Oh, how we love to laugh! He he he he

Yes, once again, I'm up late with Thing Two, attempting to get him to sleep while my older two boys are sleeping soundly.

Thing One does an awesome job of making Thing Two smile. He's even gotten a sort of laugh or giggle out of him. Hopefully you'll be able to see the smile behind Thing Two's little fist. Enjoy, because I sure do!

The Gifts of Christmas

Recently President Clark release his Christmas message.  I really enjoyed this and hope that you will as well.



Travis

Our little Things

Once again, I am waiting for the little guy to go to sleep. I was out of bed four times and then decided it was better to wait in his room for him to go to sleep rather than be in and out of my comfortable bed attempting to get some sleep. So, I thought I might try to post.

Imagine I took these the day I got home from the hospital. The plan was to bring both of the boys home and take a few pictures of them in their take home shirts, but there were a few changes in plans and it didn't end up working out. So they got taken quite a bit later and we still had fun doing it. The romper that Thing 2 is in was actually the way we planned on announcing that we were pregnant, that didn't work out so well either, but I hope that we will have the opportunity to have it work next time (Which that won't be happening any time soon). We might have to make the shirts next time because they aren't cheap. We'll see.

We love our little Thing 1 and Thing 2. Thing 1 dotes on Thing 2. He still will give random kisses and hugs to him without prompt, although sometimes for pictures, he doesn't mind being prompted.

 Hopefully you can tell, but I'll say it anyway. Thing 1 was trying to give Thing 2 a kiss on the face, but it wasn't working and he settled for a hand, which he sometimes will do or a foot. However, Thing 1 doesn't like kissing Thing 2 where there is hair on his head. It's funny to watch especially when Thing 2 is jerking his head around.

 Thing 1 loves getting Thing 2 to hold his finger. Thing 1 will occasionally try to force Thing 2's hand open so that he will hold it.

Now that Thing 1 and my husband have been asleep for between an hour and a half and two hours, Thing 2 has finally fallen fast asleep. Night and enjoy!

Travis' Work

It's late at night and I'm waiting for Ethan to go to sleep. He takes a little bit to fall asleep and I've learned it's just easier to wait in his room until he goes to sleep rather than be in and out of my comfortable bed. I should be lying down or resting, but this seems to be the only time that I can find to do this without being bothered. 

 Travis currently has the opportunity to work in the auditorium that they are building on-campus. It will seat 15,000 people and has the same design as the Conference Center in Salt Lake. He wanted me to post this picture because it's a once in a lifetime shot. This is a shot from a projection booth where just behind Travis a projector screen will be. Once the screen is up you will no longer have this view from the booth to see. He's enjoying work right now, and is keeping very busy with the VOiP deployments. 

Sorry it's blurry, but you do what you can with a cell phone. 

Ethan is finally out and so am I! Good-night!

Before Baby Brother...

Two days prior to my due date, Jordelle called Adam and I and invited us to go to the zoo. I was so excited. Jordelle, Michael, Boston, and I hadn't been before, so it was new to us. It was a really nice day too. Here are some pictures from the zoo.

Being very pregnant made it very difficult to get very good pictures. (Sorry, couldn't help the very thing) So they're kind of random, and I'm learning that sometimes it's better to capture the moment than be terribly picky about the actual image, so I'm learning to carry the point and shoot instead of my DSLR. The birds the boys were looking at were huge, and they had a lot of fun.

Don't know if you can see the lioness in the background, but she's on the right.

Adam for the most part was tall enough to see over most of the exhibits. That was nice because he is not a light little boy.

This tiger looked very old, and seemed upset over something. I think it may have been their dinnertime, because it was close to closing time. We were actually the last people out of the zoo, we were...escorted out by a security guard after looking at the alligator. Oops. But we sure had fun.

This water fountain was so much fun. Adam could reach the side but poor Michael wasn't quite tall enough. 

My boy's corny smile, and  Michael's scowl. Thanks Aunt Delly, we had a ton of fun and were so excited to get out of the house.

He's Here!

Ethan arrived September 8, 2010. Yes, it was the day after Adam's birthday, and he was very excited about it. I have debated on whether or not to post this, but so many friends have asked to hear about "the story" that I figured you may choose whether or not to read this. For those of you curious (which there seem to be a lot), here's the story.

I made the blue blanket, it's made of minkee. So soft that 

I want to cuddle my little boy no matter what.

I had a doctor's appointment on the 4th (a day before my due date), and my cervix was ready but we just had to wait. I had tested positive for a bacteria that required penicillin to be administered at least 4 hours prior to giving birth, otherwise it could be harmful to the baby. Don't worry it's not that big of a deal, it's pretty common. So, after talking with Travis and my doctor, we decided that I would be induced the following Wednesday (the 8th) because if we were going to choose the date, we didn't want to choose Adam's (the 7th) birthday, and I really wanted to feel comfortable again.

So Adam went to his Grandma's after we did a small birthday celebration on his birthday the night before. We were to be at the hospital by 7 a.m. so that I could be started on I.V.s and such by 7:30. They immediately put I.V.s into my wrist. I'm so glad that it wasn't in the back of my hand this time, that was more painful to me than my epidural. The first thing I noticed in the birthing suite was that there were smelling salts everywhere. Three packages on the outside of the bathroom door, two on the inside and two on the mirror. I couldn't help but wonder if they were more for the father. :) 

Apparently I was having contractions between one and six minutes apart. This was before they had even given me anything to induce labor. I was already in labor, and talking with my nurse and doctor, they said with how strong my contractions were and consistent, I would have gone by that night anyway. Little did I know that I had been contracting for weeks, I just thought they were cramps. They were very different compared to with Adam. So I feel just fine with receiving a little extra help and with the need for penicillin I felt even better about it. 

 I hate the right after birth picture :(

Love the Daddy after birth shot though. :)

At 10 a.m. oxytocin was administered. At 1 p.m. the anesthetist administered the epidural. My doctor broke my water somewhere between 1:30 and 2 p.m.  Around 3:15 my nurse came to check on me and see how far I was dilated. I was up to a nine and she told me to make her aware of when I felt pressure. Immediately following her departure I felt pressure, but waited ten minutes just to make sure I was feeling it. I called her and let her know. She checked me again and asked me to push, and Travis said she was holding Ethan's head in so that he wouldn't come out. She left immediately to call my doctor. Travis was a little confused thinking, "She doesn't have to push for two hours?" The doctor arrived shortly thereafter gowned up and asked me to push. Travis looked at me after the first push and said, looking a little astounded, "Babe, I can see hair." The doctor asked me to push again and Ethan's head was out. A third push and he was completely out. Ethan came into our lives at 3:56 p.m. weighing in at 8 lbs 15 oz, 20 inches long and with 14 inch circumference head. I would rather give birth than be pregnant, I wish I could just give birth and skip the pregnancy, is that possible? If you know of a away to do that please let me know. ;)

 

 Adam loves his baby brother

  We're all doing fantastic. And I'm healing very quickly in comparison to Adam's labor and delivery. Adam has adjusted to Ethan very well, and is always bestowing his cheeks with kisses. Whenever he is parted from Ethan, he always gives him a kiss when he returns, and he just will randomly kiss him. It's wonderful to see him adjusting so well.

These are the only ones you get...

As a good portion of you know, I really dislike pregnancy, so to even show these to other people is a little bit tough for me. The only reason why you get to see them is because Travis requested some maternity portraits and Adam is in them with me. These are my favorites. A friend Heather Lyn willingly took these for us and in return we posed for her for an assignment, which included costumes and props, it was fun. 

I love this photo of us, it fun and casual, no you can't really tell that I'm pregnant, but I'm okay with that. 

This one is my favorite, I think primarily because Adam was attempting to give baby brother a hug, and wasn't quite tall enough to reach. He normally gives him these really sweet hugs while I'm sitting down. 

The only reason why I did the photos was because I had Adam in them with me, so don't expect to see many more. I think this one is very sweet, he pretty well did this on his own, I think.

Road trip

Daddy went away on business, and I really didn't want to be by myself in a big house, so we took a little road trip to Utah. We visited one of my cousins and one of my favorite roommates from college. Although I didn't take very many pictures, I was able to get a few. 

Here's our little boy with my cousin's children on Temple Square in Salt Lake. He loved the water fountains and could have just sat at the fountain the whole time. 

The reflection pool was their favorite, primarily because they played in the water and could actually reach it. Thankfully there were no accidents and no one fell into the water. It was a somewhat warm trip so that shorts and t-shirts were worn, but it snowed and rained the next day and we were back to jeans and sweatshirts.

He loved looking at the temple, which makes me so excited that he somewhat understands how important the temple is to Dadddy and I. 

Here is my cousin and her children. We had so much fun! Thanks for letting us come and crash with you guys for a couple of days.

 As you know I'm not in front of the camera very often, so thankfully we were able to get a shot of us before we left. My goofy little boy! He's been in front of the camera way too much already huh? Sorry, I don't have any pictures from my roommate's place (I was tuckered out, being a single parent on a road trip is tiring!) but you can see some pictures she took here.

Easter

It snowed the day we planned to do our Easter egg hunt, so we colored eggs inside and had an Easter egg hunt in our basement. Growing up I remember coloring eggs was a blast in my family. We would be as creative as we possibly could, using a variety of things to make our eggs cooler than all the other eggs. We used crayons to color on the shells, which created some neat stuff especially with a white crayon. We loved using rubber bands and dipping the eggs in multiple dyes. My younger sister is at a college nearby and came over to help us decorate. 

 Travis says he didn't color eggs more than once or twice growing up, so he just watched us thinking we were crazy. Like I said this was/is something that I have so much fun doing with my siblings and parents, I hope that our boys have as much fun doing this together as I did with my siblings.

The crayons also made it even more fun for him so that he did something more than just drop the eggs in the dye. I unfortunately forgot to take pictures of the eggs after we finished, oops, but he sure had fun.

Hope you enjoyed your Easter celebration!

I can explain...

Why there have been a shortage of posts. It also has to do with the downpour of tears as mentioned in the last post. I've been sick a lot lately, and it's not because of all of the colds, or bugs that my husband and son have shared with me or vice versa, it's a little more permanent than that. And being this sick messes with my head, so I decided that it was best to wait until we knew what was going on inside my body. See the thing is...

I'm pregnant, and am 19 weeks along with a due date of September 5th, 2010. Hopefully you can see his profile and left foot in the bottom picture. I had to take a picture of the images with my computer, all the cameras batteries are dead, so the foot looks like his right. Adam has been excitedly telling people on the phone, "Baby brother!"(Yes we're having a boy) He's so cute about it too. When we left the doctor's office, Adam said this to my doctor, "Thank you for baby brother." And insisted that the ultrasound pictures are his, so I'm going to have to make a copy of them for him, so that he doesn't accidentally tear them.

Hopefully soon, the regular posting will resume, the colds and bugs we keep getting will go away. And last but not least the warm weather will quit holding out on us so that Adam and I can get outside and play/work in the dirt. Here's hoping!

The Girl I used to be

I stole this from a good friend's blog, who in turn stole it from a dear friend of hers. I read this on her blog and really liked it, then I read it to my sweet husband and made it to the third line and was in tears. I have a few reasons why I was in tears, but will explain more soon.

The Girl that I used to be

She came tonight as I sat alone, the girl I used to be.

And she gazed at me with her earnest eye, and questioned reproachfully:

Have you forgotten the many plans and hopes that I had for you?

The great career, the splendid fame, all the wonderful things to do?

Where is the mansion of stately height, with all of its gardens rare?

The silken robes that I dreamed for you, and the jewels in your hair?

And as she spoke, I was very sad, for I wanted her pleased with me.

This slender girl from the shadowy past, the girl that I used to be.

So gently rising, I took her hand, and guided her up the stair

Where peacefully sleeping, my babies lay, innocent, sweet, and fair.

And I told her that these are my only gems, and precious they are to me;

That silken robe is my motherhood, of costly simplicity.

And my mansion of stately height is love, and the only career I know

Is serving each day in these sheltered walls, for the dear ones who come and go.

And as I spoke to my shadowy guest, she smiled through her tears at me.

And I saw that the woman that I am now, pleased the girl that I used to be.

  

I still have a few dreams that I hope to make come true, old and new, and the best part is that I have a wonderful and loving husband who is not only willing to support me in them, but also make them come true.

What's a post without a picture? 

 

Halloween 2009

I'm backlogging and that's okay, I'll get to present pictures and events soon, don't worry. Anyhow, I had an amazing opportunity the day before Halloween. Evelyn Hymas of Hymas Images located here in Rigby hired me to take over for her Halloween shoot last year and I was happy to do it. I've also helped her with Senior shoots as well. But this was my first completely solo act without her on site. It was exciting. Here are pictures of Adam from Halloween this last year at the studio.

I'm not sure if it's good or bad, but Adam knows how to pose for a picture. He's been the model too often for me. I re-finished his bag from last year, made a smaller and used my serger to finish the seams. I even added some black lettering to spell BOO. I loved it.

He's so good at pouty faces too.

I love this huge smile while he's riding the rocking horse. He's having a huge giggle fest. The shot I took right before this one was where Travis was tickling Adam on the horse, and Adam is leaning the opposite direction. I love that shot and am debating on using for other for something else.

P.S. Hopefully you can tell he was Zorro.