Week 17...A little Snow Tubing Never Hurt Anyone!

We had a great mini vacay recently that took us to see our great friends Jeremy, Amy and Noah. What started out as a day or so of beautiful West Virginia countryside ended up being an additional day or so of snow. The good thing was that we didnt get the snow storm until our last night there, the bad thing was that our flight got cancelled and postponed for a day.  And here's a bit of information to keep in the back of your head for later travels...when it snows in Roanoke, West Virginia, the mall closes, the Target closes, and all the restaurants close, except for the Smokey Bones BBQ restaurant. Incase you are wondering, the anti-Christ of american retail, Wal-Mart, was open.

Chilling with the Barclay's is always enjoyable. They havent lived in West Viginia for too long, but when they were in Dallas, we could literally pop down there for a visit anytime we wanted. A trip to WV takes more planning. Some heated discussions about the possibility of snow-tubing while there came up a few times between B and I.  And although I was ready to concede to his request of no tubing, once we got there and he beer-relaxed a bit with Jeremy, he realized that I wouldnt be risking too much safety by tubing.  I will say, pregnancy sure does take your stamina down several notches. Throughout my life I've always been proud of the fact that I could somewhat "keep up with the boys", but not this trip. For every two times they made it up the ramp to tube, i may have crept up there once. And forget about staying up past 8:00pm.  I think Noah and I had the same nap schedule and bed time pretty much each day we were there! :-) 

Speaking of Noah.....what an absolute doll baby!!!  He's now 9 months old and is literally smiling all the time. Everything makes him laugh and smile. I'd like to think he was just super excited to spend time with Aunt Awesome and Uncle Cool, so we'll just go with that. The great thing was, he took to us so easily. I think he remembered that he already met us before, even if it was on his day of birth. Time passing does not forget when it comes to the Bar-Nutts!!

One of the best evenings of the trip was when Amy had a friend of hers come to the house with her portable ultrasound machine. Brian and I were anticipating the sex of the baby, and we each had our money on the opposite sex. I would have bet the house I was carrying a boy. I dont know why, but I would have. Brian, on the other hand, was positive I was carrying a girl. I think more hopeful than anyting because he want a "daddy's little girl". Well, thanks to an awesome gal name Paula who has an amazingly cool laptop ultrasound machine, we found out...................... It's a girl!

I dont know why I look like i've gained 50 pounds in these pitures, but I do. Sadly, i've only actually gained 16 pounds so far. No time, or desire, to photoshop the puffiness away....it just is what it is!