I have good news and bad news:

Which do you want first?

The good news? Okay, here it is: the Ultrasound to find out the gender of this little squirmer* is in a month! September 12th people, so I'm putting up a poll, just because I think it's fun to see what people think. Also, COMMENT, because I want to know who thinks what and why and stuff.

The funny thing is, technically on September 12th, I will only be 18 weeks. I started this pregnancy at one dr. office and switched (because the first was kinda awkward - you don't want to start out awkward, yeah?) and the second doctor never got the ultrasound information from the first doctor, which showed that I was actually only 6 weeks instead of 8 weeks (as the internet and "first-day-of-your-last-period" crap will tell you), make sense? SO I'd better be able to tell what this baby is, or I'm going to be mad at BOTH doctor's offices. :)

Okay, so the bad news: I have to start watching what I say. I knew this day was coming and it's not like I say really bad things, you know, but Karly said "Oh crap" today (hey mom, don't tell dad, okay?). Nate and I of course kind of laughed, and then I told her not to say that - it's not nice, yadda yadda. Nate, on the other hand, says "Karly, we only say that at times like when you fall down or something." Great. I guess that's better than teaching her she can never say it when I do, huh?

And since I feel like blog posts are not complete without a picture, here is one of Karly swimming a couple of weeks ago. I think it's time for a new suit since she gets made fun of in this one... :D

Have a nice day!

*I am only 14 weeks, but I swear I've been feeling this kid move for at least 2 weeks. I read that you usually feel the baby start kicking around 16-22 weeks, but they also say you feel it earlier the second time around (since you already know what it feels like) and I felt Karly move at 15 weeks, so I'm not crazy! :)

The Bench Bunch is pretty awesome too!

So immediately after the Cox get together, we all headed out to Upalco, UT (if you have heard of that, I will be AMAZED and wonder why) for a family reunion with my mom's family. There was so much to do I seriously didn't worry about Karly at all. She was either jumping on the tramoline, looking at the new baby kitties, playing with toys, on the 4 wheeler with someone, eating, or sleeping. :) Nice huh? As I was looking through all the pictures family members took, I realized I was absent from a good number of them. Dang baby was starting to make me pretty sick and exhausted at this point. We had a lot of fun, though.

Just to show you how many people were there...

The guys spent a good part of each day shooting guns (either at targets or "rock chucks" - I have no idea what their real name is. Snipes maybe? I never saw one even though they said they shot lots of them...) Nate came home from the trip wanting to buy a 22 or something. The "need" has passed or at least subsided for now.
4 wheeling was a big hit.

In honor of my grandpa, the king of doing things the hardest, possibly most dangerous way, but ending up with something cool in the end, my brother, dad and cousins built a zip line in the above mentioned way.

I think there were people [read: children] on that zip line 90% of the reunion.

Karly also enjoyed the tree swing (once again being entertained by her awesome dad)
Another hit was the trampoline. Funny, all these things kept the kids entertained. What did the parents do? Sat around and talked without having to constantly worry about their kids.
Karly eating with some of her cousins (have I mentioned there are 4 girls cousins and 11 boys on my side of the family? They are all hoping I'm having another girl :D)
Bonfire (fell asleep putting Karly to sleep and pretty much missed the whole thing. This was followed by night games, which sounded like lots of fun. Too tired.
We went on a hike on the red rocks above my aunt and uncle's house - thanks Em for taking the cute picture!

Can't wait for Bench Reunion 2013!

The Cox Family is the best!

At the end of June, we went to Utah for a family reunion with my immediate family (all 29 of us!) followed immediately by a reunion with my mom's side of the family. It was so good to be with family and let Karly just run around with her other cousins. It was also nice to have so many other people willing to help out with Karly, so I could get a little extra sleep.

On the drive over. Trust me, it was not this pleasant the whole way. :)

Karly was in heaven getting to be outside so much. Nate and I kept saying to each other "we need a backyard for that girl."

Trying to "catch" a fish.

I swear the best part of this week was how often Nate was willing to take care of Karly. She adores him and loved playing with him. I think 3 or 4 people took pictures of this because it's just so stinkin' cute!

Male bonding...or something - we miss living near these guys!

The cabin we stayed in had a great TV room in the basement. We took full advantage and let the kids watch probably way too many movies. :) 10 bucks if you can find Karly in this picture.

There was also a hot tub that the parents (after bed time)...

and the kids took full advantage of.

We also managed to get lots of games in, despite the 15 children vying for attention (maybe this was during a movie? :D)

We took family pictures while we had all of us together, which was quite the feat, I must say.

I loved this one, taken accidentally - the chaos of trying to get everyone ready.

Which worked out pretty well, I must say! I sure love this bunch!

And the parents and offspring. Kinda hard to tell we're all related, huh? :)

It's a little depressing that I may not see most, if any of my family until after my next kid enters the world (and who knows when after that?). I keep trying to convince all of them how awesome Denver is, but there are these obnoxious things called jobs that keep people living where they are. :) Luckily, Shan just moved to Utah, so I at least have someone within 8 hours of me!

There is no better way to watch TV...

...than in just your underwear.

My child, the homeless one

If we are going anywhere or going to see people, I HAVE to fix Karly's hair. As in, get it wet and put it in pigtails or half pigtails or something. Otherwise, she looks like this:

(this last picture is not so bad, but trust me, when it's just down like this, she is constantly pushing it out of her face)

Cruise

Man, I really am a slacker. This was over 2 months ago!

We went on a cruise for our 5 year anniversary with some of our best friends, Troy and Lindsey (who were also celebrating their 5 year anniversary!). They were the perfect couple to go with, as Nate and Troy NEVER have and never will run out of things to talk about. Lindsey and I still just roll our eyes about their ability to turn any conversation to something financial - for example

"This ship is HUGE. How much do you think it costs to build something like this?"

"Better yet, How much does it cost to run this thing for a week? With food and electricity and water."

"Yeah, and then on top of that, paying employees?!?"

"[some random, probably WAY off number is thrown out]"

On and on. :)

So anyway, we went from Miami, FL to the Cayman Islands to Isla Roatan, Honduras to Belize to Cozumel, Mexico and back to Miami. We only scheduled one excursion through Carnival - for the rest of the days we got a taxi, drove to a beach and snorkeled or relaxed on the beach (except in Honduras - more on that).

And here come the pictures...

The obligatory towel animals...

There were 2 "dressy" dinner nights, where we were just uncomfortably dressed while we stuffed our faces. :)

(by the way, I was JUST barely pregnant on the cruise, so I had no idea. I was however, very confused why both of these dresses felt SO TIGHT on my ribcage. Huh. :)

Speaking of dinner, here were our servers for dinner:

They were both from Indonesia and by the end of the week, Lindsey was ready to "adopt" them. They were pretty funny guys, but man would it be a hard life working on a cruise ship. They work for 6 months, then get 2 months off. The one in the back on the right has been doing this for 18 years and has 2 kids, who he basically missed growing up. We (meaning Troy and Nate of course) figured out that he saw his kids a total of 4 years of the 18 years he did this! I think I can handle busy season pretty well, knowing it could be WAY worse. :)

So I mentioned that at 3 of the 4 ports, we just grabbed a taxi and went to a beach to snorkel and relax. In Honduras, that's what we did, but Nate talked to the taxi driver to see if there was anything else to do and he mentioned a little "zoo" that we stopped at. Here are some of the pictures of that:

There was a little monkey that had a little bit of devil in him. He bit Troy, tried to bite me, and got into Lindsey's bag and stole her Bang! cards (probably thinking they were candy) and scattered them ALL OVER the cage. It was funny and scary all at the same time. :)

And my video of the devil monkey is not working. Apparently his devilish powers reach pretty far.

We did a LOT of snorkeling (Nate more than anyone else - he says all our vacations from now on must involve snorkeling). We bought a little case to put our camera in to take pictures. It worked...uh...really well.

And then there was Lindsey's awesome camera and her awesome camera case:

The snorkel boys

Here are just a few random pictures to complete our cruise story

I have a good excuse!

I realize my last post was over a month ago and basically told NOTHING of our lives (except that Karly sleeps with plastic toys).

It's sad, really, because we've been on a cruise, I went to girl's camp, we went to Utah for 2 family reunions, so we've been busy! And while I haven't taken many pictures, others have plenty of picture proof I can steal, so there's even lots to SEE and SAY!

But can I tell you how unappealing blogging is when I feel like I'm going to puke all day? And when I don't feel like I'm going to puke, all I want to do is sleep?

J

That's right folks. Baby #2 is on the way!

Not that most of you care, but for those who do, I feel like I've been more sick than with Karly. I've been wrong before (I'm 0 for 1), but I think I'm having another girl. Aside from being more nauseated, it's been very similar to Karly, including the NEED for milk. One night I drank 4 12-oz glasses of milk. I have definitely experienced more cravings (even though Nate tries to tell me it's just a woman's way of getting her husband to go to the store in the middle of the night for whatever she wants to eat). I have been wanting Chinese food for about 2 weeks (FINALLY got that one!) and I'm dying for salt and vinegar chips. I was craving buffalo wings, but I got that one covered. :) Nate has actually been very sweet about it, offering to get me chips at 10:30 at night and offering to pick up Chinese on the way home.

Up until about 2 days ago I wouldn't have said I necessarily looked more pregnant than last time - just fatter (which I am, let's be honest). However, getting ready for church Sunday I thought "geez, anyone who doesn't know I'm pregnant will now and I'm not even 12 weeks!" I really think the layer of pooch that I never got rid of from Karly doesn't help, but that's only part of it. Yay.

I had a 12 week appointment today and heard the heartbeat for the first time (only saw an ultrasound at the 8 week (which was actually 6 weeks) appointment (see picture above). It took the nurse a few minutes to find it and I kind of started freaking out (just a little), but it was 150 bpm. Karly was 175 at this point, so...boy? :) We'll know in September!

Anyway, I have lots to update, so hopefully I'll get back to doing that now and in the next few days.

Who needs a soft cuddly baby doll...

...when you can sleep with a hard, heavy, plastic toy?