Kicking!

Im 22 (23 tomorrow!) weeks! I am feeling Michael kick SOOO much more. Its crazy! It started 2 days ago. I was in walmart standing at the registry machine and I really needed to pee and all of a sudden I'm getting kicked. Its not little flutters anymore, its kicks! Maybe punches, all I know is he is practicing his Taekwondo on my bladder and my belly in general now!

I told Josh about it and later that night I could feel him again. Josh put his hand on my belly but couldn't feel anything so I told him to push harder, he pressed a little so I put my hand over his and pushed it in there and he was like I dont know if I felt anything...I felt a little bump. I told him "thats it!! That him kicking, its just a little bump right now!"

It was very exciting and it still is, although at times when I really have to pee, it gets a little uncomfortable and Im sure it will get more uncomfortable as he grows but I am just glad to be able to feel that my little guy is alive and definitely kicking!

Due date!

I get to change my due date back to my original April 30th! It seems so much closer than May 6th! :)

We had our 20 week ultrasound a couple weeks ago and thats when they measured our little boy, who by the way, is still a boy! :)

At the ultrasound they looked at his heart to make sure there were 4 chambers and there were. :)

They checked for cleft pallette and cleft lip but he didn't have either!

They also zoomed in on many of his bones, which all seemed to be developing right on!

It was so neat to see my baby and see all 4 chambers of his heart pumping. It was an emotional ultrasound that I honestly didn't expect coming. I didn't realize I could have been walking away from that ultrasound finding out that our baby would have some kind of issues and trials, but he doesn't and I am so grateful to have a healthy baby boy growing inside me. I just hope the rest of the pregnancy, his growth, and birth all continue on track and that we'll have no complications or at least not many with the birth and none for him.

2 years

2 years ago today, Josh and I were sealed in the Washington DC temple for time and all eternity!
It was the best decision I ever made :)

I never wrote in my journal about that day (shame on me, I know) so I thought I would write down now what I remember :) Warning this will be long!

Josh and I flew out to PA 2 days before our wedding, so the 18th. We had just finished finals and it snowed so hard in Utah we were afraid we wouldn't make it to the airport in Salt Lake from Provo BUT the snow stopped for a short time, right when we needed to drive. Thank you Heavenly Father :)

Josh's sister and brother in law picked us up from the airport. It was my first time meeting them. They gave us our wedding present in the car, it was awkward and funny :) They warned me of what was to come when we got to the house. Everyone would be sleeping (it was around midnight when we got there) but Mom wanted to be woken up. They warned me that the family was loud and crazy and would probably not stop questioning me because I was new. So i was warned but I really had no idea what I was getting myself into.

We got to the house and walked inside. Josh's mom was there waiting for us. We sat down at the table and talked for a little while and soon the whole family was down stairs talking. It stayed kind of quiet, at least for them but I was still a little overwhelmed and didn't talk as much as I usually would.

The next day we watched a movie, Mom and Jenn started working on the wedding cake and my parents flew in from California. The boys got in lots of boy fighting time and video games. We went to bed early (Not that anyone really slept because of the anticipation, but we tried) knowing we would be waking up early to drive to the temple to get married.

We woke up, I woke up about an hour or so earlier than everyone else so I could do my hair and all of that! I brought all of my stuff with me. Josh's dad showed up to drive us all in the big van to the temple and my parents and Jenn and Mark followed in their own cars. There had been ice warnings going on for days there. Everything was frozen over. One of my favorite things there were the ice trees. I'd never seen them before but what the warning meant for us was that the only people who would be going to the temple with us were our immediate families. As we pulled out of the driveway the van slid on the ice in the road, swerved and then finally got a grip again. I was a bit scared after that, we prayed we would make it there safely.

After the 2+ hour drive there we got out and went into the temple while Josh's Dad and my parents and all the siblings besides Jenn and Mark stayed outside and went to the visitors center.

Josh's mom, Jenn, Mark, and Josh and I went into the temple. We talked with the temple Matron and made sure all of our legal stuff was taken care of. We then went and changed into what we would be married in. Josh was waiting at the door for me and we walked hand in hand to our sealing room, the smallest and most intimate of them all and were sealed for time and all eternity. It was a beautiful experience and very spiritual. We were given guidance and advice for us to live a better, happier life. We then went into the celestial room where we could be in a quiet and peaceful place together, where it is easy to feel the spirit of God. After spending some time in there we went to the changing rooms again. I changed into my wedding dress and got "reready" fixing up my make up and hair. After I was ready, Josh was waiting for me at the door, it was so nice to feel so beautiful and see his face light up when he saw me for the first time :)

We walked out of the temple doors and Josh did his "golasso" pose. He is so..him :) We started taking pictures and hugging family. It was great to see my mom after that, to let her know how special this experience was and how grateful I was that she was there on the temple grounds when I was sealed. After we left we went to wendy's on the way back to the church for our reception, we had only a short time so fast food it was. We drove with mark and jenn most of the way and then my parents started falling asleep so we took over their car :) We got to the reception after almost everyone had already arrived, had to change into our wedding stuff and get out there fast for a short ring ceremony. It was a fun reception and very relaxed. I got to meet many of Josh's high school friends and had fun dancing and enjoying my first few hours as the new Mrs. Joshua GodfreyI'll do our CA reception and ring ceremony another day!

Movement

At 18 weeks (last night) December 5th 2010 (for documenting purposes) I am pretty sure (semi, kind of, almost?) that I felt our baby move.

I was laying on our game room couch watching Percy Jackson and the Olympians with Josh and half looking on the computer, kind of curled/squished with my knees bent and I felt TWO little...bumps? in my middle lower abdomen... then as I was getting up I felt one more. It was kind of like a little push, tap, something BUT i'm pretty sure it was my little monkey!

It was so excited because I have been WAITING for this to happen. I stayed up later last night than I have in a LONG time. I rarely stay up past...9 or 9:30 (this baby takes a lot of energy ;) ) and last night I stayed up until 11 ish and I think I felt him around 10:30-10:45 so maybe he's just a night owl!

I love this baby so much. He consumes all of my thoughts (and all of my energy!) but I would give everything for him! We tried for such a long time (at least to us, some people have much harder trials than we did and my heart goes out to you, it truly does) to create this beautiful baby. I hope he always knows he was wanted and that we could not be happier to share our lives with him. We are grateful to be so blessed to take care of a son of our Heavenly Father and to be blessed by his spirit. This baby has already had a positive impact on my life (and on Josh's as well). I want to be better because of him. I want to know more about the gospel and about everything so I can teach him. I want to do more so I can be an example to him. I just want to be a better person so I can be a better Wife to my husband and Mother to our "soon to be born" son.

It's a...

Well this is a little late, but we are having a

BEAUTIFUL BOUNCING BABY BOY!!

And we could not be happier!!

We drove up to Phoenix after saying we would just wait it out and find out at 19 weeks (which still happens to be a week away from when Im writing this)

BUT

My doctor office could not get me in until I would be 21 weeks and that was just TOO long of a wait! So at EXACTLY 15 weeks we got to see our little MICHAEL ALEXANDER on the big screen! (it actually was pretty big! They projects the ultrasound up on the wall so Josh and I both could look comfortably!)

We had a conversation with the technician before we started about how it is easier to tell if it is a boy because there will be "something" there as compared to early on nothing there could mean "it" just hasn't grown yet I guess!

We started the ultrasound and his little face was front and center! I said "Oh look it's the baby's face!" The technician said "That's not what we're looking for today!" :)

She wiggled the wand around a little bit and said "Well I'm pretty sure I already know."

We didn't really say anything, just waited and she said "Well you know how we were talking before about how easy it is to tell if it's a boy...well...It looks like it's a boy!"

She kept bouncing the wand on my belly and having me cough so Michael would get in a good position for us to see "the goods." She kept saying "Yeah, yeah, it's a boy" then said "BUT I'm going to prove it to you!"

So finally Michael cooperated, turned and put his body the way my body was, so his spine on mine kind of a thing, facing upward and gave us a great shot of his belly, legs and penis. There is no way my boy could be a girl now!I'm completely in love with this boy inside me, even though sometimes I still wonder if he's real.