Memorial Day Weekend

We had a great weekend this year and the best part was the weather. It was AMAZING!

Tony had a track meet on Friday that went pretty late so we didn't do much that night. On Saturday morning I headed over to the Motherhood outlet store in North Bend to shop for some much needed maternity clothes. I spent a couple hours over there and then drove back to Cle Elum to meet up with Tony and all the family. The entire Butorac family was there for the night including Tony's aunt, Annie, and his cousins (Annie's kids), Kristi and Mark. Tony's uncle (Annie's husband and Mark & Kristi's dad), Leon, passed away in early June last year so they came over to spend the weekend with family and visit the cemetery. We took a nice drive out to Teanaway (a favorite place for the whole Butorac family) and sat by the river enjoying some snacks and ice cold Rainier (another Butorac favorite). That night we had a huge meal out by the fire in the backyard. It was a great night spending time with family!

Sunday, Tony and I headed back to Ellensburg to pick up GE and then we were off to our friend Scotty Alexander's house in Quincy. Our good friends Zak and Hollie Hill were also meeting us in Quincy. On a side note, I have to explain the story behind the picture below. The night before Zak and Hollie's wedding, Tony, GE, Eric Davis (another good friend) and Zak all stayed in a hotel in Wenatchee. The next morning all the guys were getting ready to go out to breakfast and Zak pulls out a pair of carpenter-style jean shorts to wear. According to Tony and GE, jean shorts went out of style years ago so they started making fun of Zak and giving him a really hard time about his sense of style. Well, almost 2 years later they still crack up laughing about Zak's jean shorts. So, knowing we were in for a fun couple days with Zak, I told Tony he should cut off an old pair of jeans and show up at Scotty's house in some jean shorts. GE wanted to join in on the fun too, so I made them each a pair of shorts and they decided to take it to the extreme by adding the trashy mesh tank tops and rolling their shorts up really high. It was hysterical!

Jorts anyone?

Needless to say, everyone died laughing when we arrived in Quincy and Tony and GE showed off their great outfits. We spent the rest of the afternoon in the pool drinking Corona's (well I had bottled water, but it was almost the same as an ice cold Corona with lime on a hot summer day...). That night we drove to Crescent Bar and had dinner at a great pizza place and then met up with some other friends who were staying there for the weekend. It was really fun to hang out with everyone since we don't see them very often, but I struggled to make it to midnight :-) Once we got back to Scotty's house I went to bed, but the guys had a few more beers and went for a dip in the hot tub. The next day we were planning to head home fairly early, but the weather was so nice we ended up staying and spending another afternoon hanging out in the pool soaking up the sun. I was so excited to finally get a little color on my skin! I haven't been to a tanning bed since I found out I was pregnant and I hate being so white this time of year :-) Here are a few more pics from the weekend:

Enjoying the sun!

Scotty and Tony

Relaxing on the giant floaty. This thing took up almost the entire pool and all 6 of us could fit on it!

Zak and Hollie

Class, class, class...

16 Weeks!

I had my 16 week checkup today. Nothing too exciting but I did get to listen to the heartbeat, which was great. It took the Dr. a little bit to find it and I was starting to get nervous, but they must deal with that all the time because she kept reassuring me that it often takes a while for them locate the heartbeat depending on the position of the baby. She started looking for it up by my belly button and ended up finding it much further down on the right side of my belly. It was a healthy 150 bpm. After that, I went over to the hospital and had blood drawn for the Quad-Screen Test which helps the Dr. determine if the baby may have Down Syndrome and helps rule out other potential problems such as neural-tube defects. We are praying that the results bring good news!

I am feeling pretty good for the most part. I still have moments where I feel nauseous, but it is definitely not as often as before. I am getting so anxious for the weather to get nicer so that I can start walking in the evenings. This whole week the temperatures have been in the mid 50's and the wind has been blowing like crazy - not umcommon for Ellensburg in the spring, I know :-)

Here are some pics of my 16 week belly. It just keeps getting bigger and bigger!

My belly button is huge :-)

My next appointment is scheduled for June 8th. This will be my 20 week ultrasound and we will be able to find out the sex of the baby - that is IF I can talk Tony into it. I really want to find out what we are having and he really wants to be surprised. I told him that it will be a surprise either way, what difference does it make if we are surprised at 20 weeks or 40 weeks? I guess we still have some discussing to do...

...And Baby Makes Three

This is Baby Butorac's first picture. He is waving at us!

We are so excited to announce that we are going to have a baby! Even though we have only been married 10 months, we were both anxious to start a family - ok, I was probably WAY more anxious than Tony, but he is definitely very excited now!

It was President's Day weekend and we were just hanging out at our house. I realized I was a couple days late (which never happens to me), but I was nervous to take a pregnancy test because I didn't want to be disappointed. Tony finally talked me into taking one late in the afternoon. I set it on the counter and went about straightening up the bathroom while I waited. I glanced down a few minutes later and saw two pink lines. I froze because I couldn't remember what "two lines" meant. I grabbed the instructions and reassured myself that two lines meant PREGNANT. I couldn't believe it - I was nervous to take the test because I didn't want a negative result, but I never thought about how I would react if it was positive. I grabbed the test and went into the living room to tell Tony. I said, "I think we're going to have a baby!" He was totally shocked as well, it was a totally surreal moment. But then we just started smiling and hugging and talking about who we were going to tell and when. Turns out we couldn't keep a secret very long and ended up driving to Cle Elum that night to tell Tony's younger brother Mikey and his wife Stephanie the good news. (Turns out that a week later they told us they were also expecting a baby and Stephanie and I are due just 2 days apart. It is so fun to be able to share this experience with her and I know it has been amazing for Tony to be able share it with his brother.)

We had both of our families over for dinner a few weeks later and told them the good news. As you can imagine they were all very excited and a little overwhelmed I think too. I made T-shirts for Stephanie and I that said " Baby Butorac" and below that was an arrow pointing to our bellies and then under that I put each of our due dates. 

The two mamas :-)

I felt pretty good until about 7 weeks and then I started feeling nauseous all day long. Fortunately, I never threw up - but I felt like I was going to throw up all the time, so I'm not sure which is worse. I was exhausted by the end of each day at work and basically came home and camped out on the couch for a couple hours and then went to bed. Tony was great at making "special" meals for me since what he was having for dinner never sounded good. The only things that sounded good to me were greasy, fatty, sugary things - not so great for trying to control my weight gain!

We had our first ultrasound at 12 weeks and it was so amazing to see the baby and hear the heartbeat. It made everything seem so much more "real" and since then it has really sunk in that we are going to have a baby! Tony came to that appointment with me and he had a huge smile on his face the whole time. He said that the baby definitely looks like a boy. Of course, you can't tell that early on, but he has been calling the baby a "he"since the day we found out I was pregnant - wishful thinking I guess :-)

I am now 15 weeks and starting to feel much better. I was hoping that once I hit the 2nd Trimester I would just feel a huge burst of energy and all the nausea would be gone. It hasn't exactly happened that way, but I do feel like I have more energy that I did a couple weeks ago. I am still pretty tired and I have been getting sinus headaches too, which makes it hard to focus at work when I am staring at 3 computer screens for 8 hours a day. My body has changed so much! I already have a pretty good size tummy and I only have a couple pairs of pants that I can still button - the rest I have to wear unzipped and unbuttoned with a "belly band" over them. I am kind of in that phase where you might wonder, "is she pregnant or has she just gotten fat?" :-) I have been getting heartburn a lot and just have an overall feeling of being bloated all the time. I have also been waking up in the middle of the night to go the bathroom - which I never used to do.

But even with all the changes, I am so excited for this baby! I am also anxious for things to progress and can't wait until I can feel the baby move! I promise I will post some tummy pics soon!