the secrets out!!

My little sister and her husband called me last week and made me keep a secret!

But now it's out......

Baby Danilson is set to arrive sometime in March or April 2013!!!

Congrats Sara and Jeremy!

It's a YES!

Garran just called and his meeting went really well. They said that he got the teaching position for next year!!

He will be teaching a foundations drawing class. I am so excited for him. I had a feeling that things would go well!

Woo Hoo Garrans!

We love you and are so proud of you!

something new

so i failed both of my diabetes test. BLAH! for the first time ever. it stinks. however, it is not all that bad either. i had to go for training on Friday at the local hospital. it took about two hours and they explained everything from things i should avoid eating to how to use my new handy dandy glucose meter. i have to go back in a week to see if i need to be put on insulin. the nurse seems to think that i might. her reasons are that my body does fine during the day processing everything and my levels are good, however at night while i am asleep is when the problem occurs. i wake up with high blood sugar, which i guess means that i might need a little extra insulin before bed. thank goodness this is only for the next three months. at least that is what they tell me. there is a small chance in anyone who has gestational diabetes that it could stay after the baby but they said that my chances are pretty slim. i have a new sympathy for people that have to do all this on a regular basis. so for this week i am trying out the new system and by next Friday we will know about the insulin. WOO HOO! (sorry i can get a little sarcastic at times) so for now I am staying positive. it could always be worse.

new news

well today i had my monthly check up for baby to be. things went pretty well and standard for the most part. heart beat was good and i drank my nasty glucose stuff. blah. it really isn't that bad, i just hate drinking that stuff. anyways the only thing that was really any different is that the doctor said that she had some concerns about the results of the ultrasound.

of course my heart sank immediately. i felt sick. however, as she started to talk things started to get better. she said that during both of the ultrasounds they were not able to see the baby's upper lip. the doctor said that this was not a definite result but that it did mean that there was a chance that the baby had a cleft palate. i kind of took a breath of relief.

while i would prefer that there be nothing wrong, (which still might be the case) this seems so minor. i think of all the horrible things that could be wrong and this seems pretty minor. yes if the baby does have a cleft palate, there will be surgery to correct it and that is concerning. only because it is surgery and you never want to see your kids have to undergo that. so right now we are hoping for the best and that they just were not able to get a clear view. we are also looking into getting a 3D ultrasound to see if they can get a better picture of what is going on. not that it would really change anything, more to just prepare us for what we might have to take care of.

so for now keep your fingers crossed. we are going to say a little prayer and hope that things work out no matter what the outcome. right now we are just grateful that it was not something serious.

my monsanto man

well garran had training at Monsanto on monday. he said it went pretty well. he came home with this hat that he won during training because he was able to answer some question about corn!

he's so smart ;0)

Anyways, he said that his boss looks like an older, taller version of a friend that we had in Iowa. Ironically I believe he works for Monsanto too. Anyways, while we are grateful for the job, we are bummed that it will not start for another week or two. I am sure there is a lesson to be learned in this, but I will be glad when we have income coming in again. 2 1/2 months is to long for me!

J-O-B

the phone rang today...training the last week of the month and then starting sometime in July. I wish it was earlier because we still won't have income for a while but at least it is coming...sometime!!! I am so excited!

round two.

well i guess i was not the only one that thought yesterdays ultrasound was a bust. the doctor called this morning and said that she was not happy with the ultrasound at all. that the pictures were not clear and that the girl had even forgotten a couple of things. i am hoping round two goes a little better and hopefully they will get all the images that they need.

i was nervous when they called because I thought that something might have been wrong with the baby. however she said that from what the could see, everything looked ok. they just wanted to see it a little bit better. oh well. we will see what happens. off to schedule the next ultrasound.

uneventful ultrasound

well this was by far the least fun ultrasound i have ever had. it started off lame because it was a student and an instructor, so they would not turn the monitor so I could see anything. BLAH! Then it took forever and the poor girl that was the student was having a hard time because the baby would not cooperate. It took an hour. It was the longest one that I have EVER had.

However on a different note. Even if we wanted to find out what we were having, we would not be able to. This baby was sitting with its legs crossed and would not budge. Oh well. Guess it worked out the way we wanted anyways!!

Oh and the lamest part. We got no pictures at all. NOTHING!

Guess we will just have to wait and see what the real baby looks like!

today!!!

we are going for the ultrasound!
we are being brave and taking the whole gang since we do not know any sitters here. wish us luck. i am hoping to get some cute pictures.

baby news

well for starters I have to say that I really love my new doctor!!! I was very worried because I have not always had great luck with my doctors in the past, however this one is great.
she is very to the point, which I like. She is personable and easy to talk to which I also like.
so for my first appointment this is what we have learned.

1. i have an ultrasound tomorrow. if everything goes according to plan, we will not be finding out the sex.
2. my doctor has already decided that we are going to have a c-section at 39 weeks. due to complications with cullans delivery and due to the size of our babies, that is what she feels will be the best plan.

*the funny part to that is that 39 weeks starts on October 18th. Cullan's birthday is the 17th. YIKES! Hopefully cullan will not mind it being so close.

so for now we have a lot of info to digest and some other decisions to make. i will post pics tomorrow if we get anything good at the ultrasound!

doing some math!

1+1=2
2+3=5
5+1=6!

so long!

we are unplugging tonight...but don't forget to check back in a little while. hopefully our internet will be up and working at the new place sooner than later!! wish us luck. I am hoping the move goes well!

new place

today it became official. we just got back from finishing up some last minute stuff. this is our new place. well new to us and new for the next three years of our life. at least until grad school is over and we move on to a new home. the kids were excited to see it and pick out which room they wanted. i'm sure their minds will change but by the end of the month we will be living here.this is what our kids are most excited about. this is pretty much in our back yards. probably 100 yards or more from our back door. so while we are sad to be leaving all our friends here, we are excited to be moving to a nice place!

i have our new address if anyone needs it. just message me and I will get it to you!

Kael Update!

our boy will survive. the eye doctor ran a bunch of tests and all of them came back just fine. he said that kael probably just broke some of the smaller blood vessels in his eye from the pressure of the scissors. he also said that this is not the first time he has seen this. not that that makes me happy but in a small way it did make me feel a little better that my child is not the only one that has got a hold of scissors that he was not supposed to have.
thank goodness he is ok. now his eye will just look gross for about two weeks.

the move

well today we got the call. the place we really loved came open much sooner than we had planned. so our next few weeks will be insanely busy ones. sorry if there is a lack of posts. i will try to keep everyone updated. sickness has been attacking our house, so at the moment it is day to day.

the future!

well a decision has been made. it was not easy. we really loved the idea of living in the mountains and the appeal of being back towards where we are both from. alas, after much prayer and discussion among ourselves and others in the field we have decided to go to ......they made us the best deal. it has a great program and garran really enjoys the professors and other graduate students there. now that we have a location, we will soon be announcing when we will be moving. we feel really good about our decision!!

opps.

well we got some news from another grad school. Friday, garran and I were out on a date night when I got an email that said that he did not get into Kansas. We thought ok. Neither one of us were super bummed. We were disappointed but not like earth shattering disappointment. Anyways today we got an email from the Director of the Art department. She said that Garran had been sent the rejection email by mistake. That his application was still being considered and that they were terribly sorry for any confusion that this may have caused. BLAH. so now we are just waiting...AGAIN. i just want answers so we can start making plans. is that to much to ask?

We Got a YES!!

We Got a Yes!!
We are going to wait and see what comes in with the other schools, but it is great to have a YES! Especially from Tennessee. It was one of Garrans top two and it is ranked top 3 in the US for printmaking!!
So two down three to go! We will keep hoping for good news!
We are sad it did not come with an assistanship, but those are reviewed every semester, so it is not like we would never get one!
Here is the first paragraph of the letter they sent!

Dear Garran,
I am pleased to let you know that you have been accepted to the graduate program in studio art at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville with a concentration in printmaking. A letter will be sent soon with more information. We deeply regret that we do not have an assistantship to accompany this acceptance, as we are very impressed with you work and your application materials. We are not surprised that your faculty mentors speak so highly of you.

thank you.

i just wanted to post a quick thank you to all of you who have posted this story on your blog or face book pages, or have spoke with me about this. it never hurts to get the word out. i am truly grateful for all the prayers and service that has been given so far on behalf of the Palmer family. I continually pray that they will continue to be blessed with strength and that we will be able to help them with their financial struggles when they need to be able to focus on their family.
i have been working on a committee and we have some great things planned to raise some money and we also have a virtual fundraiser going on to try and raise money for them. we can only hope for the best. thanks again from the bottom of my heart.

oliver

this is my friends son oliver. I have known this little boy pretty much his whole life. his parents have been some of our best friends while living here over the span of almost ten years. our kids play together and even though their ages don't match up exactly, they always seem to have fun together! on December 23, their family got some horrible news. i am on a committee that has been formed to try and help them. i am asking any of you that read my blog to please go and read his story. if you are able to help in anyway possible, i would be so grateful. we pray daily for ollie and his family. please add this sweet family to your prayers as well.
thank you.

www.olliesallstars.blogspot.com

for updates on how oliver is doing, you can go to the following link.

www.oliverpalmer.blogspot.com