May

We celebrated our 6th anniversary by having dinner at "The Roof" restaurant on temple square.  Chase got a BOGO coupon for his birthday, so we thought we would try it out.  We were not very impressed with the food, to say the least.  There didn't seem to be a huge selection of food and there wasn't a whole lot that appealed to us.  The dessert bar was fantastic though and we couldn't get enough of that! It was fun to dress up and go to a fancy restaurant, since we don't get to do that very often.

The bill before the BOGO coupon. Ouch!

On Sunday, May 13th, we celebrated Chase's 28th birthday and Mother's Day.  We went to Shauna's house (even though she was out of the country!) and had dinner and cupcakes. On Monday, I brought Chase home some El Pollo Loco for dinner and a present of candy for dessert.

Meg had to be there to watch Chase open his gift!

 On May 19th, we spent the morning beautifying our neighborhood by spreading bark in our and our neighbors' yards.  It was a lot of hard work but the weather was beautiful and the neighborhood looks great.  Then we drove up to Logan with Chase's mom and her cousin.  We started by visiting the Pepperidge Farm outlet store at their factory and then got some ice cream at the Fat Boy ice cream shop.  Then we went to spend a couple hours at the Logan temple before going to Chase's cousin Brandy's wedding reception.  We had a great little day trip and it was a fun first visit to Logan.

The next day in the evening was a solar eclipse.  The last solar eclipse that was seen from this part of the world was in 1994, so it was pretty remarkable.  We watched it in our driveway with our next door neighbors Nicole and Stoker.  They had borrowed a welders helmet and we were able to see it perfectly through that.  It was so cool to be able to look at it.

The biggest changes in the pregnancy this month is that we have felt the baby kick! Last Friday, the 18th, we were laying in bed watching TV and I started to feel some thumps in my belly.  Through their consistency, I finally figured out that it was probably the baby I was feeling.  Chase was even able to feel the thumps every once in a while.  It is a really cool feeling and now she kicks me any time I'm sitting still.  If we watch my belly, we can see it jump every once in a while like a Mexican Jumping Bean!  The other thing I'm starting to notice is that I'm starting to get the leg cramps that are oh so much fun! We are signing up for a Bradley Method birthing class that is starting next month.  I was having a hard time trying to figure out if we wanted to take a class since I feel like we know so much from talking with Chase's sisters, but we decided to do it for the experience and to learn a few more things.  I think it will help me feel more prepared and ease my anxiety about labor.

May 5 - 21 weeks 5 days

May 25 - 24 weeks 4 days

April

I had my 3rd midwife appointment on April 13th. They did end up drawing enough blood this time (I drank lots of water!) and we listened to the heartbeat again. Everything seems like its going great.  My blood pressure was just a titch high, so I hoped it wouldn't turn in to pre-eclampsia.  Two weeks later (on the 24th of April) we went in for our 2nd ultrasound to check the health of the baby.  We went through head to toe and everything looked good.  We couldn't get a good view of her face, so she couldn't be sure if there was any cleft lip/palate, but that was all.  Chase and I learned a lot asking the tech a million different questions about what she was looking at and what she was looking for.  I went in for my 4th appointment this past Friday (May 11th).  I am gaining weight, that's for sure! I've gained about 18lbs so far, which was more than I expected, so I think that I should probably start eating a little better.  I don't feel like I look like I've gained that much, but I don't want to have loads of weight to lose after the baby is born, so it is time to step it up.  My blood pressure was back down to normal, which I was happy about.  I asked about the results from my blood test and the ultrasound.  Suzanne said my iron was just a tiny bit low, so I need to start getting a little more iron in my diet.  On the ultrasound, it showed that my placenta was only 1 3/4 in above my cervix, which they like it to be 2 in, so she wanted me to get another ultrasound at 29 weeks to make sure it has moved up and won't cause any problems during delivery. We listened to the heart beat again and everything seems good.

The latest changes in my body for pregnancy (at 23 weeks): I have been getting a lot of heartburn recently.  Starting at about 3pm and lasting the rest of the night.  Tums was working for a while, but isn't cutting it anymore.  I went and bought some omeprazole on Saturday and started taking it and it is working very well.  I am going to try to keep it down to one every other day so I don't have to take too much of it.  Its a heck of a lot more expensive than Tums, but it is worth it.  I really feel for people that suffer with chronic heartburn/reflux.  I could barely eat my dinner the other night, it was so bad.  I'm really glad there is medicine that will help me get through it.  My belly is growing.  My co-workers have said that I have "popped" this past week!  I can feel the ligaments stretching every time I stand up or roll to my other side.  Its only going to keep growing! Ahhh! I am to the point where I have to sleep on my side all the time, which I hate doing.  I wake up several times each night because I am on my back again and so I have to roll over again.  That's not going to be very easy when my belly starts weighing more.  It really hurts my hip to sleep on my side too, but there's not much else I can do besides sleep sitting up.  The belly is not big enough yet that I have started getting stretch marks, although I'm sure they will come soon.  My breathing is starting to get a little more difficult especially if I fill up my stomach, which happens almost every time I eat because I can't fit very much in there anymore.  That makes me hungry again almost every hour.  I never thought I would get so tired of eating! I think that's about all of the changes over this past 1 1/2 months.

April 18th - 19 weeks, 2 days

May 5th - 21 weeks, 5 days

Well, we were planning on going to Phoenix for Easter but then Chase got an email asking him to interview for a pharmacist position with a grocery store that weekend.  So of course, we weren't going to turn that down, so we cancelled our trip.  The interview didn't go as great as he wanted and was apparently for a position in Logan, which we really don't want to move until we get desperate for a job.  So it was a little disappointing, but it was good practice for interviewing.  Graduation is coming closer, just under a month away.  Chase finished his final internship rotation this past Friday. He still has to do about 150 hours on his own over the next few weeks and take his boards before he can get his license and then hopefully get a job. We'll just keep praying!

Chase's cousin Heather was in town on their way to moving across the country and so we decided to have a Straw family BBQ.  It was fun to see everyone and have a good meal together.

The next day we had Memphis' 5th birthday.  We went bowling and had cupcakes and then went to lunch together.  We had so much fun and all the kids had a blast. It was nice to have a way to entertain all the kids for so long where they didn't have to be contained or stay quiet.  It was a definite success!

Stacey's first frame: STRIKE!

She was so excited for Hungry Hungry Hippos!

The next weekend, Stacey, Ryan, Chase, and I went on a 3 night cruise to Ensenada, Mexico.  We drove to Vegas on Thursday night after work and stayed the night at Ryan's grandparents' house.

We saw this awesome "double rainbow all the way across the sky" on our drive down.

We drove the rest of the way to Long Beach the next morning.  It was a great, relaxing drive.

We got on the ship with no problems...

...and, after dropping our bags in our rooms...

...enjoyed some lunch on the Lido deck.  We went to the safety drill and then went up to the top to watch the ship depart. We were amazed that people were still boarding the ship several minutes after we were scheduled to leave.  Then we went to dinner...

...and on to what we thought would be "So you think you can dance?".  They didn't end up doing that, but did trivia questions instead.  After that was Game Show Mania that Stacey and Ryan both got to participate in and got sweet sweet medals.

We went to the piano bar after that where they were playing "Guess That Song".  Then we went to the Welcome Aboard Show where they more or less introduced what was going on during the rest of the cruise. After that we went to "Superstar Live" where people got to sing karaoke with a live band.  It was so awesome! Stacey and Ryan both got on the stage to sing.

Saturday, we got to sleep in as long as we wanted, which wasn't that long because we were woken up by the bow thrusters when we docked in Ensenada.  We went to breakfast on the Lido deck and then got ready to get off the ship and explore Mexico.

We met an LDS tour guide named "David" - he told us of things we could do, but since we didn't have much money, we decided we would have to contact him the next time we visit Ensenada.

 

We went shopping for a few hours.

I had to take a picture with this dress because my mom wore almost the exact same dress through the last few months of her pregnancy with me because I made her belly so huge!!

My mom still has her's!!

 We got back on the ship when we got hungry for lunch and got a couple pictures of the whole city.  Stacey said goodbye to her first trip out of the country as we departed.

 We checked out some games from the library and played them for a while. We also watched the break dancers for a while.

We then got ready for the formal night at dinner. We took some of our own pictures outside. There was lobster and ribs on the menu at dinner.

 We changed out of our formal clothes and went to check out the karaoke in one of the bars.  It was very different than the superstar live, full of people that were very drunk and very bad singers, so we decided to leave.  We went and played games on the Lido deck again so Chase could get his "4th meal" in and get some ice cream, which he promptly dropped on the floor after he got it.

That small white pile on the floor is Chase's ice cream...

Mimicking a woman that didn't know how to shut off the ice cream machine in front of him, so she just walked away and he had to shut it off.  He was showing us how it went, which is why he dropped his ice cream.

 Sunday was a day at sea.  We went to breakfast on the Lido deck.  It was a cold, cloudy day, so we did stay indoors for quite a bit.  We played games and decided to go to the water slide.  There were only a couple people there because it was so cold that day (the hot tubs were packed though!). We were definitely crazy for going in the cold water, but we waited too long and really wanted to do it before the cruise was over.

Then we decided to play some mini golf.  Stacey decided to take a nap, so it was just the three of us.

The boat was rocking so much! Made golfing a little hard.

We also went to "The Game of Love" and then to "Superstar Live" again before dinner.  We stole the show and even Chase got up to sing.

We went to dinner where our servers sang and danced for us.  Everyone waved their napkins in the air.

 After dinner, we went to both comedy shows and had a good time.  We met a few people from Utah that we had seen on the ship throughout the weekend.  One of them happened to be in my ward growing up! We didn't have much else to do, so we went to bed.

Monday morning we woke up and packed our bags.  We went to breakfast in the dining room and said goodbye to our room service guy from Bali, Indonesia.  He was pretty awesome and we had some good conversations with him.

The awesome towel animals he made for us!

After we got off the ship and made it through customs, we had to get ready to go to Dancing with the Stars!  We went to Chelsie's house to get dressed and all made up.  We went to lunch at the Cheesecake Factory at the mall next door to the CBS studios and then walked over to the studio.  We stood in a line for VIP guests outside the gates and then waited in another line outside the building til about 4:30.  They let us in to find our seats, which happened to be right behind the judges! It was so awesome! We were on TV every time Carrie Ann was talking.  It was so loud in the studio, we couldn't hear anything anyone was saying.  We had to watch it again when we got home to see what was going on.  It was way interesting to see where all the camera men were and how it all came together.  We had a great time watching the show and got to say hi to Chelsie right after the show.  We waited in her trailer with Louie Vito (her past partner who was there visiting) while she attended the press line.  We only had a little bit of time before we had to leave to drive back to Utah to get to work on time the next morning.  Ryan really wanted to wait til Chelsie got back to say hi to her again, so Chase and I decided to go get the car and fill it with gas and come back to pick Stacey and Ryan up at the gate.  (Unfortunately, we didn't get one single picture with Chelsie!)  After grabbing some dinner, the GPS estimated we would arrive home at 7:45 on Tuesday morning, which is about the time that I was supposed to be at work.  We drove as fast as we could without getting a speeding ticket and with as few stops as possible.  We ended up getting home at 7:10, which gave me just enough time to shower and get to work.  I slept probably about 3 or 4 hours in the car on the drive, so it was a long day at work, but I was just really glad we made it home on time.  We had so much fun on this cruise.  We thought it was better to have more people with you on a cruise.  We never got bored and did things we wouldn't normally do.  It was also real nice that I felt better on this cruise than the last one. The rocking of the ship didn't affect me very much at all this time.  Overall, we had an awesome time! Thanks Stacey and Ryan for letting us crash your anniversary trip!