Baby Pond

So...Shayne called from work, and said he needed the picture of the ultrasound to show the "girls" at work. So, here I am at 11:30 at night scanning the picture to email him. You can see it's little head on the right, with little leg buds on the left. The arms aren't as visible, but on the actual ultrasound they were waving all over the place! Shayne was trying to check to make sure the heart had four chambers, Shayne was born with some missing heart "stuff", but you can't tell just yet. Doc just laughed and said it looked great at this point. :) We think our little Baby Pond is perfect!!

Anyway...I haven't packed yet, but I needed to get this picture scanned and posted. It's all worth it though, because the ladies he works with are pretty darn amazing! They are taking some personal responsibility in us being pregnant, b/c they had to give me some of my injections when Shayne was traveling for work, or just too busy to get me my shot when he was at work. So...this picture is for all of you to enjoy...but it's truly for the ladies that keep Shayne in line while at work! :)

Whew...Don't forget to breath!!

So...I just finished posting our Mexico trip. Sorry it took me so long to get it all on here. However, Shayne and I have been pretty preoccupied with some other stuff that's been going on. Here's a brief synopsis of what we are "dealing with" at this point...

After getting back from Mexico, I talked to Doc, and we both expressed that we needed to find out what we needed to do with my incompetent cervix. I've known for 12 years, since my last major surgery, that I have a incompetent cervix. I've also known that I've needed to have an abdominal cerclage, as apposed to a vaginal cerclage since then as well. However...very, very few dr.'s know of the abdominal cerclage. That was the case with Doc...but as always, he lets me do my research and trusts what I find.

So...I felt VERY prompted on Thursday night to do some research on the trans abdominal cerclage, or TAC. I discovered that the few dr.'s that do perform the procedure, like to do it between 10-11 weeks. I am now at 12 weeks, that stressed me out a little. So, I found probably the best dr. in the U.S. that performs this procedure in Chicago. There are zero dr.'s in Alaska that perform it...in fact there are probably only about 100 dr.'s that are truly competent in the procedure in the U.S. So...I call Doc Thursday night, and he asks for the Dr.'s name and phone #, and calls him Friday morning.

Well, Doc called me at work on Friday afternoon, told me he was immensely impressed with this Dr. Haney, that my procedure was scheduled for Wednesday, and that we needed to call them and get the all the paper-work started and purchase plane tickets! Needless to say...Shayne and I have been a bit overwhelmed! Shayne and I made a bunch of phone calls, and we are flying out for Chicago tomorrow night. We will be flying into Chicago Wednesday at 6:30am, I have to be at the hospital at 10am for an ultrasound, at the surgical center @ 10:30am for pre-surgery "stuff", and will have the procedure done at 12:30pm... all on Wednesday. I have a 48 hour hospital stay. I will be release around Friday morning, and we will fly back to Anchorage Saturday evening.

This is not just small out patient procedure. I will be having surgery similar to a C-section in order to basically "tie" my cervix shut, so I don't miscarry about about 18-20 weeks. However...the good news is that after having this procedure, I shouldn't need ANY bed-rest, and should be able to carry the baby full-term, or very near full-term!

I did have an appointment with Doc today, and everything looks great!! He says my cervix is doing awesome at this point, and we got to see our baby actually moving!! He/She has arms and legs, and a face...and it was moving around!! It was soooo cool!! I cannot tell you how incredible it was to see our baby moving there on the screen...it was all so surreal!! I have pictures, but I'm a little pressed for time...I have to pack, and clean, and, and, and...before leaving tomorrow. So...I haven't scanned the picture...but I will as soon as we get back.

I just have to say through this whole process...that Shayne and I have the most incredible support group!! We have family that keep us in their prayers, and call and make sure we know they are thinking and praying for us. But even more important for us at this point, is the fact that we have an incredible "family" here in Alaska. We both have some incredible co-workers that are very supportive of us having to leave on short notice. In fact, the nurses at the hospital have informed Shayne, they aren't covering for him, they are working for me! They make me cry. We have an incredible group of friends in our ward that have been supportive, and willing to do whatever, to help us get through this. In fact...Becky has become my surrogate mother, and is making darn sure I'm not going to do anything "dumb" in my post-surgery recovery. :)

I cannot tell you how much I love our families in Idaho and our "family" here in Alaska. We are truly blessed!!

Los Barrilles

So we flew into San Jose del Cabo on Wednesday afternoon, and drove to Los Barrilles. It's a very small town about 45 minutes north of San Jose. We spent 3 days there before going to Cabo San Lucas, which is about 35 minutes south of San Jose.

We loved Los Barrilles!! In fact, we preferred it to Cabo. It wasn't nearly as touristy...in fact there were hardly any tourists at all. We stayed in a little hotel for about $50/night, but it was actually really nice. Nicer than most hotels I've stayed at here in the States. We could get to anywhere we wanted by walking on their dirt roads. In fact, there was only one paved road, and it had just been paved within the past year. There were some great little local restaurants, and we tried a different one every day. The beach was only a 5-10 minute walk from our hotel. We hung out there pretty much every day. On Thursday Shayne fished from the beach. I brought a towel and a book and just read while he walked for a mile or more up the beach and fished.

You can see him as the little spot on the point of land in the one picture. He didn't catch anything, but he had a great time.

The other two pics are from the beach as we were waiting for our charter boat to show up. It was about 6:15 am, and the sun was just coming up. Shayne had his fly-rods and I thought the pic was pretty cool. Then all of the sudden we see a pod of about 10-15 dolphins swimming right along the beach. It was pretty amazing. I tried to get more pictures, but this one was the best. It was so incredible to be standing there on the beach, by ourselves, watching the sunrise with the dolphins silently swimming past.

We loved Los Barrilles, and will definitely go back there again!

Fishing Friday...

This was probably Shayne's favorite day. We went out fishing for 8 hours on a charter boat with Israel, or "Cuyoyo", as I think his nickname is spelled. He was a great guide, and we had an awesome time! We caught some Sierra, Bonita, Skip Jack, Cabrilla?, and Jack Cravalis?. Shayne's going to totally give me crap for how I spelled some of those names! :)

I must say, I pretty much rocked fishing on the salt! I do pretty well on the salt water, because Shayne's a little more out of his element. He kills me on the river, but I can show him up on the salt. He doesn't mind though, b/c if I'm having a good time, it means he gets to go again!

We had just the best day! We saw a couple different pods of dolphins swimming around. The most amazing thing, that we couldn't really get a good picture of was a HUGE school of small sting-rays jumping out of the water. I'm not talking about a few...I'm talking about hundreds in a school of rays about the size of a football field. You would just look out and see about 30, 40, or 50 rays all jumping clear out of the water. It really was cool.

Shayne got to try his fly-rod out on the Jacks. We got into a couple of good schools, and when they start feeding on your feeder bait, they go crazy. But...the wind wasn't in his favor, and he just didn't have enough experience to get one on the fly. However...I'm sure he's made plenty of mental notes about what to do next time, and I have no doubt he will land a Jack on the fly next time we are down there.

As you can see, we were being good...wearing long-sleeved shirts, caps, and I even had sunscreen on my face. However, Shayne fried his face, ears and back of neck, and I still burned my nose and chin...from the water reflecting off the water...and burned my hands. My right hand ended up swelling up from the burn...weirdest thing. I reacted so differently to the sun this time.

Anyway...we had so much fun on the salt water out in Los Barrilles. We will definitely go again!

By the way...that's my big ole' Jack in the top pic that Shayne landed for me, after I fought it forever. Our guide kept saying..."Your wife is a lucky woman!" Shayne would just smile and say..."And that's just fine with me!!"

Sunburn Tuesday

We got to Cabo San Lucas from Los Barrilles on Saturday. It was nice on Saturday, but not the best on Sunday and Monday. So on Tuesday we decided to just hang-out and do nothing. Sunday and Monday had been really windy so it was nice to have a good day on Tuesday. After sleeping in, we walked about a mile down the beach to some rocks that had some small tide pools with a few cool fish.


Then we decided to grab our towels and books and just read on the beach...away from all the skin that was on prominent display at our resort. This truly is the ONLY time that Shayne and I were at all exposed to the sun. We had been VERY good about wearing long-sleeved shirts, and sunscreen...except on this wonderfully sunny day!! :) We were VERY good about wearing long-sleeved shirts and sunscreen on every day after this as well!

However, as you can tell on this day we didn't do so well. After doing some ER burn calculations, Shayne has taken a burn-trauma class, Shayne decided he'd burned about 80% of his body...the pictures will attest to that as well! :) He was moving pretty darn gingerly for a few days...he was even sore for a few days after getting back to Alaska. I felt bad, because I only had Tylenol for pain relief. However...he was all over that on Tuesday night! :)

My shoulders got a little burned, but my feet got it the worst!! I honestly have never reacted to the sun like I did while in Mexico this time. After talking to a few people, I've now learned, or recall, that you burn more easily when you are pregnant...I will attest to that fact! My feet were on fire, and were incredibly swollen. I didn't sleep hardly at all Tuesday night...I finally gave in at 3am and got up and took some Tylenol and was able to sleep for about 3 hours. The next morning they were so swollen I couldn't walk. I managed to finally hobble on my heels into the bathroom, fill the bathtub with cold water and just sit there with my feet in the water to reduce the swelling so I could walk! We managed to walk to the pier and back on Wednesday afternoon to snorkel, but my feet were not happy! I had to ice them in order to sleep on Wednesday night. I ended up developing a fairly large blister on the top of my left foot, because the fluid had to go somewhere. It was pretty disgusting...

However, you should have seen us scratching and peeling the week after! There were bits of skin all over my house!! Really was pretty funny!!!

Snorkeling

On Wednesday we went snorkeling. It was awesome, because not only did we get to go snorkeling, but we also got to see a Humpback whale with a baby breach a bunch of times. Never pay for a whale watching tour, unless you don't want to fish or snorkel. You can get whale watching while doing another activity as well. It was pretty amazing.



We also have some close-up pictures of the arch that makes Cabo San Lucas so famous. Just on the other side of that arch is the wide open Pacific Ocean. On this side of it is considered the Sea of Cortez. There are Sea Lions that hang out around the other big rocks around the arch. It's pretty cool.



The snorkeling wasn't as good this time as it was when we went in Nov. 2006. The water was considerably colder, and cloudier. We did take a water-proof camera, but haven't developed the film yet. The cold water was a good thing...after getting so sunburned on Tuesday the water helped cool, and reduce some of the swelling in my feet. But...we only swam around for about 30-45 minutes before my teeth were chattering. It really was cold!! I cannot tell you how good it felt on my feet though!! :)

Anyway...Shayne and I are big fans of snorkeling, especially when the water is warm. :)

Shopping in Mexico

So we did the majority of our shopping on Thursday. We we close enough we could walk into town from either the beach or on the roads. My feet were feeling better on Thursday, so walking wasn't quite as painful. The shops are colorful, and full of all kinds of things.
You can bargain down anything...they are always calling out to you..."Les make a deal!", in their funny accent's. I did the bargaining, Shayne just watched, interpreted when I needed, and laughed at my bargaining abilities. It's fun to shop that way. Wish I could do that here! :)

Last Day on the Beach

So on Thursday after doing some shopping we walked back out to the rocks at the end of "our" beach that we had been to on Wednesday. Shayne decided he wanted to go later in the day to get some sunset pictures. We got soaked as we were walking out, because the tide was definitely in...and there were some pretty good swells hitting the beach. It was ok though, because me feet and legs were still burning and the cold water felt good.

You can see the full moon above the resort with the purple sky...pretty awesome. I was watching the crabs crawl around...read the next post to find out about those.


Shayne had to set the timer (obviously) to get this pic of us, so he had to scramble to this rock and lay flat so you could see the arch behind it. I love the lighting in this picture!!



No...the water didn't hit me, but I thought it was. My reaction time was a little slow...about a half a second later I had jumped and squeeled thinking I was going to get wet. However, it provided a nice little pool of water, in between those rocks, I could clean the sand out of my shoes and off my feet. I have my capri's pulled all the way up, because they were wet and rubbing my sunburn with the little bit of sand on my legs. Wasn't pleasant!!




We loved this beach!! When we went there on Tuesday, the tide was out and we found a couple of little tide pools with different kinds of fish. There were black/white striped, and some electric blue, with yellow, and even a funny little eel looking fish. And...there were lots and lots of crabs!! It was so much fun. Not very many people walk out this far, and even if they do, we only found a couple of locals climbing around on the rocks. It was nice to get away from the craziness of our resort and spring break.

Last Days in Mexico

This is a picture of our walk back to our resort. Our resort is about a mile down the beach.

These pictures are when the sun was going down, and the moon was coming up. It was absolutely incredible!!





This pic is of crabs hanging out on a rock. There were crabs everywhere!!! Seriously, as you would rock around the rocks you would hear scraping and clawing, and when you would walk around a corner there would be 23, 30, 40 crabs scurrying into different cracks and corners. It kinda gave me the hee-bee-gee-bees...but it was till pretty cool.

It got dark as we were walking back, but the moon was sooo bright we actually were casting shadows from the light of the moon. My feet were still a little tender so we stopped on our way back and sat in some beach chairs at a resort and just watched the waves and looked at the stars. It was so awesome.

You can see the arch in the distance of a couple of the pictures. Shayne did a good job of taking them.

We're Back...

So we just got back from Mexico late last night. It was wonderfully warm!!! I'll post pictures later today or tomorrow. We had a blast, but are ready to get back to our regular life. Sorry I've been slacking on the blogging, but we refused to even look at a computer while we were gone. However, check back and I promise some fun pictures!!