It's a...

A week ago we had our 20 week ultrasound and were able to spend 25 minutes looking at our little peanut. It is the most humbling and surreal experience to see this little life moving and squirming around. Brent was meeting me at the ultrasound so he could get Isla settled with my friend who came to watch her while we were gone. And wouldn't you know... they were ahead of schedule (which never happens) and had me go back before Brent was there. I started to panic a little as the ultrasound got underway, but was relieved when Brent sheepishly knocked on the door.

This little one almost didn't cooperate enough to allow the tech to determine its gender. But after enough poking and pushing, the baby gave an obstinant series of kicks back, and turned enough to see what we were so patiently waiting to see: It's a girl!!! We are so excited to give Isla a little sister, and know the two girls will be good friends as they grow together. Brent and I had not been unable to agree on a boy's name, but have had a girl's name picked out for quite awhile. We're 99% sure this baby will be named Norah Lee Lacey. Norah, because we loved the name (though I did find out that my great great grandmother was named Nora), and Lee after Brent's mother's middle name. The first time we heard the combination, it felt so right and perfect. We can't wait to meet our little Norah!!

A question...

Why do you always feel most inspired to do something when you can't do anything about it right then? My good husband is doing a fitness challenge and has been really inspiring with his dedication to eating better. The problem: I'm almost 5 months pregnant, and getting "in shape" right now seems a little futile. Sigh. Instead, I guess I'll just have to focus my efforts on eating healthy for this little baby and hope the motivation lasts another 5 months.

P.S. It should be against the "rules" for husbands to get skinnier while their wives are pregnant. Just saying. :)

Still here.

Maybe I need to stop recommitting to my blog. It seems to be the kiss of death to any new posts. Knowing it has been almost a year since my last post, the thought of having to play "catch-up" makes me want to scrap the whole idea. So instead, I'll do a quick recap, and then move on.

We're back in Arizona! If you'd asked me a year ago if we'd ever be back in Arizona, I would have given a definite "no". But after months and months of interviewing in Washington, we started to consider leaving our beloved NW. The whole process was inspired and a new, better job fell into place with little to no effort by Brent. We feel incredibly blessed to be back in Arizona, where we left many good friends and lots of great memories. We love our new ward and the great friends we're making. Our house and neighborhood are amazing and Isla is loving all the added space (with a backyard to boot).



To add to the blessings we have received, we found out in December that we're expecting Baby Lacey #2 in August! In another week and a half we find out if Isla will have a little brother or sister. She will be a great older sister and will LOVE having a playmate besides mom.

Speaking of our little Isla... she's not so little anymore. This month she turned 18 months and has definitely become the queen of the house. She loves to "talk" aka ramble on and on with out making much sense. But has slowly begun to add more and more words to her vocabulary. She continues to say "dadda", "hey", "hi", and "Isla" but has recently added "shoe", "key", "bye-bye", "hot", and finally... "momma". She enjoys singing with daddy and has started to sing the ABC's on her own (though we might be the only people who can really tell what she's saying). At her 18 month visit she continued to be off the chart in height and 45th percentile in weight. She loves being outside and really loves when daddy gets home and wrestles with her before bed.



All in all, we have no room for complaint (though I can always find some), and feel very blessed to have a healthy little family. I hesitate to say that I'll try to post more, but I will. We'll see how this goes...

Not so little anymore.

Now that Isla is almost 8 months old, I thought it was time to finally update our blog.



Isla was blessed Thanksgiving weekend. She looked like a little princess in the dress that her Aunt Shannon made for her big day. Both sets of grandparents were able to attend, along with many aunts and uncles. It was a special day.





In December, Isla took her first big road trip to Montana. We had so much fun with Grandma and Grandpa Lacey, Aunt Shannon, Aunt Natalie, and Uncle Justin. Isla almost slept through Christmas morning, but managed to wake up before she missed all the fun. Grandma and grandpa gave Isla a warm snow suit and daddy started the brainwashing by presenting her with her first piece of BYU apparel.





Isla has grown and changed so much in the last few months! She is a very happy baby who always seems to be smiling. She loves to talk and wiggle and is constantly making us laugh. She rolls and sits up and would probably be crawling, if she didn't hate being on her stomach so much. She LOVES to stand, and could easily walk before she crawls. We can't imagine our lives without our little Isla girl. I'm so grateful to be her mom. Happy Mother's Day!!



More updates to come, along with more current pictures. :)

If you hadn't heard...

Introducing Isla Jean Lacey

If you hadn't heard, we had our little girl on September 14th, 2010 at 4:08 am. Isla weighed in at 7 pounds 11 ounces and stretched out to 20.5 inches. It was a very eventful couple of days, leading up to her birth. I'll spare too many details, but Brent and I went in at 8 pm on September 12th and were officially induced the next morning. With lots of IV problems and 3 hours of pushing (fun!), little Isla finally made her entrance into the world.

Within seconds, she was looking for something to eat and latched on right away. By Wednesday morning, we were home and healing.

Now, seven weeks later, all are healthy and happy. It's crazy how the time has flown! Minus the little scare Isla gave us after not gaining weight, she is healthy, happy and gaining as she should. She's still tiny, but she's now cooing and smiling all the time. She has consistently slept through the night for almost a month, and mommy couldn't be happier. :) We love her so much, and can't imagine our lives without her.

Brent and I have felt so much gratitude for the many friends and family who have helped us through this transition. Thank you for making us feel so loved!

I'm not going to lie, and say that our blog won't be all about Isla now, but I can't. She has quickly become the center of our lives and we can't help but brag and show off this little cutie!

There will be lots more Isla to come.

What a day!

It was quite the day today! My official due date was yesterday, and I was very excited to have my 40 week OB visit today. I couldn't wait to hear how I was progressing and when this baby was coming.

I should have known it would be a long visit when I got to the doctor's office and they had double booked my appointment. Forty minutes later, I was in an exam room and being told that I still wasn't dilated! At all! Besides that, the baby was ready and positioned perfectly. So we started talking about options for induction and when I could/should do it. I was told that I would have to come in the night before and receive a drug to help me dilate (which could take up to 12 hours), then I would be induced the next morning.

Okay... sounded easy enough. But then my doctor also wanted me to have a non-stress test done as I mentioned that she wasn't moving AS MUCH. Maybe I should have been more specific. She is always moving. So anything less is probably normal for most babies. So... she sent me across the hospital to have some tests run. Two hours later I managed to freak out my husband, worry my family that I was having the baby, have a very detailed ultrasound (which I loved!) and spent 20 minutes with monitors hooked up to my stomach. The conclusion: baby is fine and healthy. What a relief and thank heaven for insurance!

We did learn some fun things today:

#1- Our baby has hair! It was pointed out to me in the ultrasound and I was so excited!

#2- Our baby may not have inherited the "Platt Melon Head", as the ultrasound tech said it was normal for a baby at 40 week. Thank heaven!

#3- The baby is now weighing approximately 8 pounds, 9 ounces. Exactly my birth weight! Let's hope she doesn't get any bigger.

#4- She's as camera shy as her mother. She kept her little arm over her face the entire ultrasound!

#5- She'll have her mother's chubby cheeks (on her face). :) When you can see them from the ultrasound, you know they're "bad".

#6- This baby will either have a birth date of September 13th, or sooner.

#7- Last, but not least... she's the most adorable baby ever!!

There you have it. My oh-so-exciting day at Evergreen Hospital. We're so glad that she's healthy and that we get to meet her soon!

A little redundant.

I'm really struggling with keeping my blog up, and I blame Facebook. I don't feel that I have anything new or excited to post, that hasn't already been posted on Facebook. Is anyone reading this that doesn't have a Facebook account??

Well, just in case, I'll write a quick post. Today marks week 37 of this pregnancy. I cannot believe how fast the time has gone! At the same time, I feel that I've been pregnant forever. I saw a digital pregnancy test commercial on t.v. today, and got a little reminiscent. We used the same test and I remember how crazy it was to see the word "pregnant" as clear as can be. That was December 26th, and the last 9 months have been full of so many changes for our little family. I'm even more in love with my amazing husband than I was before, and cannot wait to meet this little one.

My doctor informed me today that the baby is dropping and that now it is just a matter of time. How surreal. It looks like the next post will be to introduce Isla Jean to the world.

It's a girl!!

This last Thursday, we finally got to see our little one in our first ultrasound. It was one of the most amazing experiences of our lives! We both watched in amazement at what we made. The tech first made sure that everything looked good, then told us we had a happy, energetic little girl coming in a few months. She moved and squirmed the entire ultrasound (like she is as I'm typing this).

It was so amazing to watch her squirm and stretch. Brent tried to see if the tech could tell whose hairline she would have, but she said she couldn't tell. I do like to think that she already has my nose. :) We can't wait to officially meet little Isla Jean in September!

Enjoying the journey... or trying.

Well... my blog resolve was a little short lived. Here we are in April! I can't believe how the time is flying. I'm enjoying Spring Break this week, so I thought I'd take a second to update our lives via our blog.

We are officially pregnant. I know that should be obvious by 17 weeks, but having heard the heartbeat (twice) and seeing the belly grow (along with emotional outbursts), it's becoming more official in my mind. We could not be more excited to be looking forward to the birth of our little one. But there have been certain parts of pregnancy that have really frustrated me. I know that all you moms our there know exactly what I'm talking about. I want nothing more than to bring this child into the world. But do we have to learn all these little lessons of patience and endurance along the way?? Of course we do.

More specifically, I'm talking about the weight gain. I have always struggled with my weight. That is nothing new. I spent years trying to lose weight, and only failing. After I moved to Arizona, I finally discovered the gym and became a runner (in my own right). I loved watching my body change! Finally, I was comfortable in a size 8/10 and enjoying the life of a medium size.

Then... marriage hits. You get happy, and you get fatter. I said it wouldn't happen to me, but it did. I have the most amazing husband who has always made me feel like the most beautiful person in the world! I no longer stressed about my size and just enjoyed our social eating habits. But as we got closer to starting a family, I tried to buckle down and really lose some extra pounds to make my pregnancy that much more enjoyable.

Then... the holidays hit. And boy, did they hit! And to our joy and surprise, we were pregnant after a miscarriage and 6 months of trying. We couldn't have been happier.

Then... the nausea hit. And what made it better?? Food!!

I have gained almost 20 pounds in 17 weeks. This has been the biggest trial of my pregnancy. I don't know how to handle it, and I'm afraid that I'm not enjoying this amazing time in my life as much as I should. As the nausea begins to subside and I continue my gym routine, I'm hoping that I can just sit back and enjoy the ride. I have wanted to be a mother my entire life. I can't wait for this baby to join our family! I am making a resolve right now to enjoy the journey.

Fine... I'll get my own ultrasound

After my first trip to our OB, I was so disappointed that we didn't get to see our little "sprout" for the first time. I wanted to see the reason for all my nausea and queasiness... to help me remember that I want to go through this. No dice. We have another 10 weeks to wait. After finding out that was pretty normal, I decided I can get my own picture (though it's not of my child).

We are SO excited to have this baby join our family. I'm pretty sure we're both scared to be parents, but this baby will be so loved. Thanks to all our friends and family for your love, support and advice. We don't know what we're doing, so it is all appreciated. Seven months to go!

We're taking a poll

If you haven't heard yet, Brent and I will be parents in September! But combining our genetics has brought up an interesting question: Who's hairline will the baby inherit? I (Allison) was born with a head of hair. Brent's hair came in around his second birthday. What do our friends and family think? The poll is officially open. :)

Our annual post

I considered waiting another week to make it a whole year since our last post. We are obviously not very good bloggers. Ironically, a lot has happened this last year. Both of our jobs have changed, we live in a different state and we are no longer newlyweds. Quite a lot of accomplishments. Here are a few of the changes we've made from 2009-2010:

*Brent graduated from ASU with his MBA (YEAH!!)

*Allison finished teaching her second year of fifth-grade

*Brent and Allison took a belated honeymoon to the east coast. We visited DC, Philadelphia, NYC, and Boston

*Brent applied at Edward Jones

*Brent got hired at Edward Jones!

*We packed up all our belongings and headed north to Seattle

*Brent started with Edward Jones

*Allison started subbing

*Brent and Allison had their 1 year anniversary!!!

See! I told you it was an exciting year! It's been great being close to Brent's sister, Tammy and family. We've also been able to head south to Portland to visit the Platt clan.

We love living in Washington, and look forward to our future here. Brent and I are part of an amazing ward. We were quickly put to work. Brent teaches the Sunday School class for the 17/18 year olds while I was called as the first counselor in Young Women. We are busy and happy.

We hope that you all had an amazing Christmas and are starting an amazing New Year. We will see how long it takes us to post again. :)

Another attempt

We are not good bloggers.  That's my new conclusion.  But I'm still going to make an attempt. We've been married now for over 2 months, and life is starting to settle down a little.  I will be done with this school year in May, and Brent will graduate soon after.  We're excited to have more time together, and finally take our honeymoon.  Life continues to be good.  We love being married.  We should have done this sooner!  :)  

Here are some of our bridals, that we had taken back in September.  Amy Hanson (Sara's sister-in-law) took them for us, and we love them!  We'll write again "soon".  (That could mean 2 months from now.  :)

Yes...We're Alive

So, we decided that after two month of no new posts and six weeks after getting married we'd let everyone know that we're still here.  So here's the Reader's Digest version.

We were married Saturday, November 8th in the Portland Oregon Temple.  Considering it was Oregon...and the middle of November, the weather was great.  It rained for about a minute while we took pictures.  Our parents and all of our siblings were able to spend the day with us.  Later that night we had our reception in Newberg where we saw how much people really like candy...especially the adults.

The next Saturday we had an open-house here in AZ at our old bishop's (Paul & Heather Sandstrom) house. The weekend after that we went to Montana to have our third, and final, reception.  The best part was when we went into Drummond to pick up some ice at the grocery store and saw our announcement and picture taped to the door of the store.  Who knew that we were celebrities in Drummond?  

Now that the craziness is over, we've been piecing together our apartment.  The best part was when we lugged our 7-foot couch up three flights of stairs, while our neighbor stood at the bottom and watched the whole thing.  I'm sure it was hilarious to watch.

Married life is good...what else can we say?  We hope that you all have a Merry Christmas and a great New Year!

My sister Sara

With a week off for Fall Break, I came home to finish planning for the wedding.  My sister, being the saint that she is, planned a bridal shower for me.  It was beautiful!  Her and my mother spent a lot of time preparing, and then pulled off a wonderful  event. 

What good is a blog, if you can't use the space to gush about the people in your life.  Sara has been my best friend for as long as I can remember.  We were nicknamed "Salt and Pepper" (guess who is who from this pic).  I'm so grateful to have her in my life!  

Um...yeah, that's not water damage. It's dog urine.

Not only am I out to prove to Allison that I'm actually kind of excited to contribute to our new blog, but I also have a funny story (funny-interesting...not funny-ha ha).  So we've been looking for a house since neither of us wants to continue living with our current roommates after we get married.  With the state of the current real estate market in the Phoenix area we thought we'd try our hand at the short-sale/foreclosure market.  Along the way we've run into some interesting situations.  Houses left with refrigerators full of food, ceiling fans ripped out, appliances missing, holes in walls, etc.

After looking at 20+ houses, the beaut pictured above caught my eye in the listing so I went by to take a look.  I spent about 10 minutes in the house, called my my friend, Preston, who is our realtor, and told him to make an offer.  He submitted and the next morning the bank holding the lien accepted our offer.  The rest of the day at work I spent dreaming about where I'd finally be able to hang all of my Pokemon posters and the case that holds my genuine Captain Kirk, Star Trek suite I won on ebay.  

Preston called and suggested that he go check out the house with me since he hadn't seen it yet.  Since he used to work in the construction industry I thought that would be a good idea since I didn't spend much time in the house.  Within the first minute of being in the house he found, at least what appeared to be, water damage in about 5-6 spots around the house.  I started to get pretty down, knowing what he was about to tell me.  Water damage = potential mold = don't buy this house.  About this same time, Allison arrived to the house from work.  We were both pretty frustrated at that point, considering we'd already looked at so many houses and are getting married in less than 6 weeks.

So Preston calls the listing agent and asks what the deal is.  The agent says, "Um...yeah, that's not water damage.  It's dog urine."  Now, call me crazy but hearing those words actually made me feel a little better.  We can replace drywall, replace all of the flooring, and paint the entire house to get rid of the smell.  But if it's legitimate water damage and mold we're not so certain we want to get into that.  Anyways...we're having a mold contractor go out to assess the damages and see if we can't talk the bank down.

My point in telling this story isn't so much to update you all on the status of our house hunting, although it is a great by-product, as it is to make a point.  I'm not against having pets in a house, as long as it's not a cat since I'm severely allergic (sorry, Allison).  The moral of the story is to house-train your pets and clean up their "accidents" when they happen.  One would think that this goes without saying, but...

And now you know...and knowing is half the battle. 

We gave in...

Well... here we go.  Not that I'm against blogging.  I'm not.  I just never felt that my life was interesting enough to blog about single.  Now there are those people (aka my future sister-in-law) that have interesting lives as single people.  I don't feel that I'm one of them.  

Now that I'm engaged to be married, I figured it was time.  I'm starting to feel left out of the blogging world, so we're giving in.  Note:  when I speak in the plural, it's only so I feel justified in my blogging, though Brent may never actually contribute to this blog.  

So, we're getting married!  We're so excited, and I'm beginning to act a little more sane, as the stress slowly decreases.  The dress has been bought... the invitations will be sent soon... the temple has been reserved... we're on our way.  

Thus begins the blogging...  :)