We're Having a Baby and It's a Girl!

We're excited to announce that we will be having a girl March 8th!

Ryker seems REALLY excited... I think he doesn't quite know what's coming.

20 Weeks

Lake Powell '12

What a great year at Lake Powell! I may venture to guess that it was the best one for me so far. It was so much fun to have Ryker there. It made everything that much more exciting.

Ryker and I left before Nate because he had school and decided to come up with papa the next day. My awesome nephew, Jordan, was cool enough to ride with me so we had a fun trip talking and listening to music. Ryker did really well the entire way there! There was one point where he got a little carsick because we were going through some windy roads and he was watching a movie on the laptop. I looked back and his face was green... Poor kid.

Along the way we stopped at a clothing store in Kanab and tried on some hats. Ryker thought it was pretty fun.

As it turned out, Nate, Papa and James got stalled in Salt Lake for another day so we hung out with Jodi and Paul and their family for the day. We found a close beach and played in the sand and water all day. Ryker and Colby had so much fun.

So... This wasn't a fun part of the trip but I got the flu for a day! Ugh. Sadly, it ran rampant throughout the entire family. Pretty much everyone threw up over the side of the boat that trip.

After I got all better, we had a great time. Ryker loved the water weeny - Although this picture may not suggest it.

Cute cousins on the water weeny!

Ryker LOVED the jet ski more than anything else. He wanted to be on it the whole time.

This year there was an unfortunate accident in Lake Powell before we came. A person died during a storm in the canyon we were in and when they were looking for the body we couldn't wake board or anything so we had some time to hang out at the houseboat and play games and go hiking. 

 

Hiking up to Rainbow bridge

 

 

Watching Daddy wakeboard

Wake surfing without the rope! I was 17 weeks pregnant in this picture!

Cute Ryker! So there is a story to his red nose: It had been like that for about a week and we'd tried to see if there was anything up there but without success. It continued to seep the entire trip until the last day when Nate held his other nostril and told Ryker to blow through his nose... Out came who-knows-what! It was gooey and black and... YUCK! Poor little kid.

*Romantic Ryker*

Ryker and I were sitting on the couch tonight watching Enchanted and it got to my favorite part: The ball at the end. I LOVE the song "So Close" when McDreamy and Giselle are dancing together. 

While I was enjoying the song, Ryker got up and grabbed my hand and pulled until I stood up. I thought he wanted me to get him something from the kitchen but he grabbed both my hands and started dancing with me! Oh my gosh, I started bawling. It was so cute!  

He swayed back and forth and I would spin him and then we would walk in a circle and he was singing and just being so adorable!

He danced with me until the song was over and then clapped at the end. 

Aw man, I can't wait until I can see that moment over again in Heaven.

The Crib is not the Limit

At 1:30 this morning I woke to our door slowly creaking open. I elbowed Nate in the ribs thinking that someone was breaking into our apartment (I had just woken up!) and watched the door open and couldn't see anyone coming in... Then we heard the giggling. That's right - Ryker has learned to proficiently scale the walls of his crib and open his bedroom door. 

Heaven Help Us.

Ryker's Summer 2012

Ryker has had a great summer! It's been way hot in  Logan but we still were able to play, play, play.

Ryker loves to be outside more than anything. 

We went to the Farmer's Market a couple of times and they had a band there with lots of instruments for the kids to play. We stayed for more than an hour. Ryker loved it.

 

There is a little irrigation stream that runs in our yard. Ryker could and often does spend hours playing in it. He likes to throw things in it too... Hopefully I haven't lost anything unknowingly to the stream.

We've played with the cousins as much as we could. Here we went to Rigby Lake. Ryker has no fear of water - which I don't like.

 Getting all cleaned up after Rigby Lake. Cute cousins!

We went repelling with our great friends Tiffany and Spencer Maughn and her sister Trudy who I went to High school with. It was fun to see her again. Ryker thought it was so cool that we were climbing down the rocks.

 We went camping a few times. Ryker LOVES dirt.

We made homemade pizza with Nate's friend Jarrett and his wife Sydney. Ryker helped a lot.

We got to go to the Hunter Reunion in Rexburg, ID and play at the water park and go on the merry go round. I thought Ryker would be scared... I'm so silly. He's not afraid of anything.

 Ryker has 4 cousins his age. They are all cute as can be! Ali isn't in this picture. She is on a big horse!

4th of July in Menan. It was fun to have a kid to celebrate with. It makes it that much more enjoyable.

We spent some time at Grandma Hunter's farm. She passed away in August but we got to be with her and know that she was the best grandma ever.

 As I said... Ryker is not afraid of anything- including huge horses. 

Last but not least, Ryker got to have hernia surgery! The doctor said it was more progressive than they thought so we were very happy we did the surgery when we did. Ryker was so cute to start out with but did NOT like waking up. Mommy won't forget that part. It didn't keep him down at all. We had to go to the park that day because he was jumping all over the place. So much for a recovering mild child.

Ryker is almost 2 years old and he's starting to show it. He throws some pretty good tantrums but we do our best to ignore it and reinforce his good behavior. He is super active and I'm happy when he can sit down and watch half a disney movie. He can get pretty demanding but can also be so sweet and helpful. When he wakes up in the morning he gets into bed with us and snuggles for about 30 seconds... It's always the greatest 30 seconds of my day. I love this kid with all my heart.

MaRyLaNd

Nate is currently working at a lab on campus where he designs, creates and flies UAVs (Unmanned Arial Vehicles or remote control airplanes).

He LOVES working here. He comes home nearly every day and has some exciting news to share about how airplanes did/did not fly... Usually it's how incredibly bad one of them crashed.

He was lucky enough to be on the team making a "Quadrotor" to take to a competition in Maryland. Here is what a quadrotor looks like for all of those out there who, like me, would normally have no idea what was coming out of my mouth:

 So you can see that it has four propellers and four motors making it a Quad-Rotor. 

Their's was the only quadrotor entered into this competition. Usually USU brings a fixed-wing UAV and gets 1st but they decided that it was time to challenge themselves - and boy, was it a challenge. There is so much that goes into making something fly and it gets way more complicated when you add 4 motors - not only that, but when you take it to another part of the country, you have to re-tune it to the current climate/elevation. The process was pretty frustrating for Nate and his team because it just wasn't working for the first 3 days of the competition. Miraculously, they got it to do some things that they didn't expect they would and ended up doing pretty well in the competition considering they brought such a hard UAV. 

After the competition, we celebrated by eating some awesome sea-food and going to the beach.

We also took a trip to Washington D.C. which was awesome. I have been here once when I was in 2nd grade and it was fun to go back. We started with the Museum of Natural History. I could have stayed for HOURS but they only gave me one.

But they got to spend FOUR HOURS at the Air and Space Museum! 

This was Nate's face as we walked in:

Wow right? That something so nerdy makes my husband so excited... Yikes.

I got to learn a lot of information about certain spaceships and planes there but I've forgotten it all now...

 I had a great time with my hubs and his team. It was really hard not to feel like Penny on The Big Bang Theory... And I did learn just how much of a nerd I married. I knew he was one before but I saw IT ALL on this trip. And guess what, I love him even more for it. :-)