Emerald city-licious.

Greetings from Seattle! Spens and I buzzed up here for a quick trip so he could take an exam at the federal building for a position with the government and except for about 25 extremely panicked minutes earlier this morning (explanation forthcoming), it's been a lovely trip. I've been to Seattle many times and Spens and I hit most of the touristy spots just last fall on our honeymoon, so I'm not sure what I'll do during his test but for now I'm hanging out in the Seattle Public Library. It's pretty much the coolest/freakiest/trip-on-shroomiest public library you'll ever visit.

Spens and I stayed at the University Inn near the University of Washington because a) we found a good discount rate online, b) it offered free parking (hard to come by in Seattle) and c) it offered a free shuttle into downtown Seattle, meaning more free parking. Budget luxuries baby, that's how we roll.

As life often goes, circumstances conspired against us and Spenser ALMOST missed his test this morning. Yeah, yiiiiiiiiiiiikes. Spenser and I had both independently checked the address and the shuttle drop off locations to make sure we would make it to the vicinity with time to spare...but when the shuttle dropped us off we plugged the address of the test location into our phones and it said we were 15 miles away - 22 minutes by car! I started hyperventilating and yelling 'we need to get a cab!!' like a crazy person, while Spens suggested we walk to the location we had originally identified (before our phones deceived us) and check it out. We had about a half an hour to spare at this point, so in my mind, there was zero time to try both. It was either walk to that place or get a cab to the mysterious place our phones wanted us to be. We decided to walk.

We were scurrying down to 2nd Avenue and it was slow going so finally I just told Spenser to run ahead. He shot off and I continued to waddle down in his general direction until he called and told me he FOUND it - his initial instincts were totally on and he was there just in the nick of time. Scary! It would have been a huge bummer to miss the test just because of a logistical snafu like this when we had saved and put up the monies for gas/accommodations. I'm sort of conflicted as to whether or not I now hate or worship the Google navigation app on my phone. It wanted us to go in some totally different direction and could have totally wrecked the trip. But on the other hand, without the panic it instilled in us I don't think Spenser would have made it to the right building on time. The DeLongs are fasting for him today so that must be what pulled us through the confusion!

Have a lovely day, wherever you are.

Pregnancy, so far.

Hi all, a quick update: Things are going well on the DeLong front. We are just working away (and in Spenser's case, schooling away) and prepping for a fun summer! Today marks 26 weeks of pregnancy. That's just over halfway, for those unfamiliar with gestational timing lingo, but I sort of feel like I have been pregnant forever already. (Pregnant women everywhere who know what is ahead of me in the third trimester are laughing. I surely deserve it.)

The first six months, in a nutshell:

Month 1: Experience strange physical changes. Get suspicious when the monthly visitor fails to arrive, and pee on a stick. Try to convince your husband this is really happening. Throw an epic tantrum in the Bi-Mart space heater aisle when he says he'll believe it after you visit the doctor...in two months.

Month 2: Become a hormonal, raging vomit machine so horrific that even the creators of The Exorcist couldn't dream you up. Become convinced that the baby now has every imaginable birth defect because you can't get a prenatal vitamin down. Settle into comfortable denial by reassuring yourself that a large McDonald's fry has 200% of the daily recommended value of folic acid.

Month 3: Read lots of weekly pregnancy summaries on Babycenter, where the size of the fetus is repeatedly compared to various exotic fruits you've never seen before. Adjust to the idea of impending motherhood. Begin to notice dark bags under the eyes of child-toting women in public.

Month 4: Poke your still squishy abdomen daily and wonder when you'll transition from looking fifteen-or-so pounds heavier to decidedly pregnant. Watch The Business of Being Born and simultaneously feel both intensely empowered by your gestational superpowers and hugely guilty for planning on an epidural.

Month 5: The fun stuff: Learn the sex of the baby, see her recognizably human outline moving around on the ultrasound, feel her first movements and rolls inside of you, settle on a name. Buy your first baby outfit, display it somewhere visible in the apartment.

Month 6: Explode in size. Seriously, become humongous and unmistakeably pregnant practically overnight. Attempt (and fail) to understand how your uterus can now be the size of a soccer ball, but the baby still only weighs about a pound, and wonder - in fear - where the other 7 pounds will go.

Six months down, three to go! :)

An auspicious birth.

Last weekend at a stake closet swap event I attended on behalf of our ward's young women, I met Brother Fei - a mainland Chinese guy in our stake. Of course I had to inflict my ever regressing Mandarin conversation skills upon him in not-so-veiled hopes of securing an invite for hot pot. When he learned I was pregnant, his eyes got big and he exclaimed: "Year of the dragon! This is very lucky!"

Since leaving Taiwan, I've totally lost track of the Chinese zodiac but it would appear that, in fact, our little lady will arrive in the luckiest, most success-producing year (according to Chinese tradition) of the zodiac! Unlike many Chinese parents, Spens and I didn't plan it that way but given that our Chinese surname is Long 龍 - "dragon" - it does seem particularly auspicious. :)

22 weeks old.

A little lady.

{Click here to see more ultrasound pictures}

Spenser and I had so much fun going in last week to take a second (updated) look at our little lady! At eight weeks, she didn't look like much yet (she was affectionately known as "Alien Shrimp"), but now all of the anatomy is in place and from now on she just gets bigger and bigger! The doctor said everything looks typical and healthy...we are stoked!

Exciting news.

Hello all - as you've probably already assumed from the above photo (or perhaps you already knew, I think most people do by now!), our exciting news is this: We are going to have a baby! To spare everyone a tedious account and hopefully eliminate the excessive use of exclamation points for this VERY exciting (we think, at least) news, I will now proceed to answer all of your questions below in Q&A format.

Q: When did you find out, and when are you due?

A: We found out late last year (beginning of December-ish). My suspicion was aroused with the onset of certain obvious physiological changes, some welcome and some not-so-welcome (don't expect me to elaborate; that's what WebMD is for). An at-home pregnancy test and subsequent 8-week ultrasound confirmed the fact, although sometimes I still wonder if I am, in fact on the receiving end of an incredibly elaborate practical joke that ends with Jimmy Kimmel popping out from behind the corner with a camera crew to reveal the stunt. But I'm pretty sure it's for real.

The baby is due August 7th, 2012. That could get moved up or pushed out in a few weeks after the docs take a look at the next ultrasound and gauge the baby's development. So, as of this posting we are about 18 weeks in.

Q: Wow! Are you excited?

A: Yep, we're pretty stoked! Although, I am a hormone casserole and alternate several times on any given day between the extremes of this-is-the-coolest-thing-ever and what-the-&$!#-is-going-on.

A: How are you feeling?

Q: Thanks for asking, that's very kind of you. LIKE CRAP. Haha, just kidding. No, what am I saying - not even kidding. I struggled most at the very beginning with nausea/vomiting, which had me googling every possible remedy and racing around picking them up after work (ginger candies, accupressure bands, you name it - I tried it!) but it was pretty much just miserable. Eventually my ob-gyn put me on Unisom and vitamin B-6; Unisom is a sleep aid, but supposedly the antihistamine in it interacts with the vitamin supplement to suppress nausea. Whatever! It has been working pretty well, as evidenced by how I feel if I forget to take it.

Over the past few weeks, I've really started to feel a lot better but don't tell Spenser because I'm using the discomfort as leverage for back rubs and household chores. :)

Q: Do you know the sex yet? Have you picked a name?

A: We do not yet know the sex, but we will found out in a few weeks at the ultrasound screen. Fingers crossed for a healthy, happy baby! I have a strong suspicion that it's a girl, but we will see...

Yes, we have picked two names (one boy name and one girl name), but we're keeping them under wraps until the little one arrives! Why? Well, partially because it will be a fun surprise for our families (we hope), and partially because when you tell someone a name you like, they tend to offer their opinion, be it critical or supportive. Why not just wait until the baby is here and the ink is dry on the birth certificate to announce it? Then, even the people who don't like it will probably just pretend that they do.

In the meantime, you may refer to the child as "The Fetus." That's what Spenser and I do. Seriously.

Q: Do you have a baby bump?

A: Well...I dunno, not really yet I guess? I definitely have a growing girth but it's a lot squishier than I always thought a baby bump would be. You know what? Let's just say I have a baby bump; I can't think of too many other times in my life I'll be allowed to consume an entire tray of sweet potato fries and blame the subsequent belly bloat on pregnancy, so I'd better take advantage of it now.

Q: Awesome!

A: We'll keep you all posted!

Any other questions? Hit me up in the comments.

Welcome to the fam.

Please excuse this horrible cell phone photo and mysterious blurry hand and join me in congratulating Brad (my brother) & Stephanie on their engagement! We could not possibly be more excited!

Why, you ask, is Stephanie wearing a furry pink crown? Let's just say that if you managed to dominate your future in-laws (including Vince, Brad, and Spenser) in a fierce Hoop Fever free throw playoff at the bowling alley arcade, you would be wearing one, too. This woman is seriously impressive.

Congrats! :)