Our family Grew two more feet

 1St Carter 1:1
AND it Came to past that a son was born unto goodly parents.
Well after about a year of trying and 9 months of pain, uncomfort, and waiting a son was born. Here is
Austin Makai Carter he was born at 1832hrs on 22Oct2011.


...To be continued

Almost there...

I figured I should post something now because I'm not sure when I'll get back on here. But, then again, we don't know when this little guy is going to decide to come out. So I may still be hanging around next week.

The due date is Saturday. That's a little scary, but amazing to me at the same time. The doctor told me that he won't let me go past the 29th, so he already scheduled an induction for that date just in case. Maybe he already thinks I'm going to be late...

Here's the latest in photos. Brett took it yesterday.

It really looks bigger in person than the picture makes it look. When Brett got home from work last night his first words to me were, "Wow your stomach looks huge! What happened?" Thanks husband.

Sometimes that's a good thing to hear though. Most people tell me I can't be due this weekend. I look too little. Just watch him be a huge baby. I'll laugh. Afterwards. :)

It's still HOT here in Hawaii. Probably not as hot as I think it is. But I blame that on this big belly. It's nice that the beach is less than 10 minutes away though. Yes, I am bragging. We still go lots of days when Brett gets home from work, and watch the sun go down. Brett falls asleep laying on his towel way too easily.

 I tried too...but I'll spare you the pictures :)

On Saturday we went to a Polo match. Cool huh? I had never been to one before. The pictures are on Brett's phone and therefore I can't show you how much I felt like I was in England as we wandered around the field. Seriously though: sun dresses, women with huge hats, tents with catered food for the players families...it was all there. And although I still don't completely understand the rules...it was lots of fun.

THEN Brett surprised me and took me to the pumpkin patch. I saw a sign for it the other day and told him how we used to always pick out pumpkins to carve at pumpkin patches. I forgot about it, until he started driving to it. And it made me smile.

And then he sat me down next to the pumpkins because he thought it would be a funny picture. Again, thank you husband.





AND we found a rodeo to go to, which was pretty cool sitting at the rodeo and looking out at the beach just across the road. We enjoyed ourselves. And our all-natural grass fed beef burgers we had for lunch. :)

The next time I post on here, I'll probably have a baby. Get ready :)

Time to Update I Suppose...

Just an update on a few things I guess. I'm not very good at keeping this up to date. I'm working on it.

Well....

I'm 25. And that's weird. Thank you to Richard for reminding me that I am now a quarter of a century old. I guess I can't blame him though. That was the first thing I said to him when he turned 25 too. I liked being 24. I didn't feel like I was very old. For some reason, 25 makes me feel a lot older...

I've tried to be somewhat crafty, for Brett's sake. He wishes I was more inventive, creative, etc. So I'm working on it. We brought these old metal dressers and cabinets from Utah. And we wanted something that looked a little bit...well different than they did when we got them. So I painted them. Crackle painted to be exact. Which stressed me out like painting has never done before. They aren't perfect, but they definitely look better. Except that I like the first one I did better than the second. So much for practice makes perfect. No practice looked better than practice. Here are the dressers:

And here is the other old metal cabinet we took from Utah, and decided to reuse. I actually forgot we even brought it with us until the moving guys took it out of the truck. It isn't done yet, I have a few more things I'm doing to it, but in case I don't get back on here anytime soon, here it is so far (the before and after):

Baby update:

Four more weeks!
I'm kind of going a little crazy knowing that. It's stressing me out a little bit. The delivery isn't even what scares me though. It's what's after that, that scares me the most. I don't feel ready for a baby. I probably never will. But it's just hitting me now that it is so close, and I'll be considered full term this weekend, and it could happen anytime after that...I don't think I'll be early. But just knowing that the time is so close...
I just pray every night that I can be who I need to be.

But...in other news...
we got a bed. And a stroller and carseat. The bed isn't set up yet, because I thought I might get a different one. Brett likes the one we got better, so he just wants to keep it. But I'm still debating. Thanks to recommendations from Michele - we got the baby trend jogging stroller and carseat together. And we like them...a lot. So far. Not that we have the baby yet...Brett had to try it out.

 And here are the pictures of me for those of you who wanted to see (35 and 36 weeks):

The baby decided to grow. No one believes me that I only have a month left though. But this past weekend I feel like I look closer to it than I did before.  And I finally know what braxton-hicks contractions are. About time maybe.They did some testing for preeclampsia a couple of weeks ago because my blood pressure rose at my appointment. But the next appointment it was back down lower than before. That was good to see.

I feel like I have been very blessed during this whole thing. It really hasn't been bad at all. My ankles started swelling up last week, but not even enough to really hurt. I just can't tie my shoes as tight, and I can't see my bones as well. But I can still wear my wedding ring :) Hooray. The baby (who still doesn't have a name) really enjoys sitting up in my ribs, so my upper back hurts if I sit too long. But other than that, it hasn't been bad at all. And I feel very blessed to be able to get everything moved in and together before he comes.

Thats all for now folks :)
Til next time!

For My Family's Entertainment....

Here's the kind of Tahitian dance I did with some of the ladies in the ward. I look huge. Everyone loved that I did it pregnant...but it was nothing compared to teaching Bhangra and Salty Dog Rag to the youth last week. Should have waited until I was past my due date. It definitely would help :)

Enjoy :)

And here it is... :)

Back from three weeks with my family in Utah and New Hampshire...and I guess I'm ready to show you the "baby bump." But trust me...if I had put anything up before three weeks ago, you wouldn't have believed me. Most people couldn't tell...And it definitely started to really show the week after I got to Utah. It hurt to grow that fast. I think that's all I'll say about that :) 

And here they are...Weeks 25, 26, 27, 28

Oh yea...and here's the little man from the ultrasound :)

He's cute huh?

So a little update: he moves ALL the time, his feet are apparently really comfortable in my ribs, and he really doesn't like when I lie on my back. I have an appointment next week, but so far everything has been perfect!

And now we're less than 12 weeks away. It seems to be creeping up on us so fast. It's just been so busy. But that is fine with me. We're really excited. But when I think about it coming it scares me a bit; the mothering part more than the labor part. But I keep reminding myself that the timing was all in the Lord's hands, and so I know with Him I can be the mother He, and he, needs me to be.

H-A-W-A-I-I

Yes, we are in Hawaii. And yes we've been here for over a month and I haven't written a thing about it on here. And yes, we're having a baby :) And that will be the next post, especially for Katie and Kayleen.

And so, our adventure began on May 16. Since then, we have moved into a two bedroom townhouse in Ewa Beach, gotten a dog, and been on lots of excursions around the island.

To name a few:

 We hiked Diamond Head Crater not long after we got here. It isn't that bad of a hike. Most of it is paved, but I just thought it was cool that we were in the middle of a crater of a volcano. :)

Visited the Laie Temple many times. And it is beautiful.

 We hiked to Laie Falls and went swimming one day after going to the temple. It was a beautiful hike, and it was a little bit longer of a hike, which was fun. Parts of it reminded me of hiking in southern Utah; but then you could look out the other direction from where you were standing and feel like you were in a rainforest. We ran back in the rain most of the way. And we were covered in red dirt by the time we got back to the car.

We spent a night walking downtown in Chinatown. It brought back amazing memories from our trip to China two years ago. It was a lot of fun to remember it all again.

Brett loves the huge trees here...everywhere. This was just one of them.

We stopped at a little hole-in-the-wall Thai food restaurant, and it was really tasty. Way too much food, but tasty.

We found the cool "bikes" all along the sidewalks that are actually for locking your bikes to :) Pretty clever...

 

And this was too much a memory of China that we couldn't pass it by without a few pictures.

We took a tour one weekend that was offered by the post. They took us all the way around showing us all the places we need to go visit and all the places we can do fun stuff while we're here. And it was free :)

 At the Pali Lookout Point. It was the location of one of the major battles here on the island. And the wind is crazy up there. I'm surprised Brett still had his hat by the time we got back on the bus.

 After lunch in Waikiki we got to visit the Macadamia nut farm...and crack open our own as well as taste the different coated ones they had as samples. They were delicious!

One weekend at the beach, Brett decided he was going to climb a tree and get a coconut. So he did.

I wish I had pictures of the whole experience, but I didn't have my camera until he was all the way down to the actual coconut. He looked like a monkey climbing the tree, broke the outer shell off on the rocks on the edge of the beach, and then cracked it open to drink the milk with his knife.
That's my Brett!



One of the many things I love about Hawaii. We see a rainbow just about every single day. And what is cool, is that they amaze me every single time. I could take a picture of every one that I see, but it doesn't do them justice. But they are a reminder of the love and power of our Father in Heaven, and I love when that reminder comes from His wonderful creations. Why did He create rainbows? Just for us, because they are beautiful, so we could smile and think of Him.

Oh yea...and we got to see the ship from Pirates 4. Don't be jealous or anything. It's just sitting in the bay at Ko'Olina. That's all :)

 And here is another reason I love Hawaii.
Sunset Beach.

 We went for a run one down along the beach and came back to swim...Brett really just wanted to take one of these guys' boards and ropes and get out there himself. This beach was full of them.

 And the lovely grass we find everywhere...
We went to a movie in the park one Friday night and Brett sat down on the grass before we put the blanket down. He got up pretty quick, and picked the little thorn things out of him for a while after that.
I'm not sure how these kids play sports in this grass. I would NEVER want to fall down. Those things hurt.

 Oh yea. We got a dog. A puppy actually. She came from the Humane Society. And her name is Rika.
I feel like I have a kid already. Someday I will learn to speak her language. Or she'll learn mine.
We're getting there :)
She's cute. And loves EVERYONE. But she has also been a great lesson in patience. I still have a long way to go though until I'm really as patient as I should be.


We went SURFING!!

 And we both got up on our first waves. Go us. It was a lot easier to get up than I thought it would be. But the beach we were at didn't have huge waves. We went again this past weekend, and the waves were a bit bigger. We still got up, it was just a bit harder to get back out without being trampled by my board. I didn't stay out as long...but I surfed.

Brett just rented a board and tried it, and did it perfectly, like he does with everything he tries.
I actually got a short lesson from Buttons, a famous surfer guy on the island. He was really great. And fun to watch on his board.




Just this last week we went to the Botanical Gardens at Waimea Bay and did the walk into the waterfall. But along the way was gorgeous. At one of the first little huts inside this older woman told us all the little trails off the main trail that we should take so that we could actually see everything because there was so much more than just a waterfall. I am so glad we stopped to talk to her.

Apparently there used to be a whole village up in this canyon, but it was all destroyed by rock slides, disease, etc. She told us where to go to find old house foundations, cemeteries, old garden plots, religious spots, etc. And it was amazing.

And we thought these roots were awesome. And these trees. Brett's been wanting to find one to take a picture in the whole time. They remind us of Lost.

 There was a place to stop and play some traditional Hawaiian games on the trail to the waterfall. So we played. Brett won one, and I won one. So we were even by the end. Except my win was kind of just luck. I'll take it though.




There are some pretty amazing flowers here.

 And we made it to the waterfall.

 I love being out in our Heavenly Father's creations. It reminds me how blessed we are and how much He is in every moment of our lives.

That was really long. So I'm not going to go on anymore.
But we love it here, even though Brett is gone for 12 hours everyday. We're definitely having fun.
And hopefully our furniture and things will get here soon. I mean, I love sleeping on a pull out couch, but after not having our bed since October, it will be VERY nice.