Happier News!

Amazingly, Chris and I aren't feeling too much worse than we felt yesterday. I was dreading waking up this morning and feeling like...well, like a truck had plowed into us.

Just to elaborate a little more from what Chris said, we were at a red light close to our house. When the light turned green, I started pulling out to turn. All I remember hearing was Chris saying "I don't think that...". I turned and saw that there was a car stopped in one lane on the cross-street, and a huge Dodge in the next lane (the one furthest from us) that was not slowing down. Because I hadn't taken off quickly, I was able to slam on the brakes and we came to a complete stop before we were even in the path of the truck.

When the truck saw us though, he slammed on his breaks and turned his wheel...right into my driver's door. By that time there was nothing to do but sit there and wait for him to hit us. I braced myself on the steering wheel, and turned my head back facing forward and closed my eyes. I have never been in a wreck before, so it was really weird- kind of like an out of body experience.

I remember hearing his tires, but I don't remember the sound of the impact. When it was over the only thing that I could think about was getting out of the car in case it caught on fire (one of my childhood fears of cars being in a wreck and then exploding). I even turned the car off because I thought that would help. Then I told Chris to get out so that I could climb over the seat and we could escape before the impending explosion....

Of course the car didn't catch on fire. Luckily, someone else was paying attention because I didn't even look when I jumped out of the car and ran across the road to the curb.

There was glass everywhere...even in Chris's house shoes that I had thrown on before heading out the door (my parents were asleep in our room and I didn't want to wake them up to get my shoes....they didn't know that we had gone to get breakfast).

Chris called 911 and requested that an ambulance come for me because of the baby. They were there in what seemed like seconds later and were very nice. I just about lost it in the ambulance, but I was able to keep it together while calling my dad to tell him that we had another wreck in my mom's new car and while talking with the police and paramedics. Then my mom came to pick us up in my car and clean out her car since it wasn't drivable.

When we got back to the house we called my OBGYN and they said to go directly to Labor and Delivery (So, here is the first "bright-side" moment: we have become very acquainted with Norman Regional, where all of the baby action will happen in January).

I got in very quickly and soon they were monitoring L'il P. I was so relieved when we heard the heartbeat and heard that he was kicking like crazy still. Now is the second "bright-side" moment: Chris got to feel his son kick for the first time! While the nurse was tying down the heart monitor, she felt one of L'il P's kicks and looked at me and smiled. She told me that she had felt it and I said "Awww, that is sad because my husband hasn't been able to feel him kick yet." Wasting no time, she told Chris to get over there and hold the monitor. He got to feel some pretty powerful kicks before all was said and done.

After they released me from Labor and Delivery, we (Me, Chris and my parents) made our way to the Emergency Room to have both of us checked out for lower back pain. Chris was taken out of the waiting room first and I was taken to another room for more critical injuries (I am guessing because I was 5 1/2 months pregnant). Everyone was super wonderful, from the doctor, the nurse that did all my blood work, and the technician that came to give me a sonogram. "Bright-side" moment number 3: We got to see L'il P again! The tech was amazing and took a long, good look at my uterus to make sure that it wasn't torn and then proceeded to confirm our little boy's manhood, along with other measurements and explanations.

About 5 long hours later and another trip upstairs to Labor and Delivery, we were released to come home! We know that we were being watched over and that we are very lucky.

If you had made it this far in the post, thanks for acknowledging me. I am very wordy…much more so than Chris; writing is therapeutic for me! Thank you for all of the e-mails, calls and prayers. We are very cognizant of how just how blessed we are to have people like you guys in our lives! Mostly, I am thankful for my awesome God who protected all 4 of us: me, Chris, the baby and the other driver. I am also thankful for my husband who is my rock. It is such a relief to have someone in your life that you can go to and let your guard down. I can tell him exactly what I am feeling and how scared I am, and he is always there. I am so glad that I married him and more in awe every day that he chose me to call his wife.

On to other happier news:

In true game day spirit, we suited up the pups in their Sooner gear earlier this week...
Don't they make your heart just melt???





Here we are at Big Red Rally. Chris and I are all about checking out everything that OU has to offer us our last year here. We have season tickets and plan to go to everything that we can so that we have no regrets when we leave Norman in a year...

We met up with Darcy!!! I know what you are thinking...that was totally Chris's Coke Zero in my hand...I promise that I only had a few sips of caffeine!


Here we are at the first game of the season...in the student section.

A word of advice: Get there early if you are going to be sitting in the student section.

Because we were not early to the game we ended up cutting our losses in the student seating and packed onto the ramp. We had a much better view, could feel a breeze, and there weren't as many people that hadn't bathed in the last week...

A couple of Chris's pics from the game...

Okay, now I am really impressed if you have made it this far! Yay!

For those of you that care, go down to the "We're Having A..." post. I have edited the video more and posted more pictures from the night!

Labor Day Fun. . .

Well, so far Tif and I have had a real "bang-up" Labor Day. Here are a few pictures from our Sunday o' Fun.

We were in Teresa's (Tif's mother) car on our way to get breakfast for us and Nelson and Teresa since they are visiting this weekend. For those of you who don't know, we were in her car two weeks ago when someone changed lanes without looking and ripped her side mirror off of the car. So this week, the guy in the Dodge ran a red light and t-boned us. The downside was that Tif was driving and he hit her directly. The side curtain airbags deployed, keeping most of the glass off her. The upside is that everybody, including the baby is okay. We came home and went to the hospital about an hour later so they could check Tif and the baby out. I got x-rays, and the three of us are okay . . . just a bit shaken up. Our backs hurt a little and we have a couple of minor cuts, but I am sure we will hurt more in the next few days. We thank God for keeping us safe, because the damage (vehicular and bodily) could have been much worse. Hope your weekend is much better! We will have pictures up later from the OU game yesterday.

Here are Tif and I proudly displaying our hospital bracelets, we are just thankful that we and the baby are okay. Keep us in your prayers. Happy Labor Day!

We're having a.....

Saturday night we had the big cake cutting to find out if we would be expecting a boy or a girl. Basically we had our technician write the sex down on a piece of paper and we took the paper to a baker with instructions to make the cake batter blue for a boy or pink for a girl. We were able to share the moment that we found out with 20 of our closest friends and family.

Thank you to all of our family and friends that came to share this special moment with us! We are so blessed to have so many wonderful people that care about us!



As promised, here I have added pics from the 20 week sonogram and a few pics from the party.

The little guy...


his foot...


4D picture: you can see his two little fists covering his face and his right ear...


Pics from the party!

Look at Chris's face: he is so excited that it is a boy! :)


Here are the awesome cookies that Jess and Karen helped me decorate...


Darcy, Karen and me...


Gearing up for the l'il Sooner! Thanks, Terry, Anna and Kara!


Aunt Darcy got the baby a ton of adorable ducky fun stuff!


Because we knew that Norman was a long way to drive, we had these cards ready to send out if our parents couldn't make it. We mailed each card in a brown envelope and placed a green sticker on the girl card and a yellow sticker on the boy card. We called Chris's mom as soon as we cut the cake to tell her which one to open! We just wanted it to be a little more fun than just saying "It's a boy!" over the phone.

Babymoon!

A week ago we returned from our much anticipated babymoon to Denver. (In case you are wondering, babymoon is an actual term...we aren't just making it up. :))

We had such a wonderful time relaxing and getting to spend some quiet time away together before the craziness of the fall semester started.

The weather was perfect...in the 80's with a chance for rain every day.

Here we are at the Denver Aquarium. We had a ton of fun and we can't wait to take our kids along with us next time!







Of course, all of these awesome pictures were taken by the talented photographer.

















































Here are a few pictures from our visit to the capitol...








After our tour of the capitol we met Chris's new colleague, Bryan. They will be working together next fall in Amarillo,





Our next stop was the Hammond's Candy Factory in Denver. We had fun getting to see how they made all of their candies.










Oh, yeah, people were staring...



The next day we ventured to Golden, Colorado...





yep, people were staring again...









Here we are at the Red Rocks- thanks for the suggestion, Monica. They were amazing to see!

Here is a little road that we got lost on. At least this stretch had a guardrail...the road was so narrow and steep that we couldn't turn around. Little scary.

During our time at Colorado Springs we went to see the Seven Falls...

Here we are at the top! I was pretty proud to be able to get up there halfway through my pregnancy.

We took a little trail at the top...

We also went to visit the Cave of the Winds...

Also, we went to the Garden of the gods.

The mountain in the distance covered by the clouds is Pikes Peak.

Later that night we went back to Seven Falls to see it lit up at night...

Here is an awesome ice cream place that we came across...it was heaven.

Our last day we got up extra early to see if we could get a standby ticket into the mint, which we got to do after Chris sprinted back to the car to drop off his cell phone.

We are so grateful that we had the opportunity to get away for a week and spend time together before this semester starts. It was a great time for the two of us to have fun, reconnect, and celebrate everything that is going on in our lives at the moment.

We are so excited to be halfway through our pregnancy! We had the big sonogram yesterday and everything looks great...we can't wait until this weekend to find out if we are having a little boy or girl!