One year in a nutshell.

Wow. It has been a very long time since I have had the chance to update my blog and since my last update I sure have had a lot happen in my life and couldn’t even begin to fill the pages with every detail that’s led me here to where I am at today. Since my last update I have found myself a married woman, now part of the Mckinley clan! :) 

 I was lucky enough to meet my sweet husband Nathan here in Australia at institute and first impression, “what a weirdo”!! He just returned home from his mission and was only in Perth visiting some mates for 2 weeks and obviously had lost the ability to socialise with girls lol! And I was in the middle of planning to go home, cause I was so adamant on serving a mission and getting back into school for a bit. It is crazy in fact how keen I was to get back home at that point of time, then happened to meet Nathan! My first few times hanging out with him I was so drawn and attached to the spirit he carried and the way he spoke of the way he wanted to go about his life. He was sincere. He was faithful and strong, he knew what he wanted and would live life the way he knew he should, and I knew that was the kind of man I wanted to marry. Surprisingly, I strongly fell in love with this weird return missionary who I had no physical attraction to, who I thought was such a goof ball, and so annoying at times too! BUT there was no denying he would be the one who would take me into the temple the one I would sacrifice my previously life for, my family, my friends, my familiar surroundings for a whole new life in Australia. So January 5^th 2012 we were sealed into the Perth, Australia Temple for time and all eternity!! :) And he just so happens to be the most handsome man in my eyes now :) lol 

 

So how is married life they say!?? Well its not all sunshine and roses like people make it out to be but, it really is great and a blessing! Nathan has been such a fun husband and so caring and is always considerate and concerned about how I am feeling, especially being so far from home. Through my toughest days he really is my rock and my strength, and other days we can find ourselves wanting to wring each others necks ha then realise we love each other too much to do that baha! 

 Very lucky to be married to this handsome man, :) 

 

So for our honeymoon we spent one week in Tasmania than, really wanted to participate as counsellors for EFY so decided to spend one week doing that. Then about 1 ½ weeks later I found myself PREGNANT!...I can say though I was horrible with taking those stupid contraception pills. I remember I was so paranoid about the way they were making me feel, so I read a bunch of stuff on google about how they can be bad for you and found myself not wanting to take them...so then it resulted in a honeymoon baby..whoops. But, I can honestly say I would never take it back because we ended up with this beautiful girl in our lives! 

 Isnt she lovely :) 
It was amazing...the birth was nothing like I had imagined it to be. In fact, in some sick way it was easier than I expected it to be! Wanna hear a funny story? .... I was in labor for about 18ish hours or so, for part of that I went shopping, went to get pizza, then checked myself into the hospital :) when contractions began to kick in it felt like someone was squeezing my insides apart! I decided to get into the bathtub for some hydro relief and ahh..was a beauty. I still felt a bit of pain and my contractions began to be around 2-3 minutes apart so i thought I would ask for some gas to suck on before it got worse! So they gave me this long tube to suck on and I did that for about 9 hours...and by the time I was sucking 1 hour later my contractions began to be 1 minute apart....and WOW thats when I realized the gas was doing nothing to help so I told the midwife to get me some darn pain killers I dont care what it is just put it in me! LoL, but the midwives dont like to do epidurals, only as a last resort so they got me some "Pethadine" which is like heroine..and I was as high as a kite!! When they put it in me the nurse came over to check on the gas and said...
"OH...the gas was not even turned on" ....
"wow" ...I thought. That whole time I was sucking on nothing but air but by that point I was  too high and tired to even care. So the whole time for all of my labor except the last 2 hours I was all natural with this girl!! Pretty proud of myself I would say. I remember because I was so high on the Pethadine, I felt like I was dreaming and falling asleep between my contractions. At one point I could hear a lady next door screaming while in labor...that was very comforting let me tell ya. Next thing ya know I was pushing!! And at 5:12p.m, October 30th, my sweet little 7 pound 11, 22 inch girl Katara Taina Mckinley was placed on my chest. At that moment, I completely forgot all the pain, forgot I was on drugs and as high as a kite, forgot they were still working on getting the placenta out and focused on my little girl, who happened to still be sleeping as she came out haha. 

Our newest addition :)

She was sleeping, didnt even cry or scream and it got me real worried. To this day she is still a little gem and doesnt cry much!

Dad cutting the cord.

Katara with dad after we got her measured and ready :) 

 It really has been an amazing year and I have definately grown and strengthened as a wife, and as a mother and am excited for the journey that lies ahead with my little family. We are now just working on our future plans as nathan has applied for a paramedics university course and I am just working on that photography of mine and living life as a mother :) Katara is now six weeks old & wow time flies! 

L.O.V.E this face, she does it after every feed haha

lol the bread company was doing a photo competition so I used my lil katara as the model :)

 That would be my year in a nut shell, and even though im missing heaps of stuff that has gone on, thats ok because the most important events are here :)