Baby Update

I'm so sorry, I haven't actually given any baby news in a long while. As if you people are reading this blog to find out what B and I are doing - yeah right - get to the kid! Here's all the baby/pregnancy news fit to print.

We did a very 'unofficial' ultrasound with a nurse at our home clinic. We played around for about 1/2 hour - it was awesome! We saw some images of the baby's face, and for just a moment a perfect little foot with 5 tiny toes. What fun! The kid was squirming and moving hands and legs constantly; which I guess I already knew because I can feel it all the time now. Just recently we actually reached a stage where you can see the movements by just looking at my belly. That's kind of creepy. Anyway, the point of the story - having seen no 'man parts' we believe this baby is a girl! So I'll finally stop saying 'it' and call her she, which is so much better! We've been calling her a girl for a couple weeks now, and even buying a few girly things, so we're getting pretty excited about baby-girl world.

I'm still feeling really good - this whole pregnancy has gone just beautifully. I'm bigger now, as you can see from the 28 week picture, and growing regularly. So, I do have some discomfort with her pushing against my ribs, and just in general getting heavy to carry around. My feet and hands swell up every now and then, but not to unbearable amounts. I guess I'm a little nervous to see how the next 9 weeks go, knowing that she'll gain 1/2 pound every week from here on out. I guess that means I'll about double in belly size. She's roughly 3 lbs right now. People say I don't look 30 weeks pregnant yet, I'm too small. I feel big, though! It may be that I'm carrying her really high - in my ribs. In the next few weeks she's supposed to move down lower and 'get into position'. We'll see.

I had a blood glucose test about 3 weeks ago, and failed. So I had to do the 3 hour version of the test last week. Which meant I went to the clinic at 9 in the morning, not allowed to eat breakfast. They drew my blood, waited an hour for the results, had me drink the sugary soda thing then drew my blood every hour for 3 hours. So, all told, I couldn't eat or drink anything until 1:00 that afternoon. That's like torture for a pregnant woman! In the end they said my body is NOT processing sugar appropriately. So, I've been put on a minimum sugar and low-carb diet until the end of the pregnancy. They said my levels aren't quite at 'gestational diabetes' classification, but it's a similiar idea to that. So that kind of stinks for us. I really like bread in all it's forms, and sweets a lot! But, it's been going ok this week to back off them all.

That might be all the baby news I have right now. My dad is making some picture for the nursery, which I'm really excited about. He's got all the skills of an artist! I think Beth is going to do some art work too, which will be awesome! She's in Peru right now, so keep her in your prayers. Also, on a side note, please lift up my good friend Amber and her boyfriend Eric in your prayers. Eric was recently diagnosed with leukemia and has been in the hospital all week with problems.

The Rock - ROCKS again!

We're back from a wonderful week of camp out in the hills. 56 middle school campers, and nearly 0 disciplinary problems. Can you believe it? It was such an amazing group of kids, I was extremely impressed. It also probably helped that we had a world-class staff of great counselors to keep them entertained, happy, and growing all week long. I swear I laugh more during one week of camp than most other months altogether!

Some of the highlights from our week:
*The outfits counselors wore to play Rock Band.
*The new variation of 'electricity' that includes tossing a cup of water at your competitor.
*The really well-behaved, involved, enthusiastic campers!
*The fact that very few, if any, kids said the sessions were too long and boring.
*The communion service on Thursday night with lots of genuine commitments and repentance.
*Teaching a whole group of campers how to play Samari / 'Waa'.
*Scaring the pants off the group in the cave. I didn't go, but I saw the footage and heard the stories.
*Playing with the three little boys that came with counselor parents.
*The best moment: when the counselors attacked the entire camp with garbage pails of water and the hose, while all the campers had their heads down and eyes closed, innocently playing a game! Both Ju-cos were with the campers, getting soaked, even though they had foreknowledge of the plan - that's dedication!

Now we're home, doing laundry and sleeping. I napped twice already today - long naps too. I feel fully pregnant and huge now, and get worn out fairly quickly. We've got a week to recover and prepare, then it's back out to the same place for high school camp. I hope that one goes just as well!

Africa Pictures and random update

Here are some of the picture from Brandon's trip to Tanzania. We're still working on putting some video together. Follow this link http://picasaweb.google.com/vbvetter it's the first album, called Tanzania 08.

I started my job this month at Trinity. It's been going pretty well. Like with any new job I've got a lot of people, and programs, and computer files to keep straight. There's lots of information gathering at this time. But, overall, it's been going really well. I like my co-workers and am getting along with them. I've met a few people from the church, and everyone's been so welcoming and nice. I really like this congregation, actually. I haven't hung out with many youth yet, but have at least met a few. I'm eager to get started with that. We actually have meetings this coming week with both high school and confirmation groups - so things are starting up!

Brandon has nicely recovered from his jet leg, and a weekend of Annual Conference. So, the house is happy and normal once again! This weekend we're actually out in the Black Hills with my family, just to hang out and take in the trees.

Vicky

Brandon back in America!

Sorry, I didn't get on earilier to say that Brandon and the entire team did indeed arrive safely home earlier this week. I've only gotten some stories as they come trickling out; but lots of good pictures. Everyone is doing well, and it sounds like the trip overall was a big success. B's gone again now, for Annual Conference. But, he's in the country and only out of a couple of days - so I can handle it. Eventually we'll post the Africe pictures and I'll share that link with y'all.

I started my new job this week! It went really well. There's a huge learning curve, of course - it'll take a while for me to know what's going on and learn who's who. But, this week I figured out a few organizational things in the office, started getting a feel for the programs in place and what's been tried before. Best of all, we had VBS all week - so I got to hang out with lots of great moms and volunteers and about 30 sweet kids every evening. It was really fun, and quite a successful event. I was with the 4 yr. olds mostly. I'm so impressed when they answer questions about the Bible or theology correctly. It's amazing how much they can understand and remember so young! Overall I'm really excited to be in the church and glad to finally get going on the job.

Garage Sale Queen!

Do you know a Garage Sale Queen? I'm sure glad I do! She goes by many names, but I call her 'Mom'. And this past week she dominated the Bis-Man Garage Sale kingdom. In the process the Vetter family nursury went from 0% stocked, to 80-85% done! Check out the pictures, we made a major haul! It filled my SUV, and we had to leave the big piece, a changing table, back with Grandpa for some reinforcements.

We got big things, like crib, swing, blanket sets, bouncy chair and we got teeny-tiny things like newborn onesies and socks that barely fit two adult fingers. Overall we had 70+ items of clothing in a range of sizes to grow into and out of. Here's the amazing part...are you ready? We wrote down everything we saw laid out in the living room and estimated the cost of each item when bought new (with some internet search help). A conservative estimate puts us as $1300 of supplies, we spent LESS than 20% of that!

It was amazing to set everything up in the room that will be our nursury soon. It finally started looking like one today! I just keep thinking about all these great things and how right now they're clothes on the shelf or a cute toy on the floor - but before long they'll wrap around our baby and be drooled on and played with and washed a hundred times. These are my baby's things! How amazing is that!

Thanks for everything, Mom and Dad! I had a great week at home, and am very grateful to be this much more prepared for the little one's arrival!

Brandon in Africa

Brandon is in Tanzania - and many have asked how things are going. I'll give you the update on the few things I've heard, but I'll make him blog and show pictures later so you get it first hand. The highlights I know are what I receive in a text message when I wake up and he's finishing a day for work (8 hr difference). We've talked for a few minutes here and there too.

The first week they worked hard at Huruma Orphanage, where the main task was digging a latrine. They got it down to ten feet deep, but needed to stop there for lack of ladders or means of getting out of a 10 ft hole. The goal is to be 30 feet deep, but they won't personally dig much beyond 15 as armatures. They'll leave money for Zachariah to hire it out. Problem is, knowing Zachariah, he's going to try to keep working on it himself because it needs to get done. That's not good work for a man his age or build.

On the weekend they went on safari. The highlights I heard about there were the white monkeys with blue balls - also known as blue-scrotum monkeys, apparently. The elephant they watched push down a tree with it's trunk (look for footage on that later) and lots of good giraffes, lions, elephants, etc. Sounds like they had lots of luck finding the 'good stuff'.' They're with our same driver from last year - who is an excellent tour guide and really funny, nice man - so I know they're having a good time whenever they're travelling, and especially on safari.

This week they're in the small village of Minjingu, and a neighboring village. In Minjingu is the preschool we helped clean up and clear out last year. They have been doing improvements and final touches there. I guess Robbie and Amy built 2 picnic tables from scratch! Cha was painting some original art work on the walls, which is incredible I'm sure. Everyone else was running chicken wire along the fences to keep out the goats (always a concern), and once again dealing with the bats. They 'smoked out' the bats, literally with a flaming paint roller on a long stick. They were trying to find the opening to close it up - Brandon was standing guard to watch for the bats' exit. I guess they came flying straight towards him, he tried to duck out of the way, but tripped on a rock and fell and rolled and made everyone laugh at him for what seemed to be a big over-reaction to a few bats flying overhead!

In the second village they're constructing a new preschool building. Some were laying brick, some clearing land - like cutting down trees with machetes, some picking rocks and mowing the grounds. All in all, it sounds like they've stayed busy. They've also found time for fun. I've heard of at least one volleyball game, that they lost. They taught some local kids the basics of baseball with a stick and fruit from the ground. I guess that was a neat evening because there were about 8 kids around when they started playing, then about 15, eventually over 30 kids joking around with our team and learning this new sport.

They'll finish work in the villages tomorrow, go back to the main city, work again at the orphanage, attend a real African church on Sunday, and head home. From my time they begin travels on Sunday around 1pm, they'll arrive in Sioux Falls about 7:00pm on Monday. Please keep the team in your prayers, and ask God to bless the projects they're working on and the people they're with.

I heart Kentucky!

Brandon and I reached 'our old Kentucky home' a day late because of some airplane problems, but we're sure glad to be here now! We've just had a fantastic weekend with all the wedding festivities, and getting to see the whole church community. The wedding was absolutely beautiful, and the couple thought of so many romantic details to make things very special. It was extra fun for us because every time we turned around there was another youth, parent, church friend or whoever ready for a hug and catch-up conversations. We've actually already seen just about everyone I wanted to connect with in these past two and half days. We even caught 2 families from different towns that came in for the wedding too. It's so exciting to be back and reconnect with all these important relationships and people. It's different having a 'spiritual friendship' or even just history in a faith community than other more basic relationships. I feel so close to these guys, especially all my old youth, because of the things we talked about, learned together, and been through in the past. It's not like a reunion of college friends, or hometown acquaintances, there's a lot of depth and love shared around here. I like it!