It's a boy

At our appointment with our midwife this week, she asked us if we wanted to find out the gender of our baby. Surprised, we said "sure, but we thought we couldn't find out until week 20 and that's a month away!" Well, it looks like we're having a son!

People sometimes asked us if we "had a feeling" about the gender before we knew. I've always wanted a boy as my first, but if I had to guess I'd tell them a girl because of a goofy dream I had before we were even off birth control. It went like this: fast-forward to Dani being full-term and delivering a healthy girl in the hospital. Dani isn't discharged for a few days, but I get to take our girl home from the hospital the day after she's born. So what do I do? Take her hiking at two days old of course! She's a trooper in her baby carrier as I'm tromping all over sandstone dunes in Southeast Utah, not one peep. Only catch is we are on a short leash, as we have to get back to the hospital every two hours for mom's milk.

So anyways, we'll have a hiking baby - but we'll probably wait at least a little longer than 2 days to take him on his first adventure.

On Thursday we're officially 16 weeks and 4 days, making our official due date July 10th. We're pretty darn excited! Below is a clip of the ultrasound - he does a little jab with his elbow.

In other news, Dani's brother Jacob just got engaged to his girlfriend Karlee! We are so excited for them. Karlee is fun to be around, perfect for Jacob, and we couldn't be happier that she's joining the family. Their date is June 22nd in the Payson Temple, and we're so looking forward to their summer wedding.

Klondike Derby

This week our troop put the finishing touches on our race sled and we headed out to East Canyon State Park for our annual Klondike Derby winter campout!

The assembly crew

That night we chowed down on hobo dinners and dutch-oven peach cobbler. The other leader and I were only woken up once from a boy who was too cold, and after getting him up and moving he slept the rest of the night just fine. In the morning before the sun was up over the mountain we enjoyed a balmy 14 degree morning before the sled races! Unfortunately, one of our boys fell while pulling our sled and we didn't make it very far in the preliminaries. We might've only had four boys that were able to come, but we sure had a good time together!

The racers

Back home with all extremities and digits intact

So much snow...

We seem to keep getting storm after storm and the snow is just piling up. I love it!

This week was pretty rough for Dani. We know there's no magic date for the "morning" sickness to go away, but it was discouraging for her to feel better for a little bit and then go back to feeling lousy.

On Tuesday my buddy Todd and I drove up Little Cottonwood Canyon to snowshoe to White Pine Lake. Todd used skins on his splitboard and he let me borrow a pair of snowshoes. We were one of the only ones to hike that trail since the last snowfall, so we were breaking trail most of the way. I realized pretty quick that I am out of shape! It felt like wearing flip-flops in knee-deep water while sinking down into mud, except with heavy winter gear and all snow. It was all I could do to keep up with the guy who's been fighting fire as a hotshot all season! Regardless, we enjoyed catching up and breathing the smog-free mountain air. It was incredible hiking through the blanketed trees and deep snowdrifts with white mountain peaks surrounding us.

Our trail through the trees

This week I had my first ride-a-long with Morgan County EMS. I will be volunteering with them just like I did down in Moab. Morgan is a small community of less than 10,000 residents about 25 minutes away from my house. Our call volume is pretty small, so sometimes it can be boring around here. I usually just bring my homework and hang out at the station until we get a 911 call. It will be a good way to force me to take a full study day for the week while still doing what I love on the ambulance.

The call we had that day was for a woman with a kidney stone in extreme back pain. She was at the Morgan Health Center and we transported her to McKay Dee Hospital in Ogden. We don't have a hospital locally, so we take all of our patients to Ogden. A fairly uneventful day, but I love being back on the ambulance.

What's a quinzee?

Igloo: built of blocks of hard snow
Snow cave: shelter dug in deep drifted snow

A quinzee is a shelter made by piling snow into a mound and then burrowing into it. I've always wanted to build one and sleep in it, but living in Moab I never saw enough snow to make one. That all changed when we moved to northern Utah! I spent the day after our white Christmas making a huge snow pile, and the next day carving it out. It was long and wide enough for two people to lay flat! I spread out a tarp and threw out our sleeping pads and bags and Dani and I slept that night perfectly cozy.

Dani had a streak of good days, and we were able to drive down to Provo to hang out with some of her friends, namely Candace who was visiting with her family from Alabama for Christmas. Nearly all of Dani's college roommates have babies, so it was nice to hear their stories and get some good advice for new parents.

Candace with Ollie, Dani, Michelle with Everley, and Laura with Josh

Unfortunately later this week Dani started feeling sick again, but she encouraged me to go hiking to alleviate my case of cabin fever. I did the Ogden Canyon Overlook trail, which starts at Snowbasin ski resort and goes up about 2.5 miles to the top of Ogden Canyon. There was quite a bit of snow but there had been enough people who skied the trail to pack it down enough for me in my hiking boots. After I escaped the overflowing parking lot of snow sports enthusiasts, I didn't see anybody else on the trail until I was almost to the trailhead again. It was a perfect day of solitude.