Bath time!

Henry's first real bath. His cord finally fell off, so we were able to put him all the way in the water & he actually liked it this time!Yay!


He's about two weeks old in these pics.

Henry is here!!!!

Here he is; Henry Ranger Davidson

Our adorable little man.

Proud papa at home with the little man.

I finally got to hold him. One happy mamma!

Henry is having his first checkup here right after birth. You can see the forecepts mark on his cheek. He's already cute.

Hey everyone!

So, I know we are a little late in announcing this, but with the holidays & all we've been a bit busy!

Henry Ranger Davidson was born on December 20th at 12:14 PM. He weighed 9lbs 2oz and was 21 1/2 inches long.

We had a long (31 hours, with 7 hours of pushing) traumatic delivery, but made it through ok. Henry finally decided to join us & we couldn't be more thrilled! He's perfect! (I know....every new parent says that...but I can't help it. He's really perfect.)

We had John & laurie over for about a week which was really nice & Scott came to join us for Christmas too.

We are getting into our new routine around the house & trying to sneak in sleep where we can. Luckily Henry is a great baby. hardly any crying, but he has his hours backwards, so he's up all night & sleeping all day. We will try to get him switched around eventually, but for now, we are trying to adjust ourselves to his nutty schedule.

Hope you all have a great New Year & enjoy the pictures!! We hope to see and hear from you all soon. It has once again been too long since we've seen many of you. Hi to Brian & Alicia on Sarabande by the way!!! Great to hear from you!! We'll check your blog next. I'm curious to see where you are now.

Nope, No baby yet.,

Just to let you all know, there is no baby yet. I assure you that we will be posting when he arrives. We promise. Kristen is doing well & so is the baby. He's big & healthy & we saw a 3-D ultrasound the other day & he already has a little hair on his noggin. Very cool.
Sorry for the delay, but the little man just doesn't want to come out yet..apparently. We are getting pretty anxious. Especially with Christmas being next week.
Hopefully you will all be hearing from us very soon. Happy holidays if we don't talk to you before then!!! We will most likely be staying home.

Keep up on the blog. We will post pics as soon as possible!!
-Ben & Kristen

Nine Months Pregnant Pictures

From the side

Seriously HUGE!!!

Outside all bundled up.

Ok, so I've been asked by a ton of people to please post a picture of me pregnant.

So...here I am in all my glory at 9 months along. This is as big as it gets.

I'm due any day & wish I had some older preggo pics to share with you, but this is it.

Any time now!! We'll make sure to let you all know when he shows up!!

-Kristen

Any day now!

Hi guys!,

Thanksgiving was really good. We had a bunch of people over at our house & had a Big turkey & a ham plus all the stuff that goes with, so we still have some leftovers. I love Thanksgiving leftovers!! hope everyone else had a good one too!! It was funny having one at home again. last year it was our first full day out on the boat after leaving Oriental, so the three of us were all alone. It was nice not to have to travel this year too.

We are still just waiting for the arrival of the little guy. I went to the doctor on Tuesday & she said he's on his way for sure & she would be surprised if he waited another week. I haven't been sleeping the last two nights because of cramps and contractions, so thats a good sign that he's getting ready. These contractions could last up to two weeks though. I hope not!!! We went to another class last night & that was good. It was about all the scary stuff like epidurals & creepy tools etc... I'm glad I got to see everything.

I have been told that if I go bounce around or walk up a steep hill etc... I could go into labor pretty quickly, but I'm hoping to let him come out when it is his time. I figure if he comes out when he's ready instead of when I bounce him out labor might go more smoothly... Thats my thoery anyway. We'll see. I am really excited for him to show up & today would be great...so wish us luck!

We will update you soon. Probably when he's born....I hope!!

I put a few pictures of the roosters up to entertain you & show you what they look like in case anyone is interested. They were taken with our camara that is dying, so they arent' the best quality, but thanks to Doug & his early Christmas present we are the proud new owners of an amazing camara as of yesterday, so we should have awesome baby pics when he arrives!!!!!

Thanks again Doug!!!!!

Roosters!

Hey again,

there has been a lot going on at the Davidson household for the last few weeks. We are getting ready for the little man of course. We are painting his room Monday or Tuesday & we had two showers last weekend. One here in Cle Elum for the Eastsiders & one in Bellevue at Doug & Janet's house for the westsiders. They were both really fun & we hope everyone had a good time! We really loved seeing everyone!! Especially people we haven't seen since as long ago as our wedding! I still can't believe we have been back home since summer & have missed out on seeing so many people!! We will try to be better about visiting friends in the future!...although, we may be a bit busy with the baby for a while.

Our house is quickly filling up with baby stuff. I am trying to keep it contained! We are hoping to keep his room as the guest room for a while, and have him staying in our room at first, mostly so I don't have to go trudging across the house at all hours of the night to feed & change him. I figure that all those extra minutes that I save wandering around are extra minutes of sleep I will be getting. It probably means much less sleep for Ben, but some sacrifices need to be made. It's funny, because our guest room bed is a king & the baby's room is tiny, so not much room to maneuver around once all the little man stuff is in there. Oh well. Guests will understand I'm sure. It just looks a little messy.

We are on our last "vacation" right now before I am not able to travel anymore. We are in Port Angeles at Cy's house finishing up her deck & getting Ben a bit of surfing in. We should be home on Monday. I could be due any time, so I have to stay near the hospital after this weekend until he shows up. It's funny to think that this is the last trip we will be on alone together. We are so excited to be having this baby! We can't wait.

We were out of town all last week as well starting Cy's deck project & had my mom watching our chickens for us. Thanks again by the way! We got home & on Monday morning realized that the "hens" were crowing!!! they had never done that before!! Ben had a suspicion that the supposed female chickens were roosters, but I wasn't convinced....until Monday. Turns out that out of the 4 "guaranteed Hens" that we bought we are really the proud owners of 3 roosters & one poor hen. Over the last week they have really started to develop their crows. At first they were just tiny little half crows, but they are quick learners. Now we get three roosters competing for loudest longest crow of the day....all day long! They chase poor eggbert (our hen) around & sit on her quite often. I think they are claiming her. She has become a pretty fast runner. We will put pictures up soon. Who knew chickens could be so exciting! Ben wants to eat them, but I raised them & am quite attached, so I am only willing to give two away to happy homes who promise not to eat them. If anyone is interested, they are Buff Orpingtons. They are a fancy rare breed layer chicken known to lay double yolk eggs & are also known strangely enough for their personalities. They bond with people & become attached to you. They are quiet chickens...yes, the roosters crow, but really not too loud. We can't even hear it in the house most of the time. They are HUGE chickens. bigger than a small dog or cat.

Well, other than that,we are getting ready for the holidays. Thanksgiving will be at our house this year! I can't go too far, so we are bringing the party to ourselves. We have an estimated 16 people on the way as of right now...but the way things are going, we will have more than that by the time the day arrives. I hope everyone is up for getting cozy, because we have a small house! I'm excited though! It's going to be nice to see everyone, especially since we have no idea what we are doing for Christmas this year. If we have the baby early enough, we will be able to travel...If not, well, I guess we are on our own. I know we will be tired, but we are hoping that we can still drop in on the family for Christmas. We will just have to hand him off & take naps if it works out time wise.

Ok, well gotta go check out the farmer's market with Cy now. We will put pics up when we get home.

Hope to hear from you soon!

love, Kristen & Ben

Land life update

Skip dog at home in Washington.

Kristen at the farmer's market

Ben with a fish he caught up at lake Cle Elum

Our house in Roslyn..bit messy. we were still moving in.

Some of the wonderful weather Ben encountered on his way home.

freaky clouds creeping in

Hi!

Kristen here, I know, I know, it's been months & months since we last wrote to update anyone. So much has happened that it is going to be way too much to fill you all in on, so I'll give you the quick cliff notes version of life after Panama.

We left Panama after realizing that the boat along with ourselves were not up to the challenge of taking on the Pacific Ocean this season & also found out that we are having a baby!

Took on a new crew member to help us back up to North Carolina where the boat was to be stored. Ben was my hero! He was so good about taking almost all my watches for me while I was feeding the fishes over the side rail, but there was no way either of us could live through the whole trek back with me that sick & him that sleep deprived, so our new crew member Russ was crucial.

I was sooooo sick (yay morning sickness combined with being in the middle of the ocean) that it was no longer safe for me or the baby to be on board the boat any longer, so I jumped ship in Grand Cayman & left the boys to take the boat up to North Carolina alone.

It was a nerve racking few weeks for me, because I was not used to being without Ben after all that time together on the boat & the second I got on the plane I missed him already. I was also worried about him out there with a new guy on the boat. We had a routine down & it worked really well for us. I also had little to no contact with him until he reached the states, which did not help me feel any better about the situation. The only thing that made me happy was the fact that I was now reunited with Skippy & we spent all our time hanging out & taking walks together. It was great! Meanwhile, although he did miss me he was having a lovely sail back up around Cuba with the brand new spinnaker that we had just made together & the trip could not have gone better.

The story changed dramatically when he reached Florida! Luckily I could talk to him on a real phone again! Unfortunately, the weather turned bad in a hurry & unless he got the boat out of the "hurricane area" quick Wind-Borne was uninsured until he hit North Carolina waters. He encountered the craziest storms & lightning showers. We had seen nothing like it before. He still gets a worried look on his face when he sees lightning after that. I'm not sure if you all know what lightning can do to a boat, but it can pretty much annihilate it immediately. There you are bobbing around in open water with a 50 plus foot metal lightning rod sticking straight up from the middle of your boat...... so,that's not a good start. If you do get hit it completely wipes out all your electronics. You have no AIS, no GPS, no radio, no depth finder...you get the point. It does this and can damage several other things on the boat as well. Long story short, he spent much of his time sitting under bridges in the ICW & anchoring out as close to boats with larger masts than Wind-Borne as he could get in the hopes that if lightning did strike, maybe it would hit the bigger lightning rod first..... Good news is he made it!!

So, now we had to decide what to do with Wind-Borne now that she was back home.

Russ took off for his home (Canada) and I flew back to Oriental NC to help Ben with boat prep & loading up the suburban (which we left at the boat yard) for the long drive home. I was sooo happy to be back with Ben & both be on land in the US! We decided to put Wind-Borne up for sale, because we didn't know when we would be able to return to finish the journey with the new baby & all, so that added a lot of work for us. We cleaned, re-stained, re fitted, & rechecked everything on the boat along with finishing up a few small projects we had put off & after about two weeks of working steady we were ready to go. We put her in her new slip, said a tear full goodbye & off we went.

We made two stops on the way home. One in Nebraska to see Tyson & Neris & one in South Dakota to see my dad & family over there. Nebraska was sooo much fun & we loved the chance to hang out with old friends again! Dad's was fun too. We just so happened to arrive the day before a big cattle brand. Ben was amazing!! He was assigned to be a cow wrangler, which I think is the hardest job & he looked like a prop doing it! He did manage to get his hand branded on accident, which was lame, and also bucked off by a nice sized cow, and had an impressive showdown with a big mean black cow with long horns that had it in for him. It charged & there was no time to get out of the corral, so Ben help his ground & armed with only a little plastic paddle he kicked that cows butt. It never knew what hit it. (I guess all that baseball practice really paid off) he whacked it upside the head so quickly & so furiously that it stopped in it's tracks & when he just continued to beat on it non stop it finally backed down. Very impressive!...and pretty funny when it was all over.

So, we made it home!!

Skippy was so happy to see us & have the whole pack back together again!! It was perfect.

We stayed with family until we found a place to rent in Roslyn. We have a nice little two bedroom house built in the 1920's right in town with a big yard & I started a nice little garden.

Ben got back to work and I settled in.

I started baking for the farmer's markets which was awesome to make some extra money & because I love to bake & Ben's business started to pick up. Things on land were starting to look pretty good.

We bought chickens. Yes, chickens... we had a big enough yard & we thought it would be cool to get our own eggs. Skippy was not amused by the chickens, but didn't dislike them either, so that was good.

Life on land seemed like it could not get any better, although we do miss Wind-Borne & the adventures we had. Not to mention the friends we made out there.

We found out we are having a little boy & he is due in December! He is very healthy & we could not be more excited!!

Life was indeed perfect for team Davidson. (or as close as it gets) then tragedy struck.

I'm sorry to inform you with some really bad news. We are still not over the shock of it, and are still unable to really talk about it, but about three weeks ago, Skippy was hit by a lumber truck at work with Ben & died almost instantly. We miss him everyday. He was with us constantly & made our lives better. Ben had him more than 13 years & they have traveled everywhere together. We never imagined life without him. Especially since he was so healthy & happy still at his old age. It has left a huge hole in our lives...

So, we have been trying to move on & continue getting ready for the little man's arrival. I am due in a month & a half, so that's great! We can't wait. Next step is getting the nursery together. It's a disaster area with all our extra furniture etc... crammed into it. I think we will paint it next week.

Farmers markets are over for the year, so I'm just doing side orders for custom cakes etc, but nothing big. We have had our first snow although nothing stuck to the ground yet. Its' been a roller coaster with the weather being warmish, then freezing cold. Today I accidentally went ice skating across the lawn in my slippers when I went out to feed the chickens. Brrr!!! Luckily I did manage to stay on my feet & did not end up on my backside.

We have a baby shower coming up soon & John & Laurie (Ben's parents) are coming over to stay with us tomorrow. We are excited! Oh yeah, and Ben's birthday was last week!!! he's 33! That went pretty well too!

Ok, so that's all the updating I have for now...I'm sure I missed a ton of stuff, but you get the gist of things I think. Keep in touch & we hope to keep this blog going even though we are land lovers now. We will have new things to blog about when the baby comes & maybe if we keep this up long enough it will turn into a sailing blog again someday. Who knows.

Hope everyone is happy & doing well.

-Kristen & Ben