Zoo Trip

The kids and I went to the zoo yesterday. We stood and watched a baby and mommy elephant for a long time. They were really cute together. I am a sucker for baby animals.

But these little guys (Golden Lion Tamarins) were one of my favorites:

They are from a rainforest in Brazil, and only about a foot in length. Their tales are just as long as their bodies. I think they are really cute, and I think they would make fun little pets.

But I already have five little monkeys, so I guess I don't need anymore.

They are very family orientated and the males stay with the females after mating and actively help to raise the babies. The daddies carry the babies around on their backs. They are also very protective and will be aggressive to non-related animals.

What good little daddy monkeys :-)

This one (either Poco or Puddles) reminds me of Aaron :-)

Don't know why.

Little Flower

Number NINE is so FINE!

Kaeli turned 9 yesterday!

She had an awesome birthday!

Her siblings think she's the BEST!

And because we have recently discovered skype, Kaeli got to skype with her daddy who was in France and with her grandparents. It's the coolest thing ever!

We love our Kaeky Ray!

6 weeks old...already?

I wanted to take some pictures of Violet's dazzling smile, which truly is one of the sweetest things to behold, but instead of smiles I got the zzzzzzzzzs.

So I tried to wake her, and I got some stretches and some funny faces.

So in the end, I relented and let her snooze...

...and took a snap shot of her cute piggies :-)

Violet's Blessing Day

Have you EVER seen anything SWEETER???

Violet was blessed on Sunday by her daddy. It was a super sweet and special blessing. After sacrament meeting we gathered with some family at our house for some hoagies and chocolate cake!

It was a special day!

Double Digits!

Sam da man is now TEN! He's a decade old! He's in the double digits! And yes, he has to use every single finger (including thumbs) to show you how old he is!!!

And he got a super cool fancy new bike!


And a birthday cake that I hoped resembled a campfire:


And these four girls are the luckiest girls in the world to have a BIG BROTHER like Sam!

Almost 2 weeks old

(taken by SIL Dawn)

I am waiting for my PC to get back up and running and then I'll post some more recent pics.

My SIL has a talent for taking pictures. She snapped a few pictures of Violet on Saturday. You can see them on her website:

http://www.alanandawn.blogspot.com

Violet has gone ULTRA VIOLET!

Violet has a high bilirubin count, and now she has a new bili-bed to try to get rid of the jaundice. We can only take her out for feedings and diaper changes! How sad is that!!! It breaks my heart not to be able to pick her up and soothe her when she needs her mommy. She has another bilirubin count on Monday. We hope it's low enough to loose the UV bed.

Violet Mae is here!

The long wait is over! Our sweet "Little" has arrived!

Tuesday around 11:30 am, I noticed my contractions felt different from the regular false labor I had been experiencing. These felt real and I hoped they were, and a week early? Yeah for me! Tuesdays are my crazy busy days, so I kept running the kids here and there and doing what I usually do. I picked the kids up from school and had about 10 minutes before taking Kaeli to gymnastics. I wondered if I should since my contractions were already 6 minutes apart. I decided I could always take Kaeli out of gymnastics early if I had to. So I loaded the kids up and left. On our way I reached for my phone to call Aaron and to let him know that the labor was "real" and he should be ready to leave work early, but I FORGOT MY PHONE! I felt panicked! Out of all the days to forget my phone it had to be today!!! I dropped Kaeli off and the rest of the kids and I headed to Walmart to grab a few last minutes things (like pizza for dinner and a birthday present for a party Sara had been invited to on Saturday). In Walmart my contractions were about 5 minutes apart and I hoped my water wouldn't break in the middle of the store! I tried to discretely pause for my contractions because they were getting uncomfortable. I hated not having my phone with me! I guess I wasn't as discreet as I thought I was because as soon as Kaeli got back into the car Sam leaned over to her and said, "I think Mom is in labor! She had to keep stopping in the store!" Who knew a nine year old boy would have any idea what labor looked like any way! So the minute we got back home I called Aaron (my contractions were 3-4 minutes apart). I told him I was in labor and to come home right now. He said, "really? OK!" A few minutes later he called back when he was already on his way to make sure I wasn't joking and just trying to get him home from work at a decent time. I assured him I was serious. I think he made it home in record time! I quickly finished packing my bag (between contractions) and Aaron called our "on call babysitter". She showed up excited to take charge and Aaron and I headed to the hospital. By the time we got there my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart and it was about 6:45 pm. Here is a picture of me in triage, still smiling :-)

For the past 8 months or so I was committed to delivering "al natural", so once I was admitted I began my relaxing techniques to get through the contractions. I was able to relax and remain in control for most of the labor. My water broke around 11 pm and from there on out my contractions were on top of each other, no breaks in between. Without drugs the pain was incredible, but it was really cool to see what my body was capable of and to experience the instincts my body naturally had during the labor. I thought it was miraculous! Once it was time to push it wasn't even something I could control. There was no distinction between contractions anymore. It all blended into one giant reflex and it was completely involuntary. So I gave it my all and bore down through the pain. After two pushes my baby was born! Once again I had another posterior baby!

Violet Mae

7 lbs. 9 oz.

20" long

born at 11:52 pm on February 9th, 2010

Here is our baby, not even a day old yet:

It was love at first sight! Violet is as sweet as can be! She has thick dark hair which is about an 1-1.5 inches long. She nursed right away and is still a good eater. She's also very cuddly and just seems to melt into you when you hold her.

We were able to bring her home on Thursday which just happened to be Aaron's birthday. I had everything boughten ahead of time, but had no birthday cake! Aaron insisted he didn't want a cake but wanted to make himself homemade oreos instead. I couldn't argue with that, and although it was unconventional, they were delicious.

Here is Daddy and Violet on his birthday:

The kids love their baby sister and have adjusted to her presence very smoothly. There is always someone around eager to hold her. I have the best helpers ever!!!

Violet has her days and nights a little backwards, and her bilirubin count is a little high, but other than that everything is going really well. I love kissing those cheeks! We're all so excited to have her as part of our little family!

One week to go...

NESTING would be an understatement!

It has been so long since I've posted..., but I've been too busy NESTING! Aaron and I had the grand goal of finishing a bedroom in the basement for Kaeli and Rylie before "Little" makes her grand entrance. By moving the big girls downstairs and moving Sara into Kaeli's old room, we would be freeing up Sara and Rylie's old room for the baby. Soooooo my super handy hubby finally got the room done up to the mudding and texturing. The rest was up to me. I primed & painted, puttied & sanded, caulked, and painted some more. Although it seemed to be tedious work I actually enjoyed it for the most part...minus the pinched sciatic nerves in the evenings, ouch!

So far we've moved the girls in and they're already on their second night! They love it! I love the blue! Who knew blue could be so girly?

The ceiling fan was all white when I bought it, which I didn't love (but it was cheap). So I bought some spray paint to make the metal parts look like stainless steel. It actually turned out!

We still need to build shelves in the closets and put the closet doors on...and paint them too. Oh and carpet may or may not happen this year...


My favorite part of the whole room is the window. I asked Aaron to frame it all around, and it looks so good! He truly is handy :-) There is so much light coming in from that window you would never guess this is a basement bedroom:

I will take some final pictures of their room as soon as I have it decorated!

Sara has moved in to her new room too! I thought she might have issues about being alone since she's never had her own room before, but she loves it!

And today I finally completed "Little's" room. The crib is up, the clothes are washed and in the drawers, and all I'm missing is the BABY!

11 days to go....

(plus or minus)

Pray that it's a minus :-)

Soon to be a big sis!

I am always surprised by the comments of our little Sara. She's very verbal and able to express her ideas about the new baby and what life might be like in my tummy in a very humorous way. She can't wait for the baby to come because she envisions the baby chasing her and that would be so much fun! I try to explain to her that the baby won't be able to crawl or walk when she first comes, and we'll just hold her. Sara then asks me if she can hold her too because she is very strong. And I tell her of course she can (sitting on the couch with me right there, of course). Sara told me yesterday that when she was in my tummy that she was afraid of the dark and wished she had a flashlight in there (by the way, the girl is obsessed with flashlights and absolutely loves them...until the batteries run out). And the funniest thing was when she put her ear to my tummy and told me she could hear the baby picking her nose (because that's what babies do, not big girls). Every day she kisses my tummy, tells me she loves my baby, and she can't wait until she comes out (me too)! I think that's the sweetest thing. She is going to be a fantastic big sis! Hopefully, life with a new baby won't be too big of a shock to her.

Belly Update

4 weeks to go...

Sara is a SUNBEAM now!

And she has been running around proclaiming that she is "Sunbeam Girl" since her first day on Sunday! It sounds like a super hero name, and I'm glad she realizes just how special being a sunbeam is.

Jesus wants me for a sunbeam,
to shine for Him each day.
In every way try to please Him,
at home, at school, at play.
A sunbeam, a sunbeam!
Jesus wants me for a sunbeam!
A sunbeam, a sunbeam!
I'll be a sunbeam for Him!

FYI: Primary is the sunday school class children ages 3-11 attend. Each age group is divided into classes and the 3 year old class are the sunbeams.

Christmas 2009

So I am a little behind on my blog...

Our Christmas was so much fun! It was nice to have the kids home from school for 2 weeks. 2 weeks to hang out and do whatever we wanted without crazy schedules and places to be...nice!

We made plates of goodies!

Decided what our gifts to Jesus would be!

And wore out our kids who swore they were going to stay up to see Santa!

They did wheel barrow races, hand stand competitions, arch-up competitions, and any other exhausting exercise we could think of.... The kids never caught on to our motives :-)


After reading in Luke 2 (Jesus' birth in Bethlehem) and in Helaman (Book of Mormon prophet, Samuel the Lamanite prophesying about Christ's birth in the Americas) the kids opened up their Christmas Eve JAMMIES, wrote a note to Santa (leaving him mousse balls, peppermint bark, & egg nog) and hit the sack...

They couldn't wait til morning!!!

Modeling their new PJs

Our Christmas morning was spent opening gifts, trying out new stuff, eating crepes, and then going to Aaron's sister's home for Christmas dinner! It was a wonderful day!

Nutcracker Ballet

Aaron and I went to Ballet West's Nutcracker performance on Friday night in SLC. I absolutely loved it! I saw the Nutcracker for the first time last year and now I'm hooked. It's going to have to be a yearly tradition from now on. This time while I watched I smiled to myself when it occurred to me how much I've felt like Mother Buffoon lately. I love how she comes out in her giant dress and all her little children pour out from underneath her skirt, dancing and flipping all around. And when it's time to go all of the children obediently run back underneath her skirt and Mother Buffoon dances off the stage. I imagine that Mother Buffoon has her hands full, but diligently keeps all her little buffoons in line. Sometimes I too feel like a miniature form of mother buffoon with children running and tumbling all around me. And here I am adding to my brood, another little buffoon on the way to dance and twirl around the house. And yet, just like Mother Buffoon, my hands are full despite the fact that my kids are obedient most of the time. Mother Buffoon dances around with an air of confidence about her, and perhaps a bit of pride in her children. I wonder if it's all an act. Maybe she falls apart at home and total chaos erupts! Either way, Mother Buffoon is a devoted mother, certainly has a sense of humor, and dances with her children! What could be more important than that!

We hope you are enjoying the snow as much as we are!

Oh the Hyprocrisy!

We used to have a tradition of hunting for the perfect Christmas tree; not in a store, or in a lot, but in the snowy Idaho mountains. We would drive up in our truck or my aunt's 4-wheeler and hike, saw in hand, looking for the perfect tree...one that wasn't too bushy or too bare on one side. But the perfect Christmas tree was never really perfect. We always chose one that looked like it needed a mother to love it, a little shabby and sparse. We always chose an orphan tree, and that was the perfect tree for me. When we got it home we always gave it time to defrost in the garage and then eagerly brought it in, and decorated it. I loved the fresh smell! I loved our silly, not-at-all-fancy ornaments, mostly made by our kids. I loved everything about our fresh-cut orphan tree!!!

When we moved to Utah we found it hard to know where to go to cut down our own tree without driving for hours. We didn't even know where to go to get permits. So we settled for buying a tree from a lot. It wasn't as much fun to circle the trees in a lot. Usually they were bound up and impossible to know what they looked like without unwinding all the twine. After unwinding as many as we had patience for we would end up settling for a tree that was too bushy, not at all fresh, and lacked the orphan-appearance I yearned for. When we got home, we squeezed the tree through the door, leaving a trail of dry pine needles all the way to where the tree stood to be decorated. More and more needles fell as it was decorated. I worried that our new tree was combustible and would suddenly burst into flames at any given moment. And the only pine smell came when I vacuumed up all the dry needles. Needless to say, I was disappointed in our Utah selection of lot trees.

So this year I put off buying a Christmas tree week after week. One day as I was cruising hobby lobby I saw their FAKE Christmas trees at a 50% discount. Never in my life had buying a fake tree ever crossed my mind. It's against my upbringing to do such a thing! Later I asked Aaron what he thought about it. He told me to do whatever (I think he's adapted to living with a preggo once more and knows to just let her do "whatever" and everyone will be happy). So I went back to the store and bought my favorite one. It's far from orphan-looking. It's very symmetrical, but it does look like it came from the forest and it is a little shabby looking, but on purpose. And it still lacks the fresh pine tree smell, so I bought a candle that smells like a fresh pine tree, too. Last night we finally got to decorating a Christmas tree, a few weeks later than normal, but at least it got done. I put on our Kenny G Christmas CD, set out the ornaments, and lit my pine-smelling candle...and we decked the tree! And yes, I am happy with it. I hope in the following years we'll have a chance to cut down more trees in the snowy mountains, but if we can't we will bring out our fake tree, light a pine-smelling candle, and call it good enough.

Our little decorators :-)

High-waters

Today I noticed that Rylie's pants that I bought her at the beginning of the school year were already too short for her. I told her she needed to stop growing right this instant! She told me she couldn't help it, that her body was doing it all by itself. Then she quickly corrected herself, "NO, it's Jesus who is doing it!" I thought that was so funny.

Little Tumblers

Kaeli and Rylie had their gymnastics performance on Monday night. They did AWESOME!!! They both love to tumble for a crowd :-) We were 30 minutes early and were still up in the nose bleed section so I didn't get any non-blurry pictures during the performance.

A Must Read!

When you have the time, sit and read these chapters about Stephanie (nie nie). This is the most detailed and most touching version of her story I've ever read!

Part ONE: (Chapters 1-4)
Part TWO: (Chapters 5-10)

Sara's First Haircut!

OK, so this wasn't nearly as dramatic as you may think. I only trimmed a few inches off, but still this was Sara's very first haircut and she's three years old! You may think that's a long time to wait before a trim, but I've been in love with Sara's golden locks for the longest time and couldn't bring myself to trim them off. With that said, I knew Aaron would have a harder time with even the slightest trim (he loves his girls w/ long hair) so I quickly did the job when he wasn't home. He was just fine with the results and was grateful it was just a trim and not a chop :-)

BEFORE:

AFTER:

And here she is before church yesterday morning:

She still has a little bit of curl (phew):

And while I'm on the subject of Sara, I have to tell you the funniest thing. Last week we were planning a quick trip to Aaron's work to meet Santa. I asked the kids what they were going to ask Santa for Christmas. Sara ran into her bedroom and grabbed a yellow stuffed duck and said, "I'm going to ask Santa for this duck!" I explained to her that she needed to ask for something she didn't already have, but she insisted that she wanted to ask Santa for a duck. When we showed up at Dannon, Sara's excitement in seeing Santa was through the roof. She just couldn't wait to sit with him. Indeed we heard Santa ask her what she wanted for Christmas and as expected she said "A duck!" The funniest part was when we heard Santa's confused response as though he didn't quite hear her right, "A duck?"

Acting Debut!

Last week Sam performed in his very first play/musical called "Bugsy Malone"! He played the part of Dandy Dan's butler, and he was adorable in his butler suit and bow tie. They performed for 4 nights in a row. I was bummed when we went to go see it because they asked that we not take any pictures or record it in any way for copyright issues. I would have loved to get a picture of Sam twirling another little girl (just his size) around in their finale dance. It was really cute.

I snapped this picture of Sam on the set right afterwards:

Turkey Day!

We had a total of 24 people at our home for Thanksgiving dinner! Of course I was a little stressed that something might be forgotten or the turkey would get scorched...or not cook at all! But of course my mom was there, so I had nothing to fear!

Here are the MEN doing what MEN do on Thanksgiving...carve turkeys:

And of course the "grown-up table". My living room turned into an extension to the dining room:

The kid table, over the TILE, not over the carpet :-)

Oh and our BOUNTY of PIES!!! I was worried about having enough so I made assignments to my sister and sister-in-law and they dutifully brought even more than I asked of them! Each and every one was delicious! Even my 10 year old niece, Lindsey, brought some chocolate pies that she made herself!

The KIDS! There were 14 in all. Will is the one missing. And yes, this was the best picture I could get :-)

We bravely road the UTA Trax up to Temple Square in SLC to see the lights (because finding a place to park would be impossible). It was soooo CROWDED that we spent most of our time trying to stay together and work our way through the mob.

The Salt Lake Temple is always so pretty. It's a special place for our family because that's where my parents were married and sealed for eternity:
All in all, Thanksgiving was a success! It was great to have all my siblings and their families and my parents under one roof.