Jingle Bells, Frozen Mail and Pedro

So I suppose it is time to update this thing a little bit. You'd think being pregnant with not a lot of energy and being at home I would be so on top of this, but as you are well aware I am not. I don't love sitting in front of the computer all the time and my computer attention span usually gets eaten up by some email and going crazy trying to make the blog cute instead of updating it. I know the updates are more important, but I can't help the fact that I care way too much about cuteness!

Here are the updates....

Christmas

We had our own Christmas the night before we left to spent Christmas in Billings, Montana, at Tanner's family's house. We watched my favorite Christmas show "It's a Wonderful LIfe!" opened presents and ate pizza. It was lots of fun. The picture below was our tree, which Tanner so cleverly tied to the fireplace to keep it upright (it had some troubles last year that we never could fix). We were lucky enough to get to spend about 2 weeks in Montana and another week at home in Nebraska before Tanner had to trudge back to school. We had a ton of fun seeing EVERYONE there. His entire family got to come home for Christmas-- yes all 7 siblings, spouses and their kids too. We had about 25 people there. There was always a lot going on, but Tanner's mom knows how to keep it all going and making sure everyone has a good time. Amazing! We did have a stinky little bug floating around the house that pretty much caught everyone with a one day stomach flu. Both Tanner and I were "lucky" enough to catch that one. We were thankful it only lasted 24 hours. But we were well stocked with Gatorade and crackers so all was well! It was fun to see everyone from Cleveland to Utah, Idaho, Arizona and Nebraska. Krista and Kara blessed their sweet new babies, Connor and Sophie, and I think we took up about four small pews in the Chapel with the whole gang. We very much enjoyed Christmas and were grateful for the break!

COMING HOME

So coming home was nice because we realized late that Tanner actually had one more week of Christmas vacation left. We got to spend a fun week at home. Well, I should say we had to spend a fun week at home because right after we got back a huge storm hit and practically froze us inside. We got about a foot or more of snow added to the foot we already had and the temperature was

-25 or so everyday. Not really what I'd call winter wonderland weather, more like a frozen misery. I was very glad Tanner had all week of so I didn't have to be couped up alone. We played games, watched tons of movies, and finally ventured out at the end of the week, before we went crazy, to the pet store for some low budget entertainment. Some fun facts about much-to-cold-to live-in-weather: Your mail sticks to the mailbox giving you quite and interesting challenge getting it out, even a pregnant lady can get too cold, it takes like 1/2 hour to defrost your windshield and you may actually need to plug your car in, the sun may shine, but it is only deceiving you into thinking it just might be warmer than it really is. Let's just say that life in a Nebraska winter is grand!

DECEMBER PREGO PICTURE

Here was our December Pregnant picture update. I was comparing my belly of Jelly to Santa's at the ward party, but I think I won! Sorry Santa.

JANUARY

It's funny how every year I try to make New Year's goals and resolutions and I try to pick something I can actually accomplish and that I know I'll do, but this year wasn't like that. All the goals I thought of either have to wait until the baby comes or will most likely be messed up when he does come. So I think I'll do some spring cleaning resolutions instead. Clean up my house and myself! Even though I didn't really make any goals yet this year, I did find my self reflecting on the new year in other ways; ways of how our little Bennion lives are going to change forever and for the best! We are very excited to welcome our baby home and, frankly, we hope it is soon! Here is the January Prego pict too. TANNER'S NEW BUDDY

So here is a funny little Tanner update. I am usually good at posting something he probably thinks is goofy or embarrassing about him so here goes another one (because I am writing the post and he is not! And I think he is cute, charming and handsome no matter what!) This semester in his anatomy class he is studying the head and neck only. So as a fun homework buddy the teacher sent home a skull for each student to work with. So lucky us we now have a real human skull staring at us everyday on our living room table (which you can see from every area of the house except the bedroom, unless it is left on the kitchen table instead). It is such an inviting thing to have in the front room as you walk in the door. I have to say though, he is kinda growing on me. He is always smiling and Tanner even named him Pedro.

Showered with fun!

While we were in Utah for Thanksgiving a friend of our family's threw me a baby shower. It was so fun! I think the whole world came and I had a blast. I got so many cute things including the cutest mini-man clothes, tons of bath stuff, a bumbo chair and one of those sweet baby boppy things. And a little guy cowboy hat! Ha! It is adorable. Thanks so much to everyone especially Mom, Rachelle and everyone who was so thoughtful.

Me with tow of my prego cousins Michelle and Melanie. We were having a contest. Well, not really since Melanie just had her beautiful baby girl this week and Michelle is due the day after Christmas!
Here is another bump picture just for record. We took this on our anniversary at about 27 weeks.

October Update

Halloween is a big thing in my family so I had to keep up some of the traditions. I love to decorate so thanks to my mom and Aunt Julie (and Hobby Lobby) I Halloween-ized our living room. It was fun and I loved it! Tanner mostly loved the Candy Countdown because lucky for him, my mom stocked us with a months worth of Halloween candy! We also made and decorated pumpkin shaped rice krispie treats. Very yummy! We had a good time with Halloween watching all the Harry Potter movies (since that is about as scary as we do here), trunk-or-treating with the ward and watching the kids who thought they could get away with going around more than once (and they did), going out with friends and eating muddy buddies. Our first Halloween was a good one even if we were lame i

n the costume department (a dentist and a teacher) and went grocery shopping that night.

Since we found out we are having a baby boy we had to go out and buy our first baby outfit. The only store open was Target (good thing I LOVE that store) so we went and picked out these cute little monster onesies. Since we are having a boy and Tanner is obviously a boy he got to be the head picker-outer for this one (with a little girly input) and I think he did a good job! Later that week I went with a friend to Gap and Old Navy clearance and got screaming deals on the cutest little guy clothes you have ever seen! We even got a mini-man Batman shirt just for daddy :)

Here is the latest baby bump picture (as of Oct 15th). I feel huge and whenever Tanner asks me how I'm doing or feeling he asks me if baby is squishing me today. I think it mustbe a little more obvious now because I finally got a total stranger asking me when I was due! Yeah!

And lastly, i have been taking a fondant cake class at the craft store with my friend and wanted to show-off my new found fun! The first one was our practice cake with all the different things you can do. The second is the final one we could do whatever we wanted. I went with simple. It was a lot of fun!

The Results Please!

We had the ultrasound today (finally) and we are having- drum roll.....

a BOY!

Yay! Another BOY to add to the grand total of:

4 BOYs of 12 Bennion grand kids

and the first of the first on the Jonesie side :)

We are both so super excited (but I think Tanner is the most. He can't stop smiling)! They

checked everything out and said Baby BOY Bennion is right on track and healthy; just what we want. When the tech pointed out the BOY parts she looked at us waiting for us to realize what we were looking at, but we had no clue so she told us. We both just laughed. We didn't know what else to do, I think. We have joked about us having a family of BOYs since Tanner comes from an all girl

family, but I don't think we really thought it would happen. Like everyone else has said today as we talked on the phone "the Bennion name will go on!"

Here is his cute head! :)

This is one of those cool 3-D Ultrasound pictures. They kind of look like he stuck his head on the copier, but it is still cool.

Looks like he may be a thumb sucker!

Baby BOY Bennion due February 22, 2010

FUN FUN FUN!

The End

The Baby Bump and Birthdays!

This post is mostly for Holly and Jocie. They have been dying to see the "baby bump" I'm getting and so here it is: We finally took this picture on my birthday (Sept. 17) which also happened to be our first Doctor's appointment here in Lincoln. At the appointment we got to hear the baby's heart beat and it was super cool! Tanner had the biggest grin on his face (I love the "Tanner Grin"! :D)

Since then I have gotten a little bigger and can no longer fit into my normal pants. :( Oh well, it had to happen sometime right? It has been neat though, growing and changing. I can feel the baby's movement a little everyday and that is exciting! Tanner keeps trying to feel, but I think it will take some more time. We are also excited because we have our first ultrasound scheduled for next week October 15. We were supposed to have it yesterday, but the doctor got jury duty. Crazy! I'm glad it wasn't me though. But next week we should be finding out what we are having! All I can really say about this whole thing is it is definitely an interesting journey!

In addition to my growing tummy, Tanner and I both had our birthdays and are officially 24! Weird. Tanner made me our favorite Sour Cream Enchiladas (Yum!) and I took the easy road and we ordered take out Olive Garden for his. In between we went out with some friends. Lots of food you can tell, but hey I'm pregnant so the more food the better right? Ha ha! They were both great days.