The Adventures of Dave, Lindsay, Cora and Edie

The results are in and we're having a girl! Not one person out there thought the bun in the oven was a boy. Which means, you were all correct. Kinda funny. We decided not to learn the gender of the baby in the procedure room at the hospital. So, we had the technician put the photo and the results in a sealed envelope and we took it home with us. Dave made a nice dinner and we opened a bottle of the bubbly... sparkling cider. Then we opened the enveolpe and had a little celebration for her. We're very excited. Although this little journey started months ago, it feels like it truly starts now. She's on her way!

July 23rd is quickly approaching and we're making the most of our final moments as a just plain ol' Lindsay and Dave. The belly is still pretty easy to disguise with a sweater or jacket but that will change soon. For now, I'm enjoying a few more weeks of my clothes before nothing fits and I have to start digging through the huge box of maternity clothes I've already accumulated from friends and my Mom's favorite new past time, buying clothes for me and her first grandchild. Keep 'em coming! Our 19 week ultrasound is on Thursday so that will make it pretty official when we get to see the little peanut and find out if we have a Dave Jr. or Lindsay Jr. coming our way. We'll keep you posted. And we just hired a doula to work with us through the entire birthing process. We knew she was the right person for us when she said she was from Missoula. The clouds are finally lifting and our little state of pregnancy denial is coming to an end. This is really happening. ...

We should have been concerned when it poured for 18+ hours yesterday but we weren't. We just went about our day and snuggled in for the night listening to the rain outside our window. Unfortunately, this morning we woke to find that our basement had been flooded with around 5-6 inches of water at some point during the night and then the water had slowly drained away. The culprit was a 'overwhelmed' storm drain in the driveway. Everything in the basement, which is where our guest bedroom, TV room, garage and laundry/storage room are, had floated to a new location during the flood. Thankfully, we were able to salvage most of our photo albums (there are photos drying all over the house currently), books and electronics downstairs. And after spending the day at the laundry mat, we got most of our clothes and extra bedding dry. The landlord showed up to help and decided the only option was to rip out the carpet and padding immediately so the floors could dry and the carpet could...

So you may have heard... we got pummeled with snow for over a week. It was nuts. Having moved from Montana, we were totally excited to have some fluffy white stuff for Christmas. It always makes the holiday genuine. Well, after a day or two the inches really started stacking up and then we realized, Western Oregon is ill-equipped with snow plows. None of the neighborhood streets saw a plow for the duration of "Arctic Blast 2008". It was less than a foot, but when the temp isn't super low, the snow turns into something between mashed potatoes and wet cement. No matter who you were or what you were driving, you were struggling to get around. It's sad to say, but we've never been so glad to see the rain... (Thanks to our friends who came into town before Christmas and had to deal with PDX being shut down for 24 hours while they waited to get home for the holiday.)

We were up at Mt. Hood a few weekends ago and headed up to Timberline Lodge, the only place on the mountain that had any snow to speak of. Peeka thought it was fantastic and ran around digging her nose in it. She's definitely a Montana girl! Our newest family member, Newman, wasn't such a fan. My mom and step-dad recently brought home a miniature schnauzer puppy that is small but full of attitude. However, even with the lovely holiday coat my parents bought him, he couldn't stop shivering in the snow. Not so tough now, little guy. Thought you'd enjoy photos of the dogs at Mt. Hood. After missing last year's epic ski season entirely, we are praying for snow and hoping to hit the mountain sometime in 2008. Mother nature may have something else in mind when Oregon has beautiful bluebird days in December. Something is not right....

Some photos from our big night out in Oregon City on Halloween. Plus, a few photos from our trip to the Sauvie's Island pumpkin patch a few weeks back with our nieces and nephews. We did it all - corn maze, riding on the flat bed out to pick our perfect pumpkin and sipping on fresh apple cider. That's why the Fall season is my favorite!

Tomorrow it will be exactly 1 year ago that we left for our 6 months of travel. Our first stop was Eugene, OR on Halloween to trick or treat with our nieces and nephews. This year won't be quite as exciting or memorable because after waiting to see if any kids show up at our rental house begging for candy, we'll be hitting the streets of Oregon City in our makeshift costumes for a "big night out on the town." It's amazing how quickly life changes.