Emerson Family

A Day in the Life of a Heart Mom

2012-02-12T18:20:00.001-07:00

Did you know that this week is Congenital Heart Defect awareness week? Don't worry, I wouldn't have known either if I wasn't a heart mom. Since Christopher was born I have become part of an on-line community of other mothers of children with heart defects. I never thought I would join a support group because I have so much support already, but I have to say, it has been wonderful communicating with other women who really know what we're going through. It's also very nice to be able to get some of my dumb questions answered quickly without trying to get a hold of a doctor.
I hesitate a little bit to write this post, because I don't ever want to sound like I'm complaining or playing the "why me?" game. I only write it to give you an idea what it's like to have a heart baby. I recently heard several moms say that they never realized how selfish people were until they had a heart baby. My husband and I were very surprised to hear this, because our experience has been completely the opposite. We have both been moved to tears several times over the generosity and compassion others have shown us. I think what those moms meant is that people don't quite understand just how hard it is. They aren't selfish; they just honestly don't know how hard it is.
In order to help my friends and family get a little insight into my current life, I am writing this post. (Also so that some day when Christopher gets rebellious I can show this to him. He he!)
7:20am--Get up and get breakfast for Shannon and Leah, get them dressed, pack Shannon's backpack and her lunch, do her hair.
8:00am--Shannon's ride comes. (We have a wonderful neighbor who takes her to school since I want to take Christopher out of the house as little as possible.)
8:10am--Pump and drink a few glasses of water.
8:30am--Turn off Christopher's feeding pump, draw up and give him his erithromycin, aspirin (I have to cut up a baby aspirin into quarters and crush the quarter, then carefully get it into a small syringe and add water to dissolve it a little bit), and Zantac. I give these via the NJ tube and flush them in with a little bit of tap water.
8:50am--Mix 5 ounces of breast milk with 3 teaspoons of Pregestimil, then mix 4 ounces of that with Simply Thick so that he doesn't get any in his lungs. Pour 50 mls into a bottle and warm it up.
9:00am--Feed Christopher on his right side since his left vocal fold is paralyzed. He isn't allowed to go for longer than 15 minutes because he gets too tired and starts to choke.
9:30am--Detach his oxygen, feeding pump, and pulse oximeter and move him into the living room, then reattach everything.
10:00am--Make my bed, take a shower, and clean up a little bit.
10:30am--Rinse out enteral food bag and put 4 ounces of fresh food in it and turn the pump back on.
11:00am--Pump and drink more water.
11:30am--Lunch
12:00pm--Play with Leah, do some tummy time with Christopher, and clean the house. I wipe down doorknobs and hard surfaces with Clorox wipes and spray Lysol on everything else.
2:00pm--Pump and drink yet more water. Give Christopher his erithromycin.
2:30pm--Bundle up the boy and put him in his car seat. Hook up his portable oxygen and pack his feeding stuff into a backpack.
2:40pm--Go pick up Shannon from school.
3:00pm--Have Shannon change her clothes and wash her face and hands.
3:30pm--Turn off Christopher's food and do homework and reading with Shannon.
4:00pm--Feed Christopher the thickened formula/breast milk concoction again.
4:15pm--Help Shannon practice her piano.
4:30pm--Change out food bag, add food, and turn food back on.
4:45pm--Make dinner.
5:30pm--Move Christopher and all of his accouterments into the kitchen so that he can join the rest of the family for dinner.
6:00pm--Pump and (yep, you guessed it) drink more water.
6:30pm--Load and run the dishwasher. (which I am still in love with, by the way!)
7:00pm--Scriptures, prayers, stories, and girls to bed.
8:00pm--Give Christopher his Zantac and erithromycin.
8:30pm--Snuggle my baby. (Ok, so I find other times to do this as well. Actually, as often as I can!)
9:00pm--Pump, drink water, and make enough food to last through the night.
9:30pm--Move the baby and all of his stuff back into the bedroom. Turn off his food.
10:00pm--Feed him orally again, then sleep for a little bit or watch a movie with my husband.
11:30pm--Rinse and refill food bag and turn feeding pump back on.
3:30am--Turn off feeding pump and try to stay awake while I pump.
4:00am--Feed Christopher.
5:30am--Rinse out food bag, refill, and turn back on.
Of course, this is just an idea. There are days like today when the speech therapist comes to weigh him and watch him eat and do some exercises with him. Then there are the appointments we have with the pediatrician, the cardiologist, and the ENT. And, of course, the all-too-frequent hospitalizations. Hopefully we can have him home for longer than two weeks this time, but I'm not holding my breath since everyone around here keeps getting sick, but I'm doing everything I can to prevent it!

You know how when a missionary comes home they are really annoying because all they can talk about is mission work? It's because that's all they have done lately! I know I'm probably just as annoying because all I can talk about is my baby, but as you can see, he takes up about 90% of my time. I promise, I'm trying to restore some balance to my life. I go to church every other week (my husband and I switch off), I go to my Young Women activities when I can, I still find time to read, and sometimes I even get to go to the store! It's really, really hard, but it's so worth it. He is so stinking cute! There are days when I get really down and I worry about the future, but then I look at this face and everything is better.

Happy CHD Awareness Week!

A Busy Month!

2012-01-26T12:51:00.004-07:00

On Wednesday, the 11th, Christopher was not eating anything for me, so after calling some doctors, I took him up to the ER at Primary Childrens, thinking that they were just going to show me how to place an NG tube we would be right back home to celebrate Matt's birthday. That didn't happen. As I was placing the tube, the cardiologist came in the room and told me to hold off, because he wanted to run some tests to make sure the eating problems weren't masking a heart problem. He had an EKG and another echo, and after clearing his heart they decided to admit him to see if they could figure out a way to get him to eat and gain weight. I got him to his room and settled him in, and by that time it was pretty late, so I headed home since I was getting a sore throat. I had a nice little cold for a few days and the doctor asked me not to hold him, so we just went up after Matt got home from work and he held him for me. They tried to feed him, but he kept resisting and throwing up, so the NJ tube was the only option. He was put back on continuous feeds that way, then a speech therapist came to see him and she asked the doctor to do an endoscopy to see if his vocal chords were working, because she was pretty sure he was silently aspirating. Well, she was right! The endoscopy showed that his left vocal chord is paralyzed in an open position. If you recall, when he had his heart surgery he had his aorta repaired because it was too small. Any time the aortic arch is operated on, the nerve that serves the vocal chords can (and usually does, to some extent) get injured, because the nerve goes up and under the aortic arch. It usually heals in time, but if it is permanently damaged then the right vocal chord will just take over, and the left vocal chord can be injected with something so that it closes. This also explains why he has had some difficulty swallowing, because he probably has a loss of sensation on the left side of his throat, and the muscles on that side are also affected. Add to that his reflux problem, and you have a baby who develops an aversion to eating, because it gets into his lungs! So, we didn't feed him anything orally for a week to give his lungs a chance to recover. I had a speech therapist show me how to position him when it was time for him to eat again, and he remembered how to do it just fine. He started off very slowly, but he's working his way back up very nicely. After a few days of eating orally again and a positive trend of weight gain, we got to bring him home on Monday. By that time, the cold had moved through everyone in the family, so that was pretty good timing! He is off the lasix now, but they added erithromycin to his meds because in low doses it improves motility. (Did you know that? I didn't know that!)

Here is a view of the mountains I got to pass every day on my drive to the hospital. We finally got a decent snow storm, and it was beautiful!

Here's a shot of all the equipment we have right now. It's really not too bad, but he's not easy to just move from room to room. Don't worry, I hold him a lot.

The sisters couldn't be happier to have their brother (and mom!) home again. They couldn't wait to hold him and take pictures with him.

Doesn't he look so grown up in this picture? Needless to say, I am head-over-heels in love with this little boy.

Cute Pictures and an Update

2012-01-15T18:45:00.000-07:00

I love these girls. One of their favorite things to do is to don their aprons and help me make dinner. Since this one was easy, I pretty much let them do all of it. Shannon is cooking the chicken and peas and Leah (in her Cinderella dress, of course) is stirring the orzo.

I went to check on them the other night and found them like this. Keep in mind--they have bunk beds. I hope they stay friends forever. They sure do like to play together.

This is Leah with her "Nanny." I should clarify that it's her grandmother, since when I usually say nanny people think we hire someone to take care of her. Somewhere in that family line they started saying nanny instead of nana, and it has stuck for several generations. I would also like to point out that Leah is a very snugly little girl, but only when she is getting "tickled." See how Nanny is tickling her foot? It's her favorite thing.

As for the Christopher update, this picture sums it all up. I took him to the ER on December 30th because he was requiring quite a bit of oxygen when he shouldn't have needed any (well, supplemental, that is). They admitted him and he ended up staying almost a whole week. They did some echocardiograms and thought maybe his Sano shunt was narrowing, so they thought of doing a cardiac catheter procedure to balloon it and open it back up. Well, they gave him some blood first and that perked him right up, so they held off on the more invasive procedure. Then he started not eating very well. We tried a few different bottles and nipples and eventually he was doing ok, so we brought him back home.

Unfortunately, he did worse and worse at home until last Wednesday (Matt's birthday, no less) I had to take him in again because he just wasn't eating much at all for me. I expected to learn how to place an NG tube in the ER and be out of there, but the cardiologist wanted to run some more tests to make sure there were no underlying causes. He was admitted again and is still there and is still not eating. In addition to that, he has taken to throwing up every day and it losing weight. So, they replaced the NG tube and tomorrow he will have a swallow study to see if he is aspirating anything. They may push the tube back down to his intestines so that he doesn't throw up anymore, or they may consider diet changes (dairy intolerance?). Basically, they really don't know what's going on and they have told us as much, but we are still hopeful that they will get it figured out. At least he's in a great hospital and is being well cared for! He is quite a bit more fussy than normal, but it could just be because he has tubes all over again. The doctor has asked that I not hold him because I have had a cold, so his dad has been holding him and singing to him. He still smiles for us, as evidenced in this video. We sure do love this little man!

Christmas!!

2012-01-15T17:39:00.000-07:00

Christmas couldn't have been more perfect. Since we have to be so germaphobic this year, we missed out on the Gingerbread Festival, the Zoo Lights, the Messiah sing along, the lights at Temple Square, and we had to limit the visitors as well, but I can honestly say I didn't really miss any of those things, because we had this:

The real Santa Baby!

We got to see the girls' faces light up when they both got the princess dresses they asked Santa for. Naturally, they had to put them on immediately. Shannon is Princess Tiana from "The Princess and the Frog," and Leah is Rapunzel.

Here is Leah dancing with her Rapunzel hair and Shannon playing with Leah's new doll. Believe it or not, this is after I had cleaned up a bit!

The boy, enjoying his chair and watching all the excitement. We got this outfit from a neighbor and I just love the little red pants!

Christmas morning! I love how they look just completely overwhelmed.

Another thing that I just didn't get to this year was having the girls do a play. That is, they didn't memorize anything. Fortunately, they are always willing to perform, so when I told them that I wanted to see them sing a song together, they were very willing to oblige. Christopher even sang along!

The kids got "A Charlie Brown Christmas" book, the movie of which I think we've watched 100 times this season. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that Leah sat in this spot for a solid hour and pushed the same button over and over again, singing along each time. She REALLY likes this book!

Leah is 3!

2011-12-20T14:51:00.001-07:00

Sorry, Lori, no pictures of the boy today. I'm waiting until he doesn't have the NG tube anymore, and that should be in the next day or two. I haven't fed him anything through it since Sunday, so give me a few more days of good bottle feeding and I will take it out and take some more pictures of him.

It was Leah's 3rd biurthday on December 3rd. She wanted a Cinderella cake, and since we are simplifying everything around here because we don't sleep much, I just used a plastic princess that we got on a cake a few years ago instead of the Barbie that I usually use. I did make an ice-cream cake for her, though. She had a fun party with just us and one friend. They had macaroni and cheese (by FAR Leah's favorite), ate cake, played dress-ups, and watched a movie. Happy birthday cute girl! Here she is blowing out her candles. (Yes, I finally figured out how to post videos again. For some reason now, I have to "finalize" the video by saving it to my computer from the camera, opening it with Windows Live Movie Maker, and save it in there. Kind of weird, but it works!)

Being Home

2011-12-10T15:13:00.001-07:00

Christopher has been home since the day before Thanksgiving. I went to the hospital to get him and spent all day there learning how to feed him and give him his meds and everything. As soon as we got home we had the oxygen delivered, the feeding equipment delivered, and a nurse came and taught me how to use the pump for the feeding tube. It was a pretty overwhelming day! He came home on 6 different medications, so for the first few days I was very busy. I had to refill his food bag every four hours, pump every 3 hours, give him aspirin once a day, lasix and zantac twice a day, propranolol 3 times a day, and I weaned him off of his methadone and ativan over the next four days. Plus I had to change his diaper and console him whenever he cried. We aren't supposed to let him cry very much because it wastes calories that he needs very much. Babies after this surgery burn 150 times more calories than "regular" babies, so in order for him to grow he needs to burn as few as possible with things like crying and shivering. I also have to mix Progestimil with my breast milk to add more calories that way.

He is currently being fed through an NJ tube, which goes right into his intestines. They start this way in order to slowly introduce food and to make sure they don't aspirate anything because the swallow reflex is still weak. Christopher's cry was so weak when he left the hospital that they didn't even bother with a swallow study because they are pretty confident that he would have failed. Apparently the nerve that makes the vocal cords work is the same nerve we use to swallow, and that nerve very commonly becomes inflammed after aortic arch repair. His cry has slowly gotten stronger (although it's still pretty weak), and he is scheduled for a swallow study on the 12th of December. A speech therapist has been working with him and she thinks he is doing really well and will be able to pass. She put a few drops of breast milk on his binkie to get him to salivate and practice swallowing, and you should have seen his smile! Anyway, if all goes well on Monday the tube will be pulled back to his stomach so that we can start introducing food slowly that way, then eventually it will be removed and he will be able to bottle feed. I really wish I could just breast feed him, but he needs the added calories of the formula, so I will continue to pump.

The girls have been begging to hold him, so after having them wash their hands really well, we let them hold him for a minute. They were in heaven. They just adore their little brother.

He had his first follow-up appointment on Wednesday of this week and everything looked great. They took him off the oxygen (yay for fewer tubes!). They also had me go down to once a day on the lasix, and I gave him his last propranolol this morning. The first night off the oxygen his sats got a little low, so I put it back on him, but since then he has been right where he should be on room air.

Here his is after his sponge bath today in his Christmas outfit that a friend gave us. Pretty handsome! (Lori--I squeeze him now. It doesn't hurt him, I promise.)

More Baby Stuff

2011-11-17T09:34:00.001-07:00

This post is for the benefit of my very curious and, for the most part, medically-minded family. While my mom was here she found these information sheets on the surgeries they will perform to "fix" Christopher's heart, and she thought they were interesting, so I thought I would share them. They are kind of hard to see, so if you're really curious there is a great animation of everything here.The top picture on this one shows a typical hypoplastic left heart. The doctor drew on it as he was showing me how everything works. Notice that the left ventricle is not formed, and the aorta is very small. The next picture shows what they did during the first procedure. They open up the pulmonary artery and the aorta and connect them in order to make a bigger aorta, then they put in a shunt to get blood from the right ventricle to the pulmonary artery in order for the lungs to get some oxygenated blood. When the procedure was first done, the BT shunt (colored in red on the bottom picture) was the standard. The other option nowadays is the Sano, which is the black tube drawn in by the doctor. That is the one that they did on Christopher because the doctors at Primary Children's believe that kids who get a Sano shunt "just do better." Our cardiologist told us that it's a little scary because it cuts into their only good ventricle, but that the kids who have this type of shunt typically survive illnesses better than those with the BT shunt. I was glad that we didn't have to make the decision! The other thing they do during the first procedure is they "core out" the atrial septum in order to allow the blood to mix freely. Now there is one big atrium and one ventricle.

Dr. Kaza, our cardiothoracic surgeon likes to give the extra material that they use for the shunt to the parents so that we can see what is in our baby. This is it. It's very soft and flexible, but the rings keep it from collapsing. I believe they told us that the shunt in Christopher is 5 mm long, but I honestly don't remember. He will have this shunt until the second surgery is done in about 3 or 4 months, and will be on aspirin during that time to prevent the shunt from clotting. (By the way--my hands look awful because I have to wash them so much now!)

Here is the information on Stages II and III. We have been told to be prepared for Christopher to have some nasty headaches after the second stage because the blood from the brain goes directly to the lungs, and when he cries and it backs up into the brain, it hurts! Those babies come out of surgery basically sitting up so that gravity can help with this. Stage III is not technically "open heart," and I think there is actually a catheter procedure being developed to do it, but I'm not sure of that. I guess we'll find out in a few years!

Here are his battle wounds. All of the holes in his stomach are from the chest tubes and drains. The patch on his neck is where they had an internal jugular IV, and the gauze next to his belly button is where the PD catheter (a drain in his abdomen) was.

When Matt and I went in on Tuesday night we saw this list on the board and we were amazed. Christopher was getting better pretty slowly, so to see so much get done it one day was fantastic. Now I will translate it for you. They gave him more blood, started a new peripheral IV, discontinued his heparin, pulled out the drain in his stomach, pulled out the line that was in his heart, pulled out the internal jugular IV, pulled out the arterial line in his right wrist, got him off of the milrinone (that was helping his heart when he was so swollen and they were trying to get more fluids off of him), and did a complete echocardiogram to make sure everything was working how it should be. The completion of this list means he is ready to get out of the cardiac ICU!

This is what his IV tree looked like on Tuesday night. Compare it with the one in the pictures right after his surgery to see the huge difference. And the pump that's sideways is my milk, so that doesn't even count! When I went to see him yesterday he was only on lipids, so there were even fewer pumps. It's so fun to see him get better so quickly!

Being extubated and free of any drains meant I got to hold him again. It was SOOOO nice! I don't know if I'm ever going to get anything done when he comes home, because I don't know if I will be able to put him down. I know he looks a little blue in this picture, but that's just because of the lighting. His color really is pretty good. Just another FYI for the curious, after the first surgery the oxygen saturation is supposed to be between 75 and 85%, so the babies typically are a little bit pale or blue and it's normal.

My Boy!

2011-11-12T20:58:00.001-07:00

I guess I'll start from the beginning. I went into the hospital at 7:30 on Sunday morning, the 30th of October to be induced. After a long day, Christopher was finally born at 9:51 that night. I only had to push twice! He cried right away, so I thought they might hand him to me for a minute, but they passed him right through the window to the NICU. Luckily, the NICU nurse took our camera so that we could get some pictures of him.

This is what he looked like after being washed up and transferred to Primary Children's Hospital. They started him on Prostaglandin right away to keep his ductus arteriosis open. What we didn't know was that it tends to make babies a little grumpy. He was fussy for the 4 days he was on that, but I got to hold him and sing to him and he seemed to really like that.

We were able to bring the girls in before his surgery so that they could meet their new brother. They loved him immediately, but they really wanted him to come home.

For those who may not know, Christopher was born with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. In order to survive, he had to have an operation called the Norwood Procedure performed. On Thursday, November 3rd, Matt and I got up at 5:00 and went to the hospital to hold him one last time before his surgery. We walked with him while they wheeled his little bed into the operating room, and when we got to the yellow line they asked us to give him a kiss and head to the waiting room. We sat there for about 7 hours, getting updates every hour or two. I can't describe in words how it feels to be told that your newborn baby is on a heart bypass machine. It was the longest day of my life. This is what he looked like when we finally got to see him again. He had 3 chest tubes, a drain from his abdomen, several different IV lines, pacer wires, oxygen monitors, a catheter, and, of course, he was intubated.

Here you can see his medication pumps on the left, the ventilator on the right, and the chest tube drains on the bottom. So much stuff for one little baby! We got a call early Sunday morning asking for permission to close his chest, as it was left open to allow some room for swelling. One would think that giving permission to open your child's chest would automatically give permission to have it closed, but apparently it doesn't! A few hours later we got a call saying that they closed him, but that his little heart just couldn't pump well enough, so they had to re-open him. That was a huge disappointment. We waited another 3 days while they gave him Lasix to try to get most of the swelling down and they successfully closed him on Wednesday.

Here he is right after they closed him. They took advantage of the extra sedated state to insert a

nasojejunal tube so that they could begin feedings the next day. So far he has tolerated the food very well and really seems to be on the mend after a pretty rough start.

Today they removed the chest tubes and decreased the ventilator a little bit more. We're hoping he will be extubated in the next couple of days so that we can hold him again. In the meantime, we are enjoying the fact that he isn't so sedated so he can look at us. He smiled for us today, and I took a video of him looking at us, but once again Blogger isn't letting me put videos up.

Halloween 2011

2011-11-12T19:02:00.001-07:00

Since I had a baby the night before Halloween, I had to miss out on the festivities. Luckily, I had the girls' costumes all ready to go and my mom and husband stepped in to make it a fun night for the girls. They filled their buckets to overflowing and had a great time. Here is Wonder Woman and the pumpkin.

We were able to carve pumpkins the night before I went in to be induced. Shannon did her own, and Leah helped me with hers.

The PICU got costumes for all of the kids, and this was Christopher's. They just set it on top of him since it was too big, but it was still pretty cute!

Shannon's 5th Birthday

2011-10-26T11:19:00.006-06:00

Shannon had a very fun birthday party. She wanted to have her cousins and some of her friends over and they spent most of the day in the pool. Here she is with her She-Ra cake.Blowing out the candles.

She wanted a Wonder Woman costume, and I actually found a modest one on e-bay . I don't have any pictures of her wearing it yet, but she is going to wear it for Halloween, so there will be pictures soon!

She got a Cinderella doll and decided to dress up just like her. Of course, Leah had to pose for the picture as well!

Unrelated to her birthday, one night when she was supposed to be sleeping I found her in her room writing on this. She wrote this completely by herself. It says "I can learn my letters. I will learn the letter A." I think this must be something written on the chalkboard in her classroom. Smart girl!

First Day of Kindergarten

2011-08-04T12:57:00.008-06:00

Shannon started all-day Kindergarten yesterday. She is on a modified year-round schedule, so they start a month early and have a 2 week break in the fall and again in the Spring. She has been waiting for this day for a long time and it sure crept up on me! Here is the excited girl with her Dora backpack. Here she is standing in her class line getting ready to go inside.
Her teacher had the class sit in a circle so that she could tell them that they needed to be quiet while walking in the hallways.
All lined up and ready to go after one last good-bye. She is the one waving at me in the middle. She didn't cry at all, and neither did I. She was too excited to think about anything else! She had a great first day even though she is still recovering from a cold. Leah did just fine at home without her. She was sad when we got back home after dropping off Shannon and when I asked her why she was crying she said, "I don't want to be home! I want to be at school!" She enjoyed her one-on-one time with me and the house was sure quiet!

Baby Number Three!

2011-07-22T22:31:00.002-06:00

Most, if not all of you know already that we are expecting our third child around November 6th. We went to the ultrasound to find out the sex, and we got to enjoy the fact that it was a boy for about an hour before the doctor came and told us that he couldn't see all 4 chambers of the heart. I didn't let it worry me, thinking it could just very well be the positioning of the baby. The next week we went to the pediatric cardiologist and had a fetal echocardiogram. That took an hour, and the tech told me that she couldn't quite see one of the things she needed to see, but that at least she had a diagnosis for us. That kind of made my heart sink. The doctor sat me down and told me that the baby had a serious heart defect, then told me all about how the heart works before and after birth. Then he turned to the next page that said "Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome," and I burst into tears. Having had worked in a NICU for a year, I have seen 2 babies with this condition, and I knew how serious it was. The doctor was amazing and spent about an hour explaining to me in detail about the three stage reconstruction that could be done to "fix" his heart called the Norwood procedure.
Since that day we have been doing a lot of praying and research, and we have come to the conclusion that we are going to exersize our faith in the Lord that we will be able to bring our son home. We have talked to various doctors and nurses, and here is what we know to expect so far:
This pregnancy is in absolutely no danger, and as long as my low-lying placenta gets out of the way (which it did with my other two pregnancies just fine), I will be allowed to go into spontaneous labor. Since we only live about 1/2 hour from the University of Utah Hospital, where I will be delivering, and since my labors have not been quick by anybody's standards, they see no need to schedule an induction. As far as C-Section, it would not be of any benefit for the baby (who we have named Christopher, by the way), and since it would only make recovery much worse for me they see no need to do that either. Anyway, I will deliver in a room at University Hospital that is connected to their NICU with a window, so that immediately after delivery he will be passed to the NICU team. I may or may not get to see him right away. They will start his IV and put him on Prostaglandin, which will keep the ductus arteriosis open (the "hole" in the heart that all babies are born with) so that he can continue to get some oxygenated blood. As soon as he is stabilized and ready to go, he will be transported over the sky bridge to the pediatric cardiac ICU of Primary Childrens Hospital. As soon as I am recovered and up to it, I will be able to go see him. They say about 20% of the babies that are put on Prostaglandin have apneic episodes, thus necessitating intubation. If that is the case, we will not be able to hold him, but we will still be able to touch him. Of course we are praying that he won't have to be intubated so that we can hold him, but we'll take whatever comes. He will have the first stage of the Norwood Procedure (google it if you are curious, as it is quite involved) within about a week of birth, and they say to expect about 3 weeks for recovery. He will only recieve IV nutrition before surgery, and will be fed post-surgery via an NJ tube. This is a tube introduced into the intestines, bypassing the stomach because it is better tolerated. He will then graduate to an NG tube, where the food will go into the stomach, and then to regular feeding. Most babies go home with at least the NG tube still in place. The nurse told me that they just don't seem to get the whole feeding thing yet. I laughed and told her that since he's an Emerson I am pretty confident he will figure it out! He will have the second surgury between 4 and 6 months, then the last between 2 and 4 years of age. There are many patients who have had this procedure done who are in their late 20s, but that is as old as the surgery is, so they don't know the long-term prognosis. I would imagine he will need a heart transplant at some point in his life, but we're just going to be thankful for whatever time we have and take each day at a time. He has every chance of having a normal life--serving a mission, getting married and having children, etc.
We talked to a genetic counselor and there is absolutely no know reason for this condition. It isn't hereditary, so no worries, and the odds of it happening are only about 2 in 10,000. I think that is all of the information I have for now, but I will be sure to keep you all updated! Thanks for reading.

Girls' "Camp"

2011-07-22T21:13:00.004-06:00

I was called to be the second counselor in the Young Womens organization of our ward a few months ago, and was very excited to hear that camp would be held this year at the Marriot Mountainside resort in Park City. They were trying to entice more girls to come, and even though we only had 7 there, we still consider it a success. Matt came with me as one of the Priesthood leaders and we left the girls with a friend in our ward. We stayed for three days and two nights here:Our first activity was to head up the mountainside on the ski lift. It was a really neat ride!The purpose of going up the mountain is to get to ride the Alpine Slide, which is in this picture.Here are some of the girls ready to go. There are levers to control your speed, and I took it kind of slowly since I was afraid of getting thrown off the track. The best part was watching the hundreds of ground squirrels and gophers popping up all along the track. I guess they live under it! One of them ran right toward the track as I was going pretty fast and I was sure I was going to hit it when it ducked right under the track .The next ride was my favorite. This is the Alpine Coaster. It's exactly what it sounds like--a roller coaster that goes down the mountain.Here are the girls, all ready to go! Each person sits in his or her own car and they track pulls you up the mountain. Once again, you control your own speed with the levers on the side.Since I was securely strapped into this ride, I went really fast. I have to say, it was by far the most picturesque roller coaster I have ever been on. It was so much fun!The next morning we went on a short hike up April Mountain. This was the view of Park City from the top. I have a video of the panorama, but once again, none of my videos will upload to blogger.Here are the girls at the top of the mountian. Apparently it is a water tower disguised in a mountain. Pretty neat!

Since this was "Princess" camp, all of the girls wore formal gowns and were presented at a short ceremony in the lobby. Most of their parents were able to come up to see them and have a formal dinner with them. Four of these girls made their own dresses! I guess I didn't take a picture of the pool where we spent most of our free time, but it was beautiful. There were 6 hottubs, all connected by little waterfalls. The suite that Matt and I stayed in had the biggest bathtub I have ever seen. It was very fancy, and very fun!

Easter and Stuff

2011-07-22T20:44:00.002-06:00

My friends Whitney and Jennifer came over to color eggs with us this year.Here is the result. Shannon's is the prettiest one with all of the colors in the middle of the section on the right. She did a really nice job!Here are the pretty girls on Easter morning after they found their baskets. Leah found hers right away hidden behind the couch. I swear she can smell candy from a mile away!This was just a funny thing. Shannon was given a bunch of glowsticks from her Nanny and a little while after she went to bed she asked me to come look at what she had done. She made this person all by herself, complete with hair. It made me laugh. Since we are expecting baby number 3 in November we decided to get Leah out of her crib and into Shannon's room. Matt went for a jog one day and came home carrying a child's bed. He said it was in someone's yard with a "free" sign on it, and rather than risk it being gone by the time he got the car back there, he just carried it all the way home. Leah loves her bed, but the first few nights they slept in the same room this is how we found them. I'm sure glad they are friends!

Birthday Party

2011-07-22T16:36:00.003-06:00

I have tried to make a post for Christmas because I'm that far behind, but all I have are videos, and for some reason they are not uploading, so I will just move on. A while ago, the girls were invited to their friend, Kylee's, birthday party. It was at a place that had lots of rides and games and the girls had a blast. Here are Shannon and Kylee smacking the crocodiles.Here is the party. Leah, naturally, really enjoyed the pizza while Shannon couldn't take her eyes off the princess cake.This is Shannon wishing it was her birthday.
I have some cute videos of the girls on some of the rides, but they won't upload either. The funniest was when Shannon rode on the bumper cars and when she finally figured out how to make it go she ran into the wall and did a faceplant into the pillow on the steering wheel. She didn't think it was terribly funny, but she got right back to driving.

Santa

2010-12-16T11:35:00.002-07:00

We had a nice ward party last Saturday and the girls got to see Santa. Shannon could hardly wait for her turn and was eager to tell Santa what she wants for Christmas. Leah, on the other hand...

We also made our gingerbread houses with Aunt Jeny's family. Mine is the temple (with Tinkerbell as the Angel Moroni), Matt's is the house with the brown roof, Shannon was very proud of the T she put on her roof, and I think Leah's is the best with one candy on it.

This is a bird I found in our yard the other day. Anyone know what it is? I thought it was very pretty.

Leah is Two

2010-12-15T15:08:00.002-07:00

For Leah's birthday we got her a toy piano because she just loves the piano! It was really funny when I had it wrapped up, sitting by an end table and she sat on the box and pretended to play the piano on the end table!We went to Red Robin for her birthday dinner and she got lots of presents. Here she is opening them.Feeding her new baby.Lastly, here she is opening up her piano. She doesn't smile, but her eyes just light up! I love it! She adores her piano and plays it every day. Maybe next year we'll be getting a real one.

Gingerbread Festival

2010-12-15T14:49:00.002-07:00

This year the Gingerbread Festival was a last minute thing for us, but we made it in time for the last hour. Here is the candyland that was the most candy I have ever seen used!The Notre Dame cathedral, complete with Quasimodo between the towers.The house from "Up." This had so many details, we probably stared at it for 15 minutes. Very impressive!Another cute one.All that candy and cute things, and the only thing Shannon was interested in was the show! There was a group of middle or high school students singing Christmas songs and Shannon thought that was the best thing ever. After one of the soloists finished a song, Shannon asked if it was her turn. I think she would have been happy to entertain that audience. Here she is with her Nanny, enjoying the show. There are so many other pictures I could post, but these are probably the best houses. Pretty amazing!

Halloween!

2010-12-15T14:37:00.002-07:00

Shannon, at the last minute, decided she wanted to be a flower just like Dora (in one of her library books). After 3 hours of sewing, here is the result. Leah was Cinderella.And here is the pumpkin carving mess. We didn't really go trick-or-treating because it was raining. We did a little bit at Walmart, so the girls were happy.Matt did a witch and I did Charlie Brown and Snoopy for Shannon. She really wanted Peter Pan, but I couldn't find a template for it. It was a fun night!

Snow and Cute Girls

2010-10-27T19:49:00.005-06:00

Look what we woke up to this morning! After breakfast we got all bundled up, then I shoveled while the girls explored the snow.Then we made a snowman! I was under the impression that since it was "lake effect" snow it would be pretty wet, but I was wrong. I can't believe how dry Utah snow is! It makes it really hard to make a snowman when the snow doesn't pack together, but the girls had fun and they were very proud of their work. A few weeks ago Shannon thought Leah looked tired, so she got her a blanket and a pillow and her pacifier and put her to bed. Leah loved it!

Our girls love books. Here they are after getting some new books at the library, reading together. This is one of their favorite things to do.

I love sleeping kids. I can't stand how cute they are, so I take lots of pictures. I thought this was really cute because of her little hand under her head.

I used all of the rocks that I found in my yard and garden this summer to make a rock barrier for the flower bed in my backyard. Shannon thought I was making a giant snake, so she decided to make one of her own. She took a bunch of rocks to the driveway and made this. I especially loved the smile and the eyes made with sidewalk chalk.

Pumpkin Patch and Stuff

2010-10-27T18:36:00.007-06:00

We met with Aunt Jeny at Hee Haw Farms a few weeks ago. Nickell and family were going to come as well, but Kade was sick that day.Here is the giany pumpkin at the entrance. The car in the background was smashed on purpose during this year's pumpkin drop. We didn't get to see that, but I bet it was impressive! This is what Leah does when she doesn't get her nap. She was a very good girl, but she mostly just wanted to snuggle her dad. Shannon went down the big slide all by herself this year, but if you listen carefully you can hear her scared sound. She did a great job, though!

When Aunt Jeny went down with her, she wasn't scared at all. Aunt Jeny, on the other hand... (listen very carefully at the beginning)

Shannon loved the "train" so much this year that she thought we were going to let her ride in every car. We might have had there not been other people waiting for a turn.

Leah didn't want anything to do with the ponies, but Shannon loved it!

Femininity

2010-09-17T15:41:00.006-06:00

Most of you who know me are probably wondering what in the world this post is going to be about since the title has nothing to do with me, right? Well, it's going to be a long post, and possibly a very boring one, but it is one that I need to write.

I was recently reading a friend's blog and she has been taking part in a challenge issued by something (a blog, probably) called "Fearlessly Feminine." The challenge is to wear modest, feminine clothes for 7 days (skirts and dresses--no pants), take pictures of what she's wearing, and blog about her experience. While I don't find it at all necessary for me to take part in this particular challenge (I wore skirts and dresses every day for 19 months) it still got me thinking.

Anyone who knows me is aware that I am not a "girly girl." I have never been good at doing my hair (actually, I think I am really bad at doing my hair), and as far as fashion goes I have always opted for comfortable, quick and easy. My parents, bless their hearts, tried in vain my whole life to get me do do my hair and make-up more often. Don't get me wrong--I don't hate looking nice and getting "gussied up." I just don't like the time it takes out of my day to do it.

Recently my niece posted this picture of me on the Lauritzen family website for my birthday (thanks, Nickell!)Terrible picture, right? I think it's a good example of how I am not good at taking care of how I look. My hair is in the typical ponytail, no make-up, no contact lenses. While it has been easy for me to just think I don't care what others think about me, it actually does matter. I have always known this, I have just never had enough desire to make the effort.

Here is why it matters:

Assuming that the prices were exactly the same and the stores were equidistant to your home, at which store would you rather shop? The vast majority of people would feel much more comfortable with the second one. The fact of the matter is, what's on the outside does count.

How you dress and present yourself affects how people treat you and how you feel about yourself. I distinctly remember the first time I got my hair and make-up done really well (thanks to my sister, Amy) and when we went out to the store there were guys actually looking at me. It may have been my imagination, but it doesn't matter, because I FELT different. I have a friend who dressed up like a "biker chick" for Halloween and she said she couldn't believe how much it affected how she acted. She was much more aggressive and rude. When we look nice, we feel good and that makes us act happier. I'm sure this isn't news for anyone out there.

As members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we are instructed to look a certain way. In the first version of the "For the Strength of Youth" pamphlet published in 1965, our church leaders wrote, "'Grubby' clothes are inappropriate in public for everyone. A 'real lady' doesn't go out in public, to the market, or to shops with her hair in curlers." While I found that very amusing the first time I heard it, the council has not ceased to be wise. That pamphlet, now updated and made more applicable to the problems that specifically face us these days, still contains great advice on modesty and decorum. We are not simply asked to be modest, but to look nice! Again, this is not news, but it's something of which I need to be reminded.

There is a scene in my favorite TV show, The Golden Girls, where Blanche is discussing chivalry with Dorothy. I don't remember it exactly, but it goes something like this:

Blanche: "I miss the days when men opened doors for women and paid for the date."

Dorothy: "So, exactly how far back do you want to go, Blanche? I mean, do you still want to be able to vote?"

I think a lot of us miss those days. Even those of us who are not old enough to remember them!

There was a time when women were respected simply because they were women. Not because we're the "weaker sex" or because men wanted to be in charge, but because femininity was gentle and sacred, and something not to take lightly.

Ever since the "sexual revolution" and the E.R.A. women have all but lost that respect. Women started acting more like men and dressing like men. Leaders of our church prophesied about what would happen if the E.R.A. passed, and they were dead on. Since the 60s, abortion, teenage pregnancy, divorce and single parenthood have skyrocketed. Granted, most of that isn't due to the change in our appearance, but I think it does have a lot to do with it. We are daughters of God, and we need to look the part. What we look like reflects who we are and how we are treated by others.

So, what is the point of all of my rambling? Simply that I would like to do better. There is no time like the present, as I have two young daughters who I would like to see grow into beautiful young women, and they are going to learn a lot from my example. I want them to have respect for their bodies and their divine nature. President Spencer W. Kimball said, "There is nothing so sacred as true womanhood." Femininity is an important part of that sacred womanhood.

Four!

2010-08-24T14:09:00.006-06:00

For those who were confused by the title of a similar post last year--I am NOT pregnant. Shannon just turned 4! Here she is with her Sailor Moon cake (a stupid, slightly obscure Japanese cartoon that she adores).I tried my hardest, and though I don't really think it looks much like Sailor Moon, Shannon was excited and knew exactly who it was.Here she is opening one of her presents:

Here she is with her "pinoculars." The pajamas are hand-me-downs. Don't worry, she has never seen "High School Musical" and won't ever see it if I have anything to do about it. And here is a short video of her opening her Ariel Barbie. She had a great birthday!

Flora and Fauna

2010-08-03T08:42:00.014-06:00

Here is one of my little friends. We have more mourning doves in our neighborhood than I have ever seen anywhere else. In the evening there are usually 4 or 5 on our front lawn.I love how many birds we have here! Ok, so I could do without the starlings, but whatever. They like to line up on our fence like this.This is called a circumhorizon arc. I have seen them before, of course, but this one was very bright and pretty. The birdfeeder in the picture usually has at least 4 birds on it. They clean out all of the seeds in about 3 days.We had a fabulous thunderstorm come through when Shannon was in bed one night. She came running out of her room yelling, "Mom! There's a rainbow outside my window!" I took her out on the porch so that she could see it better and we watched the lightening for a while. You would have thought it was the 4th of July!My miniature wax plant recently bloomed like crazy. There was a cluster of flowers on almost every single vine. Here is a close-up of the flowers. They look like porcelain and glass and they have a very light perfume. Fun!Here is the bane of my gardening experience so far this year. Looks harmless, right? And it even makes pretty little yellow flowers.Now take a closer look. This is called a puncture vine. It makes all of these little burrs (they are the seeds) that dry up and become as hard and sharp as tacks. I spent several days going very carefully over my yard removing these, and I pulled enough to fill half of a black garbage bag. Crazy! Here is what my leg looked like after a wheelbarrow full of sod tipped over on it. The bruise actually got even darker a few days later. It was pretty cool.

Here's a video just for fun. The girls were making each other laugh and I wanted to catch it on camera. I especially love the last few seconds when Shannon tackles Leah.

Bumblebee

2010-05-05T11:05:00.002-06:00

When Matt tickles the kids he waves his finger in the air and says, "Bumblebee, tickle me," then tickles them. Yesterday Shannon was doing it to Leah and I heard Leah start saying it, then tickling herself. It's just about the cutest thing she has ever done. I cought it on video today (you can kind of understand her "bumblebee"), as well as her singing a song for me. She sings whenever I ask her to. It's pretty stinking cute!

Tulip Festival!

2010-05-03T09:22:00.021-06:00

As some of you saw on Jeny's blog, she went with me and my girls to Thanskgiving Point on Saturday to see the Tulip Festival. We had plans for a whole group to go, but the weather was not the greatest, so we were the only ones to brave it. There are tons of pictures, because it was too pretty! Here is the view from the entrance:Here is a great-horned owl nesting her two babies. She made a nest in the man-made waterfall area.

I have been to the gardens here before, but I had never seen the Children's Discovery Garden before. The girls loved it! There was this sandbox, a xylophone, blocks to play with, man-made caves with bronze animals (that scared Shannon to death), and even a stream to race little wooden boats.

This is at the top of the children's garden area. I thought it was one of the prettiest spots in the whole garden. You can kind of see the fake alligator on the little island across the pond.

Here is the waterfall where that owl was nesting. There was also a Canadian Goose sitting on her 4 eggs. Shannon had her ears covered the whole time we were around this because the water was so loud.

Just a few of the 250,000 tulips we saw. Notice that Shannon is holding a dandelion. She was allowed to pick those, so she thought that was fun.

Here are some of my favorites. I really like flowers with lots of petals like this.

Anytime we came upon a hill Shannon had to run down it. She had so much fun.

All of the gardens are themed. This one is one of my favorites. It's the Italian Garden. Jeny thought it looked like a bunch of bathtubs stacked up. You can barely see the statue at the top.

These are probably my favorite. They look like they're painted!

This was the scent garden. There are raised beds with lots of herbs and smelly flowers. Chocolate mint is, of course, my favorite.

This is the creek garden. Very pretty!

More tulips.

Different colored beds. Jeny loved the orange and red one that's in the back. I love the bright white and pink one and the purple one. Oh, who am I kidding? I love them all!

Shannon is just funny. She gets so excited about everything. I love her enthusiasm!

Here is what the girls looked like on the ride home:

Lastly, here are some videos. This is the xylophone that the girls would probably have played with all day had we let them. It was really neat.

Jeny taught Shannon how to roll down the hill. She eventually rolled down this entire hill and then beyond. If you look at the very first picture you can see the entire hill. It's the same one.

Alice in Wonderland

2010-05-02T21:37:00.004-06:00

This is the first book I ever received. I can't tell you how many times I read it and how much I loved it. I spent a great deal of my childhood in Wonderland and I cherish those memories. When my family took a vacation to Disneyland when I was 7 everyone wanted to ride the Matterhorn, but I was too scared. My mom took me to the Alice in Wonderland ride instead, and I still remember it.
Last night Matt and I went to see the Tim Burton movie, "Alice in Wonderland," and I have to tell you, I absolutely loved it. I was very skeptical going into it because I have never before enjoyed a Tim Burton film, but his weirdness and Lewis Carroll's weirdness fit together perfectly! The characters were just as I remember them and the story (a kind of sequel to the well-known story) was very entertaining. Rarely do I rave about a movie, but this one has to be one of my new favorites. It took me right back to my childhood and wrapped me up in good memories.

Yet More Before and Afters

2010-04-27T10:28:00.008-06:00

This is the project I have been dreading since we moved in. This toilet was put on a tile that was cut very poorly, leaving a gap that looked gross and had wax and other stuff coming out of it. The wax ring on this toilet was also shot, so I knew we would have to take up the toilet and do some tile repair. Of course it ended up being a bigger problem than I had thought it would be. When I lifted up the broken tile the backerboard came with it, revealing lots of mold. Obviously this wax ring needed to be replaced a while ago! I had to lift up all of the tiles up to the wall and the baseboard to get all of the mold out that I could see. Then I cleaned the floor down to the linoleum underneath and put down some new backerboard and tile.I took an extra tile to Lowe's with all of my measurements drawn on it and they cut it for me. It was a perfect fit! I cemented the tile, waited a day, grouted, waited a day, then put on a few new wax rings (since the flange is now even with the floor) and Matt put the toilet back on.It isn't perfect, of course, because even with the new backerboard the floor was still pretty uneven, but it's as good as I could get it, and I am very pleased with it. No more gross toilet!

Another Room Finished!

2010-04-13T10:55:00.004-06:00

I finally finished the den! Here is what it looked like before:And after: This room was a lot of trouble because the walls and ceiling had been repaired so many times they looked like a patchwork quilt. That means that after we painted, the edge looked like someone drunk had painted it. I thought a good solution would be to put up a crown moulding. Well, I cheated. I actually bought baseboard because it was much cheaper. I just turned it upside down. I coped the corner joints and after mudding, caulking, and painting, here is the result:

It looks SO much better. I think we have doors for this closet in the garage, but Matt doesn't want them put on right now. There is a TV in the closet that will eventually get put on some kind of stand, but I think that's all we need and this room will be completely finished. Here is what we did: Removed 6 shelf brackets and a TV wall mount bracket, spackled lots of holes, painted walls and trim, replaced carpet, replaced window, added new blinds, and put up moulding.

Easter, etc.

2010-04-07T09:00:00.005-06:00

Here is Shannon ready to color her eggs. I told her about it the day before and she kept asking me and asking me if it was time to do them yet. She was very excited!She loved putting stickers on them. Here are the girls in their pretty Easter dresses:

We got a sandbox for Christmas and since it's too cold outside to use out there we just kept it inside and put toys in it. The girls love it! This is how I found Leah one afternoon. Just as content as can be!

Here is a video of one of Leah's favorite activities. She especially loves it when her sister joins her. Before I turned the camera on Leah was rocking and saying, "Wow! Wow! Wow!" It was really cute, but for some reason she stopped when I turned the camera on.

Reading

2010-02-12T10:06:00.002-07:00

When I read books to Shannon I usually read the front cover, including the name of the author (for example, Go Dog, Go, by P.D. Eastman). Shannon has picked up this habit as well, but makes things up since she can't really read yet. Today she discovered the new Children's Songbook that we just got (since Matt and I teach primary now and our knowledge of the songs is abysmal). She sat down on my lap, opened it to the title page, and said, "I am a Child of God, by C.D. Player."
P.S. She listens to the Children's Songbook every night on a CD player, so I thought it was particularly funny.

Shannon's Room

2010-01-20T16:27:00.004-07:00

I finally finished painting Shannon's room and putting up the princess stickers. I must say, it is a little girl's dream room.
Before:After:The curtains, tent, and bedspread were all gifts, so I really didn't even spend that much money. I bought the stickers and the night light (it's the pink carriage thing on top of the armoire) at amazon.com. Pretty fun!

Windows and Floors

2010-01-15T11:10:00.016-07:00

Admittedly, the window pictures don't do justice to the actual improvement, but you get the point. We had 5 windows replaced and they look so much better! This first one is our front window. We replaced it because it was one of those storm windows from the 1970s that is terribly inefficient. Also, the thought of removing the huge storm window on the outside in order to clean it was very scary!

Before:After: The kitchen was one of the worst windows. We got cold just walking by it and it fogged up all the time.

Before:
After:

The window in the den had a crack all the way across the right pane and a hole from a BB gun on the outside of the left pane.

Before: After:

The window in Shannon's room is one of 6 windows of the same type. They are wooden, double hung, and I believe original to the house (built in 1955). Hers was missing the pane on the outside and was painted shut.

Before:
After:

Our bedroom was missing the bottom pane on the inside and the outside pane rattled whenever we walked into the room. It was also very difficult to open.

Before:

After: There were 4 tiles on our kitchen floor that weren't attached to anything. The grout was long gone, so they moved around all over the place. Here is what it looked like before:You can kind of see pine needles and other garbage in the cracks where the grout should have been. I lifted those 4 tiles and cleaned the floor, then ended up removing 5 more tiles around them that were pretty loose. Here is what that looked like:
I spent 3 hours scraping the old cement off of the floor and trying to get it as smooth as I could. I had the dust all over me when I read the instructions on the new bag of cement that said it causes cancer. Awesome. I put 5 screws into the subfloor where it was uneven, and got it pretty flat. The rest was easy. Here is the finished product: Whoever put down the tile floor in the first place didn't do a very good job and they obviously didn't use spacers, so I did the best I could, but they are still a little crooked. Nothing we can do about that unless we take up the whole floor (which, eventually, is probably going to happen--I don't love tile!) Now I need to scrub the grout around it and get it all sealed so that I won't have to scrub it anymore!

Christmas 2009

2010-01-13T12:31:00.003-07:00

We had a great Christmas this year. We decided to stay in our own house (since we have one now!) and just enjoy our little family. It was the tradition in my family to put on a little play for our parents every Christmas Eve. I practiced a song with Shannon, but of course she didn't want to do it. This is about all we got out of her for her first Christmas program:

We got up at around 8:00 Christmas morning (I know! The kids actually slept in!) and here is what we found:

I must have run out of memory or something, because this is all I got of the girls opening presents:

Zoo Lights

2010-01-13T12:20:00.007-07:00

I didn't realize that I was so behind on posting, but I am! Back on the 18th of December we were able to go with a whole bunch of family members to the Hogle Zoo for their annual zoo lights. This is only the 3rd or 4th time they have done this, and it is so fun! It is cold, of course, but if you bundle up and take some hot chocolate it is a really fun night.

(We couldn't resist the Red Robin sign)

Christmas threw up a little bit in my house...

2009-12-11T11:16:00.008-07:00

We love Christmas around here, so we decorate everything we can. It also helps that we have a whole house to decorate this year. It's so much fun! Here is our tree that Shannon keeps rearranging the ornaments on (and adding her own special touches to--like her socks!).We decorated "gingerbread" houses (made with graham crackers) during Thanksgiving when some of my family was in town, and since they didn't want to drive home with them in their laps, they left them all here. Yay for me! They all turned out very nicely. I don't have pictures of the day we made the houses because my camera was malfunctioning, but you can see them on my sister's blog here.Matt decided to make the pyramids of Egypt (ok, so he only made one) complete with palm trees and the Nile River. I thought that was a very cute idea.Anyone who knows me well knows that I am addicted to snowglobes and my mom is addicted to giving them to me. I was sooooo excited to put out all of my Christmas ones this year. Oh, and the crushed house is Shannon's. She has made an afternoon snack out of it more than once.We made a paper fireplace to hang our stockings on (can you tell which one has been around for over 30 years?). Shannon calls them sockings or sockets and she loves to look at them and tell me who they each belong to. Also, when the heat turns on, the air from the vent on the bottom of the picture makes the fire flicker! I know, I'm a nerd.A friend gave me these placemats this year. They are very funny! The santa hats are napkins! It's kind of hard to see, but on the wall is a cross-stitch of santa that my sister did for me a few years ago. I have another amazing cross-stitch/hardanger in the living room that I neglected to take a picture of, but I promise it's amazing.And, of course, the chocolate. I have only made Hershey balls and fudge meltaways so far, but I am also going to make snowflake-shaped marshmallows and maybe some toffee or something. Shannon thinks Christmas is the best thing ever!

Happy Birthday Leah!!

2009-12-03T19:51:00.004-07:00

We did absolutely nothing special for Leah's birthday today, aside from the cake. Call me a bad mother, but I don't understand the need to make a fuss over a one year old, since they don't even care. She did get her cake, though, and loved it. I can't get enough of that smile. She is just fun! What a great mess!

Here is the video of us singing to her. I love the part where she starts bopping. At the end Shannon tries to blow out the candle, but she is too afraid to get very close to it.

Gingerbread Festival

2009-11-20T12:01:00.014-07:00

Yes, it's that time of year again! My sister, Jeny, and I took the girls to the annual Gingerbread Festival at Thanksgiving Point. Each year it gets bigger and bigger and the houses get more and more amazing. Here are some of the best:I especially liked this temple, because they even made the reflection pond out of melted candy! It was very neat!We all got to decorate a cookie, and Leah loved the frosting. This is her pretending to be shy.They had a stage with Irish Step dancers, and Shannon was enraptured. She wanted so badly to go up on stage with them. There was also a storytelling corner, and Shannon thought that was the best! She sat right down on that girl's lap and made herself at home. I am so glad that she loves books!

Piggies

2009-11-05T09:35:00.005-07:00

Leah's hair is finally long enough to put little pigtails in it. She actually looks like a girl now! Aren't those the most kissable cheeks you have ever seen? Shannon saw me get the camera out, so of course she wanted in on the action. They don't even look like sisters!

The other day I found Shannon in her room wearing this outfit. Whenever she finds any kind of stick she calls it a "shock" and uses it to direct music while she sings. This particular song is from the Shirley Temple movie, "Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm."

And just a few other funny things:

Yesterday I put Leah down for a nap. I walked by a few minutes later and saw her door open a crack, so I knew that Shannon had gone in there. I walked in and found Shannon sitting in the rocking chair holding her puppy, singing "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" to Leah. Here I was ready to be mad at her for bothering her sister, and she was trying to help her go to sleep. She loves her sister very much.

I was listening to Christmas music on Pandora the other day and I had the volume all the way up on the computer because I was in the other room cleaning. The music stopped, and I heard the sounds of the games on pbskids.org. I went in to the computer room and found Shannon playing games with her left hand over her left ear and her right shoulder shrugged up to her right ear because the volume was so loud. She makes me laugh every day!

Halloween

2009-11-01T08:03:00.008-07:00

Here are the girls carving pumpkins. You may remember the hat that Shannon is wearing from previous posts. She still wears it all the time.Here are the finished products. Shannon carved Tinkerbell all by herself! OK, no she didn't. But she loved it! Matt did the witch.Here are the happy trick-or-treaters. Leah looked like a boy, but that's ok. She was still very cute. We walked to the church for the trunk-or-treat there and got the houses on the way. Shannon got into the spirit very quickly. She yelled, "Trick or treat!" to everyone she saw. She even hit up some other kids who were out. They just looked at her like she was crazy.Shannon got oohs and ahhs everywhere we went. This is one of the most fun nights we have ever had as a family, since Shannon is old enough now to really enjoy this stuff. It's going to be such a fun holiday season! This is completely unrelated to Halloween, but I had to post it anyway. Shannon was singing this song all morning and I couldn't figure out what it was. Finally, I figured it out. She is singing the "Little Drummer Boy"! The "wop wop wop" part is "pa rum pum pum pum." I especially love her drum sound effect. She sang a lot more of it, but of course wouldn't do it for the camera. She is such a crack-up!

Hee Haw Farms

2009-10-27T08:18:00.013-06:00

For those of you who read Nickell's blog, this will probably look familiar. Jeny and Mark met us at Hee Haw Farms in Pleasant Grove last night for a very fun evening. There are a lot of pictures, but there was a lot to see!
Here are my cute girls posing in one of the many picture things they had there.We started off by feeding the goats. Shannon was a little hesitant at first, but finally figured out that they just lick the food out of your hands.Then we headed over to the "train." These were just old metal barrels decorated like animals being pulled by a tractor. Shannon said, "Mom, this is a good bumpy!" She is at the age where she loves going over bumps in the car, so this ride was her idea of heaven. Leah also thought it was a lot of fun.
After that we went over to the swing. I think Shannon liked this the best. She would have stayed on it all night if we had let her. Leah had a really good time watching Shannon.
While Uncle Mark stood in line for Shannon to go on a pony ride we went to see all of the animals. They had this GIANT pig (there is no picture I could have taken that would do it justice), cows, donkeys, normal-sized pigs, chickens, sheep, rabbits, ducks, and turkeys. The kids were even allowed to go into a pen to run around with the chickens and pigs. Shannon just kept waving and saying "hi" to all of the animals.
Then came the big slide. We climbed up the hill, and it was steeper than I thought it would be, so I thought Shannon would chicken out, but she wanted to go! It was another bumpy ride, so she loved it.I thought this was a fantastic idea. They filled a pen with dried corn for the kids to play in. I had to drag her out of this to go to the pumpkin patch. Somehow I neglected to take a picture of the pumpkin patch, but it was very neat. It was a field of very tall sunflowers (dried up, of course) where we found two perfect pumpkins. Shannon stopped at all of the broken pumpkins to look at them. I think she would have taken one of them home if I had let her. Gross.This last picture is really for my mom. The sunset was very pretty, and this is her favorite mountain, Mt. Timpanogos.
Thank you, Aunt Jeny and Uncle Mark! It was a REALLY fun evening!

My Favorite Room

2009-10-19T13:59:00.004-06:00

Before:After: This was one of the easiest rooms to fix so far. All we did was replace the carpet, scrub the gross walls, and paint. I still haven't painted the trim, but it will just be white instead of the off-white it is right now. I absolutely love the color! It's the sunniest room in the house, so I have all of my orchids in there.

Bathroom Before and Afters

2009-09-19T14:54:00.006-06:00

Here is what we started with. I wish I had taken a picture before I cleaned the toilet, but I don't think anyone would have wanted to see that anyway. Jeny got upclose and personal with the toilet when she helped me replace the wax seal, so she can attest to the vileness of it. It's clean now, I promise. Here is how it looks now. Here is a list of what I did, since you can't see all of it: scrubbed everything (I don't know how, nor do I wish to know how, but the previous owners managed to get urine on every wall and the door from about knee level down), new toilet seat, replaced wax ring, re-caulked everything, new baseboard behind toilet, replaced leaky faucet, installed outlet next to light switch (that I haven't wired yet because I don't have a ladder to get into the attic), wet sanded and polished countertop, sealed and painted ceiling, new towel rack, sealed and painted baseboards, and mounted the vanity cabinet to the wall.I had my doubts about this tub, but it cleaned up very nicely. Some of the paint is worn off where there was a door at one time, but I will eventually fix that.

Here is a picture just for fun. Shannon wanted to read a book to Leah, so she climbed up in her crib with her. Leah absolutely loved it. I sure do love these girls.

Funny Kids

2009-09-09T13:52:00.010-06:00

People have been asking me for recent pictures of my kids, so I took some today while we were playing. As you can see, Leah's hair still has the curl on top that I can't do a thing with. She is such a cutie. We really like her.

It looks like she is about to attack me in this picture, but it was the best smile I could get out of her on film.

Recently I scrubbed the tile in the kitchen and Shannon, of course, wanted to help. I gave her a sponge and a bucket with a little bit of water in it, and she thought that was very fun.

For some reason this picture uploaded sideways, but you get the point. The top is what it looked like before I scrubbed it, and the bottom is what the grout is supposed to look like (though if you look closely you can see that it needs to be patched, too). It was really dirty!

Shannon has really gotten into the pretend stage. She wraps her dolls in blankets and sings to them all the time. This was too funny, however, to not take a picture. This is her favorite stuffed animal. It's a teddy bear, but his name is Puppy. She did all of this by herself. I especially loved the "peek-a-boos" (sunglasses) that she put on him.

Finally, here is a video of Leah's army crawl. She is getting very fast and getting pretty much anywhere she wants to be.

Some Before and After

2009-08-27T15:23:00.004-06:00

We aren't finished with this room completely yet, but everyone has been asking for before and after pictures, so since it is the room that is the closest to being finished I decided to just go ahead and post these. All we have left to do is paint the trim, which will just be a little whiter than it currently is. So, here is the before: and after:

Same room, other side. Before:After:

Honestly, I am having so much fun I can't stand it! My body hurts all over, but I can't seem to sit and rest for very long since there is so much to do.

Three!

2009-08-24T13:51:00.006-06:00

Shannon turned three on the 18th of this month. We had the party in American Fork so that her Grandma could be there, as she is still bed-bound.All of my sisters are laughing at my horrible first attempt at a princess cake. It's a little small because I thought I had two cake mixes, but I didn't. Who cares, though. Shannon loved it! She looks terrible in the pictures because by this time she had been playing with her cousins and she was very tired. You can also see the nice hives she gets on her face from being around dogs.We invaded Grandma's bedroom to unwrap presents. She got some really fun stuff, but was too tired to get very excited.

This is her Tinkerbell dress that she loves to wear. The neighbors saw her in it the other day and asked if it was her Halloween costume. I guess they don't understand girls and dress-ups.

Personal Ponies

2009-07-23T14:57:00.009-06:00

Last night as an activity for the young women in our ward we learned how to train and groom Shetland ponies. One of the Young Women leaders is involved in an organization called "Personal Ponies," where they train these animals, then gift them to children with special needs. They also visit hospitals and nursing homes, so they are very well behaved. I took Shannon and as soon as she saw them she yelled, "horsies!"

She even got to ride one for a little bit. Basically, it was a little girl's dream come true.

She wanted to sit by one of her favorite babysitters, Sarah.

This is her friend, Josh. They had a lot of fun together chasing each other and racing up and down the hill.

(P.S. Don't miss the other posts below. I got a little bit behind.)

Ward Party

2009-07-23T14:27:00.004-06:00

Matt was sick, so I took the girls and went to help set up for our ward party last Friday. I didn't end up helping at all because Shannon was running all over the place, but that's ok. It was 100 degrees, so it was very unpleasant for both kids, but they actually handled it pretty well.

Shannon saw the camera and wanted to say, "cheese!" She is sweaty, has messy hair and food on her face, but she's still pretty cute.

Here is a video of Shannon playing with some geese we found on a pond in the park. The pond smelled like the Salt Lake and looked just about as dirty, but Shannon thought it was great fun. I think the geese thought she was throwing bread at them, because they were coming up to her, but she was just being mean and throwing dirt.

Lauritzen Family Reunion

2009-07-23T12:24:00.008-06:00

Last week we had a family reunion for my dad's family. These are most of my aunts, uncles, cousins, and other relatives.Shannon thought the stream that ran through the campground was a lot of fun to play in. Too bad she is allergic to dogs, because she loves them. This is my cousin's dog.From left to right: my dad, my sisters, Mindy and Kristi, my nephew, Jordan, my mom, and Leah being held by her cousin, Megan. It got kind of cold up in the canyon when the sun went behind the mountain. It was a very good time!

Geocaching

2009-07-23T10:50:00.007-06:00

I took Shannon geocaching with her cousins a few weeks ago in the foothills above Springville. Here we are at the trail head, wondering a little bit if this was really the right place. It was a pretty steep hill, and quite a bit more difficult than we thought it would be, so those of us in our sandals were a little bit uncomfortable, but it was beautiful! The first cache was behind this huge boulder that looked like it could roll over on us at any moment.

This is everyone signing the guest list in the cache. Shannon was really enjoying the adventure.

Here is a view of a nice storm over southern Utah Valley that was chasing after us. It was beautiful!

Our House

2009-06-10T09:42:00.008-06:00

Here is our cute house! The roof and the siding are fairly new, and the swamp cooler will be coming down since it has new central air!

This is my favorite bedroom because it is so bright. It will probably be Leah's room and my sewing room.

This is the front room. The carpet looks like someone died on it, but it will be replaced before we move in.

This is the kitchen/dining room. The counters are behind the camera. The door off to the right is to the laundry room/bathroom.

The basement. Again with the nasty carpet. Off to the left is a bedroom and the furnace room, which will be plenty big enough for some food storage.

This will probably be our bedroom. That cable goes up to a TV stand mounted on the wall. Kind of cool!

This is the back yard that Jeny and I are drooling over. I honestly don't know if there is any grass left in there, but I will try some weed and feed before laying new sod. The tree on the left is a pear and the other one is an apple. There is a shed out of the picture on the right and the garage is on the left.

We Need a House...

2009-06-08T12:36:00.004-06:00

I went to check on Leah last night and found her like this. She is still sleeping in this small crib in our bedroom because if she slept in the crib in Shannon's room, Shannon would kill her. I'm not exaggerating! I would set up the port-a-crib, but there is just no room for it. We are as squished in here as we can get.On the plus side, we got a house!!!!!!!! We put an offer on this house months ago, but since it is a short sale it took a while. You can see pictures here. It will be a few weeks before we close because we have to apply for a grant, but since we are in a contract here in our apartment until the end of June, that is perfect! We are very excited!

Reading

2009-05-19T20:01:00.004-06:00

Shannon has loved to read since she was born. Since both Matt and I love to read, we read to our children frequently, hoping that they will find it as enjoyable as we do. The other day (as I was reading, ironically) I looked up to see what the girls were doing. Shannon had put a blanket on Leah, snuggled up next to her, and was reading to her. She has all of her books memorized, so she actually does "read" them, and Leah was fascinated. It was pretty dang cute.

Green Wilma

2009-05-01T13:43:00.005-06:00

Green Wilma has been one of my favorite kid books since before I had kids. It's just a funny story! I checked it out from the library and within days Shannon had it memorized. She does love books! I have actually been trying for a long time to get this video, but every time I take the camera out Shannon thinks it's time to say, "cheese!" and she won't read with me. My persistance paid off, however, and I finally got it! Sorry she is only wearing panties. She doesn't like to wear pants, and I don't make her wear them unless we leave the house.

"The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler"

2009-04-20T13:22:00.006-06:00

I don't think I have ever gotten political on my blog before, but this post was inevitable, as I am a person with some very strong opinions.

I don't know how many of you were able to watch the Hallmark movie last night about Irena Sendler, who saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II. What a remarkable human being! I don't know if the movie really did her story justice, but it was pretty good. It reminded me of an e-mail that I recieved a while ago about the same woman. The e-mail told of the heroic things that Irena did in order to rescue these children, then at the end it said she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. Then came the part that absolutely bowled me over: she lost--to AL GORE! I can't even fathom what the committee who chose him was thinking when they made that decision. I know that in the grand scheme of things it really doesn't matter because it's just an award, but it makes me very sad that sensationalism overshadowed complete selflessness.

Anyway, you can find out more about Irena Sendler here.

"Mommy, I wanna fix it."

2009-04-14T10:50:00.005-06:00

Why is it that kids hate the paper on their crayons so much? Shannon starts taking off the paper as soon as she gets new crayons, and when she can't finish it she asks me to "fix" it. Is it similar to my taking the dust jacket off of the book I'm reading? Because I have to tell you, I can't stand that. I don't know what it is, but I can't read a book with a dust jacket on it.On an entirely different note, Shannon woke up again with swollen eyes. You can't see them very well in this picture, but they are red and very puffy. She has had this once before and I blamed it on a dog, but this time she wasn't around a dog. Hmmm. She definately has her mother's allergies. I used to wake up in the moring with my eyes literally sealed shut from "gunk."

And on yet another note, here is a picture of my matching girls. Matt's mom got these outfits for them and I just love them. Aren't they cute?

This has been a random post brought to you by me. I would write about this last weekend and our Spring Break and Easter, but it would just bum you out, so I'll stick with the positive!

Cutest Pictures EVER!

2009-03-29T19:28:00.009-06:00

My Mom recently told me that I needed to take more pictures of Leah because I took tons of Shannon, so Leah is going to wonder where all of hers are. I think it might be the other way around. You see, when Shannon was born, my niece didn't have a studio yet, so her pictures aren't quite as good as these. I am SOOOOOOOOO lucky to be able to live by Nickell (not only because she is a great photographer--she's also a blast to hang-out with!). I love them all so much I can't decide which is my favorite!

Happy Spring?

2009-03-26T09:31:00.006-06:00

I've had nothing in particular to blog about lately, so I thought I would just post a few pictures. This one was taken yesterday (it's actually much worse today). As you can see, Spring is a beautiful time in Utah. Just last week we were playing in the park and getting sunburned, and now we are stuck in the snow again. A few weeks ago we had Leah's blessing. Her grandma made this dress and it turned out just beautifully. She looked very pretty! My niece took some professional pictures that I will post when I get them (that's not a hint, Nickell, I know how busy you are).

The other night I went to check on Shannon to make sure she was asleep, and this is how I found her. She is wearing a hat that was actually for Leah when she was born, because it's a Christmas hat. Unfortunately, it was a little big for Leah, but it fits Shannon! She cracks me up!

I know there couldn't be a worse picture of me, but for some reason I still love this. We were all snuggling on the couch together and Matt thought it was too cute, so he took a picture with his cell phone. These girls really do love each other, and I sure love them!

A Soprano in the Family?

2009-03-04T20:36:00.005-07:00

Okay, I know I have been posting a lot of videos lately, but I really love being able to take videos of my kids with sound! It's so much fun! Anyway, this one is a sample of the funny noises that Leah makes. She is just as chatty, if not more so, than Shannon. I wrote before that when she got her shots she surprised us by not only screaming, but by making the highest pitch screams I think I've ever heard. Now she reaches some of those notes when she is talking.

Shannon Finally Likes the Slide!

2009-02-26T19:45:00.003-07:00

We have had some decent weather lately, so we have been going to the park every day. Shannon finally got brave enough to go down the slide by herself, and she loves it now!

My Girls

2009-02-23T20:43:00.006-07:00

Here are some pictures of my girls that we took today with my new camera. Shannon actually posed this one. She loves her "puppy" (the teddy bear) almost as much as she loves her sister.

I promise, Leah was still able to breathe. Shannon would hug her all day if I let her.

Aren't they pretty?

Here is a video showing a little bit of Leah's personality. So far, she is a lot like Shannon. She is very happy most of the time and she loves to talk!

Poor Leah

2009-02-18T18:59:00.003-07:00

Leah had her two month well-check yesterday, along with 5 shots. I have never heard a baby cry louder or higher than she cried. I had never heard her do that before, so I was pretty amazed. Call me sick, but it made me laugh. She calmed down after a few minutes, then when the Tylenol wore off last night she did it again. I was sure everyone in the entire apartment complex could hear her, but I asked our neighbor if she heard it and she said she didn't. It was pretty sad, but she is doing much better today.
We also found out that she is already a victim of some poor genes, as she will have to have an umbilical hernia repaired. The rule of thumb is if you can get the tip of your finger in it, it's too big. They will do that surgery any time after they are 4 months old, but we will probably wait until next year. Here is a nice picture of it for those of you who enjoy that sort of thing. When she is crying or straining it really pokes out.

Poppa

2009-02-02T11:19:00.005-07:00

Shannon and I were watching "Pete's Dragon" this morning (what's new?) and when Lampie (played by Mickey Rooney) came on screen she said, "Look! Poppa!" Poppa is what she calls her Grandpa Emerson. As you can see, he does slightly resemble Lampie. I just thought that was pretty amusing.
I really wanted to post a picture of my chocolate cheesecake that I made from the recipe in my new Lion House cookbook, but my camera seems to have died. I put fresh batteries in it and it still says "low battery" and doesn't do anything. I have always hated the camera anyway, since by the time it finally takes a picture the moment has long passed, and it doesn't record sound with videos. So, it looks like we may be getting a new camera with our tax return this year. Any suggestions? Keep in mind we are modest and simple people, so I don't see us spending any more than $150-$200, but I would like one that actually records sound this time.

Shannonisms

2009-01-21T14:06:00.002-07:00

I have been asked by a few people to write down some of the funny things that Shannon says. This is mostly for posterity, but you might get a kick out of some of them. I have had people tell me that it is funny to hear Shannon talk because she is so petite, one doesn't expect full sentences to come out of her mouth. Here are the ones that I could think of:
Oops! I dropped rit.
Prentzel (pretzel)
Feliz Mommymom (Navidad)
Stister (sister)
Do Re Re (The Sound of Music)
Princess Nora (Princess Aurora--Nora is in Pete's Dragon, which I guess she has seen too many times)
I want to bru her hair (I want to brush my hair--she used to say almost everything in 3rd person, but is getting 1st person down finally)
Chwocwate (chocolate)
One of the first phrases she started saying was one of her cutest. If she wanted me to pick her up she would say, "pick-a-me." She would actually say that to total strangers. Then she started saying, "want me?" and who can say no to that? Now she says, "Want me to hold you?"
One of her favorite cousins is Spencer, and I love the way she says his name, though it is not possible to write it with the Roman alphabet. The closest I can get is "Spansher."
I'm sure there are a lot of things that I am missing, but I can't think of anymore at the moment.

Leah Smiles

2009-01-06T11:05:00.004-07:00

Leah is a very happy baby. She smiles so much I managed to get a picture of it on the first try. She is getting chubbier and changing every day! Her hair still looks like it is going to be kind of blonde, but there is certainly some red in it.

Our Christmas

2009-01-06T10:23:00.008-07:00

I am just a little behind on the posts, but at least I have a good excuse! One of our Christmas traditions is to make "gingerbread" houses out of graham crackers. Shannon, of course, enjoyed eating the candy and frosting than anything else, but with the help of her Aunt Jeny she made a cute little house.Here are the finished products. My niece and nephew did the really fancy ones on the left. Mine is the boring one with the tree next to Shannon's, and Jeny's had a palm tree complete with sunbathers under it.Shannon helping me roll out the traditional Christmas Danish pastry wreath.
Shannon finding her stocking on Christmas morning. We ended up getting snowed-in on Christmas, and if you look carefully you can see all of the snow stuck to the window in this picture. I wish I had taken a picture of the 4 foot drift we had on our porch. It was great!Shannon got very excited over her kitty coloring book. As you can see by her face, she had already gotten into her stocking. She was very funny.

More Leah

2008-12-09T11:22:00.011-07:00

My niece, Nickell, is a great photographer and she took some really fun pictures of Leah last night. The last one is my favorite, I think, but the one where she is puckering her lips is so cute!

Shannon Meets Her Sister

2008-12-05T21:58:00.006-07:00

Shannon came home last night from her Aunt Kate's house just after we had gotten home from the hospital. She didn't really know what to think about Leah at first, but she very quickly warmed up to her (it helps that she loves babies). She wanted to hold her and look at her.

Today Shannon has been hugging Leah and even got to hold her for a bit. She leaned down to kiss her and, without any prompting from us, said, "I love you." She frequently talks in the third person, so she has told me many times today that "she loves her Leah." It's pretty much the cutest thing ever.

Wait...this might be the cutest thing ever. Are those the skinniest legs you have ever seen, or what? They are very long and thin. Good thing she likes to eat!

Baby Leah

2008-12-03T23:45:00.002-07:00

I actually went into labor! I woke up this morning at about 7 feeling some pretty good contractions every ten minutes or so. I waited for a bit, then called the doctor to see if they wanted me to go to the hospital. They did, so we got here at about 1:00 and had a labor evaluation. I was dilated to 4 centimeters, so they decided to keep me. I got my epidural at 5:30 or so, started pushing around 7, and Leah was born at 7:33. She weighs only 6 pounds 9 ounces (4 ounces more than Shannon) and is almost 21 inches long. She is just as cute as can be, very well mannered so far, and eats like a champ! She has lots of brown hair (though her eyelashes look very light, so there is hope still that she will be a redhead). I will post more pictures when I get them, but for now I need to get some sleep.

Busy Weekend!

2008-11-26T11:42:00.002-07:00

I haven't ever done two posts in one day, but I have had quite the weekend that I would like to share. It all started last Thursday night when Matt's tooth pain went from a dull ache to being so bad he couldn't sleep. We called the dentist on Friday, but it was his daughter's birthday, so he called in a prescription and told us to come in on Monday. We got in my 8:30 on Monday and Matt got a root canal, but the dentist was unable to finish it because it was too deep or something. He referred us to an endodontist (did I mention that our dental insurance is a joke?) and we got an appointment for December 10th. Merry Christmas to us! Because of this, my mother-in-law was generous enough to take Shannon for a few days so that I could get Matt to the dentist and go to the doctor for my check-up (yes, I'm still pregnant). She came and got Shannon Monday morning. Well, on Monday night around 11:00 we got a phone call. I didn't get alarmed until Matt shot up and said, "WHAT?!" Then my heart stopped. We raced down to American Fork because my in-laws' house was on fire! We got there and everyone was standing outside freezing and watching the fire trucks and rescue vehicles. We quickly found out that everyone got out safely, thanks to a neighbor who saw the fire and went and banged on the front door to wake them up. Shannon was scared to death at a neighbor's house, and she was very happy to see us. Somehow the fire started in a garbage can along the side of the house, spread up the side of the garage, and went into the attic all the way up the direction of the vault. Most of the damage is from smoke and water, but it will be months before everything is repaired. The kitchen, dining room, mud room, and one bathroom will all need new floors and they will have to get a new roof, of course. In the mean time, their insurance company is renting them a furnished house and taking good care of them. We held Shannon very closely that night. It is really amazing that nobody was injured and nothing of real value was destroyed. I am grateful for a caring Heavenly Father who really watches out for us.

Baby Shower

2008-11-26T11:28:00.006-07:00

My friend and neighbor, Ann, gave me a fantastic baby shower. This is a bouquet of diaper roses that she made. I thought it was very creative and cute!

This is how well I made out. I got a diaper genie, lots of diapers, and some very cute clothes, so I think we're set for a while. Very nice!

This is the game where you try to guess what kind of melted candy bar is in the diaper. Ann even microwaved them briefly so that it would be extra gross. I love chocolate, but for some reason I always lose at this game.

The guests were 3 of my young women, 2 young women leaders, my sister-in-law, Kate, my mother-in-law, my friend, Paula, and Ann and her son. Here everyone is trying to think of the ending of a nursery rhyme. I did very poorly at this game. You can kind of see the food on the table in the background. We had a very nice spread! Thanks Ann and everyone who came!

Gingerbread Festival

2008-11-20T17:10:00.008-07:00

I'm finally posting about our day last Saturday! I took Shannon and met my sister, Jeny, and my nieces and nephew at Thanksgiving Point for the annual Gingerbread Festival. Jeny and I went last year, just out of curiosity, and some of the houses were so impressive that we had to go back this year. Anyone can submit a gingerbread house and people bid on them and buy them. The proceeds go to a charity. Here are some of my favorite entries:

There were 6 birdhouses like this. I couldn't believe the detail, and every bit is candy! They were very pretty.

This one was a compilation of buildings from around the world. The frozen pond is melted candy. The clock on Big Ben is handpainted with chocolate on white frosting.

This was a scene under the ocean. There is a dragon behind it, if you can tell. Not a whole lot of gingerbread in this one, but lots and lots of candy!

This was the best, in my opinion. Each one of the narrow little windows is made of melted candy, and they had lights on the inside. Jeny and I couldn't even begin to imagine the time it would have taken to make all of those icicles and other details. It was just amazing!

There was music, so of course Shannon really enjoyed herself. That's my niece, Kelsey, who stepped into the picture.Aunt Jeny was nice enough to pay the dollar for everyone to decorate a cookie. Shannon did a great job spreading the icing, but decided the candies belonged in her mouth, not on the cookie.
Shannon loves her cousin, Spencer, but she can barely reach his hand. He is a very tall boy (I think around 6 foot 5). They both had a really good time walking around together and looking at the Christmas trees.

Happy Halloween!

2008-11-02T20:06:00.004-07:00

Here's Annie! I tried to find some orange spray for her hair, but the only thing I could find was neon orange, and that would have looked funny. I promise she wasn't sad when I took this picture. My camera is just really slow, so she had already said cheese and smiled before it finally took the picture.

Here she is with the big pumpkins we got. I have to say, Halloween was a little disappointing this year. Shannon refused to take a nap, so she was very grumpy. She didn't go trick-or-treating (which I don't really care about), but the saddest part for me is that she went to bed before we got any trick-or-treaters, so she didnt' get to see any other kids dressed up. We went to a trunk-or-treat last week that was pretty fun.
Here is a terrible picture of our carved pumpkins glowing in the dark. Mine is the ghosts in the window (I always cheat and use a pattern) and Matt's is Wonder Woman. She even has a lasso, but you can't see it in the picture.

Baby Bump

2008-10-18T10:54:00.003-06:00

I have had a few requests from people to see my baby bump, but I'm afraid most of you are going to be disappointed. See, I don't show very much when I am pregnant. I am due in 6 weeks and there are still people at church who are just now finding out that I am pregnant!

Grape Juice

2008-10-02T13:59:00.008-06:00

Yesterday I took my niece, Nickell, and met my sister, Jeny at our Aunt Julie's house to harvest her grapes. She has a fence with probably a good 50 yards of grape vines (mostly Concord), and this year's crop was one of the best I have seen! Here we are busy picking.

Nickell was pretty funny because the spider webs were creeping her out and she doesn't like to get her hands very dirty. It took us about 2 hours to pick them all, but I think we cleaned those vines pretty well.

I picked one and popped it into Shannon's mouth to see what she thought, and of course she loved them. She had her own little bucket and put a little bunch in it and carried it around, then went to pick flowers and look at the horses. She had a great time!

Here is our haul. I wish I could post a link to the wonderful smell. We juiced all day long at Jeny's house and got 21 quarts from 4 of the buckets. Not bad at all! While we steamed them we played Wii Fit. It was so fun and I am really sore today! Shannon and I were so exhausted by the time we got home last night that we both went right to bed and slept until 10:30 this morning.

Kisses?

2008-09-20T17:23:00.002-06:00

I hope you aren't all tired of posts about Shannon, but that is my life right now, and she keeps doing funny things! You may think that she is kissing her baby in this picture, but she isn't. When I first saw her she had the baby on the floor and was bent over it doing this. I thought for a moment that she was doing mouth-to-mouth! Then I figured it all out. Shannon found a chocolate chip on the floor and decided to share it with her baby. Then she wanted it back, but it wouldn't come out of the baby's mouth, so she improvised! I had a hard time getting the picture because I was laughing so hard.

Warning: Viewer Discretion Advised!

2008-09-13T17:45:00.004-06:00

Shannon was supposed to be taking a nap yesterday, but was instead singing and playing. After a while of this I heard her start crying. She does that sometimes because she can't get her shirt off or whatever, so I just ignored her. Then she got hysterical and started screaming, "Are you stuck!" (which, in her language meant that she was stuck). I decided to go see what the problem was, and when I found her I couldn't stop laughing. Maybe I'm a bad mom because instead of helping my crying child I ran and got the camera. Don't worry, it didn't take me very long to take the picture then rescue her, and she wasn't in any immediate danger. You can't see her face because she wouldn't dare move to look at me, but she was screaming, I promise. Anyway, sorry about the nudity, but again, she hates to wear clothes.

More Funny Girl

2008-09-05T11:21:00.004-06:00

I don't really have anything to post, but for the benefit of my sister who gets bored at work, I have some cute pictures for her to look at. This is our neighbor across the hall, River. As you can probably tell, Shannon absolutely adores him. She calls him "Ribber." They were watching "Annie" together.

Ahh, the phases our children go through! Shannon now loves to dress herself. I had already gotten her dressed, but she went through her drawers (pulling out everything and spreading it around the room, of course) and found this lovely outfit. She likes to put a shirt on over the shirt she is wearing, but never puts her arms in the sleeves. I purposely positioned the camera so that nobody would be offended, because another of her favorite fashion statements is taking off her diaper. That's right, she has nothing on except for the shirts. My favorite is when she comes out of her bedroom without a stitch of clothing on, with the exception on an unmatched pair of shoes.

Happy Birthday Shannon!!

2008-08-19T09:50:00.005-06:00

Last night we had a few friends over for cake and ice cream for Shannon's birthday. She turned 2, so it was actually really fun this year. Since her favorite thing right now is "mukis," I made her a music cake. She blew out one of the candles herself! She isn't wearing any clothes because she was eating cake and ice cream.

The little thing made out like a bandit. We especially loved the Victoria's Secret bag that Paula brought her presents in. She got a doll stroller (which she is pushing her teddy bear around the house in as I type), fridge phonics, some music and movies (musicals, of course), dress-up shoes, a Disney Princess toy CD player, a Play-doh kit, toy drums, a tiara, and a really cute dress.

She really loves her fridge phonics. It sings a song for every letter, but her favorite is the button that sings the alphabet song. She sings along very enthusiastically!

There is no sound for the video, so don't bother with your volume. She opened all of her presents this year, mostly by herself. It was very cute.

Funny Girl

2008-08-11T20:18:00.002-06:00

Shannon has been in the habit lately of taking all of her clothes off when I put her down for a nap. This means that I have to check on her regularly, because she is known to fingerpaint her entire crib if she messes her pants. I have tried potty training, briefly, but she didn't have a clue what she was supposed to do, so I'm putting it off for a few more weeks and we'll try again. Anyway, today I went to check on her and she had taken off her shorts and put them on her head. I thought it was hilarious! She was just sitting there reading to her stuffed animals, looking like a chef!

My New Purse

2008-08-02T20:15:00.003-06:00

Last time I saw my sister, Heidi, she had this cute purse that she had crocheted. I am not as good as she is, so I asked her to make me a pattern so that I could try to figure it out. It was very fun to make, and I think it's really cute. I may have to make a green one now! I even made a cell phone pocket.

Topaz Mountain

2008-07-12T21:14:00.006-06:00

This week has been a very busy one for me. On Tuesday I went up to a campground in Little Cottonwood Canyon with the young women in our ward for their annual Girls' Camp. I helped set up the tents and stuff, and stayed the night with them. We had a lot of fun! I got home Wednesday night, then Thursday I washed everything and packed the car to go camping again, this time with my family. Matt and I dropped Shannon off at her Aunt Kate's house (we didn't want to take her camping in the desert--too hot for babies) and went to meet my sister, Jeny, and her family. We drove out to Topaz Mountain and got our camp set up just as it was getting dark.This is our campground. It doesn't do justice to the actual area we were in because this picture makes it look like there were trees there. These were just some junipers that were very sparse. We were lucky to put our campsite here to get a little bit of shade because Topaz Mountain is in Utah's west desert. The tent in full view is ours. We slept without the fly on because it was warm enough, and the view of the stars was very beautiful.This is a picture of the "hump" with Jeny and family hiking up. Topaz is Utah's state jewel, because this is where it is found in abundance. The sand sparkled in the sunlight, but to find the sherry-colored semi-precious jewel we had to hike up the hump and use a hammer and chisel to dig. Matt was helping me up the hill when a man told us that we wouldn't find anything better up there than down in the wash. Matt told him that since I was pregnant he didn't want me to do much climbing. We found a good spot and started digging. Only a few minutes passed before the man came back with a beautiful topaz. He gave it to us and said it was for the baby. I thought that was the nicest thing! Matt was really good at just looking for a really sparkly rock and he found most of the bigger crystals that we found.
While sitting and digging we kept getting confronted by this little friend. He was a very light brown chipmunk with a fluffy white tail and he wasn't afraid of us at all. I'm pretty sure he was begging for food, but we didn't have anything to feed him.

Here are our treasures. The one on the left on the top is the one that nice man gave us. It's a really pretty color, and will make a nice necklace or something. The rest of them are pretty much worthless, but they are nice to look at!

After the sun went down we went for a little hike up the hill from our campsite. The view from the top was great! We could see how isolated we actually were (the nearest town is 50 miles away). On the ridge you can see Jeny, Mark, and Tara. I forgot to take my camera up there with me, but Jeny took hers, so I will get a picture of the view later.

It's a Girl!

2008-07-03T22:13:00.004-06:00

We went for my ultrasound today and even though the baby was in the worst position possible and was very wiggly, the technician was patient and able to find out for us that it is a girl. I tried to scan the picture of her girl parts, but our scanner is old and not very good, and it didn't look like anything. These ones turned out pretty well. This one is her cute little nose and lips, and the one below is her little foot (the white blob to the right). On my copy of the picture you can actually see the toes and everything. It was really fun! We are very excited for Shannon to have a sister.

My Little Fish

2008-06-28T23:05:00.004-06:00

There are certainly benefits to apartment living. One of the biggest for me is having a big swimming pool and hottub right outside my back door. Shannon and I have gone almost every day since the pool opened for the season, and she loves it as much as I do. She has started to kick, realizing that she moves when she does it. I have also gotten her to put her face under and blow bubbles. She is probably ready to get some arm floaties or something so that she can swim on her own, but this little baby raft has sure been neat. She almost falls asleep in it sometimes!

This is the Place

2008-06-11T00:16:00.007-06:00

Today we went with my sister-in-law and her kids to Heritage Park. It is a huge village that surrounds a monument to Brigham Young and the pioneers. For those of you who may not know, after the pioneers walked across the plains they came through one last canyon and as soon as they got through it Brigham Young pointed to the huge valley below and announced that this was where they would finally settle. That was the birth of Salt Lake City and the rest of the valley. I couldn't get a great picture of the valley because of the storm coming in, but you can kind of see the valley. This is basically the view that the pioneers had from the canyon (minus the people and the park, of course). There was a great petting zoo with hundreds of baby chickens running everywhere, peacocks, goats, rabbits, cows, pigs, horses, and llamas. This is Shannon petting the goats, which she thought were kitties, of course. The animals actually seemed to enjoy the attention.
She was too tired at this point to care much, and she wouldn't let go of her dad long enough to ride the pony, but she did sit on it for a picture.

There was the cutest little mini village with this barn, a general store, a firehouse, a teepee, and a log cabin. Shannon liked the store the best because it even had toy food and a cash register (which she promptly picked up and walked off with). She probably would have stayed here all day if we had let her.

This is Shannon with her cousins and a friend on a little wooden train. They had a lot of fun playing on that, too.

Finally, a nice day!

2008-06-09T14:11:00.003-06:00

We had a long, hard winter here, but Spring finally came. Then we had a few weeks of more cold and rain. Today was finally nice enough to take Shannon to the park. I met a few of my fellow young women leaders there for lunch and we talked while the kids played. Shannon was just fine playing all by herself in the huge sandbox.

Friday night Shannon spent the night at her grandmother's house, so Matt and I took advantage of the alone time to finally see some movies. We did a double feature and saw "Prince Caspian" and "Indiana Jones." I really enjoyed both movies a lot. We also played air hockey and went out to dinner. It was a great time!

An Interesting Morning

2008-06-03T16:16:00.002-06:00

This cougar was found just blocks from where we live this morning! There were 3 calls to 911 from people saying they had seen a cougar, so 911 started calling people in the neighborhood to bring their children and pets inside. We had a helicopter flying around trying to find it, and the elementary school kids had to stay inside for recess. They found it pretty quickly, though, and it didn't hurt anybody.

On another subject, I was able to go up to Idaho this weekend to visit my sister and see my niece get baptized. My parents were there, as well as another of my nieces with her 3 week old baby. He is very cute and never cries unless his dad changes his diaper. If you want to see him, click on the link to the Blair family blog on my blog list. It was so much fun to see everyone for the second time this month. We always have a good time together playing Trivial Persuit and talking.

Another one!!

2008-05-20T12:47:00.000-06:00

It's finally time to make the official announcement. We are going to have another baby around November 30th. I just went to the doctor today and he did an ultrasound just for the fun of it. I got some pictures, but my scanner isn't set up and I am too lazy right now to get it out, so you will have to wait. They aren't very good, anyway. It's a wiggly baby, just like Shannon was. The ultrasound was every bit as fun as last time. It's just so amazing! I saw the tiny little hands waving around and the legs kicking. Then the baby did a really good stretch for us. Even the doctor was having fun with it! Since the most common question seems to be "how are you feeling?" I will just let you all know that I am feeling great. I was nauseated for a few weeks, but not very badly, and it has pretty much gone away now. Other than that I'm just very excited!

Mothers Day

2008-05-14T21:11:00.000-06:00

What a fun weekend! My sister, Jeny, somehow managed to get all of my siblings except for the two oldest to make the trip to Colorado to surprize our mom for Mothers Day. She was very surprized and happy to see us. I think her favorite part was introducing all of us in church on Sunday. I took Shannon, and my sister, Amy, brought her youngest son, Zach. He is only 4 months older than Shannon, so they had a lot of fun together. The first picture is them playing Ring around the Rosies. They were very cute. We all stayed up way too late every night, and woke up to early every morning we were there, because we didn't want to waste any of the time we had together. Needless to say, we are all exhausted now!

2008-05-04T15:26:00.000-06:00

Yesterday we went to the Salt Lake temple to attend the wedding of Matt's brother, Sam. It was a perfect day and a very nice ceremony. Shannon got a new dress to match her cousins, and she looked just beautiful. Here she is with a grape in her mouth to keep her from crying because it was way past nap time. She had a lot of fun just walking around and playing with her family. Matt and I were up until 3:00 on Friday night helping to get everything ready, so by the time we got home last night we were exhausted.

Zoo Trip

2008-04-19T19:30:00.000-06:00

My family now has a blog, so I am going to be repeating my posts on two different blogs, but I have a lot of friends who are probably not interested in what my sister did last week, so I will continue to keep up this blog. Anyway, yesterday I took Shannon to the zoo. We met up with my sister-in-law and her family. I really thought that Shannon would be interested in the animals this time, but she was a lot more interested in all of the other kids there. She just loves to play with other kids! It was fun, though. We spent 4 hours there, finishing up with a ride on the little train. Shannon was exhausted by the time we left. These are pictures of her with her favorite cousin, Hannah. Shannon wanted to walk instead of riding in the stroller, so I made her hold hands with Hannah. She's very independant, though, and tried to wander off many times.

Baby Shower

2008-04-14T09:26:00.001-06:00

This weekend was a blast! On Friday night I took Shannon and we went to my sister, Jeny's house to spend the night. One of my other sisters, Mindy, drove down from Pocatello, Idaho, so we stayed up until 2:00 talking. On Saturday morning we went to my niece, Nickell's, baby shower. She has been waiting a long time to have a baby, so it is really exciting. All of my aunts came, and some of my niece's friends that I hadn't seen in years, so it was a really fun party. One of the highlights was the waffle bar. The waffles were made from a special recipe that includes yeast, but that's all I know so far. I hope to get the recipe from Nickell soon, because they really were as good as they were made out to be. We ate and talked, Nickell opened her presents, then we talked some more. Afterwords we took yet another of my sisters, Kristi, back to Jeny's and we sat outside to enjoy the warm weather. Shannon discovered the sand box in Jeny's yard, and she was busy for hours. Too bad we live in an apartment, or I could make her one! I really enjoy spending time with my sisters. I wish they all lived closer so that we could get together more often.

I'm a blogger!

2008-04-07T11:26:00.001-06:00

At the request of multiple friends and family members, I have officially become a blogger. I don't know how up-to-date I will be able to keep this, but I have the goal to write something new every week. We shall see!
Where do I start? Well, since we sent out Christmas letters, most, if not all of you should know what is happening in our lives. Shannon is growing like a weed. She loves to sing Do Re Mi, Happy Birthday, and her ABCs. She makes us laugh every day. We couldn't love her any more! Matt has 7 weeks left in the school year, and he plans to spend the summer finishing his novel. I am confident it will be published, but we have no idea where to start. If anyone knows a good literary agent, let us know! I'm still a homemaker, and I enjoy it very much.
This weekend was the General Conference of our church, where we get to listen to our prophet and other leaders. I really enjoyed Elder Bednar's talk on praying with faith. He gave some good examples of how we can improve our prayers, and the stories he told were very good.
That's all I have to say for now. I hope you all enjoy!