Its a...

We had our ultrasound today and it was simply magical! To see that sweet baby kick and move on a

screen and to see little fingers and toes, all perfectly formed and perfectly tiny is just one of the best 

moments anyone can imagine! We decided to have a little party for family home evening and find out

with the rest of our families what we were having. So we printed off two of these and had the 

ultrasound tech seal the correct one in an envelope which we opened tonight. And...

We are absolutely thrilled to be adding a little baby girl to our family in August!! 

Everything looked wonderful on the ultrasound and they said she is 8 oz right now. SO tiny!

I have been showing so much more than last time so I asked the tech about it and she checked

the placement of my placenta and said that it is in a position that accounts for that which makes

me feel a little bit better about being huge :)

Well, off to buy some baby clothes and daydream about our little girl!

Boy or girl?!

I am going crazy waiting to find out the gender of this babe! Our appointment is Monday and it can't come soon enough! I have practiced some serious self control when it comes to buying baby clothes (extra 30% off your entire purchase at Baby GAP, anyone?). We will be thrilled with either a boy or a girl. I'm feeling so blessed and excited for this little spirit to come to our family. I still feel nauseous and achey everyday, and evenings can be really bad, but just being to the point where I'm not throwing up makes 5 more pregnancies seem like a possibility. Shhh! Don't tell Lance I said that :)

In the meantime, I've been working on some projects I will share as soon as I finish them and get my camera fixed. The first is an awesome dresser I inherited when my grandpa passed away. The thing has some seriously stylish bones and Lance and I are painting it a Kelly green. I can't wait! It will become the new changing table/baby supplies holder in the kid's room (wow, that sounds weird). The other is this fun art print I put together tonight. I'm having it matted and framed and hung in the kids' room above the rocking chair.

I'm definitely in nesting mode!

One more random thing...I wrote down a recipe for Shrimp Scampi almost 10 years ago and just made it for the first time tonight. It was delicious and got great reviews from the husband so I thought I'd share it with you!

Shrimp Scampi

1/2 stick butter

3 T minced garlic

1 14 oz can diced tomatoes

1 cup milk

1 cup heavy cream

1 bag cleaned, deveined shrimp

1 cup feta cheese

1 package angel hair pasta

Cook pasta according to directions. Over medium heat, melt butter and add garlic and tomato. Simmer 

on medium heat for a few minutes, crushing the tomatoes with the back of a spoon. Add milk and 

cream and continue to simmer. I used frozen shrimp that were already cooked so I just added them 

while I was simmering the rest of the ingredients. The original recipe calls for uncooked shrimp, which 

you just add and cook in the mixture. Last, add the feta cheese and simmer until everything is fully 

cooked. Toss everything together in a serving dish, or serve separately. 

It's delicious! Meat can be such a pain to prepare sometimes which is why I love keeping some good shrimp recipes on hand for the days I want an easy meal. You can buy a bag of 100 pre-cooked shrimp at Walmart for $5.00 which is enough for two meals. It's my favorite cooking shortcut because you can just pull them straight out of the freezer and they take maybe 5 minutes in warm water to thaw!

I hope you are enjoying the warm weather as much as we are. Pretty sure I got burned today. Yay for sunshine!

Crew Guy

I haven't updated the blogging world about our cute little Crew guy in a while so I thought I would do that! We are just absolutely amazed at how quickly he has turned into a little boy. He is so independent and sure of himself and I love seeing him explore and be his own little person!

These are a couple of pictures from the wedding in December. He looked so snazzy!

Some of my favorite things about Crew:

• He is still an incredible talker, pulling out 4-word sentences every day now. He understands pretty much everything you say to him and is very social and conversant. 
• He loves singing songs and will request the "temple song" every night before bed. He knows both the first and second verses by heart.
• He is the silliest little boy and has the cutest sense of humor. Our days are spent just laughing and laughing together. He has me doing silly things all day because it's just too fun to make him smirk and giggle. People probably think I'm crazy when we're out and about.
• He is so sweet. He loves giving hugs and kisses and just being close to mommy and daddy. But he is also very independent and has no problem being away from us either. He recently got back from a week long trip to Arizona where he went with grandma and grandpa Walker to visit Lance's sister Kirstin and her family. I was amazed at how well he did with it and was just so excited to see us again, than back to business as usual.
• He is extremely stubborn and strong-willed! We have had to be religious about keeping him in line and disciplining him or he will take total advantage. But when we are good about disciplining him, he is obedient and an absolute pleasure to be around.

Like most parents, I feel like I could go on and on about him, all his funny little quirks and stories but that is probably a pretty good picture of our little Crew guy! We love him so much and can't imagine life without him.

15 weeks

This is the very first picture I've taken this pregnancy. I'm showing a lot faster this time than the first 

pregnancy! I wasn't showing this much even at 20 weeks so I'm a little worried how I will look at 40 

weeks. I didn't get a single stretch mark last time and I'm thinking that will not be the case this time :) 

Please excuse the poor phone picture quality- my nice camera is broken.

It's incredible the things we mothers sacrifice for our little ones and in so many ways I believe it helps us

 love them even more purely and entirely than you otherwise could. I think of all the heartache and pain 

we went through in getting Crew here and now it seems so unquestionably worth it. I know it will be the 

same with this sweet little spirit who is on its way to our family.

We find out the gender in just 3 short weeks!