Adding to the Pope Family!

Stephanie and I found out that she was pregnant towards the end of May of this year. We were so excited! We were trying to have a baby and felt so blessed that Heavenly Father would send one of his children to us. Stephanie started to feel sick shortly after we found out and her sickness has not gone away yet. For both of our sakes I hope it goes away soon!

After talking to my sister Anna, we found out that we could figure out the gender of the baby sooner that I thought we could. We misunderstood that we needed to get a 4D ultrasound to determine the baby's gender. We ended up going to the Provo Towne Center Mall to find out, but they only could do 3D and 2D ultrasounds. That wouldn't deter Stephanie very long however. After we went the the hospital this last Saturday to see our brand new nephew (Kyler Steven), we headed to the the the mall off of 106th south to see if we could get an ultrasound there. They did 4D ultrasounds. The funny thing is that we found out that the best way to go was a 2D ultrasound; so we could have just gotten one in Provo. Here are a few of the pictures from that ultrasound.

This is the first picture we saw of our new baby!

It made us very happy to see that our baby had a straight spine!


We tried for about 20 minutes, but the baby would not show us its gender.

We had to go home without knowing whether we were having a boy or a girl. It was a little disappointing. We did decide to go back this last Tuesday to try to find out again. They told us at the Fetal Studio that if they couldn't determine it the first time, we could come back for free as many times as it took to determine the gender of the baby.

On Tuesday we were excited, even though we had to drive up to Sandy. When we got in the ultrasound room it looked like the baby was asleep and wasn't going to wake up. The attendant there told us to go get some sugar and then come back in about 20 minutes. It seemed like it did the trick. After our ice cream, the baby was moving a lot more.

Here is the first picture we saw of our little baby girl!
And another one showing that it truly is a girl!

When we first found out that Stephanie was pregnant we thought we were going to have a baby girl, but I had convinced myself that it might be a boy. We are very happy to be having a little baby girl. At this point, we think we will name her Kristen Stephanie, after he beautiful mother.

A New Job

Toward the beginning of the year I was talking with my boss at PS’SOFT and he told me that the company needed me to move to California. Now I love California, but I didn’t think we could afford to live in the Bay Area, and neither I nor Stephanie wanted to move away from so much family here in Utah. I told my boss that I was not willing to move to California, and he responded that I better start looking for new job.

I was a little scared of dealing with finding a new job, knowing I had to support my family and figure out how to pay the rent. I started looking for a new job. I applied for several on Monster.com. I got my job at PS’SOFT through Monster. One job stood out from the others. It was a position as Curriculum Developer at Symantec (the former Altiris). I applied for the position and didn’t think anything of it. A little while later I got an email requesting a phone interview. The phone interview went very well and I was excited about the possibilities. The job would be based out of Lindon, so it would be a very manageable commute.

I was asked by Symantec to come to an in-person interview with some of the people I would be working with. At the same time, the hiring manager who lived in California also set up a phone interview with me for a couple of days after the in-person interview. I thought this was really good news to have both interviews, and thought there was a good chance they wanted to offer me the job. The in-person interview went very well, and the phone interview did too. At the end of the phone interview with the hiring manager, he told me that they wanted to offer me a job. I was very happy. With-in a few days they sent me an official offer letter by email. It was for a lower salary than I wanted to accept, but it was still a good offer.

In talking to Stephanie about the offer I had received from Symantec, I decided that I needed to tell them what I wanted for a Salary. I did so, and the hiring manager told me he would see what he could do. I was amazed to see that they offered me exactly what I asked for. Sometimes, it seems, you need to ask for things to get them. I think that maybe we miss out on some blessings from our Heavenly Father because we neglect to ask for them.

The transition from PS’SOFT to Symantec was seamless. My last day at PS’SOFT was on February 29^th, and my first day at Symantec was on March 3^rd.

I am really enjoying my position at Symantec as a Principal Course Developer.