Uno Dos Tres

Last night while we were eating dinner, Ada started counting to about 13 in Spanish.  It took us a few seconds to realize what she was saying.  I looked at Bryan and asked if he'd been teaching her, but he was as surprised as I was!  I guess she is learning more than we thought at "preschool"!

Waiting

 There has been a lot happening lately, but everything seems like it's moving in slow motion when waiting for a baby to be born.  I was convinced she was going to come before her due date, which is tomorrow, but I think she's going to prove me wrong.  I've had bouts of semi-regular contractions for the last few weeks, but I guess they are just getting my body prepared for the real thing.  I know due dates are somewhat arbitrary, but it sure puts the pressure on! We are all excited to meet her (Ada included) but we will wait as long as it takes.
Here are a few pictures from the last month or so.
When we asked Ada what she wanted to be for Halloween, we weren't really surprised she wanted to be a robot, since she has been mildly obsessed with them for half of her life.  Luckily, we were able to come through for her.  We took her downtown for the "Trick or Treat Trail" where all the local businesses were giving candy out to the kids.  She had a blast!   And for the next week or two, ate more candy than she ever has in her life (assisted by Mom and Dad, of course). 

 

 Her robot costume.  We were pretty happy with the outcome and some people even gave her extra candy for it.

My side of the family came down for Thanksgiving to help us out and potentially meet the new addition to our family.  They rented a house pretty close to us and it worked out really well to do the big dinner there. Here is Carol trying to keep the girls out of trouble in the kitchen.

 

 

 

Grandma and Grandpa Ken were able to come, too, and bring their dog Zooey.  The girls LOVED giving her all of their attention. 
Unfortunately, everyone had to leave without meeting the new baby, but that just means they have to come down again!

Sick of being sick

So many things have been happening around here.  Ada has started "pre-school" (i.e. day care) a few mornings a week, she has been getting better at using the potty (not quite trained, but getting there) and the new little one has been moving like crazy and is , I hope, as excited as we are to get out of my belly. 
But I don't feel like writing about any of it, because we have all been sick.  Since Ada started "school", she has had several colds that she has passed on to us.  But none of those were as bad as the stomach virus that Bryan acquired last weekend and that we are still recovering from today.  I knew that we'd probably be sick more often around here with more exposure to other people, but this is ridiculous!

Family Photo

We have never gone to a professional photographer for a family photo, and rarely do we think to ask someone to take a group photo of us.  So we were really excited when the photographer at Kris and Nate's wedding gave us our own copy of a "polaroid" he took of us.  This is my favorite family shot we have so far.  And it even includes the little one poking out of my jacket!

Ada is Tough

Ada had surgery to remove her cataract when she was two weeks old.  Since then, she has worn a contact lens and we do daily patch therapy (5-6 hours) to help her use the weaker eye.  She has been an amazingly patient child with all of it and we have been really lucky.  We were finally able to see a new doctor in Phoenix a few months ago who decided that another surgery was necessary to clean out some tissue that was growing in her lens capsule and was blocking some of her vision.  After a failed attempt to have it done a month ago (Ada got a fever the morning of the scheduled surgery), everything went as planned last week and along with getting the tissue cleared out, the surgeon was able to implant a lens into her eye.  This means that, for the time being, Ada doesn't have to wear a contact lens.  It was a difficult decision because some experts still recommend waiting until the child is a lot older if possible, but we felt that it would be easier for everyone if no one was worrying about losing contacts or hurting her eye with a contact in and the surgeon was confident that it would be a good thing for her.  Ada was a champ through all of it (and still is with several drops daily and resuming the patch therapy).  We really couldn't have gotten any luckier with a child who is emotionally and physically strong enough to remain cheerful- even when her eye is getting poked and prodded all the time.  She almost always has a smile on her face, even when she's in the pre-op room waiting for surgery! 

 

And she had to wear this huge colander-looking metal shield over her eye for a week after, but she never complained (except when we were untaping it from her face to apply drops).

 

Ada has recovered, and aside from having to wear sunglasses a majority of the time to protect her eye in the rare chance that she would run into something that could injure it, she is back to her old shenanigans.   And we could just be imagining it, but her vision seems to be better than it was before!

Trip to Utah in pictures

So many pictures and so little time to write.  Here's the trip to Utah as documented by our cameras.

We hardly get to eat breakfast in places like this anymore.

Finally hot enough for sprinklers.

Birthday presents from Auntie Lu.

Not enjoying the train as much as we thought she would.

First Chuck E. Cheese experience, and I never thought I would say it, but it was actually fun for us, too.  We might have to go again sometime.

Ada is very proud of Dad's artwork hanging at Primary Children's Hospital.

 

 Hogle Zoo for Ada's birthday.

After years, we finally got to see Trish and Bentley before they have their new baby!

Exploring Cascade Springs with Grandma.

Lots of quality time with the cousins.

Flute lessons from Grandpa.

Swimming!

Relaxing in front of a pile of presents.

Walks to the park.

 

More swimming.

Kris and Nate's backyard.

Family photo at Calf Creek.

Wagon rides.

Cheers for Kris and Nate getting married.

A lovely mountain wedding.

Time to relax before we have to head back to Flagstaff.

Huge Update

Things have been crazy here.  There are so many updates so we'll just start with a list.

At number one, we have the most significant/life-changing:

 There were chances to post this earlier, but we just kept putting it off for various reasons, then we decided to wait until one of many milestones of the journey.  We found out yesterday that Ada will be getting a little sister sometime around Thanksgiving!  We were a little surprised to see the girl bits in the ultrasound, as there have been so many girls born in our families lately, but she looks healthy and beautiful so we are excited. 
To accommodate #1, we have #2:  We moved to a bigger place in Flagstaff.  After our 2-week trip to Utah (more on that later), we came right home to get the keys to our new place- a townhouse on the other side of town.  We spent the next several days moving and have happily fallen in love with almost everything about the place. 

It has a 2-car garage (=storage), an extra room that Bryan can use as an office and it's close to things that will be useful- like the hospital, pediatrician, downtown Flag and several parks. 
#3:  Ada turned  two years old.  Along with that has come screaming and defiance, but those are overshadowed by her increasing knowledge of the world, talking, singing, improved dance moves and endless entertainment.  She is such a great girl and we wouldn't know what to do without her.

The road trip to Utah will take a whole other post, so I will get to it soon.  Right now we are recovering from a LONG day that started at 4:15 a.m. when we had to wake Ada up to eat breakfast before she was cut off from eating at 5:00, due to her scheduled eye surgery in Phoenix.  All was going well until we realized she was running a fever of about 101 degrees.  We knew we needed to call the doctor to check in, but it was so early in the morning and we had to leave for Phoenix before the offices were open.  Fortunately, we didn't get too far out of town when we were able to talk to the surgeon who had decided to cancel the surgery due to her fever.  By the time we got home, a construction crew had shown up to fix both of our balconies, thus preventing any of us from taking naps until about 3:30 this afternoon.  Ada was a champ, but she's still sleeping and fighting off whatever is causing her fever.  We sure ended up with a strong daughter.