Baby Barber coming soon!

I'm sure many of you know this by now but we are having a baby!!! Expected due date is November 26th, Thanksgiving Day actually, kinda crazy!!! I am 14 weeks today, doing pretty well, and FINALLY starting to look pregnant! I have been "feeling" pregnant for awhile now but it's a lot more real when you can see it too, at least for me lol. At our last appointment 3 weeks ago the baby was doing so good. Heartbeat was 150 and we couldn't hear it yet but we saw that little thing pumping away. It's so amazing to see our tiny baby at each ultrasound. It's truly a miracle and we couldn't be more grateful for this blessing and opportunity in our lives.

The weekend we found out was over General Conference for the LDS Church and it seemed that so many of the talks discussed the importance of multiplying and replenishing the earth, families and being good parents. All I could think about was the sweet baby growing inside me and how much responsibility the Lord had entrusted me with. I was overwhelmed with gratitude! We found out when I was 6 weeks along and so we were able to get into the doctor within a couple days of our discovery. I had been feeling different for several weeks now and finally convinced myself that I was probably pregnant and should take a test. (We have been trying for awhile now but due to my Crohns Disease it took longer than expected. BUT we learned so much during that trying time and it was really important that I was in the best health possible before becoming pregnant.) At our first appointment they give you so much information and ask so many questions. We got to have an ultrasound at that first appointment and it was amazing to see that little "thing". It didn't look like a baby yet but it did have a heartbeat and was healthy. Kevin's face was priceless. He smiled so big and you could just see the joy and excitement on his face. It was one of my top moments. The doctor had a lot of questions about my Crohns disease but wasn't concerned as it had been under control at that point for several months. I will continue taking my meds until the third trimester, then I will probably stop them for those last couple months but that is still to be determined for sure.

How am I feeling? I started getting sick at 3 weeks but it was mainly fatigue and nausea. It also caused my Cronhs to flare which means that my symptoms get bad suddenly, causing me to feel a lot worse!! That passed after a couple weeks and I was mainly just dealing with fatigue. The nausea would come and go but as long as I ate I did okay. (That is such a tender mercy in my life and everyday I am SO grateful for that!) By about week 10 or 11 the nausea was basically gone and it rarely makes an appearance, even now. At week 12/13 I had another flare from my Crohns but not as bad as before. I finally feel like it's passing and I'm getting back to normal. The fatigue is my hardest battle most days but that is also a symptom of the Crohns and often part of my daily life, pregnant or not. My Crohns disease has been getting worse according to my labs so my GI is monitoring me closely to make sure it's just pregnancy related. I had Kevin and Wayne give me a blessing last week because I have been not feeling well but also worried and I looking for peace of mind. The blessing was amazing and just what my heart needed. I'm so grateful for the power of the Priesthood and the blessing it has in my life each day.

I am officially out of the first trimester and feeling pretty good! We have our next appointment next week and I'm really hoping we can hear the heartbeat! Another 4-6 weeks and we'll be finding out the gender so stay tuned for our reveal.

We told our families earlier than I wanted to but it just worked out that way and conveniently happened with Kevin's 30th birthday as well. Here's how we told each family.

We told my Mom, Wayne, and the Snarr's on Kevin's birthday when we had them over for cake and ice cream. I had decorated the whole house and gotten a bunch of balloons too. One of the balloons said "Happy birthday dad" and I taped it to his present from me. I kept the present concealed in our bedroom until he had nothing else to open. I came walking down the hall with this present and balloon and it only took the family about 30 seconds to realize what the balloon said and meant. It was so fun to see their reactions. I of course got all emotional but I just feel so happy and blessed and sharing the news was an amazing experience. Brody, my 4 year old nephew, said we should name it Mac 'N Cheese or Rocket Ship but I don't think either of those names will make our list. I think we caught them by surprise too which made it even better. We swore them to secrecy though since we hadn't told anyone else. This will be the 10th grandkid in the family.

That weekend we went to Boise to see my dad and for my sister's baby blessing. Our idea here was pretty simple. We had taken a picture of Kevin holding his Happy Birthday Dad balloon and showed it to my dad on my phone. I just casually said, "Look at this, dad." He looked, looked at me, back at the phone and said "Really?! Show it to Lynn." Lynn of course jumped up and down and squealed in excitement. I had two sets of grandparents there plus Brittany, Ty and their new baby Reese so we were able to get several family members at once. Once again it was emotional but oh so exciting!

Our last reveal was for Kevin's family. They have about 10 birthdays in the month of April, so we had one big party for everyone that Sunday night. I had ordered a birthday cake,for Kevin, to take with us since we were out of town and had them write on the cake "Happy birthday daddy, meet you in November!!". When we arrived at this parents house everyone was still eating so we just chatted with everyone, pretending like we had an ordinary cake in our box. Then the kids went outside to play and the conversation switched to baby names. Kevin's brother and his wife are expecting their first baby in a few weeks so it was completely normal. It was tempting to chime in and blurt out our news but the cake was going to epic! Grandma and Grandpa were over and when they started getting antsy to leave I gave Kevin this look meaning we have got to do this now. I nonchalantly wandered into the kitchen and started taking out the cake and Kevin's mom started getting suspicious so we let her peek before we took it to the table where the adults were all gathered still. She smiled and gave me a hug which of course got everyone wondering what was going on with the cake. Kevin plopped the cake down and let them all take a peek. They were so excited for us! His dad's reaction was so funny too! This will make 20 grandkids for Mike and Tena.

We told other family through phone calls, an email for my missionary sister, etc. It has been so fun already and we are really enjoying the adventure.

The birthday balloons

One of the decorations I made for the party. It could've been a much better Pinterest find but my creativeness doesn't come out much. "30 sucks"

Happy 30th birthday! Yes I used 30 candles too.  Austin and Brody LOVE blowing out candles so of course they got to help. Cutest little helpers.

The typical pregnant photo right?

The picture I used to show my dad and stepmom. This was the balloon I had taped around Kevin's present too.

Baby Barber at 9 weeks 4 days. It was waving at me. I went in for a visit due to some concerns but everything turned out just perfect. Whew!

Baby at 11 weeks. It was casually resting its hand on its forehead. (the little white spot on the head is its hand) They were able to zoom in and capture some facial features too. So cool.

My first clothing purchase was a 12 month BSU jersey. Boy or girl this baby will be fan!

Our Facebook/Pinterest announcement. "Next BSU fan coming November 26th, Thanksgiving Day!" or something like that.

14 weeks. My first belly picture. I sure do love that little baby and my cute bump.

So Far This Year

This year so far has felt really busy but looking back I'm really not sure what has taken so much of our time. At work we have been doing our yearly reviews and setting new goals for the year which has really got me thinking about goals in my personal life as well. I want to have more fun, be more adventurous and get back into running.

I have been getting the running bug again, it's hard for me to keep at in the winter because I hate the treadmills at the gym. I did go running a few times while it was still "wintery" but those were rare exceptions. My sister in law, Emilee, invited me to do a 5k Color Run with her in June and I've been wanting to give it a try so I figured why not?! I am so excited!!! When we signed up we had 3 months to train and it's been fun getting back into running, especially with the lovely weather we've been enjoying. Let's hope it stays this way!!

I kicked off the new year by going night skiing with my older sister Natalee and Kelly Canyon. Thanks to my uncle we even got free tickets which made the night that much more awesome! The snow was actually really good, temperatures were perfect and the night well worth it. We grew up skiing, but Natalee and I haven't skied much together due to our age gap. We have talked about going for several years and it finally happened! It was so fun to have sister time!




Natalee found some really soft snow and sunk to her knee. It was quite comical watching her dig out. Then I did the same thing. Safe to say we stayed away from that part of the mountain the rest of the night

That's the face to 2 VERY happy skiers!!!

Another exciting event in January was we BOUGHT A NEW CAR!!! We've been talking about it for awhile now and were hoping we could wait 'til the end of 2015, but the Impala was giving up on us faster than expected and we traded it in while we still could. We purchased a 2013 Dodge Avenger that had low miles and had been well taken care of. We love it! We named it Fury; of course there's a story behind the name, but we'll leave it at that. Credit goes to Adam Snarr for the name.

Valentine's Day was the one year anniversary of having moved into our condominium. A lot has happened to us in the past year and we have come so far, learned a lot and faced many trials and hard things. We LOVE where we live and are grateful for all of the things we have learned in our journey together this far. For Valentine's Day we had made plans with Natalee and Adam to go skiing but the weather had warmed up quite a bit, so we decided to go 4 wheeling in Malad instead. We found lots of snow on the trail, but finally made it the meadow. It was really fun to spend the day outside and it was hard to believe it's only February. On the way home we stopped in Pocatello and had dinner at Texas Roadhouse.

Making our way through the snow, it was a little difficult at times, but so worth it.

Photo bomb!! It's hard to take a nice picture with Adam around...haha jk Adam!

Beautiful view and great people to spend the day with.

The guys did a little shooting as well. Kevin got this new .22 rifle for Christmas 2013 and finally got to site it in and shoot it.
 

Crohns Update

3 months ago I started my medication for my Crohns Disease, Cimzia. I went to my three month check up this week and the doctor had some pretty great things to say!!

First of all, my labs are normal people, normal!! They have been such a mess lately and I wondered how long it would take for things to turn around. My medicine has had a great effect already. Overall I feel an increased general sense of well being, something I haven't felt in a long time. I also feel more energized and able to do more than just go to work each day.

Second, I was asked to participate in a national study for my medicine, which I think is pretty cool. I had to fill out all sorts of paper work and answer a billion questions. Then the doctor had to do his part and one of the questions was marking what stage my disease is in. The choices were mild, mild-moderate, severe, and remission. I was expecting mild-moderate, however he marked REMISSION!! He was so impressed with my progress over the last three months and I can't believe I have progressed so quickly!

I feel so overwhelmed with blessings and gratitude! Last year was really hard in many ways and I often wondered if I was ever going to feel "better" again. I had several priesthood blessings and pleaded with my Heavenly Father for relief. Many prayers were answered today and I feel so happy! There are still hard days to come, but I know that if I can get through this I can get through anything.

Happy New Year..here's to 2015

New Years was different this year, Kevin and I spent it apart. He had an amazing opportunity to go to Phoenix to the Fiesta Bowl to watch BSU play!! I was jealous, but he got to go on a "guy's trip". He drove down with his brothers Chad and Todd, Karson his nephew and Adam my brother in law. They stayed with Kevin's brother Tim who lives down there and they had a great time!! I got to spend New Years with Natalee and my parents. It was fun, just like old times.

Chad, Adam and  Kevin

He was so excited!

This how I rang in the new year

I am so ready for the New Year and ready for the exciting things to come! 2014 was a good year but also a hard year with many trials. We have been so blessed and of course things always worked out, but I am ready for a fresh start!

 

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas was a very exciting time, as always! Courtney and Summer got to come home for a few days and all of our family parties spanned about a week's time, so I was exhausted by time everything got back to normal. I was able to take the day after Christmas off from work so that I could spend time with family that was in town. It was so fun and all the snow we got made it even better!!

It definitely didn't feel like Christmas outside so I did my best to make it feel that way inside

Matt and Emilee gave us this SUPER CUTE sign for Christmas! I just love it so much!!!

Kevin's fancy new watch

I got the new NINJA TURTLES movie!!

And an  iFit! My hinting worked haha

Summer, Brody and Austin, 3 peas in a pod and getting so big too fast!

Brody and I

Summer and I just chilling

Kevin was a little tired

A great part of Christmas day was getting to talk to my sister Abby who is on her mission in Fresno, CA!

This is our great Christmas photo...thanks for the photo bomb KEVIN!

 Funny story.. A week before Christmas I woke up for work not feeling the greatest but I tried to shrug it off and go to work. I sat down at my desk only to notice I was wearing this abysmal disaster!! I have a huge thing about socks and this is not okay! I ended up going home that day sick with the flu and I blame it on the outfit, not the nasty office bug that was going around haha.

Phoenix!

Right before Thanksgiving I was able to fly down to Phoenix and spend 3 wonderful days with my sister Courtney and her adorable daughter Summer! It was an amazing trip and so much fun!! Getting there proved to be quite the challenge. I flew out of the Ogden airport so I drove myself down. My flight ended up being delayed 2.5 hours. Luckily there was a Gordman's just a few miles away to kill the time! I finally arrived about 10pm and so by the time we got to Courtney's it was 1130 and Summer was so excited to show me her room and everything, so it was a late night by the time she settled down. The next day we went shopping ALL day! It was so great and just exactly what we love to do. We went to lots of different malls and shopping centers, so it was fun to see some different areas. That night we went to dinner and then to the newest Hunger Games movie! It was so good!! The next day we relaxed in the morning, then went to get Pedicures, did a little of shopping at Charming Charlie's, and then went hot tubing! Later that day we went up to Anthem to see the world's tallest Christmas Tree which was pretty sweet! Then we rented some movies and relaxed the rest of the night. The next day I was going home, so we wanted to make the most of the time left. We went up to the new Phoenix Temple and it was amazing and so wonderful! The Spirit was so strong. After that we did a little bit more shopping while we made our way down to the airport. Saying goodbye was so much harder than I imagined it being. I had a great time visiting and really enjoyed the nice weather too! Phoenix was fun and I can't wait to go back!!!

Ready to hit the road!

I took Summer's picture (above), so she had to take mine lol

Arizona Cardinal's stadium

Being goofy while we waited for the movie to start

World's tallest Christmas Tree

Summer and I are standing by the tree but you can only see our shadows

Phoenix LDS temple

Summer insisted on taking a picture of Court and I

We were having a hard time getting a good picture of us with the temple in the background

The backside. The fountain was off since the temple was closed.

The workers were setting up the nativity scene

At the airport, trying to put off the goodbye

Summer wanted a picture by the window

Summer is really into writing and drawing. Everywhere we went in the car she would ask us questions and then we would have to spell out our answers. Then she drew me all sorts of pictures and this was in my suitcase when I got home.