Guess What? - Page 2 - Wild Texas Forums: Parks, Travel & Recreation

Shannon · 09-21-2006, 02:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by copuswalker

No no, Go ahead please. I think it is a riot

Just shows how times are different and that is not always a bad thing. You do what you want to enjoy your event.
I was really just pulling your leg!!

hehe... No problem. Justin and I are geeks, so we freely admit we're geeked about our new "project". Just be glad we nicknamed the baby Sprout and not Beta or Version 2.0. :yes:

The Internet is really a tremendous resource when it comes to something like pregnancy. I get a weekly newsletter with information and basic medical drawings of what the baby (fetus) looks like at that stage of development. I follow some forums where all the gals participating are due the same week I am. I am preregistered with the hospital and can select classes for later in our pregnancy, all online. And apparently large hospital nursery's take photos of the newborns (at parent's approval, I presume) and post them online in a weekly gallery.

Heck, my youngest niece and nephew both had websites registered and online before they were born!

Yes, even having a baby has gone high tech, apparently!

You guys with get LOTS of laughter at our expense, I assure you... especially when the little one comes along and we're scrambling to remember what life was like before there was a little bundle of NEED waiting for our assistance every minute of the day.

copuswalker · 09-22-2006, 08:36 AM

Welll guess my 25 year old son is amongst the ranks of the techno geeks. He is engaged and has a web site leading to the wedding. I will spare you all the details.
Guess I have really fallen behind?:confused:

Shannon · 09-22-2006, 08:40 AM

Hehe... we had a wedding website too, in 1998. Had to -- we met online, after all (in 1988, before the Internet!)

Geeks, I tell you!

happybooker1 · 09-22-2006, 12:33 PM

Shannon, I joined one of those web lists (women due the same month as me) back in '96 when I was PG with my son. Do you know we STILL have the list going, even tho the numbers are drastically reduced (and so is the volume of messages!)?

I count these families I have 'known' for 10 years as some of my best friends. We have gone from discussing birth (natural, with midwives, home, to fully drugged) breastfeeding, co-sleeping, potty-training, to kindergarten (full vs. 1/2 day) to just now 'what is too much homework for 4th grade?' We have met each other at various places, talk about vacations, agonized with each other, gone through siblings' births, etc.

If you find a good list/people stay on it! You will get a lot of enjoyment out of it!!

Cube · 09-24-2006, 05:56 PM

Shannon and Justin,

May you have a wonderful pregnancy and healthy birth. Thanks for sharing your joy with us.

All the best!

Shannon · 10-02-2006, 05:48 PM

We're back from our 7 day vacation in Colorado's beautiful, beautiful and again, most beautiful, Rocky Mountain National Park. We hiked about 17 miles over 6 days, which isn't too shabby for a 3.5 month pregnant gal who hasn't hiked in ages (and missed it terribly), much less one who's used to the sea level of San Antonio, vs. the 9000 to 12,500 foot elevation all the hikes were at.

Photos will be posted as soon as I can dig out from the mounds of dirty laundry we created, as well as the hefty collection of spam in my inbox and junk mail now covering the island in our kitchen.

We had a splendid time, and if it weren't for the little detail that I'll be either delivering or about to deliver our first-born in March/April 2007, I'd soooooo want to return in the winter/spring to go snowshoeing. I've never snoeshoed but very much want to -- to me it combines the best of hiking with the pristine beauty and quietude of winter. Justin's gone snowshoeing twice in Colorado with his brother, and due to work and school committments at the time, I missed out on both trips.

We got to see some hefty snowfall up above treeline on Trail Ridge Road the second day of our visit -- they'd just opened the roadway 10 minutes prior to our arrival, and the snowplow's work was evident. We got to play in the snow a bit on the roadway pull-offs... (we didn't traipse around on the tundra like some... sigh... it takes 100-500 years for tundra vegetation to grow just an inch or two, and that's without being smashed by a boot or shoe.) The park was crowded on weekends since the elk are bugling and the aspen are at peak, and Estes Park had its "Elk Fest" the last two days of our visit, and while I love everything about the park I love the moments before sunrise and late at night, when the bulk of crowds are nowhere to be seen, more. Can't wait to return with our little Sprout sometime, maybe with Justin's brother and his two children -- we could introduce our favorite park to the next generation together.

Glad to be home and in our comfortable bed, near clean restrooms with no lines (very important to a pregnant lady, as I have quickly learned!), and back with our three cats who are a little psycho right now after being left alone for a week... they're spoiled, since they had daily check-ins by family, but are very set in their routines and get manic when anything changes it.

Anyway, I'll post a thread here later with a synopsis and a link to more of our photos.

In the meantime, here's a small gallery of the photos we shared with family while we were on the trip:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/93349443@N00/?saved=1

ploddinTod · 10-03-2006, 12:03 PM

Those were some awesome photos, Shannon. Alberta Falls looks so different from when we were there in mid-July. Did you make it all the way back to the third lake (Emerald) from the Bear Lake trailhead?

My avatar pic was snapped from a lunch spot boulder on the shore of Emerald Lake.

With Southwest Airlines now back in the Denver market, the fare wars with Frontier can only benefit us Rocky Mountain NP travelers.

We also stayed at a place on the Fall River (4 Seasons Inn). While not quite as close to the Fall River entrance to the park, the property's ambience of being on the river was superb.

Shannon · 10-03-2006, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ploddinTod

Those were some awesome photos, Shannon. Alberta Falls looks so different from when we were there in mid-July. Did you make it all the way back to the third lake (Emerald) from the Bear Lake trailhead?

Yes, in fact, we did. We hiked to Dream Lake twice during our visit. The stretch of trail from Dream Lake to Emerald Lake was closed during most of the week we were there (Sept. 24 - Oct. 1), including that first Dream Lake hike, due to helicopter operations. We have some photos of a really funky, alpine-adapted helicopter the NPS is using to ferry in tons of trail materials (crushed rock, sand, etc.) to Emerald Lake and several other trails they're upgrading to be more sustainable.

On our last full day in the park, we hiked to Dream Lake again and despite the helicopter operations signage still being up the Dream Lake -> Emerald Lake trail was open. It's awesome! We hiked to Emerald back in 1999 and remember it being a bit of a rock scramble and "choose-your-own-route" in places. Now? It's an impossible to miss, scenic trip amidst towering boulders and along a small stream on a sustainable crushed granite footpath. Good vertical ascent, with steps built into the ground with logs and/or natural rock formations being utilized in steep/erosion-prone areas; there's also a small log bridge, and perhaps a few other stream crossings that may be put in (trail's still receiving some work, as evidenced by the shovels and picks we saw propped behind a large pine.) Good views of Hallet's Peak on approach. This trail will accommodate more pedestrian traffic and protect the land better than the old trail, which is now closed and slowly going to be put through the process of revegetation.

Shannon · 11-02-2006, 12:27 AM

I spent much of yesterday (Tuesday) playing with our October 26th ultrasound video in ULead Video Studio (a video editing program) — adding a title screen and music, and slowing the video playback a bit so it’s somewhat easier to see the baby’s movements and body structure.

The resulting video looks best on DVD, of course, since one doesn’t have to edit the video to fit any arbitrary length and file size limits. However, I wanted to share it online so family outside of San Antonio, and friends whom I don’t see regularly, could view the video if they wished.

The YouTube.com link to the ultrasound video is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmtKTx6Dj3c

I went ahead and made it public for the time being, since I wanted to make it available to the ladies on my BabyCenter.com "birth board" (women expecting babies in April 2007).

I may lock it down pretty quickly depending on how weirded out I get that I couldn't obscure the top line of the ultrasound, which I do as a matter of course in all still image copies of ultrasounds.

I hope you enjoy! Justin and I are just so in awe that there's a new human soul growing inside me, and that we got to see her again. She's already beautiful to us in every way!

rockhill · 11-02-2006, 08:37 AM

Pretty neat video and great music choice. Makes me wish that that technology was available back in the dark ages when our sons were born. No sonograms and you did not know what you got till they arrived. My but a lot has changed