Lock it up

Before Chris and I got married we came from two different walks of life.

He was the more responsible type who developed his independence with pride.
She was the care-free girl who always had a slight fear of stepping out on her own.

With that care-free attitude it was rare that I thought twice about locking the door of my house, apartment, and, on occasion, even my car.
Chris and I went through a learning curve with one another in trying to solve this dilemma.

He would become upset with me every time he found me forgetting to lock my door.. and I would become frustrated whenever he'd comment, "Don't forget to lock the door!" in response. ugh... I'd always respond with,
 "Thanks Dad!"
 I don't doubt we both mumbled a few words under our breath about one another in a few of those situations.

Well, needless to say I've highly improved on the matter, and how grateful I am!

Why?
Because last night as I found a comfortable spot on the couch around 3am, due to restless and cramping legs and a wandering thought process that was hindering my sleep.. suddenly, the front door handle turned! Followed by the locks trying to be unlocked with a key!
 I was stiff with terror.
The minute it stopped I looked over and saw that the locks were still locked and heard footsteps pacing back and forth in front of our door. I tip-toe ran, back into the bedroom and told Chris what was going on and he quickly secured the premises, like the great protector that he is.
 He didn't see or hear anything, and we were able to fall back asleep soon after. At that point I decided to stay in bed for the rest of the night.

Crazy right?! Well, it wasn't the first time.

 Two weeks ago while I was home sick with a cold I was sitting on the couch reading a book. It was late morning, when suddenly a key entered the door lock and again, the handle started moving. I was terrified! Once the guy realized the key wasn't unlocking the door he started yelling out to someone in Spanish... from what I understood... (yes, I can understand un pequito espanol) ..the guy was a maintenance worker from the apartment complex and had come to the wrong place for a work order.
 Sure they laughed. But I didn't! I immediately called Chris and told him what had happened and after making sure I was once again calm, he wrapped up our conversation with, "Good thing you locked the door!"

So all in all, Chris was right about the importance of locking doors, because you really don't know what's going to happen.

My only weakness is when visiting home. The minute I pull into our driveway my instinctual habit comes right back and it's rare if I ever lock any doors.
 I guess that's what happens when you live in such a quaint and happy little town all your life.

Parking Violation

   Sunday night Chris and I snuck into a church fireside that was meant for singles 31+  ... We thought about taking off our wedding rings in hope to fit in just a little bit more, but with my growing belly I think it would have set me up for an even more awkward situation.

  We REALLY wanted to be there because the announced speaker was a survivor from the Holocaust Concentration camps.
 
  And so glad we did! This woman was 8 years old when being taken from normalcy and thrown into war and heartbreaking circumstances. She had the most amazing Mother who endured an unimaginable time in those camps and truly had the hand of the Lord in her life to allow for survival.

  I wish you all could have been there! And the greatest part is that this woman, the 8 year old, she's now aged with 8 children, 44 grandchildren, and 7 great grandchildren! Amazing. But even better, she's still beams with happiness and laughter! How many individuals do you know who have experienced such tragedy and horror, yet still find such joy in life?!

  Well, after the wonderful event we drove home only to find a car parked in our assigned parking spot. NOT COOL! Especially because it was raining! ugh.

  So Chris and I came up with a plan, in hopes to get the message across that it was NOT ok to pull something like this.

  We grabbed my handy-dandy window markers and covered their windows with silly comments like, "Just Married" and  tic-tac-toe games. We completed the attack with a large "Parking Violation" ticket in the front window :)  ... we brought our camera in hopes to document but before we could the violator came out to his car and started yelling at us!

  Hahah! I got so nervous I bolted... while Chris just calmly walked back to our appartment. haha. I hope they don't retailiate. Seeing that they know where we park our car.

  But that's what you get when you mess with us!
Good harmless payback ;)

Wedding Photos.

It all started with our Engagement :)
Chris popped the question on December 23rd... in Omaha, NE in front of the entire fam-damily. Not quite what I had imagined, but definitely memorable as ever!
(Just in time for me to be included in family photos)

Woman with the magical Touch!  There wouldn't have been a wedding without my marvelous Aunt Laura! xoxo

And here are my wedding dresses :) So pretty!

And here is the man of the hour. Thanks to Uncle Tom and his cabin our weekend wedding get-a-way was a success!

The main living space of Uncle Toms Cabin

Looks like love was in the air for us all...

 Making sure of perfection! And they'll tell you... it wasn't easy!

<INSERT WEDDING DAY PHOTOS HERE>

unfortunately I do not have our photos from our actual wedding day in Manti, UT available at this time...

Let's fast forward onto our wedding reception on May, 7th 2011 in Camarillo, Ca

...and more perfection.

My Aunt Melissa and I had a bit of a scare when it actually came time to put it on.

Thankfully we worked it out.

One of my best friends and bridesmaid, Rebekah perfecting the hair & placing the flower

Photo session right before the wedding reception begins...
Love this photo!

Ready, set, ...

GO!

How I will treasure this photo more than I ever thought. I'm so grateful to have had you there with me Grandma. Love you and miss you much! PS. Send my love to my baby girl for me. ;)

 The outdoor ceremony in California for those who couldn't be there for our Temple Sealing in Manti, Utah. Thank you Bishop Hoffman for coaching us up until the very day!

 The entrance of our reception, designed and created by my Mother, Mardene Hanson. And with a-lot-a-bit of help from family..thanks Kristina! You've got the touch of craftiness.

Father Daughter/ Mother Son Dance

Our very first dance (for real) as Husband and Wife.

 Note my marvelous hair! Thank you Lindsay for making the dream a reality. It's so pretty :)

Followed by the Best Man's speech... it was obviously a good one!

..and on to the cutting of the cake

Here is one of us Hanson girls favorite most talented friends, Kaci (Goodrich) Uipi, she off the cuff played our ceremonial music and our first dance song on piano. She's brilliant!

Now let's Dance!!

super cool dance floor in a super cool photo... whos in real life?!

The final hoo-rah! eh-hem, not too high Mr.. there are young boys strategically standing behind you...
Those stinkers!

 And now it is time to show off our family!!

 My Cousin James holding his daughter, Sofie as she shys away from my kiss.

Her older sister, Gigi. My most favorite hugs!

     ....our extendend family all from my Moms side. "The Youngs"

And now for the goof balls...

 This is Matt, he's adopted into our family and is comedy relief for all awkward situations.
Plus he was the best MC ever for our reception! THank you MATT!

one of my favorite ones :) she fixed my dress, planned the food menu and brought it all! ..and made sure I was on time to our Temple sealing! She was awesome!!!

 our table decorations... Too bad we didn't get a photo of them actually on each table, it looked so cool.
PS. Thank you Christine and all of her helpers for doing all of the flowers... I swear, my family is amazing!

 THE END

...Finally

Baby bump

 Here is our time  lapse photos of pregnancy for your viewing pleasure.
Also,
What you don't know about these photos... every time (Thursday Nights usually) we took a photo we also began to get grumpy! I felt fat and ugly in ALL of them... Which now looking back, I don't look too shabby! Anyway, needless to say I felt very discouraged after each photo session.

WEEK 13

WEEK 14

 WEEK 15

 WEEK 16

 .... Right about this time in my pregnancy I started to get hit on by almost all the regulars @ TGI Fridays. Comments such as
 "You're one of the most beautiful women I have every laid eyes on."
or
"Where are you from?  The Middle East? I'm just so attracted to them, so you must be!" Hah. uhhh, I hope I'm not middle eastern...
and it went on.. the best was when a man told me that if he weren't married he'd for sure be coming after me.. Can you say awkward! And yes it became even more awkward when I continued the conversation with... that's funny I'm married, too.  
   Since then we've been buddies and an occasional fist pump is exchanged whenever we see one another.
I wonder when he'll realize that I'm pregnant, too!
....
Here's Chris trying to make me feel better about my growing belly and lazy ambiance.

 WEEK 18

 WEEK 21

 WEEK 24

We missed a few in between weeks as you might have seen, but you can tell in the early weeks that not much growing was happening week to week.
  As for the Third tr-mester..
I'm definitely growing, all over! Let's take a look

WEEK 25

WEEK 26

WEEK 27

WEEK 28

WEEK 29

This week I went in and had my blood drawn for gestational diabetes. Sadly I'm right below the cut off of being diabetic, which is great, because it means I'm not. But it stinks because now I feel horrible whenever I want to eat sugar... which I love. I can say without exaggeration that Chris and I were eating ice cream just about every other night :/  hence the weight gain. Although it is mentioned in a pregnancy "diet" plan under servings of dairy. (and I'm suppose to have 4 servings!)

So there. I'm justified!

I also was given my RhoGAM shot. This is medicine that fools my antibodies.

You see, I have negative blood, and for some reason negative blood does not like positive blood. So, they give negative blood type mothers this shot to fool my negative blood type antibodies into not being able to recognize if there is any positive blood in my system.

Why would there be positive blood in my system? you ask.

Well baby Jensen might have positive blood. And if that's the case, we wouldn't want my negatives to begin attacking her positives.

Fortunately, for those positive mothers, they don't have to worry. It doesn't work both ways.

And lastly, during each check up Dr. Miller measures my belly,or uterus, to keep track of baby's growth. And this time I measured big. I asked if it was a problem, or something I needed to address, but he assured me that all was well and that I was just, "making a large baby."

Oh joy!

I am my mothers daughter.

(For the record, I was 12 lbs and Christopher was 10 lbs)

maybe she'll be 11 lbs

Here's an update of photos and what basic information I've learned with each visit back to Dr. Miller.

WEEK 30

WEEK34

As of now I'm measuring just on track... The measurement is low as far as numbers go, but it's only because I'm tall. Tall people should be measuring @ smaller numbers, but it's only because our babies have more room within our torsos, so there's not as much protruding forward.

(I hope that makes sense)

WEEK 35

WEEK 36

As of week 36 I had 2 weeks left working at TGiF. My General Manager, Beau is kicking me out in fear of me going into labor any day now! 

I'm in my 37th week now... we just haven't gotten the photo taken yet. With only one more shift left, I will soon have all the time in the world to keep you updated. Hopefully I don't become ridiculously lazy. One of the reasons I've kept working is to keep myself from getting to that point.

I just keep hoping that so called "nesting" phenomenon will be kicking in soon. . .

We've got T minus 3 weeks & counting!