I dream of Africa

I have some of the craziest dreams sometimes. I had this one particular dream months ago. I was African and living in a tribal village. I had this beautiful cocoa colored skin and wore what you see tribal people wearing in movies and pictures. I also had a baby. Well, in my dream, my village got raided and everyone was running away trying to escape. I strapped my baby to me and took off. I had to swim across a lake to safety. Now, in real life, I'm not that great of a swimmer, but in my dream I was amazing. I had long arms and legs and I swam really fast. Once I got to safety with my baby, I woke up.

The next day I told John about my dream and he didn't believe me! He thought I was making it up!! I finally convinced him that I really did dream that and he thought I was crazy. I just told him he was jealous because his dreams aren't as cool as mine! Ok, I admit it was a weird dream. I've never dreamed that I was another race before! So maybe this was the Lord's way of calming my fears about being a good mother. I mean I totally rocked at getting my baby to safety in my dream. Or maybe I just watch too many action movies :)

So, has anyone ever dreamed that they were a completely different race, or am I the only crazy one out there? Or, what has been your craziest dream?

Joining "The Club" . . .

The Mommy Club that is! So, surprise we're going to have our first baby, now who's supposed to send me my membership card??? The hazing won't be bad . . . will it?

I'm just starting my 15th week and the baby is due in January. John and I are both super excited! It still doesn't feel quite real. Whenever I tell someone I'm expecting, I kinda feel like I'm lying! I'm sure once my belly starts getting big and I can feel the baby move it will start sinking in!!! I did have some mild hazing in my first trimester, but nothing too terrible. Mostly constant nausea, but I didn't throw up, and exhaustion. I've been so tired, but I'm finally starting to get some energy back. Other than that, so far so good. John has been so great. He was doing pretty much all the house work because of my lack of energy and he only complained a tiny bit! I'm finally able to start picking up my share again, so he's getting some relief.

Ok, so the story of how we found out. It was two days before our beach trip with Nick and Jess. We were at the store getting snacks for the ride and I decided I wanted to get a pregnancy test and take it before we went. I wanted to check in case I needed to stay out of the sun and other stuff expecting mom's have to look out for. Usually John complains about that because pregnancy tests are so expensive. He didn't care this time though, because he said he had a feeling it would be positive. I'm thinking yeah right, but don't say anything because i really want that test! The past few days I was getting up early for work to make up for the hours I would miss on vacation, so I was up at 6am taking that test. Of course I expected a negative, but John was right and I saw two lines appear. I was still all bleary eyed and tired, so I had to rub my eyes and flip on all the lights in the bathroom. The second line was really light so I wasn't completely sure . . . I went to wake John up and get a second opinion. Anyone who has been around John when he is sleeping knows how hard it is to get him up. I said, "Um, I took that pregnancy test and I think it says I'm pregnant but the line is really light." He kept his eyes closed and said "I knew it". This annoyed me, so I told him to get up and look at it. He grumbled because he was so tired asking why I took the test so early in the morning, but he got up and looked at it and then sat there while I read through the whole instructions and sure enough it was positive! Then we hugged and talked a few minutes and then he went back to sleep and I went into the library and logged into work. Of course I couldn't concentrate on work. I started looking up baby stuff online!!! Later that morning, once he was up and his usual obnoxious self, he came into the library singing "I see some ladies tonight that should be having my baby" . . . typical.

So the next day we went on our trip to Florida. We decided we weren't going to tell anybody for awhile. John thought we should tell Nick & Jess since we were going to be with them all weekend, but I was just 4 weeks, barely pregnant, and I really didn't want to tell anyone. I mean anything could happen. Well, it proved to be too big a secret to keep so soon after we found out ourselves. John told me to just do everything that Jessie did and he was asking Jessie a bunch of questions about her pregnancy. We were barely in our hotel room when we discussed it again. I said they are going to know anyways because of all the questions you are asking and they are going to notice when I don't stay out in the sun or go in the hot tub later. So we went to their room and told them we had something to tell them. Then Jessie shouts out "You're pregnant!" Hahahaha, so they were the first to find out and they promised not to tell anyone. Well, it looks like they kept the secret because as far as I know the news never got out. Good job you guys!!!

More Washington Pictures

Ok, so some people might want to read a post about something else (it's coming!) but I wanted to go ahead and finish the rest of our vacation pictures. So enjoy!

This is at the Crime and Punishment Museum. This is the only attraction/museum that cost us money to see. It was really cool, especially at the end where they had all the CSI stuff. I love watching shows like CSI, Law & Order, Without a Trace, so the museum was really fun. I don't recommend buying the audio tour, it was a waste of money.

Vroom Vroom!

This is the inside of Union Station. It is so pretty and there are really nice stores, restaurants, and a nice food court. Our hotel was right across from Union Station, so we were able to ride the metro everywhere! You can go online and buy a weekly metro card for about $11 and have unlimited rides for a week.

On the Fourth of July they had a parade down Constitution Ave. Here were some members of the military getting ready for the parade.

This is in front of a replica of the Wright Bros. plane inside the Air & Space Museum.

This was the landing pod from one of the Apollo missions. The Air & Space Museum was so interesting. We watched a movie on Black Holes in the planetarium there.

This is at the capitol building. We attended the concert there on the 4th of July. The performers were Huey Lewis, Taylor Hicks, and Jerry Lee Lewis. Then they had fireworks, but the fireworks went off near the Washington Monument and we really couldn't see them because of all the trees. I wouldn't recommend going to the capitol building on the 4th because of this and it was also soooo packed! We were in line forever just to get in. If anyone is going to DC on the 4th, I would recommend going to the capitol performance on the 3rd, they do a dress rehearsal. It's the same show with half the crowd. Then stick around the National Mall area on the 4th to be able to get a good view of the fireworks!

Here is my anniversary present this year . . . I wish! It's really the hope diamond on display at the Natural History Museum. There was so much awesome jewelry on display there and it was the display that had the most people packed around it!

We had a blast on this trip, but there was still soooooo much we didn't see! I hope it won't be too long before we have a chance to go back. Some advice for anyone planning a trip; a few places require that you apply for tickets for tours in advance, like the White House and a couple other places I can't remember now.

Washington DC - Day 1

Well, I finally worked up the energy to download our vacation pictures. The first stop on our vacation was Nick & Jess's house. We drove up Monday night and hung out and they let us crash for the night. We got up the next morning and started on our long drive. We drove to Roanoke, VA, about 7 hours and stopped there for the night. We ate dinner, did some shopping, and went to the movies. We got up and drove the rest of the way to DC, about 4 hours. The drive through the outskirts of the Mountains was really pretty. We listened to the book "The Host" on CD for most of the trip, but we didn't finish it. I've already read the book, but it's interesting to hear it narrated.

So our first day in Washington was monument day. We rode the metro(subway) everywhere. The Smithsonian stop on the metro brought us right to the National Mall where all the Smithsonian Museums are, hence the name of the stop. There was a folk festival going on at the Mall as you can see in this picture.

We didn't hang at the festival long, just long enough to get a lime fizz and it was delicious! We trekked up to the Washington Monument next. It was really cool. We didn't want to stand in line to get tickets to go inside to the top, so we just walked around the outside.

Here I'm reading to John all the interesting facts about the Washington Monument in my travel book. Oh, the benches around the monument were really comfy and cool!

Next it was on to the WWII Monument. It was really impressive, there were quotes and etchings everywhere on the walls and the fountain was cool, literally.

Seeing everyone dipping their feet in the fountain made my tired feet burn to get in that water. Ah, sweet relief . . . the cold water felt amazing!

John enjoyed it too!

We went to the Lincoln Memorial next. There were so many people on the steps and none of them were speaking English! It was so cool to see all these monuments up close.

Here we are resting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. When it's just the two of us on vacation we hardly ever get pictures that have us both in them. We took this one by just holding the camera out in front of us.

We went to the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial Wall next. It was so amazing and touching. There were notes that people had stuffed into cracks and corners. There were also pictures, jewelry, flags, and trinkets left along the bottom of the wall. It was sad seeing all the names on the walls. The atmosphere here was different than at the other monuments, more respectful and solemn. I didn't take any pictures there because I didn't want to disturb that feeling.

It was getting late by then, so we had dinner and headed back to the hotel. Pictures of the rest of our trip will be coming soon . . .

Vacation

I haven't posted anything in awhile because we were on vacation all last week in Washington D.C. It was really fun, but also tiring! We took a bunch of pictures. I'll try to post some pics on here as soon as I have time . . .