Better late than never

I am mighty late getting a post up. The last 8 weeks or so have been so hectic and busy that I haven't taken the time to upload pictures from my camera and written about it. So, here it is, the mother of all posts. I hope you are up for it.

Of course, Beatrice Grace was born, I have posted about that and put pictures up so I don't have to do anything with that story. She is growing like a weed. She is already about 10 pounds and is starting to finally outgrow her newborn clothes. I think tomorrow while Matt is home I will set up an area and sit down and take pictures of her in some of my favorite outfits before she can't wear them anymore. Wish me luck, I am not known for my photography skills.

I figured I'd start off with some of my favorite family pictures. These first 3 are funny to me. These are Mikayla, Gavin, and Linus showing off their "pretty" faces. I love that all 3 of these kids have created the same face when asked to show us their pretty face. It's so stinking cute. I am still trying to get the cheesy smile Linus will give me when I ask him. I just can't because as soon as he sees the camera he tries to bat his eyelashes.





I just loved this picture of Linus. If you click on it, I think it'll enlarge and you can see how pretty his eyes are. Even though they have a little red in them, they are still a very beautiful blue.This is a common occurrence at our house. This is Linus after he throws himself on the floor for one of his temper tantrums. I decided not to kill you with a video. The screaming will burst your eardrums.
I peeked in on Linus one day during one of his naps and found him like this. I giggled to myself and had to take a picture of it. Like mother and father, like son. Matt's butt is always hanging out of his pants and unfortunately I can't find pants that fit my body right so mine is too when I bend down.
Linus with his beloved Grandpa's glasses on. Kirk would put them on him and Linus would freeze and not move. I was in lying down when they were doing this and could hear them all laughing at him. I'm so glad they got pictures of it.
This is my sweet boy with his sweet smile. I just love love love it when he looks at me and smiles at me. This is the view of him I have so you can all see what I see. I sure think he's the bee's knees.
Grandpa Kirk holding the babies. You sure can tell the Grandma and Grandpa think grandkids are great. I love seeing them with the kids and can't wait for the other 2 grandkids to come to Utah for the holidays to see them all together.
This is my very favorite picture of Matt and our kids. This shows not only how little Bea is, but it shows her smile. She smiles so much it's crazy. Linus didn't smile near this much. Especially not just by us talking to him or looking at him. He'd be staring off in the distance at his angels and smile. She wants to be talked to and sat upright and she'll smile and giggle. I love it. Daddy obviously loves it too.

We brought home our new puppy the Sunday after Bea was born. We either call her Babe or Blue, but her official AKC name is, are you ready for this, Babe the Big Blue Dane. That is my cute husband's name for her. I would have named her something else, but let's admit it, she really is his puppy. Who would have ever thought he would have bought a puppy? He isn't really known for his love of dogs, but he sure is cute with these Danes. It's hard not to be cute with these lovable giants. They really are like kids. And it really helps that they are so laid back and easy going.

Sorry the pictures aren't very good, it's hard when the puppies cuddle on the couch and they blend right in. =)

Blue is such a good puppy. The potty training is coming along. It's been a little difficult because of the cold though. She knows exactly what she is supposed to do, and when the weather is good, she goes out the doggy door and is perfect. When it's cold out though, I have to be very diligent and keep an eye on her when she isn't in her kennel to make sure she doesn't squat by the door. She is NOT interested in going outside to potty. The play? Yes, but not to potty.

She is also WAY too freaking smart for her own good. I am used to Moxie who either is just kind of dumb or just doesn't care. Blue has already figured out how doors work and how to figure out if they are open or not and to nose the door open if it isn't latched. Moxie is just NOW figuring it out after watching this little puppy do it. We have had a fence that has been open and Moxie could easily get out but never did. Never even tried. The first time a family member came in through the back, Blue immediately bolted out the fence to greet them. Sigh. Too freaking smart.

Matt did good though, she is beautiful. We got her from a breeder of blues in Clearfield. She is the result of a breeding of a 1/2 European 1/2 American female and a full European male. So far, she seems to have the blocky head of a European but her skin is pretty tight on her face so it hopefully won't be too droolly. She has very little white on her, just a few hairs on her chest and white patches on her feet above the pads. We are excited to show her and see how she does.

She's been pretty good with the kids. It's been hard because Moxie is very protective of the kids and she keeps "herding" Blue away from all of us. Then they end up playing and they get a little rough. It's been pretty hard with the little kids around while they roughhouse. The other day Blue bit Linus and that was my bad. She was in her kennel chewing on a bully stick and Linus likes to crawl into the kennel. Well, they are both at the same place developmentally so neither shares particularly well right now. Linus tried to take the bully stick and Blue was having none of it. So she gave him a growl and then a warning bite. It was enough to scratch him because of her sharp puppy teeth, but not near as bad as if she were really biting him. I just have to keep a better eye on them. And luckily, Linus is not worse for the wear. He likes the dogs just as much as ever. =)






Linus has had a runny nose and infections since 9 months old. It's been awful to listen to him try to breathe at night. I have given him Claritin, Benadryl, saline nose drops, Afrin, everything the pediatrician has recommended. Nothing gave him any relief. He ended up with an ear infection and the antibiotics cleared it up, but the runny nose persisted. I guess it has something to do with teething, but it was REALLY bad. Finally, we went in to the doctor and he heard how congested he was. When he would talk he was nasal sounding and so the doctor decided he had a sinus infection. We got another round of antibiotics and this is what we got. A great big allergic reaction. It started out looking like a couple of bug bites on his side. Then got bigger and bigger. It exploded into this after his 2nd dose of these showing up. It was weird because he'd been on the antibiotics for 8 days before this happened. I thought he had the chicken pox at first or measles or something. When I called the doctor, his nurse warned me that it would get worse before it got better. She wasn't kidding. His whole entire body was covered in these welts. He was more red than white before it started to go away. When it started to go away, each red spot was tinged with purple. He looked so awful! Luckily, he didn't itch to bad and the benedryl really helped.
On October 24th, I had people over for a "meet 'n' greet" with Bea. I didn't get a chance to have a baby shower. It's really hard when I don't have a church congregation, no relief society, no work girls, none of my friends really even know each other, etc. so I threw my own party. Unfortunately, not many people were able to show up due to sickness and Halloween parties or what ever else was going on. Those that showed had a great time just sitting around visiting and eating my favorite thing in the world... the best chili ever. I have this recipe that I love and make it when I can. This picture below is my good friend Stacy's daughter Emma. She is such a good momma in the making and just loves Linus. She played with him and he enjoyed sitting in her lap while watching TV. I just lover her, she is so cute with him.
This is Tyne and Chase. I took this picture not only because I thought it was cute, but because I wanted to be able to remember and remind myself how she gets down and plays with her kids. It reminds me how to be a better mom. I haven't had a chance to get down on Linus's level since I had been big and pregnant and then had surgery. I want to be a good mom with my kids while they are little like she is and to remember to play with them even if I am tired and sore.


This is the start of our newest house project. We used to have a 3 bedroom upper house. Matt has a much better insight to how things will look after doing something like painting or tearing down walls. He had the great idea to tear down the wall in the hallway to turn that bedroom into a large family room. It's been an awful lot of work and a huge mess, but I am excited about the end result.
This is what it looks like now that most of it is torn down. We just have to finish up the trimming and then we'll put carpet in. I am so excited for it to be done. We will have room for a Christmas tree!!

And if my life wasn't hectic enough, I had surgery to have my gallbladder removed. At the beginning of November, I had an attack. I thought I was dying. I thought it was a heart attack. I have a lot of aches and pains and migraines and I usually just tough it out. I won't go the the ER if I can help it. I was a very hard decision for me to go. It started out that I thought I was having indigestion and that I was also very hungry. So I ate a banana and went back upstairs to nurse Bea. The pain got worse and worse and so I went and took a couple of antacids. Well, the pain got even worse and it got hard to breath. I couldn't hold Bea anymore and by then, my gasping for breath and crying had woken Matt up. He look the baby and burped her while I tried to get into a different position thinking it was a muscle spasm or maybe if I moved better my heart attack would go away and I could breathe. It just got worse and worse and I thought I was going to suffocate. It was excruciating and scary. Matt finally asked if I needed to go to the ER and I conceded that yes I did. Ok, now, my only concern is do I drive myself or do we get Linus up and get Bea and take them both to the ER with us? What the heck to people do when they have kids and are by themselves? Tell the ambulance drivers where the carseats are? Luckily Mike was home in the basement and was able to come up and listen for Linus while he slept and we took off. By the time we got to the ER, the pain had let up some and I was able to talk and breathe somewhat. It got even better once they got the IV going and got some pain meds in. We ended up staying at the hospital until 4am or so. They took blood for labs and did an ultrasound on my gallbladder, gave me another dose of morphine and a prescription to take home and a referral to a surgeon.

So, two weeks before Thanksgiving, I had surgery to remove the stupid organ that was failing. My gallstones weren't very big, they were small and fit into the bile ducts. I guess that's bad since they can plug up the bile ducts and cause pancreatitis and sometimes death. I'm glad we got it fixed. Even though the recovery was really painful for about 3 days, in the end it has been pretty ok. I am so glad that Matt and our moms were so great. My mom came and watched the kids while I was in for surgery and for some of the day. Matt's mom came the next day and watched the kids while I slept and Matt went to work. I can't thank you guys enough!! I could barely get out of bed and walk around, there is no way I could be a functional parent. Then, unbenounced to me, Jeri had planned on taking Linus home with her and Kirk for the weekend. How did I get so lucky?! Matt took amazing care of Little Bea while I was out of commission and it gave me a chance to recover a little bit before he went back to work on Monday.


This is a picture of my handsome hubs at Bethany's house for Thanksgiving dinner. I didn't get many pictures as I felt under the weather with a cold I am fighting.

Uh, Oh. I should have expected this sooner or later. Bethany tried to secretly put a ponytail in Bea's hair to surprise me. Cute huh? I think she looks like a sumo wrestler and Matt said she looks like a troll doll. Nice. This is what she did all day on Thanksgiving. She slept all day long.

You can kind of see the little ponytail better in this one. I think if you click it you can see it better. I sure love my sisters. Just wanted to put that out there. =)