Happy 4th Birthday Roswell!

For Roswell's 4th Birthday, he chose to go to the zoo with the family.  It was a pretty warm day, but it was lots of fun.  I forgot to take pictures except at the very end.



 Ross wasn't sure he was ready to feed the birds.

 He got a little more adventurous.

 He was so excited to feed them and hold the birds all by himself!

 Donovan feeding birds.

 Elliott really liked it too!

 Avery did NOT want to feed the birds.  She wanted far from them.

I think this was a different day, but the kids really had fun playing Cars Monopoly with Nama & Papa Earl.  We were sad to see them leave.

 Ross wanted a superman cake.

All the kiddos dressed up as superheroes while we had cake and celebrated with my sweet 4 year-old.

Roswell has learned to recognize a lot of letters and numbers, loves stories, superheroes, pirates, cars, has finally decided to be completely potty trained after a year of training (he's a very stubborn boy!), he's very curious about everything, and when he is not throwing a fit about not getting what he wants, he is the most loveable, snuggliest boy with the best hugs and kisses!

We love you Roswell!

Happy Birthday!

Keepsake Marker

When we ordered Evelyn's headstone, we were happily surprised when they told us that they would provide us with a keepsake stone to mark her grave while her headstone was being made.

It only took a week for them to get this on her grave.

We are very pleased with the way it turned out.  Now our baby girl has something to mark her grave.  When the big headstone comes in, we will get to have this keepsake to take home and put in some special place.

Vanessa's A Happy Bride 6-8-12

I forgot to post about my little sister Vanessa getting married!

On June 6th Vanessa and Conrad were married in Queen Creek, AZ.

 The happy couple.  :)

 The Robertson Family!

We were unable to go to AZ, but they were so nice to let us watch their wedding via Skype!  It was great to watch the whole ceremony.  It was also fun to be able to chat with family after the ceremony.  There were some hilarious moments too when people were shocked by seeing us viewing them from a laptop.  It put a smile on our faces on an otherwise very difficult day (we found out about Evelyn passing that day).

We are so happy for the Robertson family!  We really like Conrad and hope we can get to know him even better.  :)

Evelyn Ginnell Earl -June 8, 2012

At my regular 18 week doctor appointment (I was actually 2 days shy of 19 weeks), the nurses couldn't find a heartbeat with the dopler machine.  So they sent me to get an ultrasound, again.  This has been the normal proceedure for the last 3 appointments, so I didn't think anything out of the ordinary, especially since my placenta was anterior - meaning that it was thicker and harder to penetrate from the belly side.  However, the ultrasound showed that our baby was gone.  There was no heartbeat or movement anymore.  I was very shocked and heartbroken.  It didn't seem real.  They called Dan who happened to be at home watching the kids and he came over right away.  We were told that I needed to go to the hospital and be induced to deliver the baby because my health would be in jeopardy if we waited too long.  Because I was half-way through the pregnancy, I would need to go through all the same proceedures that a normal delivery would require.

We were still in shock as we scheduled our hospital visit.  We wanted to attend Elliott's kindergarten graduation the next morning, so our appointment was for after the ceremony.

Our appointed time was on June 7th at 11am.  We got there and had another ultrasound right away to make sure there was still no movement.  We were praying that the dr's ultrasound machine was just malfunctioning the day before.  But sadly we found the same results.  So I was given a pill to start labor.  We ended up doubling the medication because my body was not ready to have my baby - we didn't even know if baby was a boy or girl at this point in time.

At 2:38am on June 8th our precious daughter, Evelyn Ginnell was born.  She was perfect, even down to her tiny fingernails!  She was 8 inches tall and 4.9oz.  The dr. told us that we could spend as much time with her as we wanted, but that as long as I was ok I would usually be discharged within 8 hours.  We spent every moment with her that we could.

 Evelyn's hand on Mommy's hand.

 A blurry little foot.  Her little toes were so cute.

 Evelyn's hand on Daddy's finger.

We found a lot of resemblences to our family even though she was so little.  She had my high forehead, Dan's shaped eyes but with my blue eye color, the big Earl feet, and the "froggy" belly that all the kids had.  Dan even said that her little bum looked like our kid's bubbly bums.  :)

 I think the hardest part was having to leave Evelyn at the hospital knowing that we'd never see her in this life again.  We are so grateful to know that we will see her again though, and that she can be a part of our eternal family.

The kids have been ok through this whole time.  Donovan and Elliott have had a bit of a hard time because they knew more of what was happening, but they are doing ok.  We have had wonderful friends and family watching out for our kids and us.

On Tuesday, June 12th, we had a private family graveside service for Evelyn.

 Evelyn's little casket.

Our two little girls.

Even though we know where Evelyn is, it is still hard to not have her with us.  We are still having a tough time with all that has happened, but we are doing ok.  Every day gets better.  We are so grateful for all the support and kind words that have been given to us.  We are determined to be better people and do all we can while on this earth to be worthy to live with our little girl again.  We love you Evelyn Ginnell Earl!

Birthday Month!

June has always been a busy month for us especially since 5 of the 7 of us have June Birthdays and Dan and I have our anniversary too!

On June 11th, we celebrated our 10th Anniversary!  This year has ended up very difficult for us.  We've had to go through heartache and sadness, but there was also much happiness too.  We had planned a nice anniversary getaway, but life happened and we had to take a little detour.  I'm sure that a little more down the road we will celebrate us.

Miss Avery Carlina turned 2 on June 13th! 

 She started off her day by having swim lessons with Daddy. She has had several family members swimming with her mommy and me class since I have been unable, and I am grateful that she is pretty ok with anyone swimming with her. She loves the water!

 All 3 boys are in the same swim class this year and seem to be doing well.

 Avery LOVES Minnie Mouse, so I made her a MM cake.

 She is a very determined eater, especially with something sweet!

 We have been blessed with an abundance of family this year, although we wish it was under different circumstances.  Avery got to celebrate her birthday with both Nama's and Papa Earl.

 Usually Dan and I are #1, but she has been so spoiled by family that she wouldn't stay with mommy.

 She wanted Nama Elliott!

 A happy little 2 year old!

 More cake?  Sure!

 My little sister Vanessa got married on June 6th and shortened her honeymoon to help support us in our time of sorrow.  This is her new hubby Conrad.  He is a great guy!  After a while, Avery was his new best friend.

 Papa Earl sporting some of Avery's new bling.  :)

Elliott turned 6 on June 15th!

 Elliott wanted a monster truck boy party this year, so this was his cake.

 All the boys lining up for a swing at the monster truck pinata that Dan made.

 A pretty cool truck!

 The boys.

 Another year older, and wiser too!

 Then the activities continued.  We had a cool target game using swim noodles.

 A waterballoon toss.

 The boys had the most fun just having all out war with the water balloons.  I love Ross' determination in this picture.

They had other games, but really enjoyed being sprayed by the hose while sliding.

Happy Birthday my sweet Avery and Elliott!

End of the 2011/2012 School Year

The end of this school year was a little bitter-sweet for our family.  We had a great year of learning and growing.

 Kindergarten's last full day was pirate day.  The kids had so much fun wacking on Dan's pirate pinata.  All 100 kids got to swing at him and all the teachers and parents too.  Mrs. Back delivered the final blow that severed the legs off and spread the candy everywhere.

 Elliott pirate.

Elliott's kindergarten class graduation.  They performed songs and Elliott even got to read the opening remarks.  One of the funny little moments was when they were singing a song where they had to snap their fingers.  Elliott has a tough time doing this but he pretended.  Well, his pretending makes him shoot up the middle finger.  So all during the song he was flipping the audience off.  It made Dan and I giggle, which was especially nice because it was a rough day for us.

 Elliott getting his diploma.  He has had a very fun and successful year!  He was the smartest kid in the class - and I'm not just saying that!  He reads at a 5th grade level and absorbs everything that he learns.

 Elliott and our favorite Kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Back!

Donovan's last day of 2nd grade was the next day.  I was in the hospital, but Dan was able to go to Dono's award ceremony.  Donovan had a very successful year in his all boys class and was at the top of his class.  We even found out that he is reading at a 7th grade level!  He's such a smarty!



 Donovan with his teacher, Mr. Vacha.

On to a summer filled with memories and hopefully fun things.

New Cut on an Old Gal

I have been itching to cut my hair for a few months now, but decided that I would let it grow more so that I could still pull it back if I was sick.  Now that my morning sickness has pretty much gone, I decided it was time for a summer cut.  I decided to have my new do on my birthday.

 Pre-cut

 Gotta have a belly shot too :)  (currently 18 weeks along)

 The cut.  I was able to donate 10 inches to Locks of Love!  It's been a while since I've done that and it felt great!  I'm glad my excess can help someone else feel good in their time of need.  As a bonus, the salon gave me my haircut for FREE!  Happy Birthday to me!  The stylist commented on my pregnancy and asked how many kids I had.  I told her this would be #5.  She just gawked at me and said "You don't look old enough to have 5 kids, do you mind telling me your age?"  So I told her I was turning 33 today.  It was also pretty sweet having her tell me I didn't look that old.  :)

And of course I got spoiled with nice things and a fun dinner and a yummy four layer chocolate cake with strawberry filling and choco fudge icing (thank you Dan!).  The day couldn't have been any better!