“Peanut”

I’ll admit that I’ve always been pretty terrified of being pregnant.  I’d never felt a maternal clock ticking, so I was always very apprehensive about it.  It was never something that I looked forward to & I used to think women who “loved” being pregnant were a little bit crazy.

The latter hasn’t changed – I still don’t understand women who “love” being pregnant & I’ll be really surprised if I ever “miss” being pregnant.  I miss being able to move around & do the things that I used to do (like climb a hill without getting winded).  But I’ve been blessed to have had a very easy & healthy pregnancy so far.  We conceived very easily & have left every single doctor’s appointment with good news.  I had a bit of nausea for a few weeks in the beginning, followed by a couple weeks of extreme fatigue, but I was able to do a ~30 mile bike ride for MS in New Bern, NC, when I was 13 weeks.  The second trimester & the first part of the third trimester I felt great.  I started prenatal yoga classes around 24 weeks & they were tremendously helpful in keeping my body feeling pretty good.  My biggest woe has been heartburn, but I’ve got that mostly under control thanks to Pepcid.  And in the final weeks, I’m tired, but that’s pretty normal as well.  The good news is that there’s never been a concern about my health or the health of the baby and that’s been a huge blessing.  For better or for worse, the baby has been extremely active & has been kicking me incessantly since about 18 weeks – my ribs may never be the same!  We’re hoping that the delivery comes soon & that it is as smooth as the pregnancy has been.

We affectionately named the baby “Peanut” early on – I think because in one of the pregnancy updates he was the size of a peanut.  We’re notoriously indecisive and haven’t decided 100% on a name (this time, I’ll admit that I’m the one who’s still on the fence).  We’re close, but I think the final decision will be made at the hospital after we meet the little guy.

People have asked what my cravings are….  The biggest thing is that I LOVE milk now – I rarely drank it before, but now we’re going through 2-3 gallons in a week.  Other cravings – sweets & breakfast foods.  Luckily my metabolism has been very good throughout the pregnancy so I’ve been able to give in to most of the cravings (in moderation of course).  My latest craving has been the “tortilla sandwich” – something that they made in the cafe at work in NM.  It’s basically just eggs, bacon, green chile, and cheese inside of a folded tortilla.  It’s one of the few things that doesn’t give me heartburn & it fills me up, so they’ve really been hitting the spot lately.  Food aversions – PICKLES.  The smell of a dill pickle is just AWFUL.  Also, tuna.  Chris made himself a tunafish sandwich & I had to leave the apartment.

Here are a few pictures from the journey….  We’re looking forward to meeting him – hopefully very soon!

8/5/10 – 8 week ultrasound (the head is on the left)

9/7/10 – 13 week Ultrasound

9/11/10 – At the MS ride in New Bern, NC – 13 weeks

10/26/10- Baby at 20 weeks

11/3/10 – On our “Babymoon” cruise – 21 weeks

1/16/11 – 32 weeks

2/22/11 – 4D ultrasound at 37 weeks

3/2/11 – 38 weeks (sorry for the bad pictures – I tried taking them myself!)

What’s New?

You wouldn’t know it by this blog, but we’ve been quite busy in the past couple of years….  We got married in Santa Fe on May 16th, 2009.  We took an amazing honeymoon to Hawaii – Kauai & Maui.  In late 2009, we started looking to make a move away from Albuquerque and on February 1, 2010, Chris started a new job in Durham, NC.  I stayed behind to sell the house, which fortunately didn’t take too long, and joined Chris out here in Raleigh on April 29, 2010.

The changes didn’t stop there, however, as we learned that I was pregnant with our first child in July of 2010.  Four different ultrasounds have told us that it’s a BOY, so hopefully they are right on that one.  The little guy is due really any day now – his official due date is March 16th.

As if this weren’t enough, we’ve also recently gone under contract on a house here in Cary, NC, and are planning on closing on May 11th.  We like to keep things interesting, apparently.

Since Chris hasn’t been using this blog much, we’ve decided to use it to share pictures & stories from the next chapter in our lives.  If you know us at all, you’ll know that being around kids is not something that either of us have ever been comfortable with, so it’s sure to be an adventure.  🙂

Kara (aka Mrs. Silent K)

Kara’s New Car

To test what an ’01 Honda Civic EX, granted with a really low ~ 46k miles, would get in these fuel economy minded times, I put Kara’s car for sale on Craigslist last Wednesday.  With in 24 hours I had 4 people who had contacted and at least one of which offering my asking price sight unseen.   So yesterday we sold the Civic and Kara shed a few tears since she was giving up the car she had bought new when she graduated from U of I.   We had already arranged to purchase an ’08 Acura TSX though, and it now seems safe to say there are no more tears, as the new car is very nice.  Here are a few pictures….

     

Getting Married Next May

On the drive back from Portland, Kara and I stopped in Aspen, CO for a few days of R&R before getting home to our house that we left about 7 months earlier.   While on a hike up a snow covered trail, I asked Kara to marry me. 

Lucky for me, she said yes and we just set a date for next May.  For multiple reasons, it seemed like a good time- even though it seems like a long time for now.   We’ve started putting together a seperate website for the wedding which we’ll be adding details to, such as lodging, transportation, things to do in the area, etc, over the next 11 months. 

Here’s the URL: http://weddingwire.com/chrisandkara
 

Ahhh… A good day

If my count is accurate, I’ve still only had 2 days in the last 5 weeks were I didn’t work, including weekends. 

So I decided to take yesterday and today off (and this weekend).  Yesterday, I got caught up on some stuff around the house.   This morning, I met up with Seth and Ben for a road ride.  I wish I didn’t have to be to work at 6:45am every morning.  It is such a great way to start the day with a road bike ride.  After that I came home, ate, and took a nap.  Then I decided to ride to the stop of Sandia peak on the moto.   28 miles of curvy mountain roads and hardly any cars today.  Aaahhh… good times  🙂

Hopefully tonight and this weekend, I get to hang out with Kara (and maybe squeeze in a mountain bike ride).  What a good day!

 

Wow… it’s almost June!

Life is going by way too fast.  I knew May was just a blur but I can’t believe I haven’t posted anything since February…?  Wow.  The month of May was a blur because I’ve had 2 days off from work in the last 5 weeks, since getting back to ABQ for Portland.  Sure, there’s been a couple of days where I didn’t actually go to work physically, but I count phone conferences, emails, pages, and phone calls as days at work.  And those were my weekends.   Ugh..   😦 

Kara’s Birthday- African Safari Style in the Great Northwest

Saturday was Kara’s 29th Birthday.  She’ll probably be mad when she sees that I put that on here because she keeps telling me it was her 27th birthday, but I know better.   I suppose she wanted to forget about getting older, because she asked for me to take her to the Oregon Zoo in Portland.  

It seemed that just about every family in Portland must have had the same idea, perhaps due to a rain-free weekend- as it was packed especially considering that we didn’t get there until about 2pm.  Nonetheless we had a fun time dodging the baby strollers and wild animals, at least when they weren’t hiding from us- we saw many exhibits & cages w/o any critters in sight.

Later that evening we tried out a pretty cool Asian restaurant called Saucebox in downtown and then took in the view from the 30th floor at the Portland City Grill while enjoying some libations.

   

North American Handmade Bicycle Show – Feb 10th

As I mentioned in a previous post in Nov’07, the 4th annual North American Handmade Bicycle Show was in Portland last weekend.  Kara’s been working in ABQ for the last week and a half so I had some time to kill and I checked it out.   Though a little pricey to attend ($18), I had a very good time.  Walking around with a beer and looking at bicycles and bike parts that you either can’t buy at any cost or are likely too expensive to consider is a good Sunday in my book. 

I even ran across Brian Lopes, who for those of you don’t know, is a world champion mountain bike racer and someone who I’ve followed since I raced BMX as he also got his start racing BMX as a pro.  I’ve seen him at races in Whistler, BC & Angel Fire, NM- where he won both, and man can he ride a bike.   It was cool to see Brian walking around, much like I was doing, with his digital camera admiring the hard work of those who are lucky, skilled, and hardworking enough to do something for a living that they love…

I took a lot of pictures, but here’s a bunch that show various designs that I found most interesting, but with 150+ folks showing off their works of rideable art, there was no shortage of cool things to take note of.  For info on the show, check out the official site: http://www.handmadebicycleshow.com/2008/, but here are a few of my pics in no particular order-

1)  Renovo- a new Portland based company producing high end wood road bike frames. Yes wood, and bonded to rear carbon fiber stays no less. These things are CNC machined in halves then bonded together. 

2) Delta 7 MTB- Very small carbon fiber tubes wrapped with kevlar that creates a frame that you can see through. The mountain bike frame weighs about 2.7 lbs and they claim it’s as strong “as anything in its weight class”. For $7000 (frame only) I guess you can test one yourself.  And 3) BME Carbon Fiber w/ Kevlar tube prototype road bike that at least generically speaking was very similar in concept to the more mass-produced Delta 7 MTB frame. Though they guy that built it seemed offended when I made the comparison. That’s probably because had invested over 400 hrs to make one frame and said “I probably won’t be making any more”. No doubt.

  

4) Going back to my BMX roots, I really liked the Independent Fabrication Carbon Fiber / Titanium BMX bike. It had to be the sweatest BMX bike I’ve ever seen.

5) High-end Townie bikes seemed very popular at the show. These bikes were actually some of my favorites, but I just can’t realistically think that there’s many people who will fork over the $2-6k that a lot of these would cost, and even fewer people who would actually risk the threat of theft by riding somewhere that it would be left out of sight. Nonetheless, I still have a soft spot for a tricked out Titanium cruiser.

 

6) Kevler belt drives.   Belt drives for bicycles have been around for a long time, but none have proven to actually work in real world conditions, but the makers of the ones that were at the show claim that they’ve finally created one that will stand up to real cycling needs.  As an engineer, I’m always up for new designs, especially one that is lighter, quieter, and smoother than what has been propelling bicycles for a very long time.  One interesting fact about these belts is that they require a redesigned frame with a chainstay that allows for the belt to slide on since there’s no way to disconnect any part of the belt, so bike companies will need to modify their designs should they want to run this drivetrain setup.

7) Check out the width of the rims on that Moots MTB. It’s like the bigfoot of mountain bikes!  

8) Some others…
     

Christmas… Yes, I know it’s February

Basically since the start of the year, I’ve been on call at work.  That means I get pages to respond to equipment issues 24 hrs a day Monday – Friday, and as of 2 weeks ago, about half of my weekends will be on call too.   In fact, 2 weeks ago I got the “opportunity” to, on a Saturday night, work on some equipment from about 9pm until about 1:30am.  What does that have to do with Christmas and the fact that it’s mid-February?  Pretty simple, life is too busy & moving too quickly these days….   😦

In any event, here’s the reader’s digest version of what we’ve been up to for the last 2 months: 

1) Christmas!- Bailey got a rubber ducky yellow rain jacket for Christmas from one of his grandparents that ironically enough matches his dad’s yellow Marmot rain jacket.

  

2) Happy Newyears! While his parents had a great time celebrating New Years eve at Oba (Pearl district restaurant that I’d highly recommend) with some good friends, Bailey didn’t seem as excited to wear the beads and “2008” glasses as his dad was just hours earlier. 

 

3) Showshoeing is fun. Mt. Hood has got a ton of snow this year. As I write this, they have a ~ 180″ base (that’s 15ft!). Kara got us some snowshoes for Christmas and we went new years day. Can you say POWDER?! We were able to go anywhere we wanted in the woods eventhough there was that much snow.

  

4) Portland International Auto Show. We went a couple weekends ago with some friends. There were definitely some nice rides there. Even some that I hadn’t heard of before, such as this Dutch Spyker. Yes, Kara, there are some cars that I don’t know about (though they’re available in limited quantities)!

There go 2 more months…

Wow… I haven’t posted since I got the Subie.   Well, I was gonna make a post tonight, but I can’t get any pictures off of the Canon camera. 

Since I rebuilt my desktop while we’ve been in Portland, I no longer have the software installed and unfortunately you can’t download it from Canon.  I’ve been able to get pictures off of the camera without it, but it’s locked up windows explorer 3 times so I’m done for tonight.    Hopefully I have another chance to make a couple updates in the next fews days.  Work has been keeping me busy among other things and Kara’s requested that I not spend any time on the PC when she gets back from Albuquerque later this week since it’s her B-day Saturday and she’s been working down there for more than a week.   🙂

Goodbye Pathfinder… Hello Subaru Outback

I traded in my ’01 Nissan Pathfinder today.   Just about had a tear roll down my face when i saw my trusty vehicle driven off amidst the pouring down rain today.   Kinda like loosing a good friend who’s been there for you without asking for too much in return.  Ok, now that I got that out, I’ll move on to the positive.  Hopefully, I met a new friend today named Mr. Subaru Outback 2.5i. 

I should state for the record that I’ve been a “car guy” for a long time.   Probably has something to do with my dad’s interest in cars and my fundamental interest in just about anything mechanical.   I’m regularly reading numerous car blogs and auto magazines when ever I get a chance.   But I must admit that I’ve changed my outlook over the last few years.   Maybe it’s that gas now costs $3.50 a gallon or just that I’ve become a closeted treehugger, but I had enough with driving a SUV.   I’ve flirted numerous times in the last 6.5 yrs of SUV ownership with getting something new and I’m not sure what was so different this time, but I went ahead and bought a new car.  I had thought about many other wagons and hatchbacks (almost required when you like my pasttimes and a dog), but decided that the Subaru offered the right balance of everthing I was looking for.

The “old” Chris would have likely bought the turbocharged Outback, but the “new” Chris decided to get the naturally aspirated version after appreciating the fact that it’s powerful enough for everything but  stop light drag races and is better for the earth and my pocketbook in the fact that it takes regular gas (vs premium) and gets better mileage.   I originally wasn’t a huge fan of the two-tone blue / silver combo, but Kara seemed to like it and I think it will grow on me (and I got the black interior and 5spd which were the musts for me).   

Though, I must be getting old since I just bought a station wagon!!  Ahhh!! The irony of it is that I was driving a jacked up, gas hungry, poor handling station wagon (SUV) ever since I bought the Pathfinder in July of ’01.  And a friend of mine told me yesterday that it’s ok if you buy a station wagon if you have a dog so at least I have that going for me (while trying to keep my male ego intact as best I can).

Brief review:  Since the northwest is getting battered right now with a Winter storm (50mph winds, rain, cold temps), the Outback basically got driven straight home from the dealer today, but I can already tell that it’s substantially more fun to drive with the 5 spd manual than the automatic pathfinder ever was.   And with the all wheel drive it should provide just as good of transportation for camping, mountain biking, and especially skiing.  All that and I’m expecting a solid 5 to 10+ mpg above what the pathfinder would do so now we can justify taking it on trips where the civic would only go before.  I’ll likely post up some more pictures and driving impressions once I get a little more time behind the wheel and the rain stops blowing sideways.

Oregon Handmade Bicycle Show

This past Sunday I went to the World Forestry Center in Portland to check out the Oregon Handmade Bicycle Show.   In a world where most bicycles are made by machines in Taiwan or China, it was great to see some two wheeled creations that local folks put a lot of effort into.   

The bikes ranged from crazy designs with steering wheels to one-off titanium works of art.  The companies in attendance are listed on the link above, and though I wasn’t familar with most of them, I nonetheless had a great time checking out all the little details on the bikes (welds, component choices such as internally geared hubs, frame/fork designs, etc) that the average joe wouldn’t begin to notice or care about.   The fully rigid Jones bikes frame and forks were probably the most interesting to me at the show (they’re the ones with the crazy looking forks in the pictures).  Check out how fat that tire & rim are in the last picture! 

I can’t wait until Feb 8-10th, 2008 when Portland will host the 4th annual North American Handmade Bicycle Show.

           

Cannon Beach, Oregon… on a Perfect November Day

After taking Bailey to the Hondo Dog Park near our house early Saturday morning, Kara recommended we go to the Oregon coast since it was a very unexpectedly nice November day.  And after an hour and fifteen minute drive we arrived at Cannon Beach.  Given that it was November and Oregon, I don’t think we could have asked for a better day….  Actually, I’ll go one better and say that it was perfect!  🙂

    

Silver Falls State Park, Oregon

About 70 miles southeast of Hillsboro is Silver Falls State Park.   Kara and I had heard some good things about this place from a few friends so we decided to head down there 2 Saturdays ago.   We hiked most of the “Trail of 10 Falls” before it was getting dark after a late start.   Definitely a pretty place to visit.   The only downside for us was that Bailey was prohibited on the Canyon Trail where all the falls were- so he stayed back home.   Here are a few of our pictures….

             

The Drive to Portland, That Almost Wasn’t

Before I post anything else, I should back up a little….

Due to some relatively last minute change of plans (me moving up to Portland with Kara), I decided to rent a Uhaul trailer to bring some of our things with us.  The idea was that I’d pull it behind my Nissan Pathfinder… after all, I did this when I moved back to ABQ from Portland in ’02 and it wasn’t too bad.   We had Kara’s Civic shipped.

Well, apparently, I didn’t load the trailer correctly because when we hit the high speed of ~ 65mph about 10 miles west of ABQ, things got really dicey and we nearly turned back (once I regained control of the swaying rig).   We stopped for the night in Flagstaff, AZ, after driving ~ 55mph all the way there- a drive that usually takes about 4.5 hrs which took closer to 7hrs at this rate, while, I kid you not, getting passed by ever other vehicle on the interstate, including a school bus.  Well, that’s not completely true… I did pass one other car- a minivan, pulling, you guessed it- a U-haul trailer! 

Things improved when, during our lunch break the 2nd day, in Barstow, CA, I spent about 25 minutes to rearrange some boxes and that was enough to get more weight on the front of the trailer-which then allowed me to drive safetly at 70mph.  The irony of the situation was that California’s speed limit for vehicles pulling trailers was only 55mph, unlike the 70mph that I could have driven legally in NM & AZ.  Oh well.  I’m happy to say that I was able to make some better time through CA & OR once I resolved the situation with the trailer- and without any traffic citations telling me to slow down.

Since Kara had never been up to northern Cali to see the huge redwoods, and neither of us had made it to Crater Lake, we decided to head in direction, rather than the direct route of Moab, Salt Lake, & then through Boise which we did in ’02.   Driving through the redwoods just makes you feel small.  The huge trees are incredible.   Crater Lake was definitely worth the drive as well.  We actually got to drive around the west rim, though it was going to close for the season within a week of our visit.   They already had a decent amount of snow which isn’t bad for late September, but I’m sure it wasn’t much when you realize they get 533 inches on average each year!  Nonetheless, we learned that Bailey likes to play in snow which was the first time we’ve been in snow since we got him.

And finaly, we had a good laugh near Eugene, OR (2 hrs south of Portland), when we actually spotted Kara’s civic on the back of the car carrier as we were heading up I5 towards Portland.

        

Wholly Crap- Where’d Sept & October Go?

Wow- I haven’t posted since Aug 30th…. over 2 months!  Probably no one’s reading anymore, huh?  Guess there’s been nothing to read…

Anyhow, in that time, Kara and I moved to Hillsboro, got settled into our apartment, and started our jobs here.  We’ve also done a few other things such as hanging out in Portland, hiking Silver Falls, and checking out the coast.   We’ve gotten some pretty good pictures so when I get a few minutes, I’ll make some separate postings complete with pics.  

The Dog Is Ready To Go….

Looks like Bailey’s ready to move to Portland!!   I think Bailey gets more blog time than any other topic on this blog… 

Busy Month…

Since I haven’t posted lately, probably not many people are reading the blog regularly (since there’s not much to read).   In the last month or so a lot has changed.  I’ve changed departments and now Kara and I are headed to Portland for ~ 7 months.  It will be a few busy weeks before we hit the road up to the northwest, but we’re hoping to make the drive a fairly scenic one so hopefully we have some great pictures to share soon. 

Me as a Simpson Character

Kara uploaded a picture of me into this website: http://simpsonizeme.com, and here’s what it came up with…  (Kara added a dog, which I presume to be Bailey after the fact).  🙂

                           

Bailey’s First Birthday

Kara and I celebrated Bailey’s birthday with him last night by making some cupcakes and wearing elmo hats.   Ok, we’re totally lame…..   but I think he had a good time nonetheless….