Yeah!! We finally got the tree up and I got 20% of my shopping done all in one day!

So far behind!!

Christmas is next week!! Where did the time go? I'm embarrassed to say I haven't even started my Christmas shopping. We haven't even put up our tree yet!! I told Kemper it was alright with me if we didn't put out our tree this year because we always spend Christmas at my parents, but he really wants it up so we plan on doing that when he gets home from work. I don't know why we have been such procrastinators this year, but next year we are starting Christmas when all the stores start putting out their decorations, the day after Halloween, maybe they aren't so crazy after all!!

Heartburn & Hair!!??

It is 2:45 am and I am up with the worst case of heartburn and I think I may die, no really I might, it's that bad! I have already taken Zantac, some tums and a glass of milk. Nothing seems to help so I am frantically searching the internet for a remedy, but instead I find articles about how women with frequent heartburn during pregnancy have hairy babies. Great! Please just let it be on his head!
Pregnant Mothers with Heartburn Can Expect Babies with Lots of Hair
New Study Shows Old Wives' Tale to Be TrueBy Frogdoc, published Jul 18, 2007
There are many wives tales associated with pregnancy. Most of these deal with gender-prediction and include such clues as the baby's heartrate, whether the mother is carrying the baby high or low, where the mother is carrying extra weight. One wives' tale deals with how much hair your baby will have: If you struggle with heartburn during pregnancy, your baby will have a lot of hair. This belief, like many others, has been chalked up to myth although some mothers swear it is true.

It turns out that these mothers may be right after all. Researchers at Johns Hopkins have released a study in the journal Birth showing that a correlation between heartburn and the hairiness of a newborn actually exists.

The research was conducted by Kathleen Costigan, a registered nurse in the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at John Hopkins, and colleagues. The study followed 64 women throughout pregnancy. These women were asked to rank the severity of their heartburn symptoms. When their babies were born, two independent observers rated the thickness of the newborn hair using photographs taken after birth.

Seventy-eight percent of the pregnant women reported some level of heartburn, and were able to participate in the study. Of the 28 women who reported moderate to severe heartburn during pregnancy, 82% gave birth to babies with above average hair thickness. Of the 12 women who reported no heartburn symptoms at all, 83% gave birth to babies with very little or no hair.

Costigan writes "Contrary to expectations, it appears that an association between heartburn severity during pregnancy and newborn hair does exist." She adds, "We've heard this claim hundreds of times, and I've always told people it's nonsense. Since the study came out, I've had to eat a lot of crow."

While investigating this myth, I personally ran across a number of websites that are going to have to do the same.

It's a boy!!

I was right! We are having a little boy! Kemper James II is on his way!! He weighs a little over 1 pound right now and everything looks like it is growing just right. My due date was originally April 22nd, then bumped up to the 16th, now they say it looks like it will be around April 13th! Either our dates were off or were are going to have a BIG boy! Kemper weighed 10 lbs 2oz when he was born and I weighed 5 lbs 12oz, so I think baby K will weigh around 7lbs 7oz, which I think will be a perfect size. Place your bets!!

Happy Birthday !! to me!!

Amazingly I took turning 31 years old well. I decided that I was going to be 31 years young. Why stay young when each year things get better and better? I have a great husband, great family, great job, a baby on the way, what else could I ask for? We celebrated by going out to dinner followed by cake and presents. The picture is of my adorable nephew Nolan wishing me a happy birthday.

Fontainebleau and American Airlines's motto!

Fontainebleau Lobby

Bienvenidos a Miami

Last week my job sent me to Miami Florida to attend The Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care Society conference. We stayed on South Beach at the Hotel Fontainebleau. It had reopened a few weeks before our arrival after a 1 billion dollar renovation. Its grand opening was even televised because Victoria's Secret held their fashion show there, so we were really excited to stay there. Although my excitement was brought to a halt when my luggage did not arrive, and American Airlines had no record of it. Not that I was surprised A.A. never fails to disappoint me. All they said was "we're sorry and keep calling this number". I was so mad I had packed everything and all I had with me was my coat that I didn't even need in Miami! It was late when we arrived at the hotel to check in, and apparently this hotel was the place to be at night. The hotels lobby looked like a night club, with its bar, fancy white leather couches, and its blue lighted floors. The check in counter had very dim lighting and its main source of light were candles placed at the ends of the the counters. I put my coat on the counter and I was digging in my purse for my ID when my friend Amber asked me if I smelt fire. We both then turned and looked to see my coat on fire!! Apparently they had put candles under the counter and when I put my coat down part of it came in contact with one of the candles. Great! I have no luggage and the one thing I did have was now on fire!! The Manager came out and said he was sorry and and they would get back to me about what they could do about the coat. So the next day came and I waited and waited for my luggage, checking the front desk every hour ( still wearing the clothes from the day before) finally I called AA and they said that they had found my luggage and had delivered it to the hotel early that morning. So I went to the front desk and they said that they had not received it yet, by this time I was furious, now the stupid hotel lost my luggage!! As I was walking back to my room I saw a bell hop and asked him to take me to where they kept all the luggage and sure enough there was my bag all alone, with my name plastered all over it! They had had it all day long!! and just like AA and the manger about my coat all they could say was sorry. Finally after days of trying to contact the manager about my coat he agreed to pay me for my coat after had heard about my luggage problem. What a mess!! and to top things off going home our flight was delayed because of mechanical problems! I love AA!!

Pink or Blue??

Baby "K" is now 20 weeks old and the size of a small cantaloupe! My next Dr's appointment is on December 12th and that is when we get to find out if baby "K" is a boy or girl. Kemper would like a boy so he can have a golf partner and someone to watch football 24/7 with him. I don't mind either way, Although I do have a feeling that it is a boy. I guess we will just have to wait and see!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

We usually spend Thanksgiving with Kemper's side of the family and Christmas with my side of the family, but this year my parents, older sister, and brother are joining us in little San Angelo, TX. They have been curious to see this, what Kemper likes to call "God's Country" town that he grew up in. It should be interesting!! Joining us in SA will be Kemper's sister Jill and her family all the way from Georgia. Kemper's grandmother is known for her wonderful Thanksgiving dinners so I'm excited that I get to share it with my side of the family this year.

Time to tell the Family Part two

*Mom remember to pause the music at the bottom!

Telling our families about the baby in person was very important to us so we made a special trip to San Angelo to tell Kemper's side of the family. We decided to do the " say Helen's pregnant" video trick again to see their response. Kemper's grandmother got it right away while everyone else was a little delayed like my family. They too thought he was kidding and didn't want to move in fear of ruining the "picture". Kemper's mother's response was "I knew it!!" She said that when she saw me when we arrived in San Angelo she had a feeling and thought I looked a little different, but dismissed it and continued on with her hello's. If your wondering why there is a shot of the Luby's sign at the end of the video, it is because that is where we had dinner previous to telling the fam. Why Luby's? Well Kemper's sister Jill happened to be eating at Luby's with Kemper's mother each time she told the news of her pregnancies so we decided it would be funny to keep that tradition alive. It was harder than we thought. Kemper's mother knows he prefers Mexican food so his mother kept asking us "why Luby's? are you sure ya'll want to eat at Lubys? we don't have to eat at Lubys" so we had to tell her that Kemper had a craving for chicken fried steak just to make sure she didn't figure it out.

Time to tell the family

Finding a perfect moment to tell everyone all-together, Helen and I devised a scheme by taking the family's "picture" before the Boston Red Sox baseball game, but instead of making them say "cheese", we came up with something better by making them say "Helen's pregnant!".

Our "trick" to catch Helen's family on video didn't work out as well as planned. Where we were hoping to catch everyone in celebration, we instead got video of everyone staying still for the "picture". Considering my past history of playing jokes on the family, everyone just assumed I was joking around and not being serious, hence the delayed celebration responses. Isa was mad at me because she first thought that pregnancy was not something funny to be joking about. Little did she know that I was indeed telling the truth. Also, baby Nolen was leaving "presents" for his Grandpa, and you can hear Pierre tell the family about the stinkers. At the same time I announced our surprise, Chrissy started yelling "are you serious?", but Grandpa thought she was asking that question to him about Nolen...! Eventually, everybody figured it out and we were off to see the game. Oy vey! ~Kemper

Unexpectedly Expecting!!

We are very happy to announce that are expecting our first child mid April! We have always been in agreement that both wanted children and that we wanted to be married for at least one year before we began trying. So a few weeks after our 1 year anniversary in July we brought the subject up again and both agreed that we would like to start trying for a family after the New Year, little did we know I was already pregnant! In our discussion about having children Kemper told me that when the time came and I found out I was pregnant that he wanted me to surprise him and not tell him flat out. The night I found out Kemper had just came back in town from a trip to San Angelo. It was late and didn't have anything planned so I debated on telling him without the surprise, but decided not to in the end. All night I was awake with excitement still in shock and trying to come up with a creative plan. I had just started this blog about a month before I found out I was pregnant and Kemper being the computer nerd, I mean computer man, helped me out so it was not uncommon for me to show him what I had posted each time. So when Kemper came home for lunch that day I told him I had a slide show that I wanted him to see. Little did he know it was a slide show that read out WE ARE HAVING A BABY, with pictures of the positive pregnancy tests. He had no idea because we already discussed we would wait until after the new year. I took a video with my camera ( he though I was just messing with it) and you can see what I like to call his horrified happiness. I was a little nervous so my sweaty hands fogged up the camera.

Almost Famous??!!

Last February I traveled to San Pedro Sula, Honduras on a medical mission. This mission was organized by the Friends of Barnabas Foundation http://www.fobf.org/, a Christian based mission group that provides medical care to the people of Honduras. I was first introduced to this team by two of the Pediatric heart surgeons that I worked with. They had taken a small team to Honduras the year before to perform open heart surgeries and catheterizations on the poor children in need and were very successful. So for one week I along with a team of doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, child life specialists and chaplains worked together and were able to successfully perform 9 open heart surgeries and 14 catheterizations. It was probably the hardest week of my life. We all put in a minimum 16hrs a day/night and we were working in an environment that wasn't really equipped to handle open heart surgeries. We brought all of our own supplies, medications, and equipment so they were very limited. I along with two other nurses and one doctor worked the night shift in our makeshift ICU. Although it was about the most stressful exhausting week of my life, I would do it all over again because it was such a rewarding experience.

Along for the ride was a photographer from D magazine and she had an article about our mission published in the October 2008 issue of D magazine. I was shocked to see my picture when I opened the issue. The picture is me working on my very first night getting a patient back from the OR. The stessed/ panic look on my face is because I just realized my patient was bleeding out and needed to go back to the OR. He was taken back and the bleed was stopped and he is a happy little boy today. My friend started a blog during the trip, so take a look!http://www.trenasue.blogspot.com/

Just a little behind!!

Well I started this blog for us as an online diary and to keep our friends and family updated on the exciting events going on in our lives. My plan was to blog each month but so far as you can see that hasn't really happened, so I'll have to do a little recap of the last two months because so much has happened!

Dave

My favorite band comes into town and my husband is out of town, who do I take?? my mom! Luckily for me I have a very hip mom that loves the Dave Matthews Band as much as I do. My older sister Maria first introduced me to the band when I was about 17 or 18 years old and I have been to about 2 concerts a year since then. (I'm part of the reason why that man is so rich now!)When I was in college my awesome mother would stand in line for me for hours to get concert tickets for me if I was in class. After I graduated my friends and I would use Dave concerts as an excuse to meet up and travel all over the US. Now that I'm married I drag Kemper all over to see him, he doesn't mind and I know this because on several occasions I have found one of my CD's in his car player! So if you have only heard them on the radio you are missing out and you have to see/hear them live to appreciate their talent.

Texas Heat

Texas Heat

Last weekend we all headed over to the Chenault's house to help finish painting. Well that was our original intention, but because it was so hot we all got into the pool and the painting was put aside. Even baby Nolan and Raider took a dip. Later to end the fun day Zach cooked us ribs for dinner. I think we all need to go over and paint more often!!

My boys

*pause music at end of blog to listen

Let's just say that Kemper and Raider don't always get along. Seems like they are always annoying each other like children. Kemper is annoyed by the fact that Raider follows me like a shadow and gets panicky when he can't find me. Kemper says if Raider had an Indian name it would be Two Feet from Helen. Raider on the other hand is annoyed by the fact this giant man moved into his house stole his spot in the bed and takes him away from his mommy. So I get really excited to come home and see that they are spending time with each other and getting along.

July 2008

Happy Anniversary!! Kemper and I celebrated our 1st year anniversary on the 7th. We both couldn't believe that it was here already. I guess time flies when you're having fun! We had so much fun in Jamaica on our honeymoon so we decided to go to the beach again to celebrate, but this time we decided on Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We stayed at The Vallarta Pallace, an all inclusive resort. They greeted us with champagne and flowers. Our room was beautiful with views of the ocean and the pools. While we were there we ate great food, spent lots of time in the sun, went bike riding around the town, did a little shopping, went dancing, ate great food, we even did a little boogie boarding in the ocean. I became a master at it, I rode those waves all the way in. I was so proud! Did I mention we ate some great food? In all we had a wonderful time together in Puerto Vallarta. Because all good things must come to an end on July 8th exactly three years to the date we met, we headed home. We arrived home that night safe and sound, but just about eight hours later than we expected. We were almost home when the pilot told us we had to stop in Austin because of rain in Dallas! We were annoyed but then we just laughed because rain in Dallas was what brought us together three years earlier. Now we can't really get mad a rain delays but we will try to avoid flying on July 8th for now!!