Yellowstone Half Marathon and June Trip

This weekend we had the opportunity to take a quick trip to Nate's parent's house so Nate could run the first ever Yellowstone Half Marathon. It also happened to be a cabin trip for my extended family, so my cousins Steve and Lori ran it too. I was a little nervous about how Nate would do and recover running at such a high elevation (about 6600 feet), but he wasn't very concerned about time. He just wanted to have fun. He and Steve ran almost all of it together until about the last mile where Nate hit the wall and told Steve to keep going. He finished just a few minutes behind Steve with a time of 2:22:12.

Here's some photos Nate took during the race. Certainly a beautiful course, although he said it was more of a trail run.

He had the girls run the last few feet of the race with him.

They all did it! And for the record, the girl on the right, is Lori's friend who ran it too.

Like I said, it was a quick trip. We got there late Thursday night and left Sunday afternoon. On Friday, the day before the race, we just hung out. The girls love spending time with Grandma and Grandpa and playing outside. They were hoping for a few RZR rides, but it still had the snow tracks on it and Grandpa couldn't find the right bolts to put the wheels back on. 

We would have spent some time at the cabin, but Felicity was at the tail end of a cold and Dayton was very, very sick with one. He was so sick, in fact, that he hardly slept 2 of the 3 nights we were there because he was coughing so much and very congested. Poor little guy, he spent most of Friday and Saturday just snuggling and sleeping on whoever would hold him.

It's a good thing we're coming back next month for a little longer trip and hopefully with healthy kids.

8 Months

Dayton's hit many milestones in the past month - the biggest being he is very, very mobile now. He's crawling all over the place, pulling up to stand on everything, rolling over and getting to a sitting position by himself in seconds. Although it's fun to watch him progress, one of the downsides is how it affects putting him down for naps and bedtime. Just a few weeks ago, I could lay him down awake on his back and he would stay on his back all night and just go to sleep pretty easily on his own. Now he will quickly sit up then stand up in the corner closest to the door of his room crying to be rescued. It is cute though when he's standing there in the morning, and he gets a big smile on his face when someone comes to get him.

Sadly, he's currently in the middle of another bad cold and on top of that he's getting his top 4 front teeth at the same time. He's been a real trooper though. I can't wait to see how he handles teething when he's not sick on top of it because so far all of his teeth have come in when he's been really sick.

Another big milestone is how much he's improved at taking a bottle! He got the hang of using his sippy cup to drink water, and it helped him not hate bottles so much. In fact, he's kind of been weaning himself because he prefers a bottle to nursing during the day. He's not completely weaned, but this is major progress. As far as eating goes, he also now loves to feed himself cheerios or the dissolvable puffs. And he continues to be a good eater of any baby food.

He's still a pretty mellow kid and lets you know when he wants something - usually to be held. He always wants to be held for several minutes after he wakes up, and if you try to put him down, he screams until you pick him up. Luckily he's pretty easily distracted with food or toys within a few minutes.

He continues to keep a good schedule and goes down for bed between 8-9 pm, wakes around 4-6 am to eat and goes back to sleep until 7-8 am. His naps vary a little, but part of that is from being the third kid and always having to adapt to other people's schedules.

Recently, he's also started giving kisses more on demand than he used to. He opens his mouth big and wide and often licks your cheek too.

We just love him and feel so lucky to have him!

Six...and a Half

When you're only 6-years-old, adding on another half year is a big deal, and I love any reason to make a treat. I let Bridget pick a recipe off my Pinterest boards, and she chose S'more Brownie Pie. It was every bit as good as it sounds although quite rich. Yea for half-birthdays! Maybe she'll have front teeth again by the time she's 7.

Ogden Half Marathon and Kids K

It's mid-May, so that means it's time for Nate's favorite race of the year - the Ogden Half Marathon.

Sadly, I'm not as supportive of a wife as I should be and did not go to the effort to get all 3 kids and myself ready to drive to the finish by 8:45 am, park, and wait to see him finish. Thankfully, he doesn't expect me to either. So I don't have any pictures of him to post, but here's a beautiful shot he took of the course as they head down the canyon. Yes, it was a beautiful day unlike the pouring rain of last year.

 

And Nate finished in 2:06:15

 

Like the previous 2 years, Bridget wanted to run the Kids K again this year, but this time we decided to let her do it all by herself.

 

Here she is coming down the finishing chute:

And proudly wearing her cow bell "medal":

7 Months

 I just can't get enough of this cute face!

I just love this sweet boy and sometimes it feels like he just gets cuter every day. He's certainly a busy boy and working hard to become more mobile. I'm trying to enjoy each day we have left before that happens. In the last few days he's even started pulling up on things to get to his knees.

 

Although he's not crawling, he gets onto all fours occasionally, but from there he either goes back to a sitting position or flops onto his belly to get whatever he's trying to reach. 





As far as his eating, I'm happy to say he's enjoying solid food a lot more now. He still doesn't like carrots much, but he seems to enjoy everything else. Bananas, peaches, and sweet potato are probably his favorites. Sadly though, trying to get him to take a bottle still isn't going well. He either flat out screams or just wants to play with it most of the time. If by chance he does drink, it's never been more than 2 ounces. I'm ready to be done with breastfeeding, so hopefully things will start improving soon. Part of the problem is that I would prefer not to be the one to work with him on taking a bottle since he's supposed to have an easier time taking it from someone else. But Nate's work schedule and Dayton's eating schedule never really coincide to make that happen.

On a happy note, just in the past few days, he's seems to finally be doing better at sleeping through the night and taking 2 good naps during the day. We've tried a few different times to sleep train him, but it's been more difficult than it ever was with the girls. He would scream hysterically forever and not calm down at all when we'd go in to check on him and comfort him. After about an hour and a half we'd cave and pick him up, and he'd immediately settle down. The good news is that he'd sleep great after that. I think one of the reasons he's been harder to sleep train is that he always falls asleep when I'm nursing him at bedtime, and even though I try hard to wake him before I lay him down in his bed, he's so tired that he won't wake up. I just hope this change is permanent, and I can finally get some better sleep on a regular basis.

Race for the Cure

I think it's been 4 years since the last time I participated in Race for the Cure. I always enjoy doing it, but getting to SLC that early in the morning is always hard when you're a mom of little kids. Because it had been so long, I really wanted to do it this year, so I encouraged my sister Megan, Aunt Jennine, and her daughters and their families to register too.

We rode the train downtown which was a first for me. We had to catch the train a little before 6 am (way too early). And after all my effort to get to the train station I almost missed it because of the longest and slowest freight train preventing me from getting over the tracks to the station. Luckily, I made it just in time.

It was a beautiful day - just a little chilly and sprinkling drops of rain here and there. We all started off together, but Megan and I ended up walking the whole thing together a little ahead of everyone else. It was nice to spend time together chatting and catching up on life.

This year, I felt an increased desire to participate because of my sister Amy's current battle with breast cancer. I also love that it's always Mother's Day weekend and feel like it's a great way to think of my mom and all that she went through before it claimed her life.

Bridget's Kindergarten Opera

For their end of the year program (actually the only program they did all year), Bridget's kindergarten class put on an opera that they wrote and created themselves. It took them the entire year to come up with the storyline, music, etc. In the end, it was a story about some pirates sailing to find some treasure, but some sharks come and attack their boat. Some mermaids come and help the pirates and everyone lives happily ever after.

The kids did a great job although it was hard to hear them at times.

 

Bridget chose to be a pirate.

 

Too bad I couldn't get a short video of the beginning to upload, or I would post it too.

Easter Weekend

Holidays always seem to be full of lots of activities which can sometimes get a little hectic, but I like to look at it as lots of family time and lots of memories. Here's several pictures from our busy Easter weekend.

We had a great time dyeing eggs. It was Felicity's first time because we used to do it during her nap time when she would have been more of hindrance than a help. She loved it, and did pretty well. As usual, they wished there were many, many more eggs to dye.

Saturday evening we went to our dear friends the Underwoods for dinner and an Easter egg hunt. Unlike traditional hunts, any eggs the kids found had to be put in someone else's basket instead of their own.

As for the big day...we went to church, of course. The girls were so excited to wear their new dresses. I wish that I would have had time to make their outfits, but that just wasn't going to happen this year. Instead I chose a color scheme and bought them. I love how this picture turned out. Every time I look at it, I can't help but think how lucky we are to have such cute kids.

After church, we went to Nate's Aunt Linda's for lunch and an egg hunt. The weather was gorgeous, so the kids rode in a trailer behind the RZR to the river bottoms for the hunt.

 

Finally, we headed directly to my Aunt Jennine's house for the annual decorating of the chocolate marshmallow eggs and some visiting with my extended family. Unfortunately, I forgot to take any pictures.

It was definitely a busy couple of days, but the kids enjoyed every minute of it. It was wonderful to spend time with both sides of our families as well as good friends.

My Dad's Death and Funeral

Love leaves a heartache no one can heal,

love leaves a memory no one can steal.

- Irish Wisdom

This is a picture of my dad on my wedding day nearly 8 years ago, but this is how I like to remember him.

It's been just over a year and a half since my dad was diagnosed with Stage 4 prostate cancer, and early in the morning on April 10th, the cancer won and he passed away. Bev did a wonderful job caring for him until the very end. He was pretty sick most of the short 10 months they were married, and we are all so grateful for her and all that she did.

 

Since about mid-March, I knew this day was coming as his health started to rapidly decline. I'm just grateful that I live close enough that Nate, the kids, and I could say goodbye beforehand. Although it was hard to see him so weak and frail at the end - images I can never erase from my mind - I'm grateful I was able to have that opportunity.

 

I have a lot of mixed feelings about his passing away. We weren't very close because of his constant traveling for work and missing out on much of my life, but I have never in my life questioned that he loved me. He was always affectionate and said he loved me often. Even so, he lacked an ability to communicate well, and I felt like he never really knew me - a few facts yes but not much as far as my interests, likes and dislikes. But he is my father, and I love him  - flaws, quirks, and all.

 

Watching both of my parents suffer and then die from cancer was certainly not easy. Being a 33-year-old orphan is hard too. Most people my age have at least one and most of them both of their parents, and it's hard to not feel some jealousy. I hate that my husband and children don't know my mom and my children won't really know my dad either. Bridget is 6 and will have a few memories, but Felicity and Dayton won't have any.

 

The weather and funeral were perfect. Everything from the talks to the music was just as he would have liked even though he gave no instruction beforehand as to what he wanted. As Jill, Megan, Jessica, and I were singing our song accompanied by Emily, I couldn't help but think about how much my dad loved listening to and watching us perform. All the money my parents spent on various music lessons certainly did not go wasted.

 

Here's a few pictures from the funeral:

 



 

The cutest bunch of orphans you ever saw.

Our parents have a wonderful posterity and legacy to be proud of. We were all together with the exception of Amy and Stuart's 3 kids who stayed behind because of the huge expense to fly here from Maryland.

I'm so grateful for the plan of salvation and to be blessed with a strong testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I know my parents are together again and will watch over each one of us from the other side of the veil. This is not the end, and I look forward to reuniting with them again someday.

6 Months

Yea! Dayton has finally entered my favorite stage - 6 to 9 months. I love this age for many reasons, but if I had to name just a couple it's probably because their little personalities start to emerge and because they are learning so many things so quickly.

 

Dayton's actually been sitting pretty well for about 3 weeks now. I LOVE being able to set him down and know he's not going to go anywhere. Although he is capable of rolling, he rarely chooses to do so. I just wish this stage would last a little longer and am not anxious for him to become mobile.

 

Our pediatrician is very big on waiting until 6 months to introduce solids, so I waited until just a few days ago to give him rice cereal for the first time. And he HATED it! I've never known a baby to hate baby cereals, but he was not a fan at all. He acted like he was gagging on it, made faces of disgust, and spit out most of what I tried to give him. Today, I tried giving him pureed carrots and got the exact same response. I'm kind of afraid we might have a very picky eater on our hands. He doesn't even like the taste of infant Tylenol and spit that out and cried when we had to give it too him a few times a couple of weeks ago.

 

Another big milestone this past month is that his first 2 teeth emerged. I was pretty surprised because both of the girls got their teeth around 7 months. The first tooth had actually been there a few days before I noticed it, but one day he grabbed my hand and stuck it in his mouth so I noticed as soon as he started munching on it. The second one was already breaking the surface too.

 

Sadly, Dayton's first big illness also happened at the end of March. All of our kids had amazingly stayed pretty healthy throughout the winter with the exception of a couple of mild colds. This time, however, Bridget brought home a cold from school which turned out to be RSV - not a big deal in older children but very dangerous for babies. Dayton had a really bad cough that kept getting worse and we were supposed to go out of town for spring break to Arizona. I took him into the doctor to get checked out which is where he was tested for RSV. The virus had also caused bronchiolitis which is why he was coughing so much. Because he was highly contagious for 7-10 days and also passed it on to Felicity, we ended up not being able to go out of town, but I'm just glad he never had to be hospitalized.

 

As far as sleeping goes, he was finally starting to do really well at night until he got sick and then his teeth came in. Hopefully he'll get back to sleeping better soon.

 

When we took him for his checkup today, he also had an ear infection we didn't know about. As usual, he's still our chubby little guy:

 

Height: 27 inches (67th percentile)

Weight: 21 lbs. 5 oz. (96th percentile)

Head Circumference: 18 inches (97th percentile)

 

Dayton also got the opportunity to meet all of his aunts, uncles, and most of his cousins on my side of the family today. He did really well being passed around and enjoyed everyone.

Uncle Mark and Dayton playing together

Felicity's 3rd Birthday

Personally, I love celebrating birthdays, so I do my best to make them a big deal. Felicity happened to be looking forward to hers for a few months now, so I was happy to make it a fun day for her.

Her birthday fell on a Sunday this year which also means it's General Conference. That made it a little more challenging since we couldn't go out to eat and had to plan things around Conference. But we did start the day off with our traditional birthday cake pancakes complete with candles.

I should also mention she was pretty sick with a nasty cold thanks to the RSV that ran through all three of our kids. It's no fun to be sick on your birthday, and we even had to take her to urgent care the night before because she had an ear infection.

We made the best of everything and had a few family members and neighbors over for cake and homemade ice cream that night. One of her presents was a scooter (the only request she made for a present).

She also got some jewelry since she's always borrowing/stealing Bridget's.

I had so much fun making her cake. It was certainly a labor of love, but it turned out better than I thought it would, and it was delicious. She still loves Curious George more than any other cartoon. I love the cheesy grin on her face in this picture.

 

And here's a video of the last half of the birthday song. It sometimes takes me a bit to remember how to take videos on our new camera which is why it's missing the beginning.

 

Her other gift was a swing set. Felicity loves to swing, and a couple of weeks before her birthday I asked our good friends and neighbors, Brian and RaeAnn, if they wouldn't mind helping us pick up a used swing set for her if I could find one we wanted on the local online classifieds. They were happy to help, and they absolutely love Felicity. Brian actually found this one for us for FREE, picked it up, hid it at their house, and then helped Nate assemble it a couple of days before her birthday. Both of the girls LOVE it and have spent hours on it already.

 

Happy birthday to our favorite 3-year-old in the whole world!

We love you, Felicity!

Conversations with Felicity

I love this girl! And right now she's at the stage where her language and comprehension are growing by leaps and bounds which makes for some hilarious and cute conversations. Here's a few we've had lately:

Even though it's been nearly 3 months since Christmas, she still talks about Santa quite frequently. She likes to tell me that he lives at the North Pole (and points north), that he says ho ho, how she saw him at Kneaders but wouldn't sit on his lap, that he's nice and she sat on his lap at the church and he gave her a Curious George book, and that she really wants to go to Santa's house. It makes me wonder if the Santa conversations will die down as the year goes on. Knowing her, probably not, and she'll just be extra excited when Christmas rolls around again.

A few weeks ago, I was sitting in the living room, and Felicity came running down the hall carrying a small picture of Jesus. She showed it to me and said, "Mom, I found Jesus. I love Him. He's my favorite." I responded, "I love Him too. Do you know Jesus loves you too?" "Yes, Jesus loves me and I love Him," she replied.

For the past month or so, Felicity has been very interested in discussing heaven with me. We talk about who's in heaven (Jesus, Heavenly Father, my mom, etc.). Then she likes to talk about how she lived in heaven before she was in my belly and came to our family. She has to also remind me that Bridget and Dayton were in heaven too before they were in my belly. Last week we were discussing this topic for probably the 10th time this month. This time when we talked about who was in heaven, we went through the usual list and then she started talking about the Lamanites. She told me they were wicked, they killed people, and that Jesus doesn't like wicked people. Then she went back to talking about how she and her siblings lived in heaven before they came to us and that Jesus took good care of her. I guess she's been paying more attention lately as we've been reading the Book of Mormon together as a family.

Like I said, heaven seems to be on her mind a lot lately. A couple of weeks ago, she'd just woken up from her nap, and as I was hurrying to get her ready to go pick Bridget up from school. She had a really sad expression on her face, so I asked her what was wrong. She started crying and with tears streaming down her face she said, "Mom, I really miss Jesus." That melted my heart a little, and I said, "I miss him too." We continued to get ready to go and a few minutes later she started crying about it again. I told her it was okay because Jesus misses her too.

It's conversations like these that make my day and make me feel like I'm not doing too bad of a job teaching and raising my children. It also helps make up for the times when she drives me crazy by asking 5000 questions every day and quite often the same questions over and over that I've already answered.

Visit from Jill, Elaine, & Charlotte

My sister Jill and her girls, Elaine & Charlotte, got to come visit for a quick trip this week over their spring break. Even though we don't get to see them as often as we would like, our girls love being with them and play very well together.

Elaine and Charlotte don't get to be around babies very often, and they both loved meeting Dayton for the first time and holding and playing with him.

We also planned a little family gathering with our extended family while they were here.

Megan is always the favorite aunt.

We also went to Megan's new apartment and then went to dinner together. After dinner we went to a cupcake shop where these cousins had a great time playing together. So much fun!

5 Months

Guess who finally learned to roll over yesterday? He's certainly not fast at it most of the time and not inclined to do it very often, but he did it six times yesterday. He's rolled from his back to his tummy once, but most of the time he just likes to roll onto his sides as he's trying to grab for his feet.

 

Speaking of feet, they seem to be one of his new favorite things. It can certainly make it a little more difficult to bathe him or change his diapers sometimes because he wants his feet where he can grab them.

 

As far as sleep goes these days, he's doing a little better . He's had a few nights this week where he's slept for 8-9 hours straight at night, woken up to eat, and then gone back to sleep for another hour or so. Hallelujah! We've also gotten him to go to sleep on his own so he doesn't always have to be held or rocked to sleep. The only downside is that his naps still tend to be shorter - about 45 minutes on average. And by the evening, he's pretty tired and ready to go to bed for the night no later than 9 pm. 

Don't let this next picture fool you. He's much more of a momma's boy than a daddy's boy, but that's because I'm his only source of food and spend more time with him than anyone else. He's to the point he will sometimes cry if I'm out of sight and he's wanting me or turn when he hears my voice and start crying until I come rescue him. It's okay though because someday he'll realize that Nate is the fun one.

He's also gotten really, really grabby with his hands so watch out. Felicity is NOT a fan when he gets a hold of her curls. (Thanks to my sister Jill who got this awesome action shot).

Other things to note:

• Loves his pacifier
• Started making loud squealing/squawking noises that are almost birdlike (thank goodness for the pacifier)
• Still extremely drooly
• Wearing almost all 9 month size clothing
• Birthmark still hasn't faded at all and left tear duct is still blocked
• Loves to be held as much as possible which is hard when he weighs over 20 lbs. I'm pretty sure my left arm is 2-3 times stronger than my right.
• Loves to give open mouth, slobbery kisses
• Very observant and still loves to look around at everything around him with those big blue eyes
• Still gets really excited when he smiles resulting in many blurry pictures trying to capture them
• Very, very wiggly
• Can sit up for a few seconds by himself before he topples over to one side or another

Winter Trip to West Yellowstone

Nate's parent's are currently in the middle of remodeling their entire house. The first two floors are mostly done, but they recently started the top floor and wanted a little help, so we ventured north over President's Day weekend to help with construction and so the kids could enjoy some time at Grandma and Grandpa's.

We left Saturday morning and got there by early afternoon. Dayton was pretty excited for his first trip to Grandma and Grandpa's and was an angel in the car all the way there and back.

Even though Scott and Alice were in the middle of construction when we got there, they took a little break so the kids could go play outside in the snow. One of the first orders of business was for Grandpa to create a good sled hill with the tractor. Felicity was happy to help. I should note that they've had plenty of snow this winter and had 3-4 feet in their yard and many piles of plowed snow that were even higher.

 

And here's a little video of some sledding:

 

It did snow a couple of days while we were there adding a few more inches. The girls would have loved to play in the snow more than they did, but I had to stay inside to take care of Dayton. And I didn't mind too much since the Olympics were on, and I'm a bit of an Olympic junkie.

Nate did take a few breaks to go outside with them and ended up building a little snow cave.

Bridget thought the cave was pretty cool and was sad to have to leave it when we left for home the next day.

When the sky is blue instead of stormy, it's quite picturesque. It's certainly fun to visit, but I know I couldn't handle living in a place with that much snow for months and months.

It was a quick, fun trip and fairly uneventful unless you count that Nate scared me to death on the drive home when he slammed on the breaks to avoid hitting a fox that ran across the road.