24 Weeks!

Yesterday, we officially graduated to 24 weeks! Our 24-week celebration included another ultrasound. The doctor wanted to follow up on a few things after our first ultrasound (all related to me, none to the baby), and the nurse was kind enough to let us look at our little guy for a while once she checked everything she needed to.

The results were good news all around: everything looks good on my end, the baby is average size, my due date was bumped up a day (to December 7), he is most definitely a boy, and he has a cute, mini version of Shane's nose!


All of the images from this ultrasound were printouts and we don't have access to a good enough scanner right now, so we took pictures of some of them to share with the blogging world. Sadly, the 3D ones that show his cute little face don't show up so well on the camera, but I added one and a few words to help guide your eye. I've seen the real image I know what it is, but maybe some of you will be able to see his little nose. (If you click on the picture you can see it a little better.)


He was still pretty shy this time around. He squeezed his head into another pocket and covered his face for a lot of the time. Thanks to the tech's quick reflexes, she got the picture above when he moved his hand for a minute. For a while, she just let the 3D run in real time and we saw him move his little fingers around in front of his face...

It's amazing that there really is a little mini person in there! I feel him all day now, but to see him is a totally different reality...

Coming soon: progress on the baby's room. Stay tuned!

Shotgun Wedding

For our anniversary, Shane gave me a new ring to replace my officially lost/stolen ring. First, let's have a moment of silence for my original ring....


And now, here's my new ring. It's definitely different from the first, but still follows my apparent need for squares and straight lines. I had looked at a couple with Shane and he already knew what I liked and disliked and I think his final choice is a winner!


Now, for a funny story regarding my new ring... Shane bought the ring online after much research and price comparing between stores and websites. However, the website did not have the ring in my size, so Shane bought it a little bigger and contacted a jewelry store to ask about the possibility of resizing.

Well, after our anniversary dinner, we decided to stop at said jewelry store for a temporary sizer since my fingers will be growing and shrinking over the next few months. We figured it'd be nice to have something I could change from day to day.

We walked into the store and explained that eventually we'd need to have the ring permanently resized, but that we wanted a temporary sizer for now. The saleslady then said, "Is that because you're......[VERY long pause].....pregnant?" It made me happy that people are finally thinking I'm pregnant instead of just a little thick around the middle, but I can only imagine what was going through the saleslady's mind as she posed that question. I'm sure she was debating whether to make that assumption.

Anyway, she put on the temporary sizer (free of charge) and sent us on our way. As we were leaving the store, Shane and I realized how things may have looked to the people inside... During our conversation, the saleslady was able to determine the following facts: (a) we bought the ring online, (b) the ring was the incorrect size, (c) I was pregnant. If you put the pieces together the right way, that has ALL the makings of a wonderful shotgun wedding... Whether the thought that or not, we'll never know, but we thought it was funny :)

4 whole years...

In addition to being my dad's birthday (see below), yesterday was our 4-year anniversary!! I meant to post this on our actual anniversary during Shane's busy Wednesday night activities, but because he surprised me with a night out, I didn't have time.

You see, he acted as if he still had mutual from 6:30 to 8:30 followed by basketball from 8:30 to 10:30 so I assumed we'd just eat a quick dinner at home so he could leave on time. Shane even went so far as to call me on his way home to ask if I wanted him to pick up anything from the store for dinner. But when I got home, there was a card on the door that said we had other plans...

We went out to a nice restaurant in Scottsdale and Shane even shared dessert with me (which is a big deal considering his strict focus on eating healthy). And, despite our no gifts agreement this year, he magically produced a present at dinner...sneaky little man! After our nice dinner, we made a pit stop at Wal-mart (which I was planning to do while he was gone all night), started some laundry (very romantic), and watched our wedding video... It was a great evening and I'm so glad I got to spend that time with Shane, especially because I thought I'd be alone all night!

Our wedding video got me thinking back on the past 4 years (and the year before that when we were dating). We've come a long way (brace yourselves folks, this is may be a LONG walk down memory lane)...

We met at BYU. It took Shane a while to realize he was interested in me, but I tried my best to get his attention!

We dated for about 4 months...

...and then we got engaged! (Yeah, this picture isn't a very good one...but it occurred right after he propsed)

Then, 4 years (and 1 day ago), we got married...

...discovered Rocky Point for our honeymoon...

...moved into BYU married student housing a couple weeks later...

...and bought a scooter to supplement our one-car household.

The next summer we experienced life back east during our three-month stint in Baltimore.

The next summer, we graduated from college together...


...and packed up all our belongings for a move to Phoenix.


That summer, we enjoyed family trips to Peru...




...and Hawaii...



...and bought a house!!


Then we both started REAL jobs and life got boring. But we still found time to teach each other things, like how to love our native climates...





...and the joy of exploring historic ghost towns!

These are definitely only the highlights (and what we have pictures of), but it's been fun reflecting on what we've done and how far we've come... It's been a crazy journey so far and I'm so glad I've had Shane to share it with. And I can't wait for the crazy journey ahead of us...especially our fast approaching life change:

Yep, this little gem is a reward for those of you who made it all the way to the end of this post!! This is me today, at 23 weeks + 2 days. Excuse the red face and gross hair...we just got back from working out (my version of working out is walking at 3.5 mph on the treadmill, but somehow I still manage to break a sweat!), but I decided it was time to document my ever-growing self, even if I don't appreciate it now.

I don't know if it's possible to express just how excited we both are for this next step in our lives, but we can't wait to take it together!

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Yesterday was my dad's birthday. Yes I, being the wonderfully selfish daughter that I am, decided to get married on my dad's birthday (see above for details). Luckily, the fact that these two events fall on the same day hasn't quite caused any problems (except probably for the year we got married).

Here's a look back at that day 4 years ago. We got him a special cake and had everyone at the luncheon sing to him...


Then, when the two dates collided again 2 years later, we were fortunate enough to celebrate both events in Hawaii! If you look closely, you can see that one half of the cake has my dad's birthday candle, and the other half has little pictures of us on our wedding day...all compliments of my clever mother!

I looked through the pictures I have on my computer to find a cute picture of me and my dad to celebrate his day, but sadly all of those pictures must reside on my parents' computer. The only ones I have include both of us decked out in ski gear, so there's not much to see.

Regardless, I just want to say happy birthday to my dad and let him know that we were thinking of him yesterday (I even got him his present on time!). My dad is an awesome man and a good example. I've definitely learned a lot from him...and there's still more to learn! If only I learned to appreciate my parents' wisdom when I was younger...

Happy birthday, Dad! We love you!!

Happy Birthday Shane!

Today Shane turned 29! We had a family party on Monday to celebrate. Since our nephew Brody's birthday is on the 8th as well and a lot of our family is heading to Utah this week, we decided to combine their birthday parties into one.

Each boy got his own special cake--Shane had his angel food cake with frosting (a Hatch family tradition), and Brody had confetti cake.


They received a combined chorus of happy birthday and blew out their candles together. Brody was a little jealous at the number of candles on Shane's cake.




Then it was time for presents. They took turns opening, but Shane asked Brody to help him with most of his presents too.


Here's Shane opening his present from me: a new drill!! I thought he knew what he was getting, but I believe he was completely surprised. He'd mentioned how old his current drill was getting many times during the recent updates to the house and had shown me his dad's awesome new drill on multiple occasions, but apparently those instances weren't meant to be subtle hints.... Either way, he loved it and was happy that he could save his Home Depot gift cards for another purchase.


I love how excited Brody is in this picture (excuse the quality...I blame it on moving subjects and low lighting). Shane did receive quite a few bamboo items from family members. (If you've never been to our house, you probably don't understand Shane's love for bamboo... to put it simply, we have bamboo floors throughout the majority of our house and we grow multiple kinds of bamboo both inside and outside our house. It's safe to say my husband is very interested in bamboo).


While Brody was busy trying on his race car driver outfit and playing with his remote control car, Shane got to open his birthday box from my parents...it was quite large!! The return address said "World's Best In-Laws." How true! Who wouldn't want a huge box of presents for their birthday?


Here's a sampling of the goodies inside: bamboo vase, bamboo wind chime, bamboo bowl, some baby-sized balls for our soon-to-be little boy, and new shorts.


One of Brody's popular gifts was his own Nacho Libre costume, which both Paige and Roy decided to model for me...




Sadly, I didn't do anything spectacular for Shane's actual birthday. Because we're trying to eat healthier, my offer of anything he wanted for breakfast answered with: watermelon. I did send him multiple happy birthday emails throughout the day though. Luckily, his coworkers were kind enough to decorate his cube all in pink with Hello Kitty and My Little Pony birthday banners. And apparently each of his coworkers brought some form of treat for him to eat: chocolate cake, donuts, rice krispy treats, ice cream, and cookies!! So at least someone made him feel special today!

Catching Up...

Shane and I spent four hours yesterday reclaiming our house... I worked inside to eliminate the dust, dirt, and clutter that accumulated while we neglected our house for other things the last few weeks, and Shane worked outside to tame our bushes and grass and get things ready for the baby's room.

Now that those items are taken care of, I decided this afternoon was perfect for organizing our pictures (we have pictures on the camera from March still) and catching up on blogging. See below for TWO NEW posts with plenty of pictures and videos for your viewing pleasure!

On the baby front, all is going well. He's still in there and now he's kicking! It's still sporadic and not strong enough for others to feel, but he's definitely letting me know he's there. I'm still waiting to look more pregnant and less like I'm just getting a little thicker around the midsection... We have another ultrasound in 2 weeks so we might have new pictures of him soon!

Read below for more updates on life...(i.e., the things that kept us too busy to clean our house :)

Kitchen: Accomplished!

This was what our kitchen looked like when we moved in...


We had hopes of changing a few things, and eventually made a list of the ultimate upgrades to our house. I assumed this was more of a wish list than a to-do list, but somehow we've almost crossed everything off our list, including "Re-do Kitchen," which was quite a tall order.

It started with installing new granite counter tops, a mosaic tile backsplash, and a new, much deeper sink. (These pictures were pre-backsplash...)




Then we inherited some awesome black appliances (the fridge is still white) and Shane and his dad installed lights above and below the cabinets to add some much-needed light to the room. They also cased the window to give it a more finished look.

And finally, my awesome husband finished our kitchen cabinets the night before our camping trip. He had the hinges moved inside the doors, hung the new hinges, painted the doors and boxes, then glazed the doors and boxes. It was a long process, some of which involved hours and hours in the hot garage, but we LOVE the end result.




I honestly never thought it'd end up looking like this, but I love it. Also during the transition, I changed my kitchen colors from black & red to black & green. Thanks to many green contributions from my mother and a few good finds at Home Goods, I think we've made the transition well.

**Side note: We were able to do this due to free labor from wonderful people, lots of good deals, and plenty of advice / guidance from people with more knowledge than us. Thanks to all who contributed!

Hatch Family Camp Out

Last weekend, we participated in the first ever Annual Hatch Family Camp Out at Sharp Creek. This one went so well, the camp ground is already booked for next year!

Luckily, we took our own camera, which means I actually have pictures and video to post!

The campout was Saturday through Tuesday, but Shane and I were only able to participate through Sunday night because of work. Even in that short time, we had lots of fun, including:

Bike rides around the loop

Sheriff Brody

Kite flying. Somehow, the wind would only blow long enough for them to get the kite out to the parking lot and stop as soon as they got it in the air. But Brody didn't seem to care...

Tin foil dinners (mine was chicken, peas, potatoes, and brown rice mixed with cream of chicken soup. Shane's was salmon, corn, green peppers, and brown rice. Both turned out great!)

A short-order cook staff (a.k.a. Roy and Tom Murphy) for breakfast--you name it, they made it!

Dutch oven german pancakes. I'll admit no one believed that Shane could do it, but they actually turned out pretty good (just really really thick).

Sleeping in Shane's truck tent, his favorite Christmas present ever (thanks Mom and Dad!)

Board games, card games, lots of Carrom (Tom brought two tables), and plenty of relaxation time.

Sarge came along, but had to be on a leash the whole time...

Many hours of rope-swinging

I have more videos of the kids and Amy on the swing, but they take SO LONG to load on Blogger, I don't think they'll make it. (If you want them Amy, let me know.)

Other (not pictured items) include escaping the heat, daily rainstorms, awesome meals, hot showers, smores around the campfire, and plenty of family time. Others went hiking, jeeping, shooting, and swimming, but we missed most of those activities. We had a great time and can't wait for next year!!

If you want more, see here for Amy's account (and more pictures) of the trip and here for Hilary's.