Post Op

Dailynn had her Post Operation Dr. appointment this week.  We went in and everything looks great!  They did an ultrasound on her and found everything working the way it should.  The reflux is fixed and not causing issues anymore.  We can now take her off her medications and let her body do what it needs too.  She still had her homework of going to the bathroom a lot more, but she seems a little more excited about that now. I'm hoping that we will be past the wet beds soon, but that only will come with her doing her homework.  Wish us luck!

Christmas

So we have made it through Christmas.  On Christmas Eve, we got a big snow storm lasting most of the day.  I will not lie, I was so excited to see the snow when I woke up!  The fun was that I started me having harder contractions throughout the day, that made me a little excited and scared at the same time.  We got up at a descent hour and ran down to Carl's Jr for breakfast.  We planned on going to a movie a little later in the day so we ran over and got tickets for that just to make sure they didn't sell out.  We then had 2 hrs to kill, so we went to go find dresses for Avi since she is in need of them right now, why can't kids stop growing?  We lucked out in Kid to Kid and found a great one for a great price.  The girls wanted to go see the mall and Santa Clause, so we went there.  The line to see Santa was much longer than we had time or energy to wait for, so we went to the play land instead.  I was so glad that I had absolutely no reason to step foot in any of the stores there, it was a mad house!  The girls literally ran around the play area for 20 min straight!  We then headed to our movie Arther Christmas.  By the time the movie started the place was packed, and I was glad I got our tickets early when only 10 had been sold before us.  After the movie we went home, had dinner, cleaned up a little, and generally got ready for Santa the next day.  We let the girls open 1 present which were the PJs they were going to wear that night.  

 On Christmas morning, Avi woke up at 6:20 ready to go, Dailynn was excited when we woke her up, but JJ didn't want to have anything to do with it, and wanted to go back to sleep.  The problem is we were too excited to wait for her to wake up causing a little distress for the first few min.

 The girls checking out what Santa didn't wrap for them.  Jeslyn needed a little help figuring out what was going on.

 As soon as she found her leap pad, there was no going back.  She loves that thing!

 When we open presents, each girl gets a turn.  Sometimes if they are the same thing, we will had it to multiple girls at once.  With Jeslyn, she spent the first half of Christmas playing her leap pad and only opening presents if they got between her eyes and the pad.  She would open it, look at it for a sec, then throw it to the side and get back to her game.  Eventually she realized she was getting some cool stuff and put the pad down and got excited about the presents.  Avi got a new camera, an mp3 player, a bunch of drawing stuff and books.  Dailynn got a DSI with games and  a case, books, drawing stuff, and a watch (she has been stealing mine like crazy lately, I wanted to keep it for myself).  Jeslyn got about everything under the sun, and she loves ALL of it so much!  They girls said they had an AWESOME Christmas!

2 days later we had Grandma and Grandpa come share a little Christmas with us.  They brought some puzzles, block, movies, and a great picture.  We gave Mom her gift of the flatware from us siblings.  They loved it!  We had a great time with them and the bobcat.  He liked climbing out Christmas trees, so Mom helped me put one of them away.  That was helpful, now I just have to finish putting the other one away and Christmas will be over and we can work on baby.

Room Mom

I was convinced to be the room mom for Avi's class this year.  I haven't ever done it before, so I didn't know what to expect.  Luckily I had a little bit of brain power to not sign up for too much with Dai's class too.  So my responsibilities have been to throw the class parties.  I have done 3 so far, so here they are.

We started with the Halloween party.  I have a great mom who gave me the angry birds set she used for the family reunion to use at the party.  It was such a hit!  We also did some pumpkin bowling, bobbing for donuts, and some other short games.  For it being my first party I think it went ok, I wasn't thinking clearly on the timing of things, so there were some bottle necks here and there, but the kids still had fun.

 You know Jeslyn can't be left out of the fun!

Then in November, the teacher wanted to do an etiquette dinner to try to teach the kids some manners.  Luckily all I had to do was arrange food to arrive, and there are some wonderful moms that did a great job with that!  They had to come to school in Sunday dress, and the boys had to escort the girls to the table after they got their food.  It was so cute to watch the boys fumble with trying to get the girls hand wrapped around their arms to escort them.  Before they were able to eat, they had to do a minute of silence.  I know those kids have never known a longer minute in their lives.  The teacher also insisted on them having intelligent conversation, but what I was hearing wasn't always that way, come on they are in 4th and 5th grades.

 For Christmas, we played a few games, decorated cookies, and the teacher let them play freeze dance.  We started with Christmas bingo, and Jeslyn thought it great to just eat the Swedish fish rather than play bingo herself.  We had a version of Taboo that we played and I was laughing my head of at that because the kids looked like deer caught in the headlights every time they got a new word.  They could talk and brag all they wanted, but as soon as they got the word and the timer, they couldn't say a word.  After that we let the kids decorate Christmas tree sugar cookies.  I was sick by the end of it when I saw what they had done to some of them.  The freeze dance competition was fun to watch, some kids are much more reserved, and others, just don't care what they are doing.  I got home with a super sugared up Jeslyn and a desperate need for a nap!

lesson from the BoM

So its that time of year again where everyone is asking for donations to the food bank.  At the school they are asking for 10 cans per kid and they get a ticket to go watch a movie at the high school next week. For some reason this year I'm just not excited to give food away.  I think its just that I have actually been using food from my storage this year and I guess I don't want to give it up, or I feel like Murphy has been attacking and I'm nervous to do so.  I express these feeling to Nathan last night, but when I was reading scriptures this morning this is what I got "I mean all you who deny the better, because ye have not; I would that ye say I in your hearts that: I give not because I have not, but if I had I would give.  And now, if ye say this in your hearts ye remain guilt less, otherwise ye are condemned; as and your condemnation is just for ye covet that which ye have not received" mosiah4:24-25.
I found it interesting that I read that little bit of scripture, and that its about the only part of the chapter that I paid attention to, on the morning after my comment and the last day of the school food drive.  I guess I get to go dig through the pantry and food storage before school today.

the score

I just got home from my test elated and over joyed to have passed the test!  The bummer part is that is all I know, they only will tell me pass/fail, not an actual score.  Oh well, I'm just so happy to have it done!

The test

As most of you know, I work for H & R Block preparing tax returns during the tax season.  The IRS has decided that anyone that prepares more than a few returns has to take a test to register with them.  I, like a crazy person, decided that life isn't crazy enough, and that I should get this test taken before this baby comes.  I have been studying for over a month straight to get ready, and the big day is fast approaching.  This Thursday at noon I will be taking it.  I was hoping that I could enlist your support through prayers for me that day to be able to think clearly and remember the information I have been studying.  I will try to post after the test, but I'm apologizing now if it doesn't happen in as timely manner, your always welcome to text me to ask how I did if I don't.  Thanks for your love and support.

November

I totaly Love November this year!!  The main reason is that October was so crazy for me.  Between Dr. appt., class parties, tutoring, fall break, halloween, .....  I got the girls off to school on Nov  1st, got the dishes done, and just wondered what to do.  Usually I would have taken a nap, but I wasn't tired for the first time in a very long time.  I didn't have to get something done before I started my tutoring marathon, I wasn't planning a party, or anything else.  It was so wonderful!!!  I had the same thing happen Friday afternoon.

So in October I had Dai's Dr. apt, Mom come for fall break, I'm room mom for Avi so I had her Halloween party, and then the crazy Halloween its self.  Again I have to give credit to my mom for helping with the class party.  She brought up the angry birds set that she has for me to use.  The kids (and helper parents) were shocked and excited to play with it.  Both Mom and Dad are amazing event planners, so I got some of there great talent and was able to pull something together.  We did a few games and competitions and pumpkin bowling.  I will get pictures of that later.

Halloween was a nightmare.  I only gave myself a day or two to figure out costumes, and I didn't get that one right.  On the day of, Avi went through 4 or 5 costumes before everyone was happy enough to be done.  Dai had a few costume malfunctions, and in the end really just looked like a school kid when all the makeup wore off at school.  Luckily JJ was just happy to be a princes, yipee!  We went to the neighbors house for a party, and luckily Nathan was happy to take over trick or treating ofor me. I started the trip, and after a few houses he kicked me into the car following the kids for medical reasons and he kept track of the kids.  JJ had skipped her nap (I had her in her room for 2 hrs and she didn't sleep) and then the sugar high from trick or treating and the party was not a good combination.  I got her to bed and she was still off her rocker hyper, so I pulled her down to fall asleep on my lap while I was working.  She did pretty quick thank goodness.

Now to top it off, I have had fun with my body lately.  I had about a week that I couldn't hardly walk.  I have the round ligaments on my stomach that have been pulling  and hurting.  I found a belt that helps hold the ligaments tight, and I haven't been hurting since, YIPEE!!!  Now I just have to get the rest of my body to agree.  The things we do for these kids.

I'm just looking forward to November and hoping that I can use this simple time to study for a test I need to take sometime soon.  Wish me luck!

"I'm 3"

So a few weeks ago (it has been a crazy few weeks) Jeslyn decided that she was going to act like a 3 year old.  It started out that while I was in the shower she thought that my phone needed to be cleaned with chap stick.  I got that cleaned up, and since taking a shower takes all the energy I have left after kicking the kids out for school, I laid down to rest.  I told Jeslyn to go get dressed.  A few minutes later I see her laying on the floor in my room still naked.  I asked her why she wasn't dressed and she said she had pooped.  I hate those words out of her mouth.  I ran into her room to find poop all over the floor in her room.  I scramble to get it all cleaned up before I had to tutor in 5 min.  Luckily the student was late and a mom herself, so she let me take a few min to get things taken care of.  While I'm tutoring I hear Jeslyn playing in the living room, not more than 10 feet from me.  I figure that we try to keep that room clean so she is probably just coloring and not getting in trouble.  As the student is leaving Jeslyn is asking if her hair is pretty.  I just brush it aside since I am so exhausted.  I sit down on the couch and see a chunk of Jeslyn's hair sitting on the couch and start thinking "huh, that's weird".  I look at the piano bench and see a few more chunks.  My eyes keep going around the room seeing more and more chunks, and finally land on Jeslyn holding scissors and asking if her hair is pretty.  I jump up like a crazy woman and run over to see what she has done.  The damage, She cut most of the hair on the top of her head down to 2 inches.  I sit there and just about cry. Luckily it was a Tuesday, so I ran down to the hair school where they have really cheap hair cuts for an emergency haircut.

 I walked into the school and request either a senior student or an instructor to come help me. The lady in black is the owner of the school, and she did most of the repair.  The ladies were asking her questions and just talking to her, and right then was the very first time she said she was 3.  I have been trying to prime her for her b-day for a few weeks now, but she decided she was 3 then.  The following days she said she was 2 again, and acted like the nice 2 we have been enjoying.

So what haircut did we end up with?  A modified mullet!!!  Ug it looks so gross, but the other option is to lose all the length that we have been working on for 3 years to get!  It almost looks ok in this pic, but that is the typical walk out of the salon look where it looks great until you get home and try to style it yourself.  We have found out that if we pull it up into a pony tail it doesn't look so awefull.
So we get home, have some lunch, and chill for a few min before I put her to bed.  I am so exhausted at this point that we both lay down and take a nap.  I started tutoring again at 4, and I had to wake her up.  I went and did the start to wake up process.  I go tell her to wake up and she comes to enough to look at me, then she falls asleep again.  This is what I expected, but that is not what I got.  She jumped right up and went to my room.  (my room is officially off limits now)  The whole time I'm tutoring she decided that her legs needed lotion.  Then she thought that not only her legs but her belly and arms and everything needed it, so she stripped down to her under ware (thank goodness she had at least that much on) and proceeded to spread lotion all over her self.  But of course how does a "3" year old keep the lotion confined to only herself?  I came up to find that it was spread over half of my comforter as well.  I ran it down to the wash immediately, and got her dressed.  While I was making dinner and just trying to keep myself from exploding she ran up to my room again and found our swim bag and started finding things.  All the small pockets with random things got emptied and in there was my prescription sun glasses since the only place I wear them is swimming.  She comes down the stairs a few min later with the rims on her face and the lenses were who knows where.  At first I wasn't sure what was going on until I found one of the lenses and the swim bag.
This little girl got to go to bed early and mom got to go get some ice cream after.  It was a hard day!!!  Luckily that was the worst, and the next day she wasn't nearly as awefull.

Dailynn update

First off I forgot the best part in the last post, I told Daily that after lunch on the first day that she could go play with her friend since her room was clean, her responce, "I want to spend time with grandma".  We told her that she would be cleaning, and she didn't care, just wanted to be with her.
So last week we went to her appointment with the urologist and found out that we are headed to surgery.  Basically on a scale of 1-5, 1 being slight reflux, and5 being severe, she is at a 4 on the left side.
Currently we are on a drinking/potty schedule to get her body trained to function correctly when the surgery takes place in November.  Wish us luck and please keep her in your prayers as we approach the surgery.

helping

Beware it's a long and boring post, so if you want the good stuff, rush down to the last sentence.


My wonderful awesome amazing mom came up to help me out this week for our fall break.  I have had some corners in my house that just keep getting bigger and bigger piles of stuff that need to be sorted and put away, and with my limited energy, they haven't been touched, so my mom came to help me go through those corners.  In the 2+ days she was here we worked like crazy to clean them all out!  I definately couldn't keep up with her, but luckily the girls could a little better.
The first day we started with the bedrooms.  Avi has become somewhat of a collector of things and in doing so has made her room a little cluttered and disorganized.  Since she was the first one done with breakfast, she was the first victim.  When it got to the point that I wasn't being any more help plopped on the floor directing traffic I moved to Dailynn's room to get her moving.  I have been keeping closer tabs on Dai and JJ, so there wasn't as much clutter as just messes, so by the time Avi and Mom were done with their project, I had the filth cleaned up and was ready for the help with the project of going through clothes.  I was amazed at how many clothes we have inherited from people.  I have 3 boxed dedicated to the next size that JJ will grow into.  Lucky for me, it will be summer and she will probably be destroying those clothes way too fast, so I will have plenty to spare :).  After a quick trip to the dr, and lunch; we finished up with my room and a closet and started moving down the stairs.  While I was at the dr. Mom attacked my pantry.  I had done little sections here and there as time, energy and absolute need deemed it, but she was able to get everything so that it isn't balancing precariously in there and got rid of all the crumbs and spilled flour out YIPEEEEEEEE!!!!!  The rest of the day was doing laundry, cleaning a few little places and dinner.  We were so exhausted by the time the kids went to bed!
On day 2 the real fun began.  Mom let me go play volleyball for an hour and do some much needed grocery shopping with only Dailynn (do you know how nice it is to have a helpful child to shop with rather than a hyper 2 yr old) while the other 2 girls stayed home to help grandma clean the garage and play outside for the hour of sunshine we got.  I think it was good I wasn't there for the whole garage part because I would have wanted to lift all the heavy stuff to help, and after the first day my body was saying no way!  After putting groceries away and getting a quick shower we met Nathan for a lunch with Dad day because the older girls don't get to do that very often.  Then it was back to work.  We went to town on the garage again, deciding where to put shelves and all the stuff on them.  At the same time we were defrosting our deep freeze so that we could move it down stairs in an attempt to save energy by having it in a little more temp controlled environment.  Once we got the garage sufficiently destroyed and rearranged until Nathan could get home and rebuild the shelves that he disassembled the night before, we moved down to the food storage.  It has just gotten more and more cluttered to the point where we just didn't want to go in there much.  I had a wonderful neighbor come organize all the food a few weeks ago, but now we moved all the boxes to where they needed to go rather than the teetering piles they were.  The girls had fun transporting water bottles for me to put away a little neater.  By the time we were done with that, the storage room was destroyed again, but on the mend, and we just had to wait for some reinforcement to come help us move the freezer and heavy stuff around for a few min.  I was supper lucky to have Nathan motivated when he got home and got a few hrs. of organization from him as well.  By the time we got the storage room and shelves done, there were only 2 things left on my massive list, one was clean out under the kitchen sink, and the other was the dreaded computer room.  Lucky me, I got Nathan in the computer room cleaning out his boxes and boxes of computer stuff that we haven't looked through in years, while I trapped him in going through the filing cabinet.  Mom was awesome and took care of the sink!!!  By the time mom and I got through all the papers that needed to be filed, it was time for the kids to go to bed .  We got them down, and did a little last min cleaning before we all crashed as well.
This morning we had a baptism to go to and since it was my good friends daughter, I kinda signed myself (and in turn mom) up to help her.  On a day that I'm not pregnant and exhausted I might have been able to get the fruit salad and rolls done by myself, but the way I am now, there was no way, so in swoops super mom again and saved the day.  She took care of all the fruit while I made the rolls and got kids ready.  We got everything done with a few min to spare, yipee!  The baptism was great, and afterwards I ran to set up the luncheon with the help of about 5 6-10 yr olds thinking they needed to help.  It was great, but that age group doesn't quite have an eye for how a buffet table should be set.  I'm not complaining, it was helpful to have them carry everything in, and then all we had to do is arrange it.  After lunch and cleanup mom had to take off.  I came home put the food away and slept!!!  I was so exhausted and worn out from the last 2+ days.
This is a great big shout out to the most amazing, wonderful, awesome mom I could ever ask for!!!!!

cookies

Jeslyn and I were coming home from errands on Monday, and decided to enter through the garage for a few different reasons.  One of those was to get butter out of the freezer.  I gave her the butter to take to the kitchen while I took care of a few other things real quick.  In that time, so took the butter up. put it on the counter, and took one square out.  I come up and start wondering where that square is when I put it in the fridge.  All I can get from her is that she's making cookies.  Upon investigating, I find that she has unwrapped it and put it in the mixing bowl.  While I was looking, she was grabbing a measuring cup and finding the sugar bucket.  Luckily I caught her before she got the measuring cup semi full of sugar out of the bucket and over to the bowl.  It took a little convincing, but I got her to drop the idea of the cookies and go watch Ferb for a few minutes.  That's her favorite show right now, so I was lucky.  

A few hrs later I grabbed her and we made those cookies now that the butter wasn't a frozen block.  She did an amazing job of measuring and pouring in the ingredients (all but the eggs and shortening), but her favorite part was turning on and off the mixer for me.  When we started putting the dough on the pan, she did a sufficient job of spreading dough all over the pan for me as I made cookies around her project.  Luckily they were gooey enough that it didn't matter that they were smeared everywhere.  

Later when recounting the tale to Dad and a friend, she told how she turned on and off the mixer by raising her right arm in front of here and taking a few steps forward for off and backward for on multiple times just to get the point across.  For a 3 yr. old, she did a great job of making cookies! 

Dailynn

Since Dailynn was little, she has been a little stubborn about going to the bathroom.  Because of this we have had many UTIs and had a hospital visit with a kidney infection.  Well at the end of the summer we ended up with two right next to each other.  It wasn't the same infection, different strains of bacteria, but they happened one right after another.  This was the breaking point for me, so I talked to the Dr. about other options.  So last Tuesday the two of us headed down to Utah Valley hospital for a VCUG to see what is happening.  It turns out that she has reflux.  In essence urine  is flowing back into one of her kidneys.  YUCK!!! 
So with this news, we get to start having the fun of trying to fix this problem.  We have an apt with a urologist at Primary Childrens in Oct, and from there we will find out what happens next. 
The good thing is that hopefully when we get all this figured out, we might have her bathroom issues taken care of, and maybe even get to stop wetting the bed (for her at least).  The bad news is that I was told this is a hereditary trait, and that the other girls may be having the same problem.  I'm just kinda waiting for bills and stuff to go through before I start trying to follow through with that. 
Wish us luck in the upcoming months with all this fun.

t's a.....

GIRL!   I got to have my 20 week ultrasound today.  I love the ultrasound so much, it just has  a way of making it all seem real.  Yes I have been feeling the baby move, but seeing her just makes me so much more excited!  My body was contracting while it was going on pushing the placenta into her, so we didn't get a good profile shot of her, but she stretched out a leg cute and showed us a foot.  We took Jeslyn with us, but I don't think she quite understood what was going on.

I then got the joy of waiting with Jeslyn for an hour for the Dr. to be available.  He had to run and check on a delivery, so we got the joy of waiting.  I wouldn't have cared at all, but Jeslyn was being her hyper at a bad time self and made it so much fun.  We survived, but I wonder what she  was thinking while the nurse was drawing blood from me.  She held my hand some of the time, and was mostly quiet during that part, thank goodness.

So we are trying to come up with names, and we need help.  It's kind of unofficially my turn to pick a name, so lets have them.  Remember we like unique names, but if you know someone with the name, it's ok, just not common.   The names I keep coming up with get shot down with good reasons.  One that I have liked for many years is Kovia, but Nathan doesn't like the nickname koko which is exactly what we would be doing.  Wish us luck, and please help us with ideas.

Brigham City Temple

The youth leaders in our ward wanted to do an activity going to the Brigham City Temple open house, so on the first day that tickets were available, they all called and got as many tickets as they could.  Long story short, they ended up with at least 100 tickets for 30 youth.  The next dilemma was how to get those 30 youth up to the temple?  There were a few calls made, and I was excited to have the chance to go.  I didn't end up with any youth, but oh well, I got to go anyway.  I think there were about 60 ward members that ended up going in the group.  The girls really loved it, the hard part of the trip was Jeslyn.  She was so excited and hyper that I just spent my time chasing her around and trying to rush through to get her away from a very un-baby proofed building.              

First Day of School

We did it, we made it through the summer, I survived!  We were all so excited for the first day of school, me especially.  We have had a fun summer, but it's so nice to get back into a routine and have so much more silence around here.  Jeslyn is totally missing her sisters though, but she is starting to realize she can do just about anything she wants to and get a lot more of mom's attention that she has been.  I'm just happy because I have heard that both of the teachers are the best of their grades.  Ok so maybe not best of the grade, but they are favorites of everyone around us and they say they are awesome teachers.  Avi got put in a 4-5 grade class.  The teacher has taught both of them, and there are 2 times during the day that he has just the 4th graders in the room.  that also means that there are only 13 students for those 2 hours with him. 

So we got pictures with the girls, there is Kari again, the 3 of them walk to and from school together, and there are the 2 sisters left home alone.

When they got home from school I asked how the first day was.  Both girls were so happy, and then Dai said "it was great except we had 4 recesses and they were so boring!"  What are we going too with that kid?

More summer fun

I have to admit, July was kinda a dud for us.  We went to the library 1-2 times a week and did 7 peaks once a week.  I don't have any pictures of that, but at least we did something right!

So to start off August, I snuck down to visit my parents with the girls for a few days.  I wasn't feeling good, and it was nice to have my mom take care of me (and the kids).  When we got back it was a whirlwind trying to get ready for the fun reunion we had.

I don't think any of my kids are in this pic, but it kinda shows the game of kickball.

 Look at Avi winning those 2 big guys!

 The water slide was a little popular.

 The little ones decided the slip n slides would be better.

 The top one, Dailynn is feeding me pudding, and the next one is Avi putting curlers in my hair.  The bottom one is the kids shaving their dads with cool whip.

 The candy ball game.

 So Jeff brought up the water bounce house for us to play on one day, so we turned it into a water party at our house.  We ended up with 27 kids, 16 adults and 4 babies.

 Look at those two cuties.  Thanks for coming to have fun with us and bringing the slide girls!

2 nights later we had a ward party where they had a giant slip n slide for the kids.  If you look close you can see all 3 girls and their friend Kari that is always with us.

So the day before our water party we spent the day at 7 peaks.  The day after Nathan's work had a party at Kowabunga Bay (another water slide place).  So that week we were swimming 4 days in a row.  We were so worn out by the end of it that I don't think we want to go swimming for a while.

summers gone

So I wanted to blog about the first day of school on yesterday, but when I pulled all the pictures off the camera I realized that I haven't blogged at all, so lets see what happened.

 Dailynn got to play Coach Pitch Ball this year. She loved it!

 We went to the splash pad in Spanish Fork with Brittney and Sean, and Jeff and Kenzie and girls.

 The girls got sick of the water and just wanted to walk and slide on the walls there.

 Of course we went to La sal for an annual trip.  We took our good friends with us, so there are a lot of pictures with them and their kids.  This is at Sand Dune Arch.

 Look a Picture of me not looking awful,very rare!

We asked Charles if we could borrow a horse  to ride.

 Jeslyn watshed me lead him around with everyone on, and wanted to do it herself.

 Who can go to La Sal and not go swimming?

 Mom was so nice to let the girls drive her tractor!

 The Indian museum in Blanding

Lets go PLAY!!!

Can you see the Indian Head

 Look another picture of me, wow!

 Grandpa was nice enough to let the girls drive his tractor too.  He gave Jeslyn free reign on the wheel, and they went out to spin doughnuts for a few min.  I might have that video, we will have to see if I can find it.

 Mom got these cool toys that you can use screw drivers to take apart and put together again.  It entertained everyone for at least an hour!

 Stay tuned, this is just June.