Christmas Vacation

Time has finally slowed down just a bit - praise the Lord!
Thanksgiving through the new year was insane for us!

16 weeks!

The week of Thanksgiving, we had a major dinner for Randy's work, then we saw our little nugget again (picture from that appointment in last post), told our families, publicly announced the news, spent Thanksgiving day with his family, then my mom & stepdad came up to spend the weekend with us. The following week, we had a Christmas party/dinner for Randy's work on Monday night, and Tuesday I left to see my dad & stepmom in Kentucky through Friday. The next Monday, Randy flew to India for 2 weeks for work, and I was home with the furry children. Finally, he came back for a week and life seemed somewhat calm. That Thursday, we had another ultrasound and a few more genetic tests - all of which came back perfectly normal!

part of Randy's Christmas present :)

Friday we drove down to see my family for Christmas, and drove off Dec 26th for a much needed vacation in Pensacola, FL. Our 5th anniversary is January 7th, and we knew it would be quite a while before our next vacation, so we decided to go big :) It was amazing! Check out the photo dump below for some highlights.

Christmas was so sweet this year. Every so often my eyes would get kind of huge and I'd say, "we're going to have a 6 month old next Christmas. WHOA." So this was our very last Christmas as a family of two, but it was also so surreal to celebrate the birth of our Savior whilst carrying a child myself. It was very touching and emotional. A baby changes everything.

In all the chaos, I realized there had been something I was neglecting...I'm supposed to go have my blood checked once a month to make sure my pregnancy hormones aren't depleting my epilepsy meds too much, but I had gone at least 3 months without keeping up with it. While we were gone, I started getting this eye twitch back I haven't had since starting my meds a year ago. Before my medication, I had the twitch in my eye for almost 8 years, so we knew it was a significant symptom for me. Sure enough, the results of my blood draw the week before showed my levels were too low and my doctors weren't thrilled to hear the twitch was back. I'm mad at myself for being so reckless. Seizures can not only harm me, but they can be horrible for my baby. My dosage has been raised now, and I'm going to try to stay on top of it. The twitch is an annoying reminder of how stupid and careless I was. By the time I got my raised dose, the twitch was pretty bad, so I got to it just in time.

Randy at the Taj Mahal

In other news, I've been feeling the sweet little movements on and off for the last couple weeks! I can't wait until they are stronger and more frequent. The first one came the day after Randy left for India. I thought it was way too early, but it's kind of an unmistakeable feeling. I felt like God was allowing me to feel him/her because I was really anxious being home without Randy. He's gone on many trips across the world since we've been married, but I've never been pregnant during those trips. I kept panicking that something was going to go wrong and he wouldn't be here. I was so afraid I'd have to make a call like that to him. I was so thankful for that little flutter throughout the day. I didn't feel it again for almost 2 weeks, but my doctor said what I was describing sounded like I definitely felt it. I've had several doctors tell me I'm more sensitive to my body, so it didn't really surprise me a ton that I felt it earlier than most. Those flutters are so precious. In fact, I can feel them right now as I'm typing this. I can't wait until Randy can feel the little kicks as well! Oh, what a sweet day that will be!
We're also excited for the halfway point coming at us quickly! Since I'm being induced early, we're only a week and a half from halfway! Just under 5 months until our little one is in our arms!

My mom an I - we got the crowns from Christmas poppers

My brother-in-law, David, with the epic photobomb

beignets and cafe au lait
two of my favorite things EVER

almost 17 weeks here!

We got to stay at this beautiful place for a steal thanks to hotels.com and off season costs!

The view from our bedroom window.
The sound on the left, and the beach (you can't see it here) on the right. It was an amazing view!

Nevarre Beach

We decided to check out the last night of lights at the Gulf Breeze Zoo

National Naval Aviation Museum

The little flight suit we got at the giftshop!
Randy says I won't put it on a girl...I told him that was sexist and he was wrong ;)

Pensacola lighthouse - an active lighthouse! You can go all the way to the top!

The stairs in the lighthouse...all 173 of them. We tried to go up, but it just about killed us.
Turns out you aren't supposed to try to go up if you have epilepsy and/or are pregnant...oops.

An AMAZING little restaurant we found. So good we went back twice!

We saw some amazing sunsets. I believe this one is from Fort Pickens

Fort Pickens - completed in 1834 and active until 1947

The beach across the road from our resort. We were the only ones out there that afternoon! It was chilly and we had to wear jackets and use our towels as blankets, but it was so nice and relaxing

If you made it down this far, thanks for stopping by! December was a great month.
We're pretty excited about 2017! New Years Day I kept looking at Randy and going, "Randy...we're having a baby this year. That's crazy!" We are so very thankful.