24 week pregnancy SCARE!!!

Well lets just cut to the chase... I'm already a high risk pregnancy due to my placenta previa and my vasa previa (vessels on the cervix). Well one day I had a rough night, not able to sleep. I felt a lot of pressure (lower abdomen) and all day long I was super tired but couldn't sleep. I just felt uncomfortable... didn't really cramp just felt pain when I was up walking around. During the night I had a feeling that I was "leaking" and my first thought (being a nurse) was it was amniotic fluid. I brushed it off all day long. I told my mom and sister and after hearing their advice (my mom was flipping out, telling me to call the dr) I decided to brush it off and just wait and see. Well sure enough we were getting ready to go out with friends and being I just got over some bronchitis, I still have a slight lingering cough. Well I coughed and felt a gush of fluid (no ladies, I didn't pee my pants after coughing cuz I had just gone to the bathroom). I immediately called my Dr. and she said I had to get in ASAP. So off to OB triage we went, nervous as ever. I'm just barely 24 weeks... I have a long ways to go before little girl should arrive.
So we arrive and the testing began. They did 3 different tests to determine if it was sure enough amniotic fluid. If it was, they were admitting me on bedrest for the remainder of my pregnancy!!! THE REMAINDER OF MY PREGNANCY!!! No bedrest at home, bedrest at the hospital!!! Oh the emotions hit me hard... I work full time to carry insurance until Jeff gets called out to Oklahoma for training and he starts carrying insurance. And if Jeff does get called out, I'm here alone, on bedrest... at the hospital. With all we have been through trying to get pregnant and then the vasa previa, and now possible membranes rupturing... it's taking all our patience, energy and faith to get this little one here!!!
Well after waiting 2 hours for lab results and a pelvic exam, the dr asked if I've ever been diagnosed with endometrial cysts. I said no, and she said it looked as if I had the remainder of one. So the gush of fluid was just the rupture of the cyst (explains the pressure and pain i felt) And the lab results came back positive for an infection. So thank heavens I was discharged with an antibiotic. I have to still follow up with the perinatologist to double check my amniotic fluid levels and see the status of my vasa previa... so I'm not out of the woods yet.
I just want to say first off how greatful I am for a heavenly father to send us this true miracle. I will do whatever I have to to keep her safe and inside of me for as long as I can.... sadly even if it means bedrest. This was a scare I never want to experience again.
Second off, I saw a new side of my husband I have never seen. I had a moment of extreme pain and he stood there, held my hand, told me to squeeze his hand has hard as I wanted. Later I apologized for squeezing so hard and he said, "Babe, I wanted to feel the pain you were going through." At that moment, I knew I can do anything with him by my side. I can't wait to watch him be a dad... and to protect and provide for me and our little girl and other kids waiting up in heaven to join our family. I love him so very much and with us just celebrating our 3 year anniversary, I love that we have such a strong marriage and friendship built before we brought kids into the family. The past 3 years have been incredible and I know we will never get that time back. I know our kids will bless and enrich our lives and I look forward to growing old with Jeff and being by his side for eternity.

Jeff's "Mt. Goat" Hunt

Jeff had the opportunity to go with his brother Josh on a Mt. Goat hunt last week with 2 other guys. I was excited for Jeff to go for a number of reasons: 1- He would get to do this hunt with his older brother 2- It's his first big animal hunt since moving to Alaska (the whole reason we moved here is because he has always wanted to live here and so he could hunt, oh and of course go to school :) 3- Next summer Jeff really wont' get any time off being a new controller here so I wanted him to take full advantage of this past summer up here getting as much hunting and fishing in as he could. Now there were 2 reasons I didn't want him to go 1- he would be gone for our 3 year anniversary (so knowing this I decided to work the day of our anniversary so I wasn't sitting home missing him) 2- He has never left me where I haven't been able to get a hold of him or at least talk to him once a day. When he has gone bear hunting, or when I leave to go to Utah at least we are just a phone call away. This hunt was suppose to be a week-10 days or so and just knowing I could've gone that long with no phone call (because he would be clear on top of some mt. range with no service) made me nervous sick.
Well Josh came into town and the next day they took off to Valdez (5 hr drive). Then they would get in our boat with all their gear, take a 20-30 minute boat trip across the bay to the base of the Mt they would be hunting. They would set up their "base" camp at which point 1 guy would stay behind at (Roy didn't want to hunt, he just wanted to go along for the adventure) and Jeff, Josh and Justin would then get into a smaller inflatable boat and head up different river systems looking for a place to pull off to hike up the Mountain. I wanted Jeff to type up his version of the hunt cuz trust me, it was an experience I don't want him to forget about later ( but it's been over a week and I'm getting behind in my blogging, so his story to come later I guess) They hiked 5 hrs straight up hill/MOUNTAIN and set up camp for the night there. Josh and Justin went up a little more to spot for Goats, cuz the next morning was opening day. Sure enough they spotted 10 or so trophy size goats worth shooting so they new it was game on. Well the next day a storm rolled in, bringing the worst wind, rain and even snow to higher elevations and it pushed all the goats down the ravine and they never saw a single goat for the next 2 days. Meanwhile, in Anchorage the rain was so bad we had hellacious flooding and the wind knocked out power for some time (nothing compared to the wind storm we were just recovering from that left residents with out power up to 6 days and damage costing into the thousands). Needless to say there "7-10 day" hunt got cut into 3 days. But in the mean time, Josh did shoot a black bear... so I'm at least glad he didn't go back to Utah empty handed. He took so much time and energy to prepare for this hunt and I would've felt bad if he went home with nothing.

 

My very sexy hunter!!! Gosh I sure do love and adore him.

 

 

 

 

 

Jeff had an absolute BLAST and despite all the rain and wind he said he would go in again in a heart beat. Josh was able to get a few pics of there adventure. Sure glad they made it home and lucky for me I only had to go 2 days without hearing from my sweet husband. Here I was praying for his safety and he said all he could do was pray for me and he worried and missed me. I sure love him so much.

P.S. So since he got back into town eariler than expected he was here for our anniversary... but sadly I still had to work :( BUMMER!!!

Anniversary Getaway

Jeff and I will be celebrating our 3 year anniversary next week and I've been whining :) that we didn't get a vacation this year (When Jeff and I got married we agreed to do a vacation every year... Year 1:Cabo, Mexico. Year 2:Orlando, Florida) So last minute we decided to see where we could go for a quick getaway using our companion ticket before it expires in October. Well we looked into Hawaii, Seattle, LA and then Las Vegas. Well it's kinda a no brainer that if we went to Las Vegas we would try to jet up to St. George to visit family. Sadly, with my work we only had 4 days to work with so it was kinda overwhelming to try and imagine a nice relaxing vacation.... so I decided to use PTO and we got a 7 day much needed amazing vacation to Vegas/St. George UT. Oh my gosh it was so what WE needed and it was so nice to be together (Who am I kidding, we are together alot!!! I'm a very spoiled girl to always have my husband around... I'm going to go into major shock when he is gone to Oklahoma for 3 months starting his ATC career.)

Day 1: Welcome to Las Vegas!!! First off everyday we were in Vegas we slept until at least 10 am and didn't really leave the hotel til noon. That's what vacations are for right :) Our first day there we were craving Cafe Rio so that was our first event of the day. Needless to say we ate at Cafe rio 4 out of 7 days :)

 Then we drove around and found this pawn shop off the show Pawn Stars (my husband loves this show). It was fun to go and see but so not what we were expecting. Needless to say it's cooler on TV.

 Then we went to the Mirage to see Seigfied and Roy's Dolphin and Lion/Tiger exhibit. Jeff and I have swam with Dolphins before so once you've done that, seeing them up close just isn't as exciting but we still loved watching their tricks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was in AWE at these Lions... they were huge. Unfortnately it was late in the day so the tigers and cheetas were all sleeping so no pics were taken.

 

 

 We walked the strip A TON!!! If you know Vegas Strip you know people are always dressing up in different characters for you to get pics with and give them tips. some costumes are pretty lame but my husband loves Star Wars, specifically Cheubaca. We didn't have cash to tip him so I quickly snapped a pic walking by. It was such a real looking costume.

Oh the Vegas night life. We always have to hit up the water show at Bellagio. In fact we ate at Cabo Cantena and had the most perfect view to people watch :) Afterwards we went and walked around the Bellagio to see what theme their flower garden was (this is a tradition for us) We weren't as impressed this time but I did love all the bright colors.

 

 

 

 That night we headed to Fremont Street for some night time entertainment. We say many crazy people and costumes that will never be forgotten. They had tons of different live bands and then of course their light show in the sky.

 

 Day 2 in Vegas: Whenever we go to Vegas we always walk into every casino and we love walking the strip. Well we wanted to do something different so we went to the Shark Reef at Mandalay Bay. Not a fan of this pic but it was hard to get pics of us together.

 

 

 So Jeff started pulling the "I don't want to be in pics anymore" and was just taking them all of me. So I decided I would use my phone to take pics of him... told him he had no option, I needed to blog and capture all our memories :)

 

 

 

 I love this pic... reminds me of Bruce off of Finding Nemo!!!

 

 

 We love going to Vegas shows so we decided to hit up the Blue Man Group. While we were walking around the Venetian, these odd characters were out and about. There were many more but it was again like pulling teeth to have Jeff get pics of or with any of them!

 

 

 We loved the Blue Man Group. We had just bought our tickets the day off and they said they had front row seats but they required ponchos. So we took them, knowing we were risking getting wet. Well there was not one event they did that included splashing or spraying... but at least we got front row seats. We laughed so hard we were crying and I ended up peeing my pants (a common event now with pregnancy ha ha)

 

Day 3-6 in St. George: We spend Labor Day weekend with Jeff's family. His parents and little brother Scotty came down from Tremonton to spend the time with us too. It was so nice to see everyone (we haven't seen them since Christmas) and we had 2 new additions to the family so I got plenty of baby lovin in :) I'm really disappointed with how terrible I was at taking pics. As you can see it all consisted of Jeff and his neices and nephew. With so many kids around it's hard to get them to slow down or even track them down for pics. But needless to say it was a great weekend. We were even able to get a tender for the kids and go to Benja Thai for dinner with just the adults. We love that place and we all stuffed our faces. I seriously have the BEST in laws ever and I"m so glad they all made time for us this weekend on such short notice.

 

 Our newest additions to the Harris family... Ravsten Harris (Kikki and Tippers boy) and Blair Harris (Josh and Sheridan's little girl) These 2 are just 4 days old and are hilarious together.

 Grandpa Garry pulling Halle and Raegan around after church... he truly loves his grandkids

 

 And of course there is never a time with the Harris family where we aren't playing games. We played many round of Yatzee and Screwy Lewy.

 Jeff wanted to make all his nieces and nephews marshmellow guns. It was a huge hit until we realized what a mess it was to clean up all the marshmellows (I'm sure Josh and Sher's house was surrounded by ants for days :)

 

 

 Jeff and his brothers then had to take out the potatoe gun and see who could shoot it the furthest.

 All the Harris boys... Scotty, Tipper, Josh and Jeff. Love them all.

 Jeff and his neice Lexi. She loved him when we went swimming. She mostly loved running and screaming when he was pretending to be a shark in the pool. 

  

 

Day 7: Back in Vegas: We got to spend one more day/night in Vegas before flying back home. We both thought 7 days away was perfect... not too long and we were ready to get home. The last day there we walked the strip some more and then finished our vacation going to Cirgue du Soleil: Mystere at Treasure Island. Jeff had taken me to the Cirque du Soleil: O show at Bellagio for one of our first dates so it was fun to go and see a different one this time. Mystere was great... funny and full of acrobatic events. So glad we were able to go!

 Now let me explain... this pic catches me off guard EVERY time!!! There was a restaurant on the strip called Senor Frogs and Jeff and I stopped in for Happy Hour to enjoy some Pina Colada's and me a nice mango slush... well these were their bar stools... it was hilarious. Needless to say this pic ended up on my husbands wallpaper of his phone.

Well the vacation came and went and looking back I have not one regret about missing work :) We shopped, swam, got some much needed sun, played with family, laughed, ate some great food (and TONS of it) had great talks and made amazing memories. We both needed this and I'm so glad Jeff took the initiative to push us booking it cuz he knows how much vacations means to me. This will be our last little getaway before we become parents. I love Jeff with all my heart. He is so perfect and good to me. He treats me with so much love and respect and values me as his wife. I have been beyond blessed to have found such an incredible husband. Thanks for the memories babe, I love you!!!!