Another exciting week

At youth camp this week! I have officially decided that Little K will not have a boring first summer next year :)

Let our lives begin.....

Our lives were kinda on hold the last two years while I was finishing school, but now let them continue :) Mike has already commented on how different I seem.

 So yes, thank you for your prayers Tuesday as I took my boards. I was nervous but not as nervous as I thought I would be. I ended up taking 103 questions before the computer shut off. From that moment till when I found out my results I was a walking zombie. I had myself convinced that I didn't pass (it was a hard test!) I kept looking up questions that I could remember. I'm never a patient person, but goodness the waiting was horrible!!! I knew that my results would be posted at 3:00 am Thursday. So we tried to sleep. Mike had all intentions of staying up but ended up falling asleep about 1:30. I woke up at 3:25 am and slowly got out of bed. As I opened my laptop my hands were shaking so badly it was very hard to type, I've never been so nervous before! Finally, I saw my name listed under active registered nurses in Oklahoma and begin crying and sprinting back to our room to wake Mike up! What a great feeling!!!! I just feel like my life it beginning because I'm finally living my dream, I'm finally doing exactly what God has created me to do! Becoming an RN has been a lifelong dream and I'm glad to finally say......CHECK! Thank you Lord! I start work July 6. Just in time for 3 weeks and then.....Hawaii!!!!!

So, with my added free time to my life I have been......SLEEPING! I'm not sure it it's my body has just crashed because it's been under so much stress these last few years or sweet little K is growing a ton, but I can't get enough sleep! 12 hours last night and a 2 hour nap today, life is good :) I did accomplish a large task of cleaning out the refrigerator today. I feel like it's a new fridge, it looks so good.

Sweet baby K is now 12 weeks old! He/she is the size of a lime (a little over 2 inches long). It's little fingers are beginning to open and close, his toes will curl, his eye muscles will clench, and his mouth will make sucking movements! I promise to post pictures as soon as you can tell there is a hump. There is hump but the my shirt often hides it. How we can't wait to meet our little one!!!!!!

Ashley Kaelber RN (has a nice ring to it)!!!!!!

It's 3:30 am and I just found out I'm an official registered nurse, I passed!!!!!!! :) AWWWWW!!!!

Prayers are accepted

Tomorrow I will be sitting for my nursing boards! I'm excited that nursing the school part is almost to an end but also OH SO NERVOUS to take this test! When I pass I will be an official Registered Nurse and be able to begin my Labor & Delivery job at the hospital. I'm needing to drive to Oklahoma City for it due to Tulsa being booked for a few more weeks. So Mike & I are driving down today, we have a hotel just a couple minutes from the testing center. At 8:00 am tomorrow I will begin. The test could be as long as 6 hours with 75-265 questions. So for sure I'll be done by 2. Please pray that the Lord will honor my studying, I'll bring glory to Him though this test, I'll be calm, morning sickness will not in anyway make it's presence, and I'll be able to recall information. I keep telling myself that I'm much better off then most taking this test because I have two brains (thanks to baby Kaelber) taking it as opposed to just one :) How I love my baby! Hopefully by Thursday morning we will all know the results of this exam :)

Wet happy pups :)

The summer is always hard on the pups because of the intense heat! We will usually do one fun thing with them daily though. That one thing is usually a 9:00 pm walk around the neighborhood (when it's only 87 degrees outside as opposed to 100!). Yesterday they got to do their favorite thing......they went SWIMMING!!!!! Yes, we are the greatest! :)

Gunner is more of a wader and Trig is the swimmer. Gunner waits for Trig to come back to touching area and then.....

.......pounces!

It was HOT out but with Sonic drinks in hand we survived and the boys slept the rest of the day. Well it's off to study for one of the last times :)

You knit me together in my mother's womb

"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made, your works are wonderful, I know that full well." Psalm 139:13-14

This verse has been running through my mind all day today as we were able to see little Kaelber for the first time today!!!! And let me tell you, this baby could be the cutest baby ever! So the ultrasound started and immediately we could pick our baby out because little one was using my uterus as a gymnastic gym and bouncing everywich way! We were able to pick out babies fingers, toes, legs, body everything! Just to think at only 1 inch long, their body is formed. I lay ed there crying and Mike stood as if in a trance staring at the screen. He even apologised at dinner tonight for not being more in tune to me during the ultrasound because he just couldn't take his eye's off our baby. But little Kaelber is healthy, strong heartbeat and just PERFECT! Due date is still on for January 6th! We had so much fun at the doctor's office. We love our doctor. He's very personable, knowledgeable and we just felt very cared for while being there. We have 2 pictures of sweet baby and the goal was to get them on this blog, but we are running into some troubles doing that. Hopefully tomorrow!

We are just praising the Lord right now for this creation that He's creating at this very minute in me! After seeing little one, it really puts how I'm feeling into perspective. Instead of just feeling crummy, now I get to feel crummy while holding a picture of why I'm feeling crummy and how worth it it is! Goodness though, I just don't know if we can wait 6 more months! We want little Kaelber here now :) Our prayer is that the Lord will continue to grow this little one strong, healthy and beautiful!

A weekend of weddings

We are glad to say we are home now for 2 full weeks (minus a quick overnight to OKC next week)! We had such a great time being home in Iowa though for the weekend. It was so fun to be able to celebrate in the joy of my uncle's wedding and my cousins wedding.

Please excuse this picture, I'm still figuring out this blogging thing and not sure how to flip it. Anyways, I love this pic of all the Wilhelm girls consisting of aunts, cousins, mom and grandma :)

At wedding #2 I got to spend lots of time with my adorable niece, Laycee. Here we are enjoying dinner together. This girl moves so quick. I took my eye's off of her for a minute and when I re-focused on her she had found my dinner and claimed it as hers as it was combined on her plate :)

There was a great pond outside of where my uncle's wedding was, which is where all the kids would sneak off to. My cousin, Caleb, caught this huge bullfrog and brought it up to the door. You could tell the wedding was a cause of frustration for the kids because they were in their "nice" clothes and couldn't get as dirty as they wanted. However, the second the ceremony was over Caleb was down to his undershirt and pants rolled and having the time of his life.

The happy couple! Their wedding was quaint, beautiful, totally them, and totally perfect! We are so glad to have you in our family, Lindsey. The Wilhelm name is a good name to carry!

Gunner & Trig got to meet their very first cousin, Trooper! Trig loved him so much that he left him with a very sweet love scar (Even though his mom, Kristin, may think differently). They love Iowa!

Great weekend, but we are so glad to be home!

Iowa here we come

I don't feel like we stay in one place for very long, especially in the summer. Tomorrow we leave for Iowa for a few days to help celebrate my uncle's wedding and my cousins wedding. It's crazy because they both are getting married the same day and they are on different sides of the family. We can't complain because it allows us to go to both. So the plan is to leave tomorrow after Mike gets home from work and pull into CR late tomorrow night :)

This week Mike & I have been busy with our youth missions trip. This is the second year we've done it here in Bartlesville. We started Sunday night and will end tonight. We all stay at the church & in the morning head out to serve the 'Ville. I've learned a lot about myself this week... my body is not my own anymore! These overnights usually do make me tired, but this week I've experienced a tired I've never known before. So I've been sneaking away during the afternoons and getting some much needed rest. I'm trying & learning how to not feel guilty for this. I have really missed not being with the teens as much as I could. I feel guilty for not being able to help Mike out like I always have been. But, this is a new season that is uncharted territory for Mike & I. We are so excited to be having a baby, it's just already at 9 weeks and 6 days along that we learning a little on how life will be different and just learning how to go with the flow. It has been great having our teens kinda "come along" on this pregnancy thing with us. This week some of the boys have started having questions for me. My favorite was from Matthew. We were in the kitchen together, he mumbled something at me and I told him, "I didn't hear you" Matthew: "Oh never mind" Me: "No, please ask me your question" Matthew: "I just wanted to know, um..., well..., is it weird knowing your growing another human in you?" Lots of questions like that, that I just love! Oh, and the teens had a great idea (well they thought it was great at least), they think the youth group should name our baby! So they've been thinking up names all week :) How sweet are they ;) They are all going to be such great big friends to our little Kaelber!

A long weekend with friends in Denver :)

This marks the 5th year this group has gotten together somewhere in the country! And goodness how Mike & I always look forward to it every year. It's fun to think that the group started with 5 "human" members and has now evolved to 9 human heart beats (Counting little Kaelber of course)! I have an inkling that growth will be happening yearly for the next many years ahead :) I'll explain the weekend through pictures below:

One of our many fancy feasts...steak kabobs! So good!

Heather & Elaine surprised me with my first baby shower! The afternoon was spent just us girls, eating Coldstone Ice Cream, opening gifts and shopping! What a blessing to have such close friends in my life.

This was exactly what Gunner was waiting for, his little friend!

Our campsite has a fun little marina just a short walk away where we paddle boated and watch the pups swim in the freezing cold mountain water.

J&E took off early which left us 4 to explore mountains. This picture proudly displays us on the summit of Mt. Evans which it's claim to fame is one of the fourteeners!

We just LOVE Colorado! I actually found myself a few times yelling, "I love Colorado!"



Fun times hanging out at the campsite.


So funny! Can you see Trig swimming away? Well this pic was snapped after he tried climbing onto their boat. Poor guy hung on for a few minutes to their boat desperately wanting to go with them before he heard me calling him back to shore. At one point I thought I was going to have to swim after him because he was so exhausted swimming back.

The beauty of the mountains is just incredible! It made us think so many times that it took the Lord only 6 days to create this majestic beauty and has sense been creating Heaven! We serve a God that loves us more than we will ever imagine!

It was such a great weekend! We love the openness and freeness we get to experience with our friends. Every ending is always sad but being able to look forward to next year is just so exciting! California 2011.....here we come! :)