Attack of the Butterflies

This past weekend Celia and Sean drove up to visit. Friday night we went out to dinner to a restaurant in Burlingame on a street well known for its cute & little restaurants, afterwards we enjoyed some frozen yogurt at Yogurtouille. On Sunday we headed to Golden Gate Park (the Central Park of San Francisco) to visit the Conservatory of Flowers. 

The Conservatory of Flowers was having a special exhibit of butterflies. We enjoyed roaming around the room with butterflies softly fluttering through the humid air. Sean made a "friend" who wanted to hitch-hike his way out the the real world...so Sean squashed him--just kidding :)

After the butterfly exhibit, we enjoyed a few hours of Free Comedy Day in the park. Under the overcast sky we spread out a blanket on the grass and set up camp, it was quite chilly so we huddled together to stay warm. Most of the comedians were locals or unknowns, but Hal Sparks (of Talk Soup and Dude Where's My Car fame) made a special appearance. Most of the comedians were quite entertaining, but Hal Sparks definitely stole the show.

We then enjoyed lunch at Pluto's in the Sunset District (which is where we first lived when me moved to SF) and, of course, had a small dessert at Tart to Tart. Mmmmmmm....

WI visit

The pregnancy bandwagon...Here I am with two of my friends from high school, Hayley and Michelle--all pregnant at the same time!  some more than others :)

John and I went home last weekend to WI for a collection of events:  my grandma's birthday which we celebrated at my parents' house with dinner and a pontoon boat ride on the lake, John's cousin's wedding in Oshkosh where we got to hang out with his side of the family (including our sister-in-law who is also pregnant), and Hayley's baby shower!  

It was a jam packed weekend as always, but also as always, lots of fun.  Here's a shot of the "high school" girls that attended Hayley's shower.  We had a great time hanging out after the shower and catching up.

Our Little Miracle

That's right....we're PREGNANT!!!

For those of you who don't know, Cheyenne had some fertility issues (or so she thought) due to episodes of ruptured ovarian cysts and subsequent pelvic/tubal adhesions and for the past 14 years has wondered if she'd ever be able to have her own children.  After a few months of diligently charting her cycle, a dye test to see how blocked the tubes were, and lots of praying and hoping, we decided to start trying.  

We're calling him/her our "little miracle" because after all of that, Cheyenne got pregnant on the very first try!  Cheyenne got the first positive pregnancy test on 9/7, the morning we were going out of town for our anniversary.  After blinking about 50 times to make sure she wasn't seeing things (the line was very faint), she ran out to the store while John was in the shower and bought a baby name book and a little baby outfit to put in a bag with the pregnancy test for John's "anniversary" gift.  :)  Then it was a waiting game for a couple weeks, but after an ultrasound yesterday to confirm he/she was growing in the right place, it's official!  We are thrilled.  So I guess we have officially jumped on the baby bandwagon.  

Cheyenne is 6.5 weeks pregnant, which for those of you who haven't entered this world yet, means that the baby is 4.5 weeks old.  It's only 3mm long and still has a tail, but it has a heartbeat, which we got to see on the ultrasound.  In the picture, you'll see a dark circle, and the tiny little dot in the middle of that is the baby.  The estimated arrival of baby Heltemes will be May 18th.  So yes, he/she will be born in CA, but we plan on bringing him/her home to WI permanently next October.  Watch for the 1 year countdown for moving to appear soon!  We know there is good reason not to share the news until the first trimester is over, but neither of us is good at keeping secrets, so please keep our little one in your thoughts and prayers!

Here are the ultrasound photos:

Chipmunks, Coyotes, & Bears...Oh My!

Over the weekend, we drove 4.5 hours southeast to Sequoia National Park to enjoy the wilderness. Sequoia National Park, which borders Kings Canyon National Park, is known for its meadows, wildlife, and, of course, the gargantuan Sequoia trees. We arrived on Saturday afternoon, but Celia and Sean had been there since Friday night. It was a "Welcome to California" camping trip for Sean; he has officially moved here. After we set up camp, we cooked dinner (Mmmmmm...hotdogs) under the starry sky illuminated by the full moon. That is when we had our first unwanted "visitor"--a coyote stopped in to see if we had any leftover S'mores. 

After an attempt at sleeping, we awoke to a chilly but beautiful morning. We drove towards Moro Rock, our first trail of the day, and came across another "visitor", a black bear. He walked straight towards our car and veered off onto the shoulder. Sean got a few great photos of him. After the road was clear we were able to climb Moro Rock.

Throughout the remainder of the weekend we saw General Sherman's Tree, Tharp Log, 

Tunnel Log, General Grant's Tree (the nation's Christmas tree), and Panoramic Point (views of Kings Canyon--the forest version of the Grand Canyon, and deeper than it in some areas). 

Spa-tacular!

This past weekend, we drove north, past Napa valley, to the quaint town of Calistoga. Calistoga is known for their mineral water springs and spa treatments. Surprisingly, Calistoga is also home to the "Worlds Largest Petrified Forest" and "California's Old Faithful"; which, of course, we visited.  The geyser place also had these "fainting goats" that Cheyenne fed.  The goats don't actually faint, I guess they have some genetic mutation where their body freezes up when they get scared, and they just fall over.  Interesting.  I thought we should test out that theory, but Cheyenne wouldn't let me.  

The second day we got up and enjoyed a couples massage followed by showers in the mineral spring water.  We then took our time heading back home through the wine country stopping in the little towns for shopping and snacking.   A great weekend to finish celebrating our anniversary!

Happy Anniversary!

We're celebrating our 2nd wedding anniversary this week!  Over Labor Day weekend we had a lot of little stuff to do--playing catch up with errands, chores, and work stuff in anticipation that the next few months were going to get real crazy around here.  John has had the summer off, but his MBA classes resumed this week, and Cheyenne is taking one more massage therapy course this semester (2 nights/wk) so she can finish what she started before physical therapy school and sit for the national exam.  After 2 years of working as a PT, Cheyenne is also now a "clinical instructor" for an intern for the next 8 weeks at work.  So needless to say, we didn't do too much anniversary celebrating over Labor Day weekend.  We did manage to get out and enjoy one lunch at a Greek Festival to reminisce about our honeymoon in Greece....ahh, the memories.

On our actual anniversary, the 3rd, which happened to be a Wednesday this year, we didn't even see each other!  John left for work before Cheyenne got up, and then Cheyenne had her class right after work and when she got home at 11pm, John was in bed.  But Cheyenne did have a nice surprise at work that day...beautiful flowers!  Here's Sienna EATING them...

And here is Sienna's all-time favorite pose.  She's so lady like!!  In the last couple weeks you can find her pretty much in this pose 24/7, we think because we've been having a heat wave, and she's trying to cool off :)

You know us though, we couldn't let our anniversary go without using it as an excuse to travel...so this weekend, we are heading north a couple hours to a town called Calistoga (north of Napa) to finish celebrating.  We'll post more when we get back!

Rockin' and Rollin'

Last night, I was laying in bed watching a movie when the bed starting to move gently. I just thought that the cat was playing around underneath or had jumped up on the bed. Nope, she was laying at my feet. Then it clicked...EARTHQUAKE!!  I walked out to the living room and Cheyenne was sitting straight up on the couch, she had felt it too.  Sienna had assumed her typical earthquake pose as well--back arched, nails dug into the carpet.  Yep, we had an earthquake last night. It was a 4.2 magnitude, about 40 miles east of here. 

Not only that, but it has been bloody hot here. Not the usual constant 70 degree temperatures. I am talking 90's. That is way too hot for me now that I am acclimated to the 60 to 70 degree range.