Bryce and I went on our first real date in what seems like a year yesterday. We just headed downtown, stopped at an ice cream place, and then walked around and talked. Fantastic date. Made even more fantastic by a wonderful Tibetan woman (we're not positive she was actually Tibetan, but from what we could deduce, it seems more than likely) who was selling scarves/hats/trinkets outside of the mall. She asked if I was pregnant and when I told her I was and how far along she said, "Come to me." So I went inside her little booth and she started to feel all around my belly, then turned me around so that she could feel my hips and bottom, turned me around again and pronounced, "This baby girl." So fun.
Bryce and I decided that we definitely have to go back and buy a scarf from her if the ultrasound confirms it.

We took a leap of faith and headed to the Outer Banks this past week to have a fun vacation with some of our fellow law school families. We decided that sick or not, we were going to have fun. And we did. Mostly.
Our trip began with the usual festivities: get almost out of town before Little gets car sick, forcing us to head right back home to unload, clean, and reload the car before we can recommence our journey. This time we had the added bonus of me being preggo sick, making it almost impossible for me to help with the clean up. I'm married to a saint.
However, despite our bad beginning we had hope. We did fantastically well for the rest of the drive down with only a few minor mishaps and some seriously awesome sleep positions.

The first day was beautiful, although a little cold, so we all went down to put our feet in the water. Bryce was the only one crazy enough to jump all the way in, but Little loved it. He is still talking about the ocean and Daddy jumping in.
Each night we came together for meals and after the kids went to bed there were usually games until all hours of the night, which was definitely one of most fun parts of the trip.
Enter... colds. We all came down with a bit of a cold, but didn't think anything of it because it was in and out in a day. Little was a little worse for wear as he has a very sensitive gag reflex and therefore lost his stomach to more than one cough, but other than one interrupted night, we were on our way to keeping our goal of a fun vacation.

It was stormy for the next few days so we went to try to find some of the famed wild horses that apparently roam the area down there. We never did see any, but Little was quite excited about the horse statues all over town. We also walked around the town and visited the Wright Brothers Monument at Kill Devil Hill, which was a blast. Kill Devil Hill is appropriately named, it turns out, since that's where the real trouble began.

Little started complaining about his ear hurting, but we figured it was because the wind so we whisked him home. He woke up on and off all night with a fever, but it wasn't until early early in the morning that we finally started searching for the local Urgent Care because Little looked at us and said, "Ouchy ear" in the most pitiful voice imaginable. As fate would have it, the Urgent Care wasn't open until 7:30 so we got to see what seemed like the whole of the Outer Banks area in the dark of night as we drove around to help Everett sleep.
There were an unfathomable number foxes on that drive, not to mention insects. We thought it was raining at first, but it turns out it was just all the poor innocent creatures we were annihilating. Oh dear.
Then we crossed the Oregon Inlet Bridge, where I had a full-blown, need-a-paper-bag panic attack. I blame low visibility for making the bridge seem ridiculous, the fetus for my emotional state being ridiculous, and no sleep for making it a million times more ridiculous. I normally have a slight fear of bridges, but only so much that it makes me want to remove my vehicle from them as swiftly as possible, so this took that fear to a whole nuva level. We laughed about it after it was over, but at the time it was not fun for either of us.

On the Little front, once we got him into the doctor and some good medication in his system, he and I spent almost the entire day sleeping off the ordeal. Earlier, we had joked with some of the families who were with us on the trip that we were planning on staying the entire week barring any other disasters happening. It didn't turn out to be a joke.
We spent a low key day and managed to see one of the local lighthouses, which was very fun. Other than that we decided just to take it easy. And then... Little's ear drum burst. Not fun. He didn't sleep. Bryce didn't sleep. I didn't sleep, but that was because Its Highness decided that we should get all-night party going on in the bathroom. Needless to say, that did it. As soon as it was light enough, we packed up our things and headed out.
We picked up some more medicine for Little and since it had been over 30 hours since I had managed to hold anything down, we finally had to give in and pick up some anti-nausea medication for me as well. I'm not happy about it, but I'm also very grateful for modern medicine.

We finally made it home and slept for the rest of the weekend until Sunday when I started having contractions in the middle of nursery. Seriously. Contractions. But after a few panicked calls to my sisters and the doctor, we affirmed that it is probably dehydration from our OBX ordeal, so all in all we should be intact after things finally calm down.

So it was a bit of an interesting trip, but we did manage to have fun and we've decided that we definitely need to go back some day.
I have also determined that next time we decide to have a baby I am going into hibernation for nine months.

Little has been a trooper through all of this too. He is very conscious of my needs and in his mind it is a cardinal sin even on my good days not to have a "gooka bucket"--as he calls any of my many emergency buckets I keep throughout the house--near me at all times. He's also taken to comforting me when I am in the throes of baby sickness, only I use the term "comforting" very loosely. Basically, I end up over a bucket and he ends up crawling up my back and holding on like a monkey (choking optional) or riding the "mommy horsey" until I am done with the "gookas." A bit uncomfortable, but it makes me want to laugh more than cry, so I'm counting it as a win.
Little prays for the baby every night (he can almost say a prayer all by himself now, which we are so so proud of him for) and rubs my tummy with a "Hi, baby!" and the occasional kiss thrown in. I'm excited to see him when the baby actually comes. He's going to be a great big brother. We had a conversation the other day about the baby being safe in my tummy (he was afraid the baby was going to fall out) and he has decided--no matter how many times I tell him different--that the baby must be in a carseat inside of my tummy.
I've started feeling little flutterings down there, but the first time I felt the baby it was a bigger movement and it about scared me to death. I forgot what it feels like and I was leaning over when it happened so it made me yelp. I'm pretty sure Bryce thought I was crazy for a moment, but we laughed about it later.
So the point of all this is to say that we are still alive and kicking (for the most part).