Upside down

This little girl is about to have her world turned upside down. Within the course of 1 month, she is going to be getting a little brother, moving away from her "faba" and "dada" (grandpa and grandma) and losing all her dear, dear friends. I pray for divine help in this transition...I think I'm going to need it.

UCSB...

Do the letters U, C, S, and B mean anything to you? They didn't to me either, until today that is. Now they mean a whole world of emotional change and general upheaval in the near future.

UCSB = University of California Santa Barbara

UCSB now also = Andrew's new job and our new home

Andrew was just hired as the new head baseball coach at UCSB. You can read more about it here.

We are very excited about and grateful for this opportunity and are optimistic about the way this new path will change our lives and our future. At the same time we are so sad to be leaving our friends and family in Oregon and to be leaving Oregon in general.

I can't quite comprehend it all yet.

I mean, not to complicate things, but remember that I am having a baby in 9 days...give or take a few! I can't travel now, and am planning on being fairly useless to the world for a while after the baby comes, so I think it is going to be a bit of a process for us to actually get moved and settled in.

I hear Santa Barbara is a beautiful place. Unfortunately, everyone else apparently already knew this and housing/living is a tad on the expensive side. So, when you come visit us, don't be surprised to find us living in a yurt. If we're lucky.

On a separate note, here are pictures from our recent trip to the Oregon Coast with Grandma and Grandpa Checketts and cousin Jordan. Amelia had so much fun and it was one of those pure joy moments of motherhood. She was running, squealing and laughing the entire time. She ran straight into the freezing cold water every chance she got...and pretty much didn't ever want to come out. The only problem was if her feet were in the freezing cold water, that meant mom's feet were too! But it was so worth it to see her so happy and to have so much fun together. Love these moments.

Amelia loved having cousin Jordan around and he was so good with her. Wish we lived close to all our family so that we could share many more moments like this.

Flying a kite with Grandpa.

She now walks around the house signing "hi, hi, hi-a-hight" to the tune of "let's go fly a kite" (from Mary Poppins)

Awesome pregnancy comment of the week:

"WOW! Your stomach is sooooo big! You must have eaten a lot for dinner!"

Luckily this person is only 3 years old. She still has a few more years to get away with comments like this.