The girlies

Harrison! Party of Four.

Kyle and Avery

Momma and her baby's

Mckayla and Avery

Avery in her car seat!

The great debate

So here is the deal. When people do this one their blogs I usually skip over it. And I swore I would never do any kind of pregnancy comparison on my blog. But, we have literally had so many people comment on how big I was with McKayla and how small I am with this baby- or how small I am in general that there is no way I could be close to having a baby. Whatever. So here I am doing what I said I never would do. Feel free to skip over if you want- I will understand.

This is me at 35.5 weeks with McKayla

Here I am at 35.5 weeks with this baby. As you can tell I even wore the same dress.

What do you think?

And here we are getting ready for church this morning. I couldn't resist.

Truthful Tuesday-- on a Thursday

• Everytime we go to my parents house we see a sign that says this:

LIVE DEBT FREE

CALL 1-800- BANKRUPT

Does this seem weird to anybody besides me?

• If I justify having a food storage supply of Nutella, I totally would.

• I have recently discovered the joy of paper plates and bowls. Seriously, why did I not start using these things years ago. We use them for breakfast and lunch, then the real stuff for dinner. Best thing ever- and I am only doing about half the amount of dishes.

• Have you ever heard of the show called Swamp People? Well, if you haven't, it's about these people who live in the Louisiana swamp and for one month of the year they can go out and hunt down these massive alligators. Then sell them for a lot of money. Anyway, Kyle served his mission down in the Louisiana swamps so we thought it would be neat to watch it. Well, by the time the series was done, Kyle was homesick and decided that he wants to be an alligator hunter/ shrimp fisherman. So, if we put our house up for sale and move to the swamps, you now know why.

• One of my very favorite things is watching McKayla put her groove on every time we turn on music. That and the swishy sound her diaper makes when she is running around the house.

• Current read: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels, by Ree Drummond.

I feel old

Do you remember this little squirt?

Well last week she turned 2.

Yep, 2.

And I feel old.

And here we are- eight weeks to go.

Did I mention that I feel old?

The big reveal- Part one

So, do you remember that one time, like 5 months ago, when we bought a house? And then I never really wrote anything about it since then. Well, consider this as what will probably be the first, of many house posts.

And, before I begin with the pics, I am just going to say that I married the most amazing man. I am so lucky to call him mine. Because I have been pregnant for this whole ordeal he has had to do basically everything alone. He moved us, he painted and cleaned the majority of the house before McKayla and I fully moved in, and all of the other projects that have happened since then have been done by him. He is not afraid to try things that he has never done before and he still answers the phone, even when he knows that I am probably calling with an idea for yet another project. I really love him a lot.

Okay, this is the view that we see from the back of our house. Open fields, rolling hills to the left and mountain straight ahead. It is gorgeous. And, we have found that being just a little further away from things has its perks. Nice views, it is slower paced, we can see the stars at night and we have had milder temps. We love it!

Let's just say that when we moved in, these cabinets were one of the only things that I didn't like about the house. In fact, I down right hated them. They didn't go with our color scheme and I just don't prefer the look of the light colored furniture. About two months ago I called Kyle at work and told him that we had to change them. So they went from this....

to this...

then this...

and finally this.

I don't even want to begin trying to count how many hours this took Kyle to do. But I absolutely love it. We have a lot of other kitchen projects for the future but we are thinking that we definitely got the hardest one done first- knock on wood. This, other than the fact that it is always fun to visit, it the main reason why McKayla went to Texas. Kyle needed to do the actual frame of the cabinets and we didn't want to get fumigated.

Our big bedroom project isn't done yet but there have been some big changes that I thought were noteworthy.

First, we finally got a King sized bed. And let me just say, not only does it fit Kyle and I, but it also fits the 9,000 pillow that I am currently sleeping with. Plus room to spare.

Second, as of two weeks ago we had no bedroom furniture. But, I happened to be spending the day at my parents house when my dad's business partner was getting rid of their guest king sized bedroom set. We realize that it is a bit retro, but the deal that they gave us was literally too good to pass up. And besides, some bedroom furniture is better than no bedroom furniture.

I think that some would say that the best part of us getting a new bed is the fact that we now have an actual bed for our guests to sleep on! -Cue in the Hallelujahs from every person who has slept on the beloved futon. So now, there is no excuse to not come and see us *Ted.

Here is the my first picture to show that I haven't just been twiddling my thumbs and eating swedish fish while Kyle is out slaving away. I wanted a really big H to hang on our front room wall but we didn't have the right saw for the project. So, after two weeks of literally asking everyone we came into contact with..

"Hi we are the Harrison's, welcome to the neighborhood. Oh and do you buy chance have a ban saw?"

"So if I buy some wood from you, will you take it back into your Home Depot wood shop and cut it with a ban saw for me?"

"Hi Elders Quorum President so and so, is there anybody in the ward who has a ban saw?"

I finally found an older gentleman in our neighborhood who had the saw and said he would do it for me. He was really nice about it, but when he finished he asked me not to tell anybody that he was the one who did it because it was much harder than he thought it would be. I thought it turned out nice.

Back in May, Kyle built us some garden boxes. We didn't want too many because we were just trying them out, but we will definitely be doing more for next year.

This is just a sidenote. The other night we almost had a huge tragedy at our house. Kyle let the chickens out to roam our yard now and we usually leave them out for a couple of hours. Well, the other night they were out and we had just left for a walk. We didn't find this out until later, but right after we left two stray dogs came and attacked our biggest chicken. Hence all of the feathers that are now all over our yard. Our neighbor was mowing his lawn and heard the commotion over the lawn mower. So, he ran over, saved the chickens and put them back in the coop for us. We were so lucky he was there. Kyle would literally be depressed if one of the chickens died.

Can you see the feathers going all the back to the furthest garden box?

Here is the coop. Kyle built it all and I think that it turned out really nice. He has been working on putting a wall with a gate a few feet away from the coop so they can have more room to roam around. And because of the dog attack the other night, finishing the wall has become a priority for this weekend.

The chickens

I also made a wreath.

I am convinced that one of the best kept canning secrets is canned chicken. We tried it for the first time last fall and I have fallen in love with how much time I save when making dinner. A couple of weeks ago, chicken went on an amazing sale. But I was really torn because I wanted to do some but didn't want to do it while 7 months pregnant. We knew that we would have to do more sometime in the next few months so Kyle convinced me that now was better than later. And he said he would help me. So I went and bought a ton of chicken for us to do that weekend. But as fate would have it, Kyle caught a virus and pretty much slept for five days straight, and I canned 72 jars of chicken by myself. It was worth it though and now Kyle can't say that he has done everything by himself!

It's good to be back

This is from a couple of months ago, but I thought it was pretty cute.

McKayla and I spent last week in Texas visiting Kyle's mom and dad. We had a fun time swimming and visiting Grandma and Grandpa. It was a good break!

By the way, I think that it's pretty neat that Kristen- my sister in law- and I choose the exact same swimming suit for our little girls.

And here I am, bright and early this morning, having Kyle take a picture of me before I forget and another week goes by. This is 28 weeks.

Truthful Tuesdays

Just got our utility bill in the mail and guess what? It's almost 100 dollars cheaper than the bill we got when we first moved here. That's right. Go. Us.

I think I am losing my mind. The other night I told Kyle that I would make him chicken enchiladas for dinner and he was really excited because it's one of his favs. So we sat down to eat and each took a bite. I don't know whether or not Kyle would have noticed had I not said anything, but after about the second bite I realized what I had forgotten to put in- the chicken.

I finally found chocolate flavored twizzlers at the grocery store. That means summer is here. Kyle thinks they are gross so that means more for me

Truthful Tuesdays

* Very rarely do I eat leftover food.

* When pregnant, I get annoyed/ irritated about a million times faster than I normally would. So, I am constantly asking Kyle, "Would this normally bother me, or is it just bothering me because I am pregnant?" What would I do without him?

*Is there anything better than Moose Tracks ice cream?

*I am a homebody

A giant pig just landed in our backyard

Imagine our surprise when the empty field behind our house was no longer empty- but occupied by a giant pig. So neat! We had to get a closer look.

By the way- there is a huge project going on at our house. I am so excited for it to be done so I can post pictures. Be excited!

Big News!

Here is my lovely pregnant self at 22 weeks. More than half way done -wahoo!

The big news is that we had our ultrasound about a week ago and found out that we are having a

GIRL!

Kyle was right, of course. Because this pregnancy has been so different from the last I had decided a long time ago that it was going to be a boy. So, it took me for quite a shock but I am so excited. We even got a little antsy yesterday and pulled out all of the little newborn clothes. Also, the ultrasound technician said that she couldn't remember the last time she saw a baby this active. But that was neat for us, because it took twice as long to get all of the necessary pictures so we got to see the baby longer.

I will say that we have narrowed our names down to the top two- maybe three- but aren't telling until she's born!

Busy Weekend Part 2

This is the second half of our busy weekend post- two weeks ago. And, I have heard rumors that some of you think all I post about is the chickens. I don't know how I feel about that but suffice it to say, this post has no chickens in it. Maybe next week.

Two weekends ago my very own mother graduated from college. We are so proud of her and her commitment to achieve this lifelong goal. And believe me people, this has been a family effort. Going back to school when you are older is not an easy thing to do and it makes me so grateful that I was able to finish when I did. Way to go mom!

Too cute to not share

Gotta love that natural curl!

Last weekend

was exhausting.. but in a good way.

Two big things happened last weekend and since I am still waiting on the pictures of the first I will hold off on that and talk about the second half.

We went to Rexburg. Some of our very best friends blessed their baby boy on Sunday and we were fortunate enough to have been invited. It was also really neat to see all of the

changes that have been made on the campus, thanks to the tour given by Justin. And, if you ever go and are hungry, eat at the new Crossroads eatery. It was so yummy. It is fun to go back and remember all of the things that happened to us while living there. And then we always leave saying to ourselves, did we really spend four years of our lives there? Maybe it just seems like that because time flies so fast. Anyway, we love Rexburg and it is so nice to have friends and family who still live there.