All posts by ali

catch up #5: late july/early august

love, travelin' moon

We took a vacation to Costa Rica in late July/early August. We had a splendid time! When we booked the trip we had plans to try all kinds of wild adventures like zip-lining, canyoning, repelling waterfalls and the like. But of course when we learned about our pregnancy, we amended our plan and enjoyed less wild adventures such as hiking, beach bumming and sailing. It was still a fabulous trip…

We began our trip in the Arenal Volcano area, where, as you’ll see, there is a large, active volcano – which was right outside the floor-to-ceiling patio window of our first hotel. Amazing to see it’s grandness…

In this area we hiked to a waterfall, explored hanging bridges through a canopy and drove very bumpy roads.
Click right here to view all of our photos of Arenal.

Our second location was in Manuel Antonio, where there is an amazing state park in which to see many animals. It is also very close by some amazing beaches.

We saw sloths, reptiles, butterflies, birds and 3 kinds of monkeys. We loved it!
Click right here to view all of our photos of Manuel Antonio.

The nice thing about our trip (and about Costa Rica) is that it gets dark quite early and so we slept a lot and enjoyed beautiful, clear, early mornings.

I love getting away with R and I hope to do so one more time before Baby K arrives.
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catch up #4: july (two)

family & friends, snapshots, travelin' moon

Toward the end of July we went to Washington for the wedding of Lindsey & Joe! It was in the picturesque Skagit Valley, which neither of us had visited before – we fell in love with it. Just delightful. We also got to see friends, which is always the best.

The wedding was one of our favorite’s ever – such fun!

Here are my two favorite photos I took of Lindsey…

07.29.2011 289

07.29.2011 290

(The tongue out photo was actually on the list of important photos for the day – we got it!)

The reception had this amazing view of the mountain in the background, which made for lovely photos. I also think I have a cute husband, but I realize I’m biased…

IMG_9524


Here is a link to all the photos I took. (Sadly, I have none of the amazing reception – I was having fun and dancing!)

Congratulations to Lindsey & Joe! We love you.
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baby ultrasound: from almost 12 weeks

baby k

I finally took a picture of our 11 weeks, 6 days ultrasound photo…

How amazing to fall in love with s/he from this picture and video. I know millions of other parents have experienced this, but wow. I just can’t believe that’s our baby!

I wasn’t able to upload the video R took at this ultrasound directly, so click right here if you want to watch. You can see Baby K move a couple of times around 1 minute…yay!

I am now 14 weeks and I do still feel icky in frequent waves and I’m getting really tired of it. I have to eat in order to get rid of the sick feeling which makes me fear I’m over-eating. I feel so “soft” and puffy, like I’ve eaten too much burrito in one sitting. I’m ready for a baby bump now.

I have my first “pregnancy brain” moment to share…

I was driving to work, running slightly late for my morning meeting, so I called my co-worker to tell her I was just one block away. I was stopped at a stop light talking on my headset and when we said goodbye, instead of hanging up the phone, I TURNED OFF THE CAR. Pah ha ha. I realized it immediately and all was well, but I mean, come on! And I sense it’s only going to get worse.
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catch up #3: July (one)

family & friends, snapshots

Since my parents moved to Southern California late last year we’ve really enjoyed being able to see them quite regularly. It’s like they’ve become our favorite weekend friends. They love to explore and I love that they invite us to go along so often because we’ve explored local communities more than ever.

In July we went to visit Ventura, a beach community North of LA County (where my Dad works on Fridays, actually). We had lunch at the Ventura Harbor and wandered around to explore the shops and the coast. It is lovely…

Here we are posing under the sea:

we: under the sea

And my parents as pirates:

pirate parents

And then, the beautiful shore…

Ventura Beach

What fun!

On separate occasions, we’ve also explored Santa Barbara, Long Beach and Seal Beach, but I did not take any pictures. I must get better about that.
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catch up #2: oh baby!

baby k, pregnancy

Our biggest news is that we are going to have a baby! Yes, I am pregnant (currently 13 weeks) with Baby Kozoll (currently the size of a peach).


*photo not to scale 😉

We feel incredibly grateful that Baby K came to us so quickly and easily – it was just over a month after we decided to go for it that the pregnancy test indicated “positive” and I was 5 weeks pregnant. We found out on June 11th and I left for New York City the next morning for two weeks. Talk about a crazy way for R and I to process the news – separately.

Once I returned to LA and we were able to process our news together, things got exciting. And then I got sick. Morning-noon-night sickness was upon me and I was so unhappy. I survived on sourdough toast, glasses of milk and cereal for weeks. I did enjoy the occasional salad or fruit slices. I had to eat to ease the nausea, but eating sounded awful – it was a struggle and I was rollin’ into work late every day, at like 10:30, sometimes 11am because I just couldn’t get out of bed in the morning. Ew. Now, I still have some nausea if I don’t eat enough and the sickness practically disappears when I have to get on a plane to go somewhere (Washington State, Costa Rica). But it’s back now that I’m home and I just hope against hope it goes away within a week or so. R has been simply the best through my ickiness – bringing me nibbles when I need them and not getting annoyed when I say “I don’t feel well” for the 10th time in an hour. He’s the best.

Baby Kozoll is doing great! We’ve had 2 ultrasounds (7 weeks and 11 weeks), both on track and lookin’ good. The first ultrasound photo looked like a shapeless blob, but I did see the healthy little heartbeat.
Here is baby’s first photo…

R was able to attend the 2nd ultrasound with me and we were floored and thrilled to see an amazing baby-like image. We saw arms, legs and what I thought was a nose. R already demonstrated what kind of Dad he’s going to be, because when that image of Baby K popped onto the screen he immediately pulled out his iPhone and started shooting video. He got this awesome little video of the baby moving when the doc pressed the ultrasound tool into my belly. Whoa! We fell instantly in love with our little one who, at the time, was somewhere between the size of a fig and lime. I’ll post the video soon.

I am so happy to finally be able to share our news widely now that we’re moving into the 2nd trimester, but really!? I’m 2nd trimester pregnant? Wow.

All the grandparents are excited. My dad is already planning to build a playhouse in his backyard (he’s pretty stoked). We are more than grateful to feel a lot of support and love in this new adventure.

We go back for our 20 week ultrasound on September 20th, which we hope will reveal whether we’re having Baby Boy K, or Baby Girl K, but mostly just looking forward to seeing another glimpse of our child and learning that all the anatomy looks healthy.

Baby Kozoll is due February 11, 2012!
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