March Madness

It is so sad! Grant noticed my SD card in the computer and kindly put it in a safe place... Saddly, no pictures for March. And since that is usually how I remember what happened in my life, I'm having trouble thinking of what to write... and it was only a month ago!

I do remember it was pretty hectic, I remember a lot of decision making concerning jobs and future plans, and the weather getting colder and colder, as if it was starting winter all over again. I know I took some adorable pictures of Aspen, but otherwise, I sure hope I can find those pictures! Gotta love those 2-year-olds!

February happenings

Just when we thought spring was on it's way, we were buried in snow! Kenzie know's to play a little and then run inside to get warm, but Grant will play on and on until I have to drag him inside because his cheeks are purple. He can't get enough!

McKenzie loved me writing her name in the snow, she even came over to dot the 'i' for me with her frozen hand. (it's hard to read after the Grant man walked all over it)

Grant was oblivious, but did recognize I was doing something for him :)

Ms. Aspen's eyes are slowly changing color, they are turning a greyish brown in the middle. I'm hoping they go grey or blue!

She has such a delicately framed face...

 ...especially when she's teething

Does the man of your dreams turn into a horse? I hope so :)  ...yah!

It's been so long since I've been swimming! I loved watching Grant bob in the water and helping Kenzie find her friend the whole time. She is slowing getting over her fear of the water we so kindly distilled in her.

Aspen got her first taste (literally) of chlorinated water, she seemed to really enjoy it!

 

 

Aspen's Baby Blessing

Happy Blessing Day Aspen Marie!

It was sort of last minute, but since my parents happened to be in town, I decided to have Aspen receive her baby blessing; a simple blessing of guidance and love, and to give her a name.

 The blessing was beautiful, Aspen has a strong spirit about her, she is so eager to love and give you all her attention. She looked very intently at Josh during the blessing, I'm sure she was confused why her dad was closing his eyes.

Baby Blessings are not essential to have in the Mormon faith, but they are still very special, nonetheless. So I was sure to make her clothes special as well. Her dress was made by my mom and worn by my sister, Stephanie, for her baby blessing. The pink silk blanket was hand quilted by my great grandmother, and my very dear friend, Emily, made the baby booties after being taught how by my mom's mother. Many women put in a lot of work to give this baby girl a special outfit and blanket for her special day. I'm grateful she has strong and faithful women on both sides of her family to look to as an example. 

We even managed to get a family picture before church. 

Then the dinner party began (once Grant woke up). We had a lot of fun and laughed all evening, it's amazing the similarities between our families, both so quarky and not afraid to show it!

Consider us the happy parents of three cute kids!

I Love Laundry!

I do laundry, and mostly laundry for this baby! so first...

The many beautiful faces of Aspen...

I love taking pictures of this girl, but she will almost never look at the camera, in fact she'll never look at me if she is sitting up. She's always studying something else to the left or right. It's become a competitive game between Josh and I to try to get Aspen to look us in the eyes while we hold her up... I'm winning.




I'm so excited to have washer AND a dryer again! And my first personally owned too.

I've never been so excited to do laundry in all my life! They need a little work, but I think we got a good deal. I didn't know I could bargain until Josh refused to talk to the seller. So I had to!

A Good Sunday

Last last Sunday was good, but this last Sunday was even better! We had a nice morning, everyone was happy or at least mostly (the boy just doesn't like to change his diaper) and we made it to church 10 minutes early! That was unheard of when we didn't have any kids, let alone three! I hope tomorrow is good too!

So I decided a small photo shoot was in order while we waited for Aspen to wake up.

Kenzie has decided she can take her scriptures to Primary, I usually find the 3 or 4 bows previously in her hair, in her purse.

 What a stud!!  He is still wondering about the camera these days...

Church was wonderful as usual, I'm able to focus much more during the lessons without prego brain, it's nice to be Spiritually fed and not have to be spoon fed!

Josh, Grant, and Aspen slept all afternoon while Kenzie and I hung out. I fell asleep for only 10 minutes to wake up to this by the couch...

The family dinner at the Fosters was very fun, Grandpa Foster was there and he held Aspen almost a solid hour. She likes her Great Grandpa a lot.

We were all very relaxed

Josh... not so relaxed 

Thank you to Sara for serenading us with your lovely singing ;)

See you next Sunday!!

A Very Kenzie Post

 It has been so cold! The college canceled school two days in a row, so we had daddy home all day! 

This is what happens when the spicket is on drip all night

At long last, we have finally put Kenzie's name on the wall!!   (It only took us 8 months...and big beds...and work being canceled for two days...)

 She decorated it this time with part of her birthday present, she insisted that the flowers be near the matching letters.

She was so happy and impressed with herself, "I got to decorate my name!", she said

(she wears the tutu every day)

To celebrate, we did a work out on our yoga mats (I completely faked working out). Kenzie has a candy cane in her mouth (found under the couch, still good!). She didn't want to set it down, so it stayed in her mouth while she got her workout on!

Sometime, I hope to post a video of Kenzie and Grant dancing to the Wii, but I'm not that blogger savvy... yet!

Big BIG Beds!

The kids were very excited to set up their big BIG beds, as Kenzie calls them. They helped, some, mostly dumped out the washers over and over. Grant was fascinated by all the tools and gizmos! It took a better part of a Saturday, but Joshua (with minimal help from me) put a bunk bed in their room.

McKenzie was very, very excited to have a "princess bed". She felt so grown up and trusted!

My fourth child had to climb up there too, you know, to test the strength of the bed...

Grant's favorite thing to do is to hang on Kenzie's bed at night and say DD, right back!! You can tell he is so comfortable on his new bed, he even got a pillow!!

*~*~*

I just found these pictures of Joshua and Grant, they were taken from a front door one year apart, almost to the day! 

December 22nd (ish)  2012

January 8th (ish)  2013

How funny is that?!?

I love how close Josh and Grant have come the past couple weeks, Grant loved having his daddy home for 3 weeks during Christmas break.

Surgery

I've mentioned 'recovery' some in other posts, I wasn't talking about baby recovery, but in a way, it is.

I was a good size with Kenzie...

Remember how big I got with Grant?

(and this was taken a month before he was born!)

I got even bigger with Aspen!!

So really, I just had a tummy tuck. :)

I had an umbilical hernia and one long vertical tear in my muscle just above my belly button. 

I've known for about 2 years now, and now is a good time to take care of it. The surgeon did a great job, everything went well and I'm doing fine now, just taking it easy. (it is SO hard! to 'take it easy', I could write a whole other post on this!!)

I wasn't going to write about having this surgery at all, but I feel it may be good to get it out of my head. 

I was very scared. I had surgery when I was seven, and all I remember hurting a lot. But my main concern was and still is if I'll be able to have more children. I was reassured that if I wait a little longer for the next baby, my abs would be able to stretch with me. 

My next concern was my milk supply and getting back to Aspen pronto.
Both of which are no longer concerns. 

I'm so grateful my parents-in-law are so quick to jump in and watch the kids!
It has set me at ease knowing they can come help.

I woke up in recovery in a lot of pain and unable to speak for a while, which meant I didn't get pain medicine until the anesthesiologist noticed the tears down my face. About 30 minutes later, I kept my eyes closed when Joshua came into my room. It was very painful to cry. And boy would I have liked to cry then!

I'll just say I have a new appreciation and sympathy for anyone who has had surgery and for their care takers. 

Joshua was wonderful, as usual, and loved taking care of me. I am a spoiled wife, no joke. He helped me so much he threw out his own back ten days later. So there we were, two oldies, broken and sore, taking care of the 4 and 2 year-old, and 7 week old. Luckily we picked the right time to be out of commission. We had his family taking care of us a lot, plus people from church and we are much better off with all their help!

One More Party

My dad came rolling by in his big truck for the weekend. The children were very happy to see Grandpa! He brought them both a birthday present, he could hardly carry Kenzie's. She got a barbie car (mostly because I always wanted on when I was little). Her face was priceless! She sat in it a solid hour since it would take a day for the battery to charge. Grant pushed her too, a great way to keep them busy, no? Grant got an airport track, which keeps him very busy too!

Luckily, we hadn't celebrated Kenzie's birthday with the Foster's yet so we did on Sunday night and my dad got to be there. Grandpa Foster came too, straight from Arizona. Kenzie had a friend party and a family party, but I think we confused her since she keeps asking if she's five now.




I've decided on any warm day I can, the children and I are going for a walk. We have been inside so much since November, for very good reasons; huge pregnant, new baby, surgery. We also get easily dehydrated, so I grabbed some cups and we all went out to the spicket to get some water, then out to the wild unknown. The children armed themselves with sticks, so we were definitely safe. I enjoyed feeling the sun burn my face and seeing Grant get mud all over his hands.

These guys love being outside, we can look at the horse, chase chickens, jump on the trampoline...I'm very excited to be recovered and for warmer weather. Hold the bugs please.