South Carolinians!

That's our family now! All my life I've been an Oregonian and now here I am, trying to adjust to a new culture, accent, weather climate and life as a South Carolinian.

We flew here October 1st and have slowly been starting over as we set up "life" here. At this point, we're living with Joel's parents in Summerville, SC (a suburb of Charleston). They've graciously given us their upstairs with two guestrooms and a bathroom all to ourselves. We've already rearranged furniture and bought some things to "settle" in as much as we can at this point.

We've actually only been here for a week and a day. Joel and I got new cell phones already, his is an iphone and I must say that I am completely jealous and happy for him at the same time. I've often teased him that he's always had a "jr. high" version of a cell phone when we were in Slovenia. It made phone calls and sent text messages, but that was about it. My phone actually didn't do much more than that either, but it looked better! : )

Well, now it's flipped! Literally! I now have a flip-phone that pretty much only does phone calls and Joel has the full package iphone! He's loving it and every day points out some new amazement of what his "phone" can do! I'm happy that on Sunday's now he can watch his football and check up on his fantasy league right there on his phone, leaving me the laptop! : ) Everyone wins!

His phone has come in really handy so far, especially the GPS app. We used it the first morning he had it when we had to venture downtown Charleston to find the office for my new Gynecologist as well as places to eat or garage sales. So helpful!

Speaking of that appointment! I was feeling all sorts of mixed emotions heading into it. Being reminded of the familiarity of what we left in Slovenia, some of that happy, some sad and feeling the apprehension of starting over again in a new place, learning a new system, meeting a Doctor and nursing staff, etc.

I cried from the stress of it all several times that morning and teared up as I walked in and was greeted by the most friendly receptionist and realized how much easier and uncomplicated it is to do it all in one language. The staff was all so warm and friendly!

The first part of the appointment was an ultrasound and the tech took lots of time as she looked at all the baby's parts and measured it all. The baby had the hiccups at the time of the ultrasound and several times she would switch it to a 3D/digital ultrasound. It was AMAZING to see our baby in 3D. It was hard to believe that it still needs 6 more weeks to grow and mature more! Tears kept coming as we watched the little baby jumping from the hiccups and trying to get it's little fingers into it's mouth. What a gift it was to be able to "see" our new baby before it's arrival.