The Beginning of 2014: Preparing Our Nest, and other craziness

Where to begin? I feel that in the last few months a ton has happened and not very much as well. Lets start with baby Tate and all the fun things associated with him.

When January rolled around I was super excited. Finally I was done with homework, and with all the traveling, and projects I had to get done for Christmas. I was also done with morning sickness! I was free! All through November and December Nathan had been asking me, "When are you going to research that? Do this? Buy that?" etc. And each time my answer was in January.

So began our 2014.  I made a giant list of all the things I had been saying for months I would do. Then the last few months I have been doing them.

I have read through the books I wanted to read through before baby:

I have had three baby showers thrown! One in Logan, Boulder, and one was a surprise that the Young Women in the ward threw for me and another pregnant lady who is also in Young Womens. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos. What I do have is an old balloon from the Young Women baby shower that is amazingly still floating around our apartment.

Its still floating around after a month. I have to say I'm impressed.

And a photo I am stealing from Miranda off of Facebook.

My wonderful sisters-in-law :) Missed you Bethany!

All the baby showers were so much fun, and I just want to say thank you to those who threw them for me. And for all the wonderful ladies who came to them, and gave us stuff.

Let's see we have bought/gotten all the stuff that was on the baby wish list I created in January. 

We've got our stroller, car seat and have set up our crib.

 

We've created more storage areas for baby stuff, and bought a rocking chair.

The Ottoman is storing all our baby blankets

Here is our  baby swing, and our coffee table became a storage area. I put baskets on top and filled them with  baby stuff. And underneath the coffee table I have made room to store more baby stuff. Babies have a lot of stuff.

I have deep cleaned the apartment. And finished some decorating.

 

I attempted to sew a baby blanket, and a pillow sham (I got tired and didn't get around to sewing the other one, its the floppy white one.)

 

We toured the hospital, wrote up a birth plan, and put together a hospital bag.
We talked to our insurance and got for sure money figures.
And we went to about 15 hours of  baby/birthing classes. Nathan was a real sweetheart about it.
Also Nathan has been working on our car and making it safer for baby, and for us too.

I think that might be about it for my nesting and our prepping for baby. It was a little weird because I feel like I nested early and now that its April I'm not sure what to do with myself. I'm hoping to still make a few frozen meals and get our pediatrician solidified.

Other fun stuff that has been going on is that finally around Christmas time baby started showing! We haven't been very good at documenting the growth but here are a few shots.

 

 

I'm hoping to take some maternity photos with Nathan before he comes. Hopefully baby will wait for us to do that.

Also something fun in the last few months was that for Valentines Nathan and I had our "baby moon". We splurged and went to a fun Bed and Breakfast in Colorado Springs and checked out a few things there. It was nice to get away and have time for just the two of us before baby comes. Here are some pictures from Garden of the Gods that we went to and walked around.

 

Now for a few fun things the last few months that aren't baby related. And lets talk about Nathan; I think he has been a little neglected this post so far.

Let me start at the beginning of the year. In January Nathan started renting an office. It seemed like a good idea at the time because he was thinking of hiring more employees. His business plan was to expand his development shop and have more employees to help him develop websites for more clients. We were excited about his little work space. I had began making plans to help him decorate it a little more as the bare walls and the one giant whiteboard made it seem a little too much like a man cave.

Then in February the winds of change began to blow and we had to rethink what we had originally planned. Nathan had been offered a position to be a CTO (Chief Technical Officer) for one of his clients. If he took the offer we would be making less money, but Nathan would gain valuable experience of being a CTO before we go to get his MBA in a few years. It seemed to dawn on both of us that he really needed to gain experience like this if he was to progress in his career.

We considered it for a week or so, and while we were considering it two things happened.

The first was that I realized that we wouldn't be able to afford Nathan's little office and it would be better if he worked from home. Which would mean we would need to find a bigger place with multiple bedrooms, so Nathan could have his own office. It also made sense to get a place that would fit a toddler and probably another sibling so we didn't have to move again before business school.

So began the search in February for a new place for us. It was frustrating things were either extremely expensive, fake listings, had an income cap, or gone in the blink of an eye. Near the end of the month I began to despair. It seemed we would never find the perfect place for us to live for the next few years. Then when all seemed lost a realization dawned on both of us. My sister and her husband had been looking for a house to buy, and their place would work perfectly for us if they moved. So came the waiting game of hoping they found a house, so we could take their place. And last week that's exactly what happened.

They found a house, and are in the process of fixing it up. They are closing on April 30th and moving in the middle of May. We then are moving into their place at the start of June! We are really excited and feel blessed that the Lord helped everything to work out perfectly for us.

The other thing that happened is that we didn't end up taking the offer. Our plans have still changed though because in the process of considering; Nathan realized he wanted to gain that CTO experience by working on his own start up idea. He had been thinking of the idea for awhile when the offer from his client came, he realized that he wanted to give it a shot.

So that's what we are doing now. We are still trying to get rid of his office and have him work from home so he can have more hours dedicated to Doskara which is what his start up is called. I'm really proud of him he has already put a lot of work into it. We're both excited to see what comes of it, and maybe nothing, but we're glad we are giving Nathan the opportunity to try it out.

Well that's about it for us. Right now we are just waiting. Waiting for baby to come, waiting to move, waiting to get rid of the office... We are just waiting, and its fun. We should enjoy this downtime because everything is about to change.

I like to end with photos, so here is a random photo of Nathan trying to throw a rock through the ice on a small lake. Surprisingly the ice won. We have been taking lots of walks as that's good exercise for pregnant ladies.

Anyways love you all, and I'm excited that my next post will have the newest member of our family! I cant believe its finally here. :)