat on the couch and she dozed off again...for another two hours!  A good step back toward normal.  

We're trying to get by without using any baby-proofing like gates or cabinet locks, so it has been about 80% clever organization on our part, and 20% reminding Hollie to please not to dig in the trash can.   

When we got here, she definitely had an instinctive feeling of being in someone else's house, which kept her from really getting into the exposed TV cords and unraveling the toilet paper rolls.  It gave me a nice grace period to get things, at a minimum, safe.  That feeling is slowly wearing off, but it has been a good learning experience for her - she can take everything out of the kitchen drawers and cabinets and I won't stop her (let's face it, I can't), but she needs to put everything away (with help, for now) before she moves on.  I know that it's only a matter of time before she starts to truly feel at home...then we're really going to have to keep an eye on that toilet paper.  

Happy Memorial Day weekend!  And congratulations to my little sister...graduated from high school yesterday.  I can't believe it.  Sorry I didn't call you...I will this weekend.  

First appointment with my new OB is next Tuesday!

Much more to write about...coming soon.             

Finally

Travel plans.  We have 'em.

Earlier this week they told Daniel they wanted him to start in Seattle next Monday.

First, we thought it might be possible for all of us to fly out together this weekend.  Then we thought Daniel might fly out first, and Hollie and I would follow a few days afterward.  Then we thought Daniel might fly out this weekend, work a few days, then fly back here and make the drive with me...
It went on and on - juggling what the relocation people could make happen, and what was actually going to work for us.

Finally, two days ago, we figured, why don't we just drive all together this weekend?  Get it over with.  

Ran it by the managers yesterday and got the go-ahead.  Daniel won't be starting on Monday...more like Wednesday, but they're okay with that.  Airline tickets on such short notice are craaaazy expensive, so we're saving them a chunk of change.  It will be a long drive, and a busy few days getting ready to go, but I am so-so-so happy that this is finally happening.

Fortunately, while we were waiting for all these things to fall into place, we were mentally preparing, so now the actual preparing and packing is off to a great start and hopefully will continue to go smoothly.

We tried to have some fun while we waited, too.

 

Yes, painting with q-tips.  Yes, shoes are on the wrong feet.  She's a tough one to argue with about that.

This girl is funny.  Here are a few of the new and crazy things we've heard from her lately:

"Oh my josh"

"Stay here.  I be right back."

One morning she woke up after Daniel had left, and when she asked for him I said, "Oh, Daddy went bye-bye."  She shook her head and insisted "Daddy hello!"

When we're out walking and we look for cars before crossing the street, she's got the script down pat: "No cars? No trucks?  Okay, go!"  No prompting necessary.  There have been a few times that she's run away even after we've yelled for her to stop, which we've let her know is unacceptable, but she's never run into the street.  I think she has, what I like to call, a "healthy fear" of moving vehicles.

There's more, but it's late and my head's full of packing checklists and things to do tomorrow - our last full day to get ready.  I have new belly pictures accumulated, so next time I have a minute (ha) I'll get that updated.

Next time you hear from me, it will probably be from Washington!

Revise

So, we didn't leave this week.  Now it's looking like May 19th at the latest (but possibly earlier).

We had a little scare - almost immediately after getting the green light to go on this trip, Daniel found out about a little wrench in the works that might prevent him from leaving Wichita.  There's another project that might need him.  Put a little damper on our excitement for a moment, but on the other hand - flattering that my husband is in such high demand at work!  Anyways, it seems to have been worked out, and we've been told, again, that we are going to Seattle as planned...but there is a meeting next week to decide for certain what's going to happen.  From what I understand, everyone's aware that this trip will be a great opportunity for him and they won't keep him here unless they really really need him.

So, after being given a 100% affirmative, an "out-of-the-blue" negative, and a 99.9% affirmative all in a short time, we're just going to sit tight and wait.  It's been nerve-wracking at times, but thankfully it's in our nature (as a couple) to stay relaxed, wait and see, and make the best of whatever happens.  But that doesn't mean that Daniel's been twiddling his thumbs.  He's been hounding them to commit to travel and start dates and just make decisions about this...possibly relaying the stress he's been getting at home from a certain pregnant someone.  Preliminary details (housing arrangements, new facility clearances, etc) are starting to fall into place, and he feels like these things wouldn't even be happening yet if he wasn't staying on top of it.  He's taking care of us.  :)

Whew!  I know everyone who reads this has probably already heard it from us in person anyways, but still feels good to unload.

I've been keeping myself occupied by making mental packing checklists.  Since we don't have to take furniture, it seems like we're actually bringing very little: clothing (for all four of us!), Hollie's toys and books, baby gear, stuff like that.

After a pleasantly short search for good OBs in the area, there are several so far that will be willing to see me.  That's a huge weight off my shoulders.

Looking forward to a huge weight off my midsection, too!  I was 32 weeks yesterday, and saw Dr. J earlier this week, for (hope I don't jinx it!) the second-to-last time.  Everything is good, as usual, and baby's head seems to be down.

For a while now I've been having sciatic nerve pain that has been almost constant, but of course that pretty much comes with the territory and there's not much you can do about it, anyway, aside from taking Tylenol and applying heat.  Always frustrating to me to be unable to fix the cause, and only treat the symptoms.  However, I've found that sitting cross-legged and keep my back straight really helps...even reduces the pain for a few hours afterward!  

The very bottom of my belly button is now out in the open, in case you were wondering.  So cool.  :)

<---Two new belly pictures up...

I haven't told you much about what Hollie's up to these days, and I will be sure to fix that.  She continues to amaze us daily with the things she says and does.

Example:  I gave her a bowl of blackberries for a snack.  I usually stay with her when she's eating anything that could result in a bad stain (like blackberries), but this time I got distracted.  Later I saw her without the bowl and freaked out, started running around the house, imagining an overturned bowl and blackberries smooshed into the carpet somewhere.  Looked everywhere...couldn't find it.  Don't know why I didn't just ask her where the bowl was.

She had put it in the sink.