There is Something Growing in my Belly!

That is right everyone, meet the newest addition to our little family, Baby Smith! 

Jake and I found out we were pregnant just a little over a month ago, and you can better believe we were  beyond excited! We had decided even before we got married, that after we tied the knot, we were going to leave it in God's hands for when He wanted to provide us with the AMAZING gift of a baby. (A.k.a. no birth control) And let me tell you, this was OBVIOUSLY His plan. Since I've been in Germany, as most of you know, Jake as been in the field for 90% of the time. (Which leaves little possibility for this to even occur) He left for the his first field training exercise on August 2nd, and not to get into too much detail, but there was no possibility of us being pregnant at that point. But while he was away (for almost a month) he was able to come back for one night to deal with some paperwork that I couldn't do without him. ONE night! And thats all it took :) Shortly after he came back from the field we found out we were expecting!

As I mentioned before, this was definitely left  to God's planning, not our own. I'm sure a lot of you might be thinking "Wow they were only married for a few months when they got pregnant" "What about spending some one on one time before starting a family?" "What about traveling Europe?" etc. etc. etc. Well we've definitely thought about those things as well, but I look at it this way. We decided we were going to leave it up to Him, He decided we were ready for this gift, so we have one of two ways to respond: Graciously accept it, be more than thrilled and start planning for our little bundle, or worry and complain about the would've, could've, should've. I'm sure you can tell which one we chose ;)

Jake and I had our first doctors appointment today with the gyno I think we are going to use, Dr. Roy. He is based out of a hospital in Rothenburg which is roughly 45 minutes from here. When I first met him, I noticed that he was very nice, spoke relatively good English, and overall seemed to have his head on straight. So I think we have a keeper. Today was the first day that we got to actually see our little nugget! Dr. Roy was able to show us where our baby's head was, how long the body was, and their heartbeat! It was such a neat feeling to actually be seeing the tiny thing inside of me that has been making its presence known SO apparently to me in these past weeks. Unfortunately I haven't gotten out of the morning sickness curse that pregnant woman get, but with me it seems to be even worse. So I have renamed this aweful thing to "All day pregnancy sickness that doesn't even let me throw up but just makes me feel like I really want to ALL day long" I feel like that is more appropriate haha. The sickness mixed with the mood swings, constant feeling of needing to pee, wanting to nap 24/7, and random food cravings every now and I again, our nugget has made it clear that I am in the full swing of this whole pregnancy thing :) 

I know that there are going to be many positives and negatives along this 40 week road, but I also know that the positives WAY out weigh the negatives. Besides, I'm already 1/4 of the way there! All I can ask from you is your constant prayers for our little Baby Smith, that he or she will grow healthy and strong so they can come out and meet all of you!

Things to watch for:

-I will be having another doctors appointment in 3 weeks, where we will hopefully be able to hear the baby's heartbeat for the first time! Then 2-3 weeks after that we will be able to find out if they are going to be a girl or a boy! 

-I will start posting belly pictures every so often so that its like you are here with Jake and I seeing our little bundle grow!

Prayer Requests:
-That little Smith continues to be healthy and strong
-That Duke continues to be well behaved but learns to walk on his leash more easily
-That Jake is able to get everything that he needs for his WOFT packet so that he can move forward to what he really wants to do
-That I start feeling better and less tired, to be able to finish up the last touches of putting our house together


Praises:
-That God has blessed us with a precious little baby on the way
-That Duke has more or less become potty trained, and that his leg that was hurting him is healed
-That Jake was put on a task for the next few weeks that will have him working on the helicopters again rather than doing other random things like he had been doing this past week
-That I get to learn to be a Mommy and carry our baby for the next 7 months

Jake and I couldn't be more excited to tell the world about the start of this next adventure in our life, we hope you're excited too!

Love,
Bethany