Let the Stockpiling Begin!

When I was about 8 weeks along, before anyone but Todd knew about the pregnancy, I had a little incident at the school where I work. I was in a classroom that was very hot, and there was very little air flow in the room. I was in the middle of helping a girl with a problem, when I got super light headed and dizzy. It got so bad that I had to sit on the floor, not move, and she ran to get the nurse for me. Talk about embarrassing in front of 30 high school kids!  She found out I was pregnant and called my supervisor to let her know what happened, and why it happened. The next day I get to work and all of the teachers are telling me congratulations! I was so confused until finally one of them told me that my supervisor sent out an email to all of the teachers in the program I tutor for about my pregnancy! I was so uneasy about it because I hadn't told a SOUL yet, and all of a sudden it seemed like the whole world knew. I got over it real fast though when a teacher offered me a ton of free baby stuff that she'd been wanting to get rid of anyway. SCORE! I also realized that it ended up being a good way for the pregnancy to be out in the open, and I don't have to say anything. So it ended up being a big blessing. 

So below is a picture of everything bagged up that we were given. In the top bag there is a really nice bedding set and the bag below is a giant bag of little boy clothes. The two sticks are Eddie Bauer sun shades for the car. Super nice! In the small plastic bag is a bottle warmer and some other contraption that I still haven't figured out :). Below it all are some books about baby sign language, prenatal yoga, baby names, and a medical book. Pretty awesome!

 Not to mention the best thing we were given! This suuuuper nice high chair! You wouldn't even know it was used, it's in perfect condition!

So that was the beginning of the stockpile. We didn't add anything to the stockpile for a while either because we haven't wanted to buy any clothes or anything until we know the gender. It feels like we've been waiting forever for that! But the wait is almost over! We find out Thursday!! Anywho... I've also wanted to start stocking up on diapers and wipes, but I haven't found any spectacular deals (nor have I been actively searching that much). Lucky for me, Black Friday rolled around, and I hear from a coworker that Toys R Us and Babies R Us would be selling boxes of diapers for $10 each. This equated to about $0.11-$0.13 per diaper, which is a pretty super deal! Things I've read on pinterest suggest never paying more than $0.20 per diaper, so I thought that $0.13 was pretty spectacular! It was hard to shell out about $100 all at once for the stockpile below, but I think I'll be pretty grateful that we did later on. 

 Todd and I also had some time on Thanksgiving day (while the Turkey was cookin') to run to an outlet mall that had some incredible sales going on. Everything at Carter's was 50% off, and we couldn't resist the deals! We ended up getting two sleepers and a bib that were just oh, so cute! I still insist that the sleepers are gender neutral, but Todd thinks they're girly. I just think that they're so perfect because Todd always refers to our future baby as his "little duck," so both sleepers are little ducks. I think it's adorable :)

I've been a little discouraged lately because I've been feeling like I haven't been "showing" as much as I should at this stage in my pregnancy. I look at week by week pictures on pinterest and I feel like all those girls started showing waaay sooner. I know it's a silly thing to worry about, but I'm a worrier I guess. Thank you for the worry gene, Mom ;). I've been taking bump pictures weekly. I may not ever do anything with them, but it's fun for me to  compare, and to reassure myself that I am actually growing. I thought I might share my first pic and my most recent pic. The difference is definitely there!

 I took a pic at 8 weeks too, but my pose was a little awkward. So I thought I'd start with this one... little grape-sized baby Brooks

The bump exists!! It actually looks really big in this picture and the tight shirt. When I'm in my usual attire, it is not noticeable at all, but here's the proof people! Let's also pretend that the bump was not at all influenced by the big lunch I had that day :).

Taking these photos has actually been more of a chore than I anticipated. I've been doing it weekly, but have seriously been considering doing it every other week. I'll probably give in to that the week that I get super busy and/or forget :). I took a pic of my little set up that I have to do each time. I have to move our dining table and chairs out of the way, and set up all of the lamps in our house so I can have enough light for the pic. Unfortunately, there is never enough light streaming in from the balcony :/. It's a pain in my booty, but it will hopefully be worth it one day :).

In non-baby related news...
Todd and I recently had the opportunity to fly out to Pennsylvania for Todd's first grad school interview. It ended up being a long journey to and fro, but it was well worth it. I flew standby and we bought Todd's tickets with United. Not only was I lucky enough to get on all of the same flights as him, but we were also able to sit next to each other on every single flight. That was a miracle! 
We flew into Philly, and then drove four hours to a tiny tiny town called Loretto. It was so cool to be able to check out Philly, and then the country-side of Pennsylvania. There's so much history on that side of the country, it's crazy! 

So this is a screen shot of the town and the university. As you can see... the university's campus is bigger than the whole town! And this campus was probably a little bit smaller than BYU-Idaho's campus... just to put it into perspective a little bit.

We ended up staying in a town about 6 miles away that was super cute, and a little bigger than Loretto. It had a Walmart, so we'd have everything we'd ever need if we lived there! We also found these townhomes there, and I seriously want to move to Ebensburg JUST so we can live in those townhomes! They were white and adorable, and the best part is... rent is like $600/mo for a 3 bedroom! Whaaaaaa?

Just this week the likelihood of that happening very slightly went up too! So just to give some background... this University has an undergraduate Physician Assistant program that feeds into the graduate program. Therefore, they reserve all of their seats for their undergrad students. Every year they'll have anywhere from 2-10 students drop from the program. They interview outsiders (like my Toddy) in order to make a wait list for if and/or when students drop out. So Todd's odds going into the interview were very slim to say the least. We figured it was worth it, however, because it would give him the interview experience that would help him when it's for an actual spot instead of a wait list spot.

Well, of course Todd aced his interview anyway and just this week we found out that he's been awarded a wait-list spot! It may not sound super huge to you, but if this had been any other school, that would have been an actual spot in the program. We won't find out where he falls on the wait list, but I think he's probably #1 or 2 :). So we just need a couple people to drop out, and we're in! Keep your fingers crossed! 

So St. Francis will be on the back burner for now, and Todd will keep interviewing in the meantime. He has an interview in a little over a week in New York, and then in February at another Pennsylvania school. We should also find out this week if he got an interview at the school in Yakima, WA. I'm still really hoping for that school (in Washington), but I'm also starting to think Pennsylvania would be alright too :). It's pretty gorgeous out there! Here are some pics from our journey out east!

First Priority: Chow down on some Philly Cheese Steak! Yumm!

We got to take a tour of Independence Hall, which was super awesome!

We finished our day in Philly at a world foods market thing. 

I found some olives :)

Soooo pretty!

This is the campus

Another pc of campus

Todd was eager to get to work!

This is pretty much the entire town of Loretto, haha. So cute though!

Needless to say, we had a great trip, and we ended it with a nice long layover in Houston! ;)

So that's about all that's new! I decided to turn down that teaching job that I was offered (in case you were wondering what happened with that). We just feel like everything is still so up in the air right now, it wasn't a commitment I was comfortable making. So we're both just plugging away in our current jobs, trying to see if we can find a way to maybe make it to Utah sooner rather than later.

The Rumors Are True!

In case you didn't catch the announcement on facebook...

Todd and I are expecting a little nugget!!!! He or she will be arriving around mid-May, and we are beyond excited! I am currently 13 weeks pregnant, and it has been beyond difficult to keep this a secret for so long! Todd and I have been waiting so long to be able to start our family, and have just wanted to tell the world now that it's finally here. 

Just for a little background on this picture, I set a timer on the camera and told Todd the news when it was about to take the picture. The three pictures on the right comprise of his reaction to the happy news. The big picture on the left is of us holding the onesie I bought for him that says "Daddy's great catch." 

Last week we sent little packages to my family, and then went up to Utah on the weekend to tell Todd's family. It was such a happy time to be able to share our happy news with our loved ones and celebrate! I'll probably share some videos and pics of everyone's reactions in my next post. 

To update everyone on life lately... Todd and I have been faced with some very big decisions that we're going to have to make very quickly. First being the fact that we're in a little bit of a pickle since our apartment contract is over in March, but the baby is due in May. 

To add to this predicament, since we won't know if Todd will have gotten into PA school before January, he's going to have to enroll in a couple of science classes to be able to apply to more schools next year (in case he doesn't get in). The school semester also ends in May, so we'd be stuck here until the semester is over. But if we stay, we'd have to pay month-to-month which can get pricey. We would also have to move almost immediately after the baby is born. 

We've started to explore the option of moving to Utah in January and taking classes/working there. We'd first have to see if Todd could get transferred to a Biomat in Utah, and he would have to enroll in school up there immediately. 

To make this decision even more impossible, I just got offered a full-time teaching position at a private high school. I would be able to finish out the school-year because it ends right before the baby is due. However... I'd also be working right up until the baby is born... which doesn't sound too fun. It is a really great opportunity to work at a great school and would help us save a bunch of money for little baby Brooks. But then that makes the months of April/May very very stressful with so much going on at the same time. 

We are kind of leaning in one direction right now, but need to make sure a few things will work out first. We just want to do what's best for our baby and his/her future. 

That's about all I have to update on right now, but am sure I'll be posting lots and lots of updates about the pregnancy, so beware. We find out the gender in 4 weeks and CANNOT WAIT! We want to start shopping but it's so hard without knowing if it's a boy or girl. I'm also super excited to be able to stop calling our baby "he/she" or even worse... "it." Sounds horrible. Just makes things a little more real and personal :)

As usual, I will leave you with some pics of our trip to Utah. We got to go on a hike with Todd's dad to the upper Silver Lake (I think that's what it's called). We didn't really know how long the hike was, but the sign when we got up there said "3.7 miles." We didn't know if that was each way or round trip... guess what it was? Yep! It was each way! So we ended up hiking almost 7 and a half miles, and I about died. It was just pretty steep on the way up, and I kept getting super light-headed. Can I blame pregnancy for that one? But we made it! No one passed out and we enjoyed a beautiful view at the top. Here are a few pics from our journey :)

These guys are so cute in their matching outfits. You can hardly tell them apart!

The three of us at the lake

We had to snuggle to stay warm. It was cold up there!

Love getting to see everyone!