Blessing Day

We had Sophia's blessing this past Sunday.  With all our family, we took up most of the chapel in our tiny trailer of a ward building.  We had quite a houseful afterward, too.

 She wore the same dress I was blessed in.

Plus, we had a combination birthday party for Eliza & Samantha since we were all together anyway.

Just had to share this picture. 

It was a great day.  Thanks to everyone!

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

Just a little house update

Just a little update....
http://youtu.be/_Bl1hL85liw


and if you don't remember what it looked like before....
http://youtu.be/lflGYZKKClQ

Taking A Breath

While the older children are entertained for a moment & I have one hand free for typing, I thought I'd post a few pictures.

These were taken with my fantastic new camera - thank you Jay and Sherrie.  You are the best friends a gal could ask for.  More to come on that later when I have two hands.

New Baby & New Crib

IT'S A GIRL!!!


I went in for my c-section early January 2.  Things didn't go quite as smoothly as they usually do, but in the end it all worked out.  My spinal block didn't block, so as they were scrubbing me preparing for surgery I realized I had an itch on my foot and was wondering about asking someone to scratch it for me when I remembered that I shouldn't be having an itch on my foot.  I tried wiggling my toes and they wiggled.  I said, "I can feel what you're doing.  And I can move my feet."  Everyone just stopped and after some testing they concluded that, yes, I could still feel and move my feet.  So, back to my room to wait another hour so they can try again.  The second time worked like a charm and a few short minutes later we got to meet our little girl.

****WARNING****  Some of the following pictures might be a little graphic of the c-section delivery.

Look at all that hair!!  

Anastasia Sophia 

January 2, 2012  10:32 am

8 lbs.  21 inches

Exactly a week before she was born, though, we were able to move in to our fabulous new house with the amazing help of some pretty WONDERFUL people.  The day after Christmas Tyler's entire family plus a good friend of ours and HIS brothers, dad, and father-in-law helped finish packing our house, loading everything on a truck, unloading everything off the truck and setting up furniture.  I am so blessed to be loved by so many people.

There are some "after" pictures coming, I promise.  Thank you so much to everyone who has helped us get so much done in so little time!  We are so grateful!

Pigs, Paint and Pretty Cabinets

In the brief moments before I go pass out in bed from exhaustion, I wanted to post some more updates!

First, the day has finally come to take our pig to the slaughter.  For the last two weeks he's been escaping from his pen, ever on the search for more food.  We decided it was time.  Originally we were planning on having a gigantic Christmas party where we roasted him out on a spit and had everyone we know come and share in the feast, but apparently we forgot how much we have going on right now and decided it would be best for everyone's sanity if we just took him in somewhere and then picked him up ready for the freezer.

So, here's a before shot of the day we got him:

 Tyler and Mario.  Their family wanted to go in on it with us to get the "farm" experience since their yard is too small.  :)  

Shortly after this day Cade decided he was a vegetarian.  He did not want to eventually eat this cute little guy.  

And then that cute little guy got really big and loud and stinky in 6 months.

It took just under an hour to get him into the trailer.  We thought he would be easily coaxed in with a bucket of food...

Then he got smart.  

We tried tying things around him, we tried wrapping him in a tarp, we tried bribing him with carrots and apples.  The only thing that eventually worked was trapping him in a cow panel (fencing) and scooting him to the trailer and chasing him in.  If only someone was there to video it all.

So, we're all pretty happy now.  And we'll have some awesome ham for Christmas dinner.  

Now, more house updates.  As of now, all of the rooms except the kids' bathroom are painted.  We still have some work to do in there, so I've moved on to painting door frames.  I attempted the base boards for about a minute and a half and decided my 36 week pregnant body can't handle that.  

On Monday we got our kitchen cabinets in and it's looking great!  We still have the crown molding to go on the top and the countertops to come in hopefully next week sometime, but I'm THRILLED with how it's coming along!

Here are a few shots of the living room:

I'm doing a board and batten look on the bottom half, so that's why it doesn't look finished yet.  We'll hopefully be starting on the floor tomorrow!  

PAINT!

Finally!  We've been able to start painting the house.  I say "finally" like we've been waiting an eternity.  It's only been 3 weeks I think since we bought it, but I haven't been able to help at all and finally have a chance to get to work on something in the house.

First I took the kids to pick out colors for their rooms.  Of course, the girls got pink.  Chantilly Lace to be exact.  Cade picked green.  Since he is color deficient (color blind - he sees colors differently than the rest of us), I let him pick out every single green sample card he liked, then I narrowed it down to the top 4 I'd be OK with, then let him pick out the final color.  He went with Safari Green.  Mainly because he knew with a name like that, it must be perfect for an animal-themed room.

My AWESOME grandma flew out for two days to help me get started.

She did all the trim to save me from having to bend over and climb so much.  She also kept me company, helped round up children and babysat while Tyler and I ran to Lowe's and Home Depot several times without having to load up the van full of children.

I just love Eliza's picture smile.  :)

We wrote their names on the floor so that one day far, far, far into the future if carpet needs to be ripped out and replaced, we can see them and smile.

This is how the kids looked most of the week.  Actually, she looks pretty good in this picture.  Their faces were covered in a combination of dirt, juice and other sticky messes that I'm unsure of how they came about.  Not to mention snot (and dirt) running out of noses, plus a nice scrape on the face from one tumble too many down the oh-so-awesome concrete ramp we have out the front door.

 So thank you, Mems for coming out and helping SO MUCH. Love you!

Remember that black entryway?  And the nice '70s wood paneling?  Here we are all primered and ready for paint!  Isn't it amazing?!  Actually, I do have all this painted now, but I haven't taken my camera back up to the house for some pictures.  Soon, I promise.

So, for two days I had some help painting from my grandma and was able to get the kids' rooms done.  Then, the last 4 days I've been able to do the master bedroom and bathroom, the hallway, the kitchen and dining room and the living room.  I'm pretty thrilled considering I'm 7 and a half months pregnant.

OH!  I almost forgot.  In all the excitement, Cade has been working on a few of his loose teeth and we finally got one out!  Thank goodness for Aunt Lorrie the dental hygienist who enjoys doing that kind of thing.