Enjoying the Journey...

Introducing Paisley Rebecca

2012-02-01T09:25:00.000-05:00

Introducing....

Paisley Rebecca Rasmussen

January 24, 2012

7lbs, 6 oz...19 1/2 inches long

Things We've Noticed About Paisley:

* Major Cuddle bug, Loves to be held

* Extremely dislikes diaper changes even if you are quick

* Loves wetting/messing her diaper just as soon as you've put a clean one on her!

* Looks very much like Brynlee as a baby, with Ethan's hair color when he was born

* Dark, dark blue eyes...guessing these will change to brown

* Loves bathtime...may be a fish like the other four?

* Smiles a lot when she's asleep...wondering if she's seeing angels around

* Has slept five to seven hours the past three nights in a row....so nice!

* Very, very loved by this family and never will have to

worry about there being someone to hold her, feed her,

play with her, change her, get a diaper/binky, etc.

Driveway Sledding

2012-01-26T08:41:00.000-05:00

We'll I am so anxious to get pictures of the newest addition to our family up, Paisley Rebecca, but I'll leave that until the house is a little quieter tomorrow....;-) Until then, here's a little adventure the kids and I had fun doing this past weekend right before Paisley was born...

Last Saturday we drove by the reservoir on our way home from the primary pancake breakfast (more later) and the kids noticed people sledding down the hill. They begged to go home and get the sleds and return to the reservoir for some sledding run. Since Ammon was on call until the next day, I told them it wasn't safe for me to join them on the hills, and we would have to pray another snow day would come in the upcoming months.

Then we arrived home.

Out of no where, Ethan exclaimed, "I know...we can go sledding down our driveway!!!". Hmmm, what? Our mostly flat driveway with only a couple of inches of snow. Interesting....;-)

But then I was humbled for the next hour and a half as they proceeded to turn our flat driveway into a sled park complete with a slushy snow "jump". They were in heaven and I got to take as many pictures as I wanted while patrolling the end of the driveway for cars each time they went in the street. Best of all, it made them so tired and able to be good later that afternoon as I took all four kids to Ethan's basketball game, stocked up on groceries at Coscto and Target and ran a couple more errands.

For me personally, it was also fun and part of the New Year's Resolution we made...more engaged parenting. I really had wanted to be cleaning inside and getting ready for my mom coming and the baby, but I surrendered and enjoyed just watching them, being outside and putting the work and inside chores aside for once and just being their mom.

And it was a good thing too, because Sunday ended up being a warmer day and dried all that snow away. Thank goodness we seized the moment and enjoyed the afternoon that way.

So excuse me for the next hundred or so (just kidding) pictures of our kids enjoying snow (I got to practice using the manual mode again).

Making poor Bryn push the train down the driveway bless her heart!

Sisters!

Bryn agreeing to be a good sport and push again!

Having some fun of her own...

They got pretty good air on that little jump!

Being a good big sister and teaching Karli how to "do it"

Totally awesome!!

And trying to look all hip and tough...like a "snowboarder"...hmm...

Karli was laughing hysterically because someone missed their sled while trying to jump on. They didn't think her laughing was so funny but I sure did!

Don't ask me how landing on this flat, hard surface was actually fun....

But hey, they enjoyed it and got tired....that's all that counts!

Getting Ready for the Baby's Birth

2012-01-25T09:00:00.002-05:00

This past Friday night, we had a special experience as a family and one that we'll all remember for a while.

I planned for weeks that that would be the night that we would do something special together as our last time with just the six of us and something fun to celebrate the baby's birth.

We ate a special dinner at P.F. Chang's and thanks to a free appetizer we got in August, plus the fact that we didn't order as much, it ended up being the least amount we'd ever spent there. Crazy since we had all six of us. I think the kids now love it just as much as we do!

We then headed across the street to the mall to Build A Bear. You see, Ammon and I have always done "hospital gifts". Something special that Ammon and I bring to the hospital when a new child in our family arrives for each of the kids. It's our way of showing the kids that something wonderful has happened but we remember them and it's not all completely about the baby.

This time though, I wanted to make more of a memory of the occassion and not just hand over another toy, which is why we chose Build a Bear. We told the kids they each had $25 to spend and that anything after that they had to pay with with their allowance.

They were so cute and so good and I'll remember it forever. They each chose animals that weren't too expensive as to leave budget room for clothing. All four of them were so excited to pick out the "right outfit" and take part in the experience. They all picked reasonable clothing and stayed within the budget. We told them after the animals were stuffed and put in the boxes, Ammon and I got to take them and they would see them again when they come to visit at the hospital. They weren't even allowed to put the clothes on the animals, which is why they are SO excited to meet up with these fuzzy creatures again.

The cutest part was the girl that was helping us because she was so friendly and fun with the kids. She made the whole experience memorable. She also helped us choose a bear for the baby. It has sewn on eyes and is allergy free and perfect for her...

Ethan chose a koala he named Kenny, Karli a pale pink bear, Hailey a pale blue bear since blue is her favorite color and a bright pink bear for Brynlee

So many outfits to choose from...hmm....maybe one of them should choose a pair of scrubs for some reason? ;-)

The outfits they chose....including a Harry Pottery like one for Ethan's...

Choosing the hearts.

They each got to pick two -one for their own animal and they each got to put a heart inside the baby's bear

First you rub it,

Then you put it on your cheeks (wasn't sure why that was!!)

Do a crazy dance for fun!

Make a wish and squeeze real tight...

Add a heart and some stuffing...

And tada the job is done and a new cuddly friend is made!

I loved how excited the kids were to put the heart in the baby's bear and that it is something the baby may treasure when she gets older. They are all so excited to meet their little sister and meet up with their stuffed animals again and it was such a fun evening to spend together as a family.

So Ready....

2012-01-24T01:14:00.001-05:00

I'm suppossed to be in bed right now. It's almost 1am and I'm due at the hospital for an induction at 5:30am. Not smart but this happens everytime something big in my life is happening....I'm up late making sure all my ducks are in a row.

But there is also real life that participated tonight with why I'm up so late. Life where our family still had to eat dinner. Life in which I stayed up late with Ethan doing his current event with him that is due Wednesday. Life where teachers had to be emailed, packages still had to go to the post office and life still had to be lived. Life as a mom with lots of children and a tired resident husband who fell asleep at 9pm. To bad he's not the one going through labor tomorrow! ;-) The everyday things a mom needs to do before she drops into bed. Therefore packing and all my things got held off today until now. Thankfully my mom is in town now helping hold down the fort.

Everyone lately has been so, so supportive and I have felt the love of family and friends from near and far the past couple of days. It's been a sweet experience with the phone calls, texts and messages. We really have an awesome support group.

A good friend at church asked me on Sunday if I was ready to meet our little girl and my response was strange...I broke down and started balling. Horomones I tell you!!! Honestly, yes, yes I am so excited but it's a little different this time around. This is the fifth time, which means very little suprise and more knowledge goes into this experience. There are no surprises about what is to come-the pain, the joy, the healing, the body changes, the miracle of birth and life changing again. I know what is in front of me and I know what's coming and that life is changing in a very big way in a couple of hours.

It hit me then when I got asked that question, that I had two days left of life the way it is. Life with four independent, potty trained, helpful children. Spontanaety with leaving the house when I wanted. The ability to go to the gym, craft or do whatever the four mornings a week when the kids are in school. And mostly that whatever this new birth brings, I had two days left before I had knowledge of what that was.

But with all the worry I've had (going back to the baby stage, the chance that she may have down syndrome, not getting much sleep), comes the realization that Heavenly Father trusts us with things and knows what we can handle before we do. I am hoping and praying that whatever tomorrow (I guess it actually is today being that it's 1am) brings with a new little one, that I'll be prepared and ready to accept whatever challenges may come. That I'll be ready to take on an infant again. I mean I've done this before...at one time I had four kids ages five and under but that seems like so long ago. I've just got to catch the courage of the life I knew not too long ago and remember the sweetness that comes with a newborn and the small little glimpses of heaven that arrive with a new life. I know the moment I look at her that I'll be mesmerized and all the worry and fear will go away. I just wish I could skip labor, needles, pain, etc and get right to meeting her. If only it were that easy....I can't believe within 12 hours I'll be holding her in my arms inside of my abdominal muscles.

Taken today at 39 weeks...I was asked by six DIFFERENT people today when I was going to pop. It's no wonder looking at that tummy!!

In the mean time....

I'M:

* So ready to meet our sweet baby girl

* So ready to not to be pregnant, nauseus, tired, moody, sore, uncomfortable, etc.

* So ready to see what she looks like and most importantly if she's another red head!

* So ready to hold a newborn again, smell that newborn smell and feel that glimpse of heaven that seems to linger after the birth of a new baby

* So ready to wear jeans that don't go up to my ribs!

* So ready to hug Ammon close

* So ready to cuddle with my kids again

* So ready to not shock people when I turn around

* So ready to dress a little girl in pink all over again

* So ready to drive a car without having to breathe through contractions everytime I go out for the past two months

* So ready to lay on my stomach and not take five turns to switch sides in bed

* So ready to go on a long walk

* So ready to look in her eyes, count her toes and fingers, and kiss her cheeks

* So ready to embrace and see what Heavenly Father has entrusted us with

Project Home: Girls' Bedroom

2012-01-18T22:40:00.001-05:00

I've been meaning to put these pictures up for a while now since the girls room has been done for about eight months now, but I'm just getting around to it. Since I was a teenager I've always loved home improvement projects, designing, creating and making something better then originally found. I wanted to do interior design so badly in college but was persuaded otherwise and ended up doing family science, which I absolutely use everyday too.

But daily I still wish I had the design knowledge as well.

Living in this rental house has been a bit hard and Ammon has been so understanding. We've painted walls and made things work-namely I think we own more sets of all things tupperware (drawers, shelves, tubs) than any other human being since we can't fix or build anything onto this house. I have tried to be so patient over the past ten and a half years of living in rentals and can't wait until we have our own home someday and can do more of the projects I dream about.

(Granite countertops and crown molding here I come!!)

Six years ago we did the girls room in all purple and white, right before Hailey was born. But then last year, I grew tired of it, and since it was nursery bedding we had based the color scheme around and no one was using a crib or the bedding anymore, I wanted to change it up.

I found the cutest bedspreads in Pottery Barn Kids and got my heart set on them. I sold all the purple nursery things and made money off the purple bedroom set which I was going to use and pay for three new bedspreads.

Then tax season came (insert funeral likemusic here...)

All the money I made on the girls' old room went to paying taxes. And I was so sad but that was life and it went on. The girls room was plain, undecorated and that's the way it was for a bit.

Then Ammon and I went on a date one night and I had the feeling to go into Home Goods before we headed home to relieve the baby sitter. I didn't know why and the store was closing in fifteen minutes but Ammon humored me and in we went.

Best blessing EVER!

Inside we found the cutest girls room set (at least in my opinion) with the bedspreads only being $29.99 each, meaning that for that price we could get the frames, pillows and bedspreads for half of what I would have gotten all the PBK stuff for. And we bought it all that night. (That's the only problem-if you see something there, you have to get it then because it won't be there later). Sure enough, I returned four days later to buy one more pillow and it was all gone. We were so lucky!

Here are pictures of their bedroom and while it isn't the best designed room or the most modern colorwise, I love that it represents all the girls and this stage in their life, when they still love pink and all things girly. The fun part is that when we move, I hope this becomes Karli and the baby's room, and that I'll get another chance to decorate a little more mature room for Brynlee and Hailey to share and I'll get to do it again.

We painted the bunks we'd gotten from Ammon's parents, and ended up keeping the full bed in there which is Karli's. We were going to change to a twin but decided it's good for when company comes until we have a guest bedroom and we had it so we didn't have to go out and buy something else. It took about seven months to finally complete...meaning that I didn't find the wall prints, curtains, mirror, etc until months after. It's been a slow process but fun too.

Curtains: Bed, Bath and Beyond

One of the dressers....(found the lamps and shades at Pottery Barn Kids a couple of weeks later and they matched perfect!)

Love the lanterns hanging in the corner....

The other dresser. This wasn't the original mirror I wanted, but I was so patient and it never went on sale, so we settled for this one from Target ($20), which is round and mimics the polka dots on the beds.

Found this print a couple of months ago at Target for $20. And there is even a redhead!

(Found at Home Goods)

The girls love their Fancy Nancy Collection...

The shelf....(and this is one of six bookshelves we have in our house!). This wasn't very organized the day I took the picture but it shows our extreme love of books plus how I keep this room clean. Each girl has a green bucket for their own stuff. You know- the clutter I don't want out and around everywhere-jewlery, body sprays, stickers, gum and mints, pencils, bracelets, notes from friends, etc. That is there one place that they can put all their treasure that I don't touch. ;-)

And for the time being, all four girls share two dressers which is cramped but doable until we move. Here is a glimpse of one of the baby's drawers! Love, LOVE seeing all the pink, purple and pastel colors again and such tiny little clothes. Can't wait to meet this sweet girl in five days.

And just for kicks, here is her outfit I chose to bring her home from the hospital in. I seriously love it and can't wait.

Weekend Pictures

2012-01-17T19:48:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it's kind of fun just to view your life in pictures and catches glimpses of what goes on in a certain time period. Here are "glimpses" from this past weekend...it was four days long, thanks to MLK holiday plus teacher grading day and it was fun to have the kids home and relaxing, playing playdoh, jumping on the trampoline and just being kids. It was so nice to not have anything too scheduled going on and just hanging out...

Went from Ammon's church basketball game (it was fun to see him make some baskets!!) directly to Ethan's basketball game where he made an awesome basket as well. We sure love sports in our home...

This was the weekend for finally setting up for the baby and we are happily ready. We got the carseat/stroller we really wanted and with a coupon for Babies r Us, it was came in less than a clearanced one at Target. It is SO FUN this time around being patient and getting what we really want and what we are happy with. Plus, being the fifth time around but starting from scratch again, it's nice to know we don't have to clutter our house with fluff...just the bare essentials. You can barely tell there is a baby coming to our house right now since we've gone so simple. Karli, which is no suprise when it comes to all things for the baby was Ammon's trusty sidekick through the whole process. We finished with getting the cradle ready, all the clothes are washed and in drawers and diapers purchased...now we just need the baby! The doctor told me this afternoon, we are cleared!! No more appointments and we are to report to the hospital at 5:30am next Tuesday morning....so excited you don't even know!

After church the kids begged and begged to get the snow squirters out (like they do every year) and even though they were in pajamas and there was very little snow out, plus it being 22 degrees outside, spent a whole hour outside entertaining themselves. I am always surprised at what four $1 bottles of water plus food coloring will do to keep them busy...

Oh yeah....trying to pull of the tough face..

And yes, all were in pajamas during this experience.

Attacking a car in the grass, and I'm sure thanks to all their imaginations, making something up like it was a nasty bug or something they had to destroy...

Found a patch in the snow walking in that looked like a heart....just for you Ammon!

Our January wreath...love it.

Sunday dinner....so simple...it came together in twenty minutes and yet everyone was happy with it. Even Hailey told me it was the best meal ever....that was a suprise coming from Hailey....

Finally finished the 1000 piece Christmas puzzle we started in December. It was nice to have an hour where we finally weren't busy to finish it. It's been a fun tradition each December (even if it continued in to January this year!).

My favorite hairstyle to do on Brynlee's hair....three rosettes...

And sometimes the floor is the best place to catch a couple minutes of sleep when you've rounded all morning...

New Year...New Goals

2012-01-14T12:26:00.001-05:00

I don't know exactly where this post is going this morning....I've been working on it for a couple of days and it's like somehow I'm kind of declaring to myself what 2012 will be about and the direction I'd like it to take. It's taken me more than a day to come to the realization of what that is exactly. So, in that regard, I may just ramble a bit...
I've thought a lot in the recent weeks what I'd like to see happen in 2012 and what kind of goals I'd like to have personally and for our family. Questions that have come up have been along the lines of....

* what could we "cut out" for the year? (like the french fries that one year)

* what is my "ten things" list that I normally make and try to stick to?

* how much weight should I plan to lose? (isnt' that one always on there!?!?)

* what goals should we make as a family?

* what kind of adventures should we take?

* what are our spiritual goals both personally and as a family?

Lots and lots of those thoughts. Thoughts that I am sure we all have. But my aspect has changed a bit over the last couple of weeks and I've been forming more of what I want to see this year and it's a different perspective than I've had in years past. My happiness and our family happiness is what is driving my goals now....

2011 was a really good year for us-not without it's challenges, especially being pregnant and sick for 30 weeks, and financially unable to travel as much but lots of wonderful things did happen. We found out after ten months that we were expecting again. Ammon started his fourth year of residency training. Ethan started playing the viola. We had lots of family come and visit. Ammon did another triathalon and I did another half marathon. Adventures taken and milestones reached....

This year we anticipate to be another memorable one, starting out with the birth of a new baby girl. She'll be covered in white and be given a name and a blessing in a couple of weeks. We'll have another daughter wearing white for a different special ordinance as Brynlee turns eight this summer and will be baptized as a member of our church. Ammon will become chief and start his final residency year and by the end of the year, we may have some idea of where life post training will take us. Karli will start kindergarten (how can that be?) and Hailey is excited about her "gumball birthday" party at the end of the summer. I hope to do another half marathon and plans for Ammon's triathalon are sure. The kids may try a mini triathalon and we hope to travel a little bit more this year and see some things that we are trying to fit in case our days around Columbus start to be numbered (potentials: Chicago, Palmyra and Boston, Florida or Virginia Beach and it would be a dream to go to New York at Christmastime!!!) Of course these are all thoughts...nothing set but fun to anticipate with excitement.
That brings me to what I want to look back and have accomplished at the end of 2012. As we thought about where our focus would be, I realized more than anything I want to be happy and at peace with our life. I never want to have regret in choices and decisions and I want to find joy in the things I spend my time on and fulfill my days with. Time is so short and days fill up so fast and I want to fill our time with good things.

So....the biggest thing that Ammon and I decided we would do this year...which is practicing "intentional parenting"-a phrase coined by someone else, but something we want to practice in our family.

As parents of almost five kids, we strive daily and weekly to make them feel their own special worth and to not feel lost in our family. We want them to know that we understand that they are individuals and all need different ways to be raised. Some need more one on one time, some just need attention, some need to be listened to, some needs more hugs during the day, etc.
This year we talked about being very specific in noticing our children and helping them grow individually. We want to notice their strengths and play upon that and encourage talents. We hope to see weaknesses and spend more one on one time or couple time helping them through those things. Spontaneous lunch dates during the school week. Teaching our kids to make something for dinner even when it's easier to do it alone. Keeping one up later than everyone else to play a 15 minute game of Wii with Ammon and I. A raquetball date, painting the girls nails even when I'm so busy, reading stories in the hallway at night, cuddling up and reading a book with just one child. So many ideas but being intentional about how we do it. At the end of this year, I would love to look back and think "I know each of our children really well, and I know them individually".

I've also learned a lot about myself as a mom in the ten years of being one. I need a creative outlet, but I don't need it as often as I once did. I strive to keep crafts in my life, but understand that they just take four times as long to complete. Ammon and I love dates nights, but date nights can too be created at home so that we don't always have to go out. I want to be healthier but not so much for the sake of a skinny body...more to feel good, run longer and to set good examples for our kids to live long lives. Reading is absolutely neccessary and so good for the brain but I get so wrapped up in a good story, I have to treat some of my books like chocolate chip cookies and resist the urge so that things get done. Housework is all about maintance and doing it everyday so it doesn't pile up. Balance is the key...

Anyway, not to have rambled on for so long, but that's my background for this New Year's goal. To be happier, less stressed and not look back and have regrets-especially when it comes to Ammon and the kids. I know there will be time for more of the things I want to do later, and the one thing I'll always look back on will be how our kids succeeded and how happy my marriage is.
I'm more excited and at peace with this New Year and will keep making personal goals for myself because let's face it-I'm a list maker and goal setter but I also will be realistic with myself and my family and my time for this upcoming year.

What's a Contraction?

2012-01-11T09:47:00.001-05:00

One of the reasons why I adore our elementary school so much is the communication between parents and teachers. Every year since we've started, all our kids' teachers have been so good and instrumental about keeping me posted when one of the kids has done something really well, if there is a problem that needs to be addressed, a story about something that happened with one of them during the day, and occassionally a fun story. I haven't always put them on here for everyone to view...somedays I wait a couple of weeks and "hide" them among my other entries, but this one was worth sharing.

I received an email from Brynlee's teacher this week about something funny that happened in her classroom. Brynlee had already come home the day it happened and related it to me, and I had laughed and laughed. Brynlee handled it well and laughed at herself, which I think is so important in life- the ability to laugh at yourself and handle a situation well even when sometimes you may want to run away instead....

Brynlee getting archery training from Ammon a couple of days ago in our backyard. She was so adamat about doing it herself and I had to remind her that Ammon was there to teach her so she could then do it alone...

I thought I would use the exact email from Brynlee's teacher to tell what happened because she described it best. You can absolutely tell what is on our minds in the Rasmussen home lately!

Hi Kirsten~
I meant to email this to you last night but I was at my daughter's middle school dance club. Yesterday we were introducing contractions (will+not=won't, etc.) and as my introduction, I asked if anyone had ever heard of the word "contraction" and if so, do they know what it means? Your girlie shot her hand up as fast as she could, confident she knew the answer. I called on her and she said and I quote, "It's when your tummy hurts when you have a baby in there and it wants to come out really badly." LOVE IT!! My mind raced and I was laughing but I didn't want her to think I was laughing at her so I said she was absolutely correct and that contraction actually had TWO meanings. We all had a good laugh with this! Too cute!

When Brynlee came home from school, she told me she laughed so hard her tummy hurt. I don't think she'll ever forget BOTH meanings of contractions now!

January Snow Fall

2012-01-10T07:03:00.001-05:00

What is it about snow that is just so darn magical that it makes our kids jump out of their chairs, forget what they were in the middle of, abandon all reason and run outside barefoot in pajamas to go and enjoy it?

This day was no exception and we took full advantage of it. It hadn't snowed really before this during this winter season and so when it became more than just dust on the ground, we bundled everyone up in snow clothes and I let them play and play for a couple of hours in the backyard.

Brynlee also had her friend Emma over for the afternoon too.

They played "GRINDERS", a game they made up where two workers would shovel snow onto the trampoline, and then the other two or three would be the grinders and get to jump on the "piles" of snow that had been tossed on. I love their creativity and imagination with making up games...they get that all from Ammon, let me assure you. He's always been so good about making any situation exciting, which is probably why he is the obvious "fun parent" in our home. ;-) And I'm totatlly alright with that. It makes me happy that I married someone wonderful who's a great dad.

I was determined that if this was the only snow of the season, we were going to get a snow picture in. The kids were patient with me and let me practice taking their pictures on manual mode which I am still in the very early stage of learning. But what I loved, was that while the lighting might not have been great in the pics, I didn't get too much of the "grey" snow look I usually get. Again, so grateful too Ammon for this camera!

Brynlee and Emma

Look at that tooth coming in that hole!

A Grinder at work...

And this is "grinding" in action...see that tiny amount of snow she's headed for? The point was to make it grind into dust. LOL...and this seriously entertained them for a LONG time.

And this one will rarely give me a smile without something goofy attached....I won't make you suffer through the other ten he did during this time too....anything but a smile...he pulls face all the time now! And serioulsy, he's the oldest....it should have gotten easier to get a picture, not harder!

And this one it's hard to get one not smiling...

And grassy snow angels in the making...well, they tried their best considering it was half grass/half snow... ;-)

And afterward, I heated up some homemade hot chocolate and popcorn and everyone warmed up again inside....not bad for an afternoon!

Glimpses of our Weekend...

2012-01-09T17:24:00.001-05:00

We had a really good weekend. The kind I mention every so often on here just to record and remember that they exist and when they come around I start the week so much more peaceful and refreshed.

Saturday was a productive day. Ammon had the whole day off...he didn't even have to go in and round like usual in the morning which was exceptionally wonderful. We slept in, ate breakfast as a family and headed out on errands. Oh my goodness errands are so much more manageable when we do them together and can split up and split the number of kids we each have with us too. We found finally found the stroller/carseat combination we needed, finished getting the rest of the baby things and Ammon helped Ethan pick out a sweet new pair of basketball shoes. We set a price limit and when it went a tiny bit over, Ethan paid the remainder from his allowance money. Things fell in to place well.

That afternoon we enjoyed Ethan's first basketball game and he rocked it. We were so happy with him and grateful he made the choice to play this season after all. He was so close to not doing it and we let him choose for himself. At the last minute, he decided he wanted too and I am happy he did since he plays well. I seriously love being a cheerleader at my kids' events-it's one of my very favorite things as their mom.

Yesterday, Ammon was on call. With 9am church now, that was a bit of a morning marathon, but the kids and I made it to church with two minutes to spare. It was really nice to sit back and enjoy the testimonies and feel the spirit. At one point during the meeting, I looked down and Ethan was all teary eyed. I asked him what was the matter, and he told me he really wanted to get up and bear his testimony and he was feeling the spirit. I told him that was wonderful and he should go ahead and do it. But then he said he wanted Ammon to be there. After a quick silent prayer on his part, he decided to do it next month with Ammon there. I was really touched because it was all on his own and he felt the spirit himself. It was the first time I noticed something like that without prodding or deciding for him and it made me teary eyed. As a mom, that is one of the biggest things I strive for. Making sure our kids leave home with their own solid testimony of the gospel and ready to face the world knowing for themselves.

Last night we brought tortilla soup and homemade cornbread to Ammon at the hospital. He mostly is on call at Mt. Carmel East these days (25 mins away) so when he gets the rare opportunity to be on call at Mt. Carmel West (like he was the first three years) we try to go and visit him, especially if it is on a Sunday. The trauma pager thankfully stayed quiet, and besides a few resident calls on his phone, we enjoyed a nice long dinner together. He treated the kids to our hospital tradition, "Sundaes on Sunday" and boy did they ever LOVE that treat. Afterward, we snuck upstairs for the very last ultrasound of the baby. There wasn't much to see this time...she was too scrunched in there, but we saw her position, saw her sucking her thumb, noticed when her foot kicked my ribs HARD, her spine and most importantly- her beating heart. Hard to believe we get to meet her in two weeks now!! But even with all that, it wasn't enough to entertain the kids this time...so notice below what they were doing with the rolling chairs, while Ammon and I were "watching" the baby. I am sure we are the biggest circus act that Mt. Carmel has ever known...

I tried to capture it in pictures (hospital lighting is terrible!!!) because I know soon these days will pass and I'll want to remember these hospital evenings we enjoy as a family in efforts of maintaining "normal" life around here.

Dishing up dinner in the cafeteria...

Look at those mounds of frozen yogurt....spoiled I tell you!

So blurry, but in action...bumper cars with the rolling chairs....I was soo not happy about this and it lasted all about 2.5 seconds. ;-)

Getting ready for the ultrasound.

Typical scene when we leave the hospital...Karli was playing, "only step on the grey stripes" as we exited.

New Year's Eve (+ weekend)

2012-01-06T17:52:00.001-05:00

So what I didn't mention on the last post, was that four days after our Christmas, Santa brought a package to our doorstep....a new camera (a Canon T2i). It hadn't made it in time for Christmas, which was fine because I was able to really soak in everybody opening their gifts and seeing their reactions instead of focusing so much on me...

Ammon knew how sad I was about the whole camera thing, but I didn't beg for a new camera. It was my fault it broke and I understood the consequence. But he also knows that photography is my biggest passion in life, besides being a wife and mom, and did some quick research and found a Christmas package deal from Costco. The camera is wonderful....I balled when I got it. Thanks to all those that left Ammon texts and messages about a camera...my wish came true. ;-) When you lose something you love in life and somehow it is granted back to you, you find a way to enjoy it ten fold if you are lucky enough to get it back.

Such it has been with our piano, our washer and dryer (sold the first set in UT), my IPOD shuffle, having a baby so long after the last one, and now the camera. I have loved the second time around far more than the first with each item.

I have been reading all about manual mode and this new little camera of mine is so fun and I am taking the time to really learn it and know it. Thanks to Ammon so much for spoiling me and making it possible to have a camera for the birth of the baby....and so from here on out, the picture quality may go up a bit! And the best part, I don't have to edit so much anymore in photoshop... Most of these are right out of the camera so it's a time saver too and I love that I'm finally going to learn how to shoot in something other than Automatic!

Okay, back to the story....

New Year's Eve we got a fun treat when our friends the Tracey's made the trip from Cleveland to Columbus for the weekend! The kids were so excited to see the Tracey kids and it was fun to spend the weekend with a family who is identical to ours-lots of kiddos the same age, Andrea is due almost around the same time as me with another girl, and Nate is a surgery resident like Ammon.

Andrea and Nate brought with them a fun new tradition with them-

FONDUE!

I think from now on it will be our New Year's tradition too. I've loved fondue and now the family does too. Andrea came up with an awesome cheese fondue recipe which if she's okay with it, I'll post on here tomorrow, and the KIDS even devoured it! Everything that was dipped it in tasted amazing-BBQ chicken the boys did, boiled red potatoes, blanced veggies (carrots, broccoli, green pepper, and asparagus) and soft french bread. It was all delicious and such a great dinner! I am so glad to know that the kids actually like fondue now since we own three fondue pots and I was wondering if it was worth it to keep them after five years....glad we have them now!

For dessert, we washed the pots out and did a creamy caramel fondue and an awesome chocolate one and once again dippped strawberries, fresh pineapple, pretzels, bananas, marshmellows and apple slices. Such a fun treat we'll have to look forward to each New Year's Eve now and so much easier and less messy than bringing out the chocolate fountain too!

Look at those happy kiddos with their dipping sticks!

We must have been nuts (especially with 9am church) but we allowed all seven kids to stay up until midnight to celebrate the New Year. By this time I was too exhausted to pull out the goblets, so we pretended and Ammon poured the apple cider into plastic cups.

We were joined by CeeLo Green in the background too. ;-)

At midnight, we counted down with the TV and watched the ball drop in Time Square. I even stole a kiss from Ammon right at midnight! ;-)

It was at least another hour before we got everyone to bed though....everyone was too wound up!

But somehow, we did all manage to get up six hours later and had eleven people to church on time! Hooray for us! And here's the proof of everyone all ready to go....

And proof you can't take a group picture without a goofy one too.

I love having such a close friend like Andrea....she's known me through it all-going on thirteen years this fall...That's almost half my life. I love that we live close to each other now (well two hours close), have husbands doing the same thing in life and who get along so well, got married one week apart, both have an oldest boy followed by lots of little girls and both are expecting a girl within days of each other. Heavenly Father gave me something great when I arrived at BYU all those years ago and walked into the freshman dorm rooms. Andrea is one of those lasting friendships...

And a pregnancy picture.....yeah, we felt weird taking the picture too! ;-)

The rest of the weekend was spent relaxing (ok the boys relaxed while Andrea and I cooked, then cleaned, then cooked a meal, then cleaned, then cooked....ok you understand), played games late into the night and fell in love with Perudo, played hours of worm championships on the WII, made bows, went to see Puss in Boots at the dollar theater (so cute!) and talked about all things baby. It was a fun way to finish up the Winter Break and spend time with them before our new little girls arrive!

Oh and got the first snow flakes of the season too....

Celebrating Christmas...

2012-01-05T23:58:00.002-05:00

Christmas Day was wonderful around here and went just the way I had hoped. I only wished I had had my camera but thankfully we were able to still have a borrowed one. Each of the kids received one Santa gift this year and all got the one thing they had asked him for (besides the batteries of course!)

I woke up at 5am while the house was still quiet and everyone was sound to sleep. I got the cinnamon rolls ready and rising, stuffed the stockings for Ammon and the kids, cleaned up the kitchen and prepared things for breakfast. I really wanted everything to be perfect when everyone woke up that morning...I even had time to shower and put my face on! That's never happened before...not bad!!

Around 8am the kiddos were stirring and finally I got Ammon up and we headed upstairs to our bedroom. We read the Nativity Story out of the Easy Scripture Readers like Ammon's family started years ago and then lined everyone up like we do every year-youngest to oldest to head down the stairs. Karli was a bit over anxious and this was the first year she was really taking everything in and understanding it all. It was really fun to experience it through her eyes and "introduce" her to the way we do things now that she gets it all.

The kids in their Christmas jammies!

The kids squealed when they saw everything and headed straight for their stockings. We could have stopped there...they were pleased with the candy, toothbrushes and I included the card for each of them from Ammon's parents. They were soooo excited and sure spoiled and so grateful. It was really sweet of Ammon's parents to send them each their own card.

During the next hour, it was fun as the mom in the family to watch everyone experience Christmas and see the happiness that came from all the hours of picking out gifts, the wrapping, the returning and exchanging to make sure everything was perfect. It went just the way I had hoped! We were soooo spoiled by family and friends this Christmas and we were so grateful for everything!

Love those monogram stockings I found last year on clearance at Target! It made finding their stockings so much easier this year!

My mom and sister secretly got together and found the EXACT Petunia Picklebottom Diaper Bag and matching wallet that I wanted. I am sooo lucky and get to have a cute diaper bag this time around!

1. Brynlee was excited about her Barbie. 2. Ethan totally embarrassed about the underwear he got! LOL 3. Santa left the "American Girl Doll" Jeep for Karli (really just a cheaper version from Target) that she had begged and begged for 4. Ethan finally got a nice camera that works 5. Hailey loved that we finally have a girl WII game now 6. Ammon like the shirt we gave him

Santa left Ethan this Harry Potter castle....the LAST one we could find on Amazon since it was sold out everywhere in Columbus. He had been wanting this for two years now and was so excited about it!!!

I found these matching shirts for our girly girls..I love that they still humor me with matching clothes occasionally! And they were thrilled with their new Barbies too.

A super fun game we just love from Uncle Paul...we've played it lots and lots....it's called ColorKu and is a colored version of Sudoku. Love it!

I married a hottie...seriously...

Okay...how to explain this gift....I scored majorly with my two boys on this one and it was all my idea!!!! For $10 each on Amazon, I found two matching blow dart guns. Now what would possess me to buy blow dart guns? Hmm...the fact that we are expecting our fourth girl and wanting to make sure that Ethan doesn't get over run by all of them!!! Haha....these things blow darts clear across the room into the wall. They are so dangerous, I don't know what I was thinking but have provided HOURS of entertainment and competitions between Ammon and Ethan. I am probably crazy but it's fun for them to have manly stuff to do together so I went with it. And I can trust them...most of the time....plus Ammon learned if he takes the sharp tip off and just blows the plastic piece out the gun, he can get any daughters that aren't listening when it's time to clean up toys, to do it for fear of being shot in the rear end!!! And trust me...it happened. And boy did that one daughter move a lot quicker!!! ;-)

The aftermath....

The ornaments I made with the kids this year. I try to make one homemade one with them each year and this year we did handprint snowman on pink or blue ornaments. They turned out so cute and I love that their little handprints are "frozen" in time.

Thanks to Andrea and Nate (more on that next), we got a family picture taken in our Sunday best too. Plus, that's me at 36 weeks...so ready to POP!!!

And the traditional one I take of the kids every year in front of the tree.....love these four kiddos!

During the day we napped, played WII, played some of the new games and relaxed. So nice to have Ammon home. That night we had our tradional Christmas dinner (steak, twice baked potatoes, red/green jello, rolls, apple cider, glazed carrots and green bean casserole) complete with candles as the kids requested. We finished with the same cookie dough/ice cream dessert we always have....we went to sleep happy, spoiled and full that night! The only thing that could have been better? Celebrating with loved ones far away...

Christmas Eve

2012-01-04T13:19:00.000-05:00

Finally on December 27th, Christmas Eve arrived in the Rasmussen Home. Ammon was post call that day, and had been absolutely slammed the night before with his duties at the hospital, so when he got home post call that morning, he went straight up to bed for the next five or six hours. The kids and I wrapped presents all day, made ornaments, cleaned the house and got ready for that evening.

One of the two nativities I made this year at the craft group Margo and I hosted this month.

Christmas Eve went down in the funniest way that it ever has before. I don't know if it was because everyone had cabin fever. I'm not sure if it was because everyone was tired and also excited for Christmas, but it was for sure, the most chaotic and comical Nativity session we've ever acted out...

A drawing Brynlee did of a nativity scene one afternoon while she was looking for something to do.

We started the evening with our traditional soup dinner, bread and salad...we've been doing soup on Christmas Eve the past couple of years to simplify things...it's been different soup every year-this year cheesy potato and ham. We have been doing the fancier Christmas meal on Christmas Day the past five years or so.

After dinner, we put on the nativity story as a family....except that there was a big brawl between our two redheads over who was going to be Mary for the year. Ammon and I laughed and laughed at Karli and Hailey and their reasonings on why each would make the better Mary for this year.

That's when as parents, we tried to intervene and advise the one that would eventually settle for being Mary next year, a deal....the baby would be here next Christmas and so whoever was going to be Mary next year, would get to act it out with a real "baby" (relatively speaking since the baby will be almost a year old!).

Karli immediately said that she would be Joseph this year and Mary next year so she could do it with the baby. Hahaha....that just ticked Hailey off even more, since she is more stubborn than Karli. She stomped, she pouted and she headed to the couch and "was not going to act out ANYTHING this year". LOL!!!! I think I'm such a mean mother...laughing at their pain...

Well admist the crying and wailing, we started the evening and our crazy rendition of the Nativity Story. When it came time for Mary to ride on our lovely donkey (poor Ammon....I think the kids will be riding on him until he's 70!), I picked up our pouting ragdoll from the couch, and placed her on the donkey....on her tummy was the only way it was going down. She was sooo mad at me but at least she made it to Bethlehem one way or another. ;-)

I almost delivered the baby I was laughing so hard at this point.

Karli didn't care...she just let the donkey around town to the "inns".

Somehow after a couple of minutes, the donkey ride must have seemed a bit boring being slung over Ammon like a sack of potatoes, or maybe it was that Hailey couldn't put up with my giggling anymore, but she sat up and couldn't be mad for much longer....she finally had to give in and be Mary and the "show went on". Lucky me, I even caught a smile on her face (she was still trying to cry here...notice the red face.)

Then we had to get lots of donkey pictures just to prove Mary ended up being happy about the situation. Ammon wasn't so thrilled about the donkey paparazzi snapping his pictures but he's always a good sport and he does make a handsome donkey.

I laughed even harder when Ammon told me he's never seen such a pregnant shepherd before in his life...could have slugged him for that one! ;-)

Singing at the piano...that was my favorite....I loved having everyone surrounding the piano during those couple of moments and hearing our family sing together (even if we are all off key and I messed up several notes....but maybe the kids won't remember that part in the future!).

Someday this will be fun to act out with the cousins when we are closer....

And a much happier Mary and Joseph......

After the nativity was cleaned up, it was getting late. But, traditions are traditions and by golly we Rasmussens stick to those suckers as much as we possibly can.

We decorated homemade gingerbread men for Santa and for a quick dessert (thanks to Lisa for that recipe last year).

Ammon decided he'd rather have mom's chocolate chip oatmeal cookies for "SANTA" instead next year....we may have to cater to his taste buds next time. ;-) The kids and I were happy though.

And since Ethan is obsessed with anything Harry Potter...his two cookies represented Harry and Ron (can you see the resemblence?)

We finished the night by opening new jammies for the kids that I had found during the month of December (thank goodness no more summer nightgowns to be worn by the girls in the dead of winter!) and their new ornament for the year....the one's Uncle Stewart made for us. These are them without the ribbon on yet and the baby's named fuzzed out (so cute to have the baby included too!!!!). We love these awesome ornaments and I love having the tradition of a new ornament every year for each of them. Thank you Stewart!

Ammon read "The Night Before Christmas" like he always does, and then it was off to bed to dream of sugarplums for the night. The kids begged once again to sleep up in our bedroom so they wouldn't be "tempted" to go downstairs and peek on Santa. The girls handled it well, but Ethan couldn't sleep up there and finally headed back down to his own bed and almost caught Santa in the act.

That was a close one.

Ammon and I relaxed for the next two hours....put together part of a Christmas puzzle while we waited for everyone to be asleep and finally Santa arrived and placed the gifts around the tree. Thankfully the kids didn't ask how Santa got down the chimney with the presents in front of the fireplace! We crumbled cookie bits on a plate and headed to bed ourselves.

Our tree with the flash and without the flash.....

Christmas Break...

2012-01-03T11:28:00.001-05:00

Christmas Break was exceptionally hard for me this year....pregnancy robbed me of energy and I had a huge project to work on so I stayed home from fun things that Ammon and the kids did to work on it, plus financially and physically we couldn't do a lot of the fun things we normally enjoy like ice skating, etc. I think I left the house maybe four times in two weeks time....major CABIN FEVER! I think not having my own camera was a hard realization too....

But, that being said, Ammon said that he and the kids really enjoyed it and the time to be relaxed and not stressed and that was the most important to me. I don't think the kids noticed that it was much different by the looks of the next few pictures and it made me realize that "a perfect holiday" is in the eye of the beholder. I think I truly was the only one affected by it and for that, I'm thankful. I am grateful that we had Ammon home to enjoy the week after Christmas, that he was able to catch up on sleep, we had a super fun Christmas, time to watch movies and play WII, dinner a couple of times with friends (Smiths and Howells) and company for New Year's (more on that later). So, without being super wordy, here are "glimpses" of Christmas Break.

My favorite treat we made for movie night...jello popcorn.

Ammon took the kids to enjoy the winterness of the Indianapolis Children's Museum and the snow slide before our pass expires in January.

I think it's hilarious that Ethan filmed himself going down the entire slide with his new camera....that movie was pretty funny to watch!

On the real Christmas morning, Ammon had a Daddy/Daughter date with Brynlee to the hospital to do morning rounds. It was so cute of him to do and it just further confirmed her desire to grow up and become a doctor. Ammon's such a good dad.

One of the second years Ammon works with (picture taken by Brynlee)

The kids and Ammon spent lots of time jumping on the trampoline and doing tricks before the snow came...

This one makes me think that Ethan is coming in for a landing like an airplane or something. ;-)

It's fun to be a kid and carefree!

A rather roudy couple of games of Hungry Hippos while I wrapped and wrapped and wrapped.

Dogpiling dad....and this would be AFTER eating a really big dinner....

I didn't think this was so smart....especially after seeing the look on Ethan's face.

I really do look forward to sometime hopefully spending time with family, cousins and friends but for now, we do enjoy our time together as a family.

Winky's Antics!

2011-12-30T20:10:00.000-05:00

I mentioned him before, but Winky was our little elf that visited this year. Normally we've had four elves around here, but this year with the pregnancy, I felt like I could only handle the antics and mischieviousness of only one elf. ;-)

Thankfully for Ammon and leaving so early in the morning, Winky was not forgotten as much as he could have been if I had been soley been left to move him. And thankfully for Ammon's foot he has on me in height, Winky was able to hide higher than our elves in the previous years!!!

This year, Winky was found some mornings on the fan, in the Christmas tree, drinking syrup in the kitchen, wrapped up in extra strands of lit lights, riding our decorative reindeer, etc. He was a busy little one but all four kids (I still don't know if Ethan is pulling our leg or not!) were so excited to wake up and see what he had done during the night.

I already posted how he left 40 gumballs in trails all over the floor one night (this a repeated picture from the other post), but here are a couple of other things I caught on camera

(thank goodness for the Smith's point and shoot camera we borrowed).

He took all 40 of our Christmas books from under our tree and set them up in teepees all over the family room and was found right in the middle of them!

One morning he was found riding a T-Rex and had "brought" all the toy dinosaurs from downstairs up to the family room, and was leading a parade of prehistoric creatures!

On the last night, "he" TPed all the kids in their beds and their rooms, and was found holding the empty roll of toilet paper by the Christmas tree. That was the kids favorite besides the gumballs....they giggled so much when they found him and woke up to be covered in their beds in toilet paper.

Then proceeded the BIGGEST toilet paper snowball fight in our family room...it was such a mess to clean up by the time it was all shredded. I even got a couple of giant balls to my face! ;-)

Even though it's extra work, this little elf business brings a lot of fun to the kids' lives each December, especially since we had to wait three extra days to celebrate Christmas. It really is like remembering to be the tooth fairy, EVERY DAY for a month, but I love to wake up and act so surprised about what the elves have been up to each night. I've got a great "shocked" look for when the kids come to wake me up each day....I'm going to have to think of some new things for next year....

Family Pictures 2011

2011-12-27T12:00:00.001-05:00

Now that the Christmas cards have all been sent, it's time to put our family's full photo shoot up here. I always like to wait until after the cards have been delivered so the pictures aren't something everyone has already seen.

We had our pictures taken this year by, Charlotte Foerschler, a resident wife that lives in Hilliard. Her blog is here: charlottefoerschlerphotography.blogspot.com. She was so sweet and did such a good job of capturing everybody. She also listened to all my little requests that I had too. We shot these pictures in Historic Old Hilliard, a quaint little villiage area fifteen minutes from our house. It has a neat wooden bridge, a log cabin, an old church, train, etc and was just what I wanted this year.

I happened to find the girls outfits on a great deal at Gymboree and pulled the rest together from things we had. Thankfully I had this maternity top from Karli's pregnancy and I loved how bright the colors looked against the autumn leaves.

Next year I hope to do an Ohio State theme so it was fun to do something a little different this year. I know, seriously, who plans their pictures over a year in advance??!? That would be me!

Our Christmas card picture is above, but Ammon and I went back and forth between that one and this one below. I asked her to do a "scrunched one" because that is on of my personal favorites when I shoot families. It turned out so cute (Ethan looked a tiny bit goofy because of the angle) but we ended up going with the one above. I love both though.

Santa in the Park

2011-12-26T22:03:00.000-05:00

It's so strange that the world around has stopped celebrating Christmas and it's passed for everyone. I noticed today while we ran errands, that even the Christmas music has stopped on the radio. Thankfully, we are keeping the kids kind of wrapped up in a bubble and they are excited for our "Christmas Eve" tomorrow night. I think we are finally almost ready for the big day....

We'll, at the beginning of December, before the camera broke, we attend this fun event to kick off the Christmas season....

This Christmas in the Park will probably be the most memorable one for our family...definately the most comical!!! This was our third year doing this tradition of visiting Santa at Thompson Park. It's a free event that Upper Arlington puts on for families at the beginning of December. It was set up perfect this year-we were able to reserve a spot for when Ammon was home and even booked at the same time as our friends the Ackers and Carmichaels.

But the night approached and once again a whole new atmosphere for the evening was set.

The first year Ammon was at the Mt. Carmel residency dinner, actually interviewing for Mt. Carmel as a fourth year. Last year it was FREEZING....14 degrees outside and so cold the horses couldn't be outside to pull the carriages. This year....torrential downpour!

But the rain wasn't even the most memorable part of the experience. We arrived in plenty of time to enjoy crafts, popcorn and hot chocolate while we waited and talked with the Ackers and Carmichael families. Rudolph and Frosty even showed up for pictures (the kids claimed that they saw the people underneath and that they were fake....guess they are getting to smart for stuffed creatures!) Then, as our family names were called, we boarded a mini shuttle bus (like you'd take at the airport) and headed over to the other building to visit with Santa. This year with the rain it was too wet for the horses to be out, darn it! Hopefully next year, which may be our last, the horses will be able to be out again for the carriage ride through the park.

There were small fires set up and so were our favorite set of trees-Bruce Spruce and Bill Pine or something. The "trees" (which are real lit trees with microphones set up in them so they can "talk") started right in with their usual jokes to entertain everyone while we waited in line for Santa. We were either under the tent listening to the trees crack their jokes or plastered against a wall to escape the rain. We still were pretty soaked by the end of the evening.

The eight Acker and Rasmussen kiddos

But the funniest part of the WHOLE experience, was seeing Santa. Oh my goodness, I'll remember this for the rest of my life and I wish I had the verbal humor to describe what happened.

When you sign up for Christmas in the Park, you write individual things about each of your children-their teacher at school, good friends, number of siblings, etc. That way, they collect the papers when you go see Santa, and have a microphone attached to his ear and are able to feed him the info about your child.

Normally this goes really well and Santa appears all knowing and aware of each child.

Not this year!!

Apparently their are TWO Santa rooms to accomodate the number of families attending this event, with two separate Santas. I had never known this before. Somehow our papers got switched and were taken to the wrong room, and Santa was fed the wrong information about our family. LOL!

We should have had the first clue when Santa asked all of us if we were headed to New York City the next day. I looked at him, laughed, and said "No, is there some reason why we should?". He just looked at me funny. Then he turned to the kids and said, "Are you excited about your baby brother coming"? Hahahaha....they all looked at Santa like he was nuts. When we told him it was a girl, instead of a "Ho, ho, ho" coming out of his mouth, it was more like a "Uh, huh, huh.... ha" and started to get so nervous. I should have rescued Santa then, but let him go a little further. He put Brynlee on his lap and asked if she liked her teacher, Mrs. So and So, which was totally the wrong teacher and got her list all mixed up naming things he had "brought" to her last year.

Ammon and I were looking at each other and couldn't hide our laughter. Santa called each of the children one by one on his lap and asked them what they wanted for Christmas. That was when the bombs dropped....

Ethan told Santa he wanted batteries for his Harry Potter wand and a camera. Santa looked at Ammon and I like were were crazy since our nine year old boy wanted nothing more then batteries instead of something like a DS. Then Hailey climbed up and told him she wanted batteries for her camera that hadn't worked in months. HAHAHA!! Ammon and I looked like the two most neglegent parents ever. Brynlee asked for her list that I posted before and Karli finished up with asked for batteries for her camera as well. Santa looked at the two of us (Ammon and I) and said very distinctly, "I'm sure with all the battery requests that we can manage that for sure". It was more like, "You two WILL be buying batteries for your kids for Christmas"! LOL!

When we left that building, Ammon and I were doubled over in laughter. Everytime we started to recall something about the conversation with Santa, we started laughing all over again. All the workers felt so bad that things had gotten messed up and hoped they hadn't given away that Santa wasn't real for our kids. The kids knew after they walked out of the room that he was such a fake...thankfully it didn't change how they felt about the "real" Santa, but they now for sure now that Santa in the Park is a man dressed up. (Brynlee told me later that she saw his beard slipping down).

It didn't matter, with the rain, the cold and a mixed up Santa, it still made for a fun night. It definately brought on the Christmas spirit and it was fun to be together as a family. It definately made us aware that our kids need batteries for Christmas and sometimes what kids need instead of new toys, is restoring life (or power) to their old ones! ;-) Bless your heart Santa for enduring that mix up....! ;-)

Santa looked so surprised at the battery requests.....

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Christmastime

2011-12-25T22:11:00.001-05:00

"Christmas is a time for remembering the Son of God and renewing our determination to take upon us His name. It is a time to reassess our lives and examine our thoughts, feelings, and actions. Let this be a time of remembrance, of gratitude, and a time of forgiveness. Let it be a time to ponder the Atonement of Jesus Christ and its meaning for each of us personally. Let it especially be a time of renewal and recommitment to live by the word of God and to obey His commandments. By doing this, we honor Him far more than we ever could with lights, gifts, or parties."

Dieter F. Uchtdorf "Seeing Christmas through New Eyes," 2010 First Presidency Christmas Devotional, (December 5, 2010)

This year so many thoughts have flooded my mind as this has been a more simple Christmas....and since we are celebrating late, today at church was definately an enjoyable, peaceful day to remember the Savior during this Christmas season. The music at church was absolutely beautiful-there are so many good talents out there and it was so good for the kids to see what can come of their piano/viola practice if they keep it up. There were no distractions, no presents, or thoughts about Santa during the morning. It was a time to spend together as a family, time to enjoy a beautiful one hour sacrament meeting, time to connect with our families on the phone and time to think about what Christmas really means.

Being 29 days from the arrival of a new baby, my heart definately went to Mary this year...the discomfort she must have felt from the travel, the worry about where her baby would be born and the miracle of it all. It has definately brought me closer to what this life is for, the gratitude I feel for being able to carry a baby and the comforts that we enjoy these days. I am more grateful then ever for the sacrifice she made that Christmas night so many years ago.

I love how each Christmas is so different, so treasured in its own way. Some years we are reminded of how good being healthy is as we've battled the stomach flu on Christmas morning. Some Christmas' seasons, we've enjoyed being with family and the excitement of being together and the joy love ones bring. Once in a while there is a white Christmas. Sometimes the kids rip open their presents, some years they've enjoyed a moment for each individually wrapped one. Occassionally for me there have been years of terrible morning sickness (with Ethan and Karli) and this year the discomfort of being so far along with this pregnacy. But I am grateful that no matter what our circumstances are, one thing always remains constant. The Christmas season brings with it the time to remember our Savior, his sacrfice for us and regaining a personal sense of the part Christ plays in our lives.

It's been a wonderful Christmas so far....

Awaiting the Real Christmas Eve

2011-12-24T22:45:00.003-05:00

Tonight all around the world, everyone everywhere, is celebrating Christmas Eve and kids are all nestled in their beds awaiting Santa's arrival.

In our home the kids are curling up in their beds but there are no signs yet of Santa's visit on this night.

Santa will come back for us, in three days time on December 28th....at least that's what we're hoping and wishing...he seems to understand those with the residency/call schedule situations. ;-)

It used to be no big deal to move dates and holidays around and shift things as needed, but the kids are getting older. They understand and worry now about whether or not Santa will make it and not forget about coming back for them. They remember so much-our traditions, the food we eat, the movies we watch, the way each holiday is done-it's all such a big deal to them, so much apart of their childhood.

They've been assured that Santa has been told and that he knows he's making a special trip back. Winky (our elf) has been reminded to take the message back each night to the North Pole. Hailey even saved her reindeer food to sprinkle on the driveway when they return as a "Christmas Bonus" for the reindeer's return.

We've learned as a family, over the past eight years, that dates and holidays are what you make of them...not so much about when the world around celebrates them. They are no longer celebrated by a date on the calendar, but are best created around Ammon's work schedule in hopes that he gets to share in just as much joy as the kids do. It's my goal that they won't so much remember how many calendar dates we switched during their childhood, but that Ammon was present (awake) and there to join in.

It's not all bad....I get three more bonus days to get wrapping done, which has been a slow process this year due to the Braxton Hicks I get when I wrap on the floor. Tomorrow won't feel so rushed since Ammon still has to go in and round early in the morning and we'll get to enjoy the one hour of church and seeing friends. Two days POST Christmas to find any last minute deals I might have forgotten.

;-) Three days more for a couple of packages to arrive that didn't make it by today. Two extra days to make homemade gingerbread men to decorate and reward Santa with (still haven't gotten to that yet). And the anticipation gets to last a little bit longer....

But my personal favorite thing marked by this calendar date? Our baby girl should arrive in exactly one month from today...one month from Christmas Eve....the same day my cute nephew celebrates his first birthday. That alone is anticipation enough....

12 days of Christmas for Teachers

2011-12-22T18:32:00.000-05:00

This year I really wanted to do something different for the kids teachers at school. They do so much for the kids and play an important roll in their lives. Plus, I wanted to teach the kids more about giving and finding ways to make someone's day a little brighter. The giving to me was the most important part this year and the reason behind this gift idea.

I don't know how this got into my mind but we decided to do "The 12 days of Christmas" for all five of the kids' teachers (Karli has two), plus our beloved bus driver, Kris, who has been heaven sent to us this year and put up with my and getting three kids out the door by 7:50.

We brainstormed ideas and came up with 12 different things the kids could deliver to their teachers each of the 12 school days leading up to their Christmas break, delivering the last one and biggest on the final day before vacation. We headed to Target and the kids' were awesome about helping me pick out things. We started in the dollar section and worked our way from there.

We found $1 Christmas post it notes, chapstick in the travel section, inexpensive nail polish, red and white bath stuff, etc. We headed to the Christmas section and found $1 tubes of Hershey kisses and bags of (my favorite!!) mint M & Ms on sale.

After we ran out of ideas, we came up with more things that could be done at home. Homemade strawberry jam we had in the freezer, a couple batches of our favorite holiday Andes mint cookies, and I made fabric bookmarks for another day.

It was great fun, stressful at times to remember every day, but the kids were always excited to come home and tell me about the adventure of the day. Sometimes there would be a sub and we'd have to get really good about remembering which teacher needed two the next day. Somedays one of them would tell me about a spot they hid the treat and I thought to myself, "Good luck Mrs. So and so...I hope you find that one somehow!!" Ethan was the only one that was able to keep it a secret the whole 12 days and it was fun to let his teacher know who is was on the final day. Hailey's teacher found out on day two because she thought Hailey was be sneaky and had something fishy going on and Brynlee's found out about day four or so. ;-) The bus driver got hers handed to her by a different one of our kids each morning (that was so helpful with getting us to the bus on time....we didn't miss the bus at all on those 12 days...for once!!!)

For Karli's teachers, it was a bit different. She goes to preschool four mornings a week but it was harder to deliver all those treats and it didn't line up with the kids' schools days as well, plus she got out for vacation sooner. You'll see the picture of the bottom....I still made her two teacher's treats on the same day as the other kids, but we put theirs into one large basket each and gave them the basket after Karli's concert on the last day before break. I think the basket was fun too because it looked so festive and decorative all in there together. I would choose to do either way next year.

For anyone who would choose to do this, it would be much easier to do the tags in November or something and have them all done at once. I had to wake up at 5:30am many days to get that mornings one done but it was worth it. During the last couple of days, I just printed the poems on address labels and stuck the stickers on...that was so much easier!! The ribbon and scrapbook paper I already had.

(Now is a GREAT time to buy all that ribbon on clearance).

The first four pictures are prior to the camera breaking...the rest are terrible due to taking them on my phone but you get the idea. We really had a lot of fun coming up with this as a family, doing an assembly line to get them put together, the excitement of delivering them and finding a different way to "give" this year. As they get older, I hope our "giving" lessons are more helping out at the homeless shelters or finding a family in need but for their current ages, this was really fun this year.

LOL....oh and forgive the poems...they were terrible...but my pregnant brain is feeling mushy and not so creative these days! Hahaha!

On the first day of Christmas, my student gave to me, A pack of post it notes, To keep things orderly.

On the second day of Christmas, my student (bus rider) gave to me, a little tube of chapstick,

in case it gets windy!

On the third day of Christmas, my student left right here, some festive nail polish, to wear through the New Year!

On the fourth day of Christmas, my student left for me, a tube of chocolate candy to eat when I'm hungry. (I know...that poem was lame!)

On the fifth day of Christmas, I am bringing to you, bath soap and a scrubbie, as thanks for all you do.

(Next year I would look for festive ones from Bath and Body works).

On the sixth day of Christmas my student left a snack, of chocolate minty cookies that could fit in their backpack.....(again, terrible rhyming!!)

I borrowed this picture for a visual....On this day we did these mint andes cookies, but we did some with the green andes mints and some with the peppermint crunch andes mints. We alteranted the red and green topped cookies and put 6-8 in a celophane bag with a giant bow on top. I heard this was the teacher's favorites. ;-)

On the seventh day of Christmas, my student left me some, cinnamon and minty packs, of flavored chewing gum. (Wish I would have done green wintergreen gum to stay with the red/green/white colored theme).

On the 8th day of Christmas, one of my Windermere Hawks, left me a present of toast warm red socks.

(These were found in packs of two on clearance for $3 at JoAnn's...Old Navy had ones 2 for $5 too.)

Found these cute Martha Stewart boxes on clearance at JoAnn's (they came in a six pack for $3). We filled them with M &Ms.

On the ninth day of Christmas, my student left some gems, of red white and green, minty M&Ms.

On the 10th day of Christmas, my student left not took,

A couple fabric bookmarks for when I read a book.

We always make a bunch of extra little tupperware containers when we make jam for giving as gifts or with meals we deliver. They come in real handy!

On the 11th day of Christmas, I really loved the most, a tub of strawberry jam,

left for my morning toast...

That was followed by the final day of Christmas...a loaf of Great Harvest white (or wheat bread) to go along with the jam from the previous day. This could be homemade if you are a good baker or have the time...I didn't have the time!

On the last day of Christmas, I was given a soft loaf of bread, to share

with my family and keep them well fed!

The basket we gave Karli's two teachers filled with everything. It was fun to see it all together!

Other ideas I have for next year: hot chocolate packets (cute at Target), tissue packs, a Book of Mormon if we got brave, a cute Christmas story, lotion, ornament, mittens.

Ba hum bug....

2011-12-21T23:08:00.003-05:00

I have never titled a post like that on our blog in December but I've been feeling it a bit the past couple of days and I just needed to get a couple of things off my mind and I always end up feeling better afterward. I just needed to change the post on the top of our blog to something different for change of scenery. I'll explain why there has been a lack of posts lately.

Normally this month is one of my brighest in the year and the month I love, anticipate and look forward to. Especially this year with so much family coming in the months before hand and making the fall really fun and exciting. Something happened last week though and it's made me so, so sad.

My camera broke and I feel like I've lost my left arm. I can't think about it without crying and it's caused a lot of tears recently. I've had that camera for four years now and used it EVERY SINGLE DAY since then. So sad....

We were at Ethan's extremely packed Christmas orchestra concert, sitting in these hard wooden chairs in the back row of the huge audotorium. Our family was already crammed into four chairs and then Ammon graciously gave up his chair to a tired mom with a toddler and carrying a baby. That left Karli sharing a chair with Hailey and in turn she fell between the wooden chair slats and her leg got stuck. With all the movement of people shifting, my camera had been on my lap to "protect" it, but due to my lack of abdominal muscles at this time, not having Ammon to help, and trying to pull Karli out of the seat she was stuck in while her face was turning purple from trying not to scream during the concert, my last attempt to pull her out freed her leg, but made the camera go flying. Minutes later it wouldn't turn on again and hasn't worked for a week and a half now.

I took it in to the camera place and they said that it would be half the cost of a new camera to fix it, it was a very "old" model and not worth it and that nothing could be done. For heaven's sake it was only four years old but technology changes weekly it seems and it is outdated. Little did they realize that they were talking to a pregnant woman- eighth months along, with a baby coming in four and a half weeks, Christmas in five days and who uses her camera multiple times a day. I can't even type it as I get so emotional. I know, silly right? It's a camera, a material possesion and I'm acting like there has been something tragic happen in the family.

But add that to not being able to take another picture the last couple of weeks. Feeling so uncomfortable that when I do laundry or wrap a present the contractions start so those two things have had to go undone. Ammon working the next eight days straight until the 27th with four call nights in there. Having no energy to have our elf do anything fun this year....(he moves occassionaly but hasn't been up to much of his usual antics). Being so huge that I can't take the kids swimming or ice skating, leaving a lot of time to fill myself, it's been a bit hard.

Kind of like a "perfect storm" in my already emotional, horomonal world. I used to swear I would never have a Christmas baby....Heavenly Father listened but he has a sense of humor....not a Christmas baby but definately close enough to the holiday.

Anyway, I don't like being this way and I don't like being negative. I never have and I don't like to dwell on things I can't change too much. I have been extremely humbled this last two weeks and I really like reclaiming a more positive me...kind of like a pheonix....getting rid of what's bringing me down and shedding it especially with so much good in my life right now. I love this time of year and I want to enjoy it.

So, sorry for the lack of pictures...I feel that I am usually not a good writer so I rely on pictures to fill in the void that my words can't, but for now as I am the one begging for friends to send pictures and try to upload from my phone camera, here is what has made happy this week.

* Finally getting our Christmas cards out yesterday...the girls helped so much. From stamping to putting stickers on the letters, etc. Soon this will be an easy process with their help!

* The annual gingerbread house party we have with the Nelsons and Burts. The houses turned out darling and were so cute. (Nevermind that Ammon's surgery OCD came out and his house was perfectly constructed-even down to the exact length of the liccorice ropes or the fact that Brynlee's dropped on the ground when we got home needing to be hot glued back together while she slept!!!) ;-)

Thank you Sarah for taking pictures that night!

* Christmas shopping is done and I didn't put any of it on a credit card this year.

* Getting to enjoy Wildlights with Ammon and the kids at the zoo one night last week. It was cold but beautiful and wasn't snowing or raining. We also went into the aquarium part of the zoo and Santa was swimming with all the fish during feeding time...that was a pretty cool sight!

These pictures were taken with my phone...hence the terribly quality.

* Receiving everyone's Christmas cards in the mail....that's my highlight of the season. They are all displayed on our fridge now.

* Playing Qwirkle with Ammon and the kids. We could play games every night.

* Craft group with the Hayden Run Ward and the new friends I've made there....Margo and I were in charge of the craft and we did vinyl nativities this month.

* Hearing Cristy play the piano in her ward.

* Christmas Game Night/Gift Exchange at our home with the Acker Family. We enjoyed playing a bunch of games, hot chocolate and lots of desserts...we sure love their family!

* Ammon's work party-this year was really fun and it was a good date night for the two of us to get away, socialize with adults, talk in the car about life and enjoy the amazing people he works with.

* Christmas dinner with the Smith Family and ornament making...they are good friends and this is our second year of doing that with them.

* And although Winky, our elf, hasn't done too much....he did manage to leave the 40 giant gumballs in trails all over the middle level of our house like he does every year. ;-)

Our elf Winky....

Anyway, I know there is a lot to be grateful for...there truly is. This is a wonderful time of the year and eventually the camera problem will be solved, I won't be pregnant forever and Ammon will have next week off after all the time he has put it this week....;-)

Dear Santa....

2011-12-14T16:32:00.000-05:00

December 2011

Dear Sanue Klos,

I wont for krismis a holuday bobe. the oun with the wite skof. But not the oun with the green grass. I wote like to is amarukin grle doll klos. and an amarukin grl doll hols with the blond hare ples. My dad is wrking on krismis so we are going to have it 3 days lator. and a stoking. I am the sekint kide born. we are going to have a nuther babe grle. my nam is brynlee. I bleve that santu is rele.

I now that Jesus is rela.
Love, Brynlee

Traslation: Dear Santa Clause, I want for Christmas a holiday barbie. The one with the white scarf, but not the one with the green grass. I would like too is American Girl doll clothes, and an American Girl doll horse with the blonde hair please. My dad is working on Christmas so we are going to have it 3 days later. And a stocking. I am the second kid born. We are going to have another baby girl. My name is Brynlee. I believe Santa is real. I know that Jesus is real. Love, Brynlee

Last week sometime I found this letter to Santa pinned on our back door in a place that I would remember to send it. After glancing at it I noticed it was Brynlee's handwriting and proceeded to read through it. I had to laugh when I read through her spelling and read what she wanted for Christmas. It was consistent...the same things she's been telling me the past couple of months and I thought, "Ok, this is doable...thank goodness Target has an "American Girl" line for a third of the price of what the American Girl catalog offers!!

Then I reached the end of her letter...ending like a testimony. A couple of thoughts ran through my head. This letter was written by our child who is very spiritually intune with her testimony and the gospel. She expresses very freely gospel subjects, her beliefs and is the first to come home and share her Sunday lessons on the sacrament or tithing.

The part that got to me was where she said she knew Santa was real (ok, we must be doing something right since she is seven and is still a believer!!) but then saying Jesus was real right after. I was impressed with her writing something like that. A part of her testimony and something she believed included with a list of material possesions she wanted for Christmas.

But, it did bring up an important lesson and discussion between Ammon and I about making sure that when the kids do eventually learn the truth of the Toothfairy, Easter Bunny and Santa- all fun things that make childhood magical-that there will still undoubtedly be a belief that Jesus is real and that that won't fade with the knowledge of the make believe characters.

We've been talking a lot about that and how to ensure that these two don't get mixed up from this time forward. I've since been trying to express the feelings and faith that come with knowing that Jesus is real that don't accompany the other magical people. It's been an interesting learning experience as a parent this year that never came up before and it's been good for me to really differentiate with the kids the importance of the Savior and his role in our lives. The nativities have been a big part of that in our home this year (more on that later).

I am grateful to Brynlee for so freely expressing her testimony and beliefs without holding back. She daily helps remind me about fasting, the importance of paying tithing and not being afraid of sharing what you believe and also the message that I need to get across to the kids of the importance of The Savior, especially during the Christmas season and the mere fact that the word Christmas has the word Christ in it. I am learning daily that since I don't attend school anymore and that phase has passed in my life that our kids are some of our biggest teachers about life these days. Something so simple as a letter to Santa has made me think deeply about faith and really being a "believer".

Carrying On...

2011-12-13T16:03:00.000-05:00

It was so ironic that just yesterday I blogged about how great life was going and how things were great.

Today about all but kicked me in the rear end. The Braxton Hicks, rapid breathing and lack of energy landed me a two hour nap while Karli was at preschool, hence using the last of my free and kidless time until the New Year. Subsequently, that snowballed into pushing all my morning plans until the afternoon that I didn't done that morning, and so on and so forth until the night just got crazy.

Tonight was one of thse rare nights when everybody had something and trying to be in ten places at once was near impossible. I had to make 40 cookies for the Daisy ceremony. Rush to Hailey's Daisy investiture ceremony with all the kids after making everyone eat the fastest early dinner ever. Rushed to the firestation for Brynlee's Brownie field trip and finally arrive one minute before Ethan's viola concert started. That landed us with Ammon needing to leave 15 minutes later for one of his new applicant dinners he has to attend this month and me with a broken camera (fell trying to rescue Karli from falling in between a wooden chair due to lack of seating in the autorium).

Why do I blog this? Why not just hide it and pretend that life with almost five kids and a surgical resident husband is doable and easy? Because that wouldn't be the truth about life and about motherhood and about being in a family and trying to make everyone's things happen. Nights like these are rare but it helps remind me that I'm not superwoman and there are hard days that happen, and trying to make multiple schedules overlap can sometimes be tricky. I guess I can be grateful at least I didn't have a carseat to lug around on top of it...yet. ;-) It also helped remind me that there are choices to be made and we are the ones that CHOSE to have our kids involved in these activities and while the night was nuts I can be grateful for the smile on Hailey's face as she got awarded a pin for her second year of scouts, seeing Brynlee surrounded by good friends at the firestation and watching Ethan so excited about his performance on stage with the orchestra. That ended up mattering the most at the end of the evening.

So when I got on pinterest, after dropping from exhaustion into my computer chair, and this was the first picture I saw, I threw back my head and laughed.

One because the saying is so true and tomorrow will be a whole new day, and I will have a completely different perspective with some sleep and two...because this little orange looks just like me with my stomach right now and I feel like that's how I have to walk and carry myself around! LOL! Thanks little orange for the humorous reminder I needed tonight!

A Bunch of Posts

2011-12-12T17:14:00.000-05:00

I've been doing a lot of personal thinking lately. I guess that comes before major changes are about to happen in your life. I've been enjoying this December so much. The simplicity, the reason for the season and not stressing about so much. It has been so pleasant!! I don't know what has been so different but I am just going with the flow and it feels good. Anyway, blogger was having a hard time uploading pictures for the past couple of days so I finally got everything caught up today. There is so much I want to journal daily-more thoughts and things we are doing to enjoy being parents and watching our kids grow up. Too much of the time I am behind on here, so today I finally just posted everything that's been sitting in my drafts folder. Below this post are five or six that I needed to catch up on and finish and instead of waiting for them to go up each day this week and getting behind again, I put them on and hope to keep journaling daily more recent things and how we are enjoying this December. Maybe it's organizing. Maybe it's OCD. Maybe it's me nesting and feeling the need to having all my ducks in a row before the peanut arrives but if you are anxious to see what we've been up to, you may have to scroll back more than a few pages on our blog.

-Kirsten

A good kind of day...

2011-12-12T17:08:00.000-05:00

(Sunday-Dec. 11, 2011) Had a wonderful day today...the kind I needed to write down, soak up and remember. The day where the moments stood out and I felt happy and blessed. Sometimes life seems so daunting, so frustrating and never ending....haha...especially when you are big pregnant. Then there are days like today where I look at my life and realize I have it so good and so much to be grateful for.

Good to be a wife, a mother and a friend.

My list for today: Listening...and hearing Cristy play Handel's Messiah in her ward in sacrament meeting...it was beautiful and such a enjoyable way to "hear" Christmas. Loving-the time we spent after church at Mt. Carmel East with Ammon, him treating us to dinner, seeing his call room and viewing the other place he works. Stuffing...and getting ready to get the Christmas cards out within the next couple of days. Watching...the movie Elf with the kids and giggling at all of our favorite lines. Reading...the nightly Christmas stories we have underneath our tree and loving the messages they teach about the season. Baking...Christmas cookies for Daisy investiture ceremony. Crafting...and finishing the 12 days of Christmas for the kids' teachers. Anticipating...Ethan's viola recital tomorrow and Karli's preschool concert on Wednesday and loving the things they are involved in. Remembering...two special people that have birthdays on the same day...my mom and Lisa. Procrasting...cleaning the house and doing the laundry! Eating...can't get enough of gingerbread cookies. I swear the ginger makes the nausea better. Tasty on my lips, but not so good for my hips!! ;-)

Ammon reading one of the Christmas stories at bedtime to the kids on Saturday night...

Visual Representations of Christmas

2011-12-12T17:06:00.001-05:00

(Dec. 8, 2011) I remember just saying last night at craft group that sometimes little events are put in our way to help us slow down a little a relax...play catch up. It was so ironic today when I woke up and got that kind of day. It was what I needed today so when Karli woke up this morning not feeling well, it was a wonderful feeling to cancel the dentist appointment I had, keep her home from school, stay in my pajamas and take some time to sit and think. She ended up throwing up six times but even that was manageable compared to the normal craziness of life. In between throwing up, she dozed a lot of the time. It was my midweek catch up to take a breather, relax and put our house back together. The baby must be feeling my coritsol levels down feels like she is having a party in my tummy.

While Karli was sleeping on the couch this morning, I had the feeling to go on lds.org and find something to be my "scripture study" for the day. I came across small excerpts from the First Presidency Christmas devotional and had some quiet moments to read through those and reflect on the season.

Ammon was on call last night and we spent the evening with him. Thanks to the DVR, we hope to watch the message sometime this week as a family when we can sit and really enjoy it.

As I relaxed on the couch by Karli this morning, I came across Elder Uchdorf's Christmas message. His words always seemed to ring very clear with me. Entire talk here. He said “We have in our minds a picture of how everything should be—the perfect tree, the perfect lights, the perfect gifts, and the perfect family events. … [But] sooner or later, something unpleasant occurs … and the picture-perfect Christmas we had imagined, the magic we had intended to create, shatters around us. However, if we focus our hearts and minds on the true spirit of Christmas, President Uchtdorf said, “we will recognize wonderful things happening around us.”

As I let that sink in, I happened to look up at our Christmas decorations this year and tears came to my eyes. We haven't had something rock our "perfect Christmas" but we have had this little baby and residency declare less energy in our lives and for more simplicity. As I looked up, our mantle setting encompasses so much of what is important to me at Christmas time and for the first time I noticed what our family was depicting this year. So much more simple than in years passed. The pictures of Christ in the center, our small collection of Jim Shore santas off to the side, the Christmas stockings my grandma had made for each one of us before her passing, our tree full of ornaments-many from family and friends and beneath all our Christmas books that we read through the month of December-well over 40 beloved titles now.

But what I noticed most of all with the whole scene, was that Christ was at the center...just the way he should be during the Christmas season.

The only other decorations we put up this year, with the help from the kids one afternoon, was our collection of Nativities. I'll take a picture of those soon. We have been collecting them over the past ten years and they are my treasures. I love unique, special depictions of that night back in the lowly stable. This year, we cleared all the books out of the bookshelf and put up all the nativities we've collected now. Our one from our very first Christmas in the center, Ammon's small one his parents sent him on his mission, the glass globe Liz brought back from her Italian mission, the small little Amish figures representing our Ohio years, the olive tree one my mom bought when I was home for my grandma's funeral, the plastic chunky Fisher Price figures that the kids have played with the past nine years and finally the one I made last night at craft group. Someday I hope to have a living room with all these nativities set up as a special reminder of the reverence I place on the season.

This year has been so good for us. So much peace has come from simplifying life and enjoying a better, calmer meaning of Christmas. There have been far fewer expectations of what the month should be like, thanks to this little baby. Trust me...I am all about Santa and Winky the elf visits everyday but I love our visual represenations of Christmas this year and hope that long after this Christmas is over, our family remembers that Christ is always at the center, not just in December.

Baby at 32 weeks

2011-12-12T17:06:00.000-05:00

(Dec. 4, 2011) Tonight we had the chance to bring dinner to Ammon at the hospital-Mt. Carmel West. I brought delicious homemade vegetable beef soup and honey oat muffins and Ammon treated us to the traditional hospital "Sundaes" he always buys the kids in the cafeteria. It was a good time to be together as a family and enjoy one another before Ammon had to get busy again.

After dinner, he had a few minutes to do another ultrasound on the baby upstairs in the skills lab. It was so neat to be able to get a glimpse of the baby again and due to all these ultrasounds we've been privledged to view, I feel like I know this little girl very much. I even think we know her name now, so it's weird for me not to address her on here by that name like we do in our home when we talk about her, but I don't want to jinx anything and want it to feel right when we finally see her. It isn't neccessarily the name I would have chosen initially, but it feels so right for her. Nothing else we bring up "fits" her and so I think her name will stick-the one Ammon is dead set on and it was meant for her. It will be fun to see if we really do name her that for real.

The face (mostly eyes)...although ultrasound pictures make things appear a bit distorted so we'll see what her real face looks like in a couple of weeks!

Tummy, legs and feet

Anyway, we loved seeing her on the screen...she's grown so much since the last ultrasound at 24 weeks. I am 32 weeks now, so she was super squished! We distinctly saw her facial features-her nose, eyes and lips, her long legs and feet, and her four chambered beating heart. It was fun to see how she is positioned-head down, bum in my ribs and feet at my right hips. I can now picture just what exactly is making me so uncomfortable each time I feel a kick somewhere on my body and it's much easier to tell what's going on in there.

Ammon has gotten so confident at the ultrasounds and I love to see how much he's grown in his skills and as a doctor too. He knew what everything was and could maneuver everything so well. So different than when I was pregnant with Karli when he was a medical student. It's fun to see him in action. The kids also loved seeing the little peanut and helping press the buttons to print some pictures to bring home. Brynlee was by far the most interested and really hopes to be a doctor someday. We'll have too see...Anyway, I can't wait to meet this little girl in seven weeks! The strong, hard Braxton Hicks I feel daily are letting me know that my body is getting ready for this next adventure!

Buckeye Retreat 2011

2011-12-12T17:05:00.000-05:00

Considering this was one of my most favorite things I got to be apart of this year, I am surprised that it took me this long to get it posted. Back in September I had the opportunity to fly to Utah for the second part of Ammon's week off (the first half we spent in Kentucky) and spend time with some of my best friends in the world and my wonderful siblings and Ammon's, who are also some of my closest friends. I couldn't have done it without Ammon and he did such a good job of holding down the fort back in Ohio, doing the girls hair, taking car of homework, fixing the car, meals, etc. I was able to be gone Thursday morning thru Sunday evening...so nice!!

I flew into Utah Thursday afternoon and was picked up by my cute sis in law Katelyn from the aiport. We got to spend a beautiful afternoon downtown in temple square and pick up some things at Deseret Book. We then headed back to the airport to pick up my brother in law Jed who flew in a hour and a half after me. I got to enjoy a nice dinner at Sweet Tomatoes (my favorite!!!) with Trevor and Katelyn (my bro and sis in law), and Chelsea, Jed and Andrew (sis, bro in law and nephew) who also flew in for the weekend. So fun to be with my siblings (pictures in the next post down)!!

That night I spent the night in Springville and spent a couple of fun hours with Ammon's sister Becca, her husband LeGrand and my four nephews and nieces, plus Ammon's sister Liz and his brother Paul and got to meet Paul's cute girlfriend Janine. I was the only one left in the family who hadn't got to meet her and she was super cute and sweet. It was fun to catch up with everyone but I sure missed not having Ammon and the kids there with me to enjoy everyone too.

Me with my favorite kiddos!!

Becca and I (love this girl!!!!)

Friday morning, I said good bye and headed to Gardner Villiage where the second annual Riverside Ward Girls' Retreat kicked off!!! I had started it the year before in Columbus and it is so fun to see that it lived on!!!

What a welcome, FUN sight to pull up and see so many of my wonderful friends standing there in a circle. I got choked up and realized how much I had missed these girls and what an important part they have played in my Ohio experience. Ohio just hasn't been the same without all of them!!!! We did miss a couple of great friends that weren't abe to be there this time and hope they can come next year. It was great to meet Andrea and Jeannette's babies that had been born in the couple months before the reunion too. We had so much fun shopping at the quilt store and little boutiques, eating a delicious lunch at Archibald's and catching up. My favorite place with my favorite people! The witches were out around Gardner Villiage and I couldn't resist snapping some pictures since we know how much I love witches!

Hailey Bowen and Alice Jeppesen (who were the most sweet, angelic, good babies ever this weekend!)

That afternoon we headed to hour long pedicures and foot massages!! I had never had one before and was very skeptical of the whole experience since I have short nails and ugly feet, but the girls talked me into it. I must day I ate my words and it was fabulous!!!! I was a little weirded out by the burning hot wax but the rest felt oh so good!!! Especially when you are pregnant (which was almost half of us!) The fun part was that eight of us went at a time.

Amber and I

That night we headed up to the cabin. Andrea and Jeannette had done such a wonderful job of planning the whole thing....it was the best reunion I've ever attended. We stayed at a cabin of one of Andrea's family members and it was comfortable, warm and inviting. It had many rooms, all with comfortable beds for all of us and was perfect. Fall was in full swing up the canyon in Midvale and the leaves were beautiful all around. It was up a deep hill though and thanks to the mud and rain we had to park at the very bottom so the cars wouldn't get stuck. Since there were many of us that were pregnant or with babies and carseats, it was quite the hike up the hill everyday!!!!

We ate a wonderful home cooked meal and stayed up until the wee hours of the morning playing games, exchanging secret sister gifts, talking, eating and catching up. I laughed so hard during some of the moments that I was crying with tears running down my cheeks. I love these girl seriously so much! It was nice to have many cameras there too.

Not everyone was able to come up the whole weekend but many who lived in Utah made the effort to join us for parts of the reunion. Amber came up to the cabin Friday night, Nina-who just had had her new baby, for breakfast one morning, Ali-who was on bedrest with her pregnancy-joined us for dinner one night, Amber for most of the first afternoon and evening, and some stayed one of the nights with us-like Laura and Barbie. Out of about fourteen woman, six of us were pregnant which will be crazy but so fun next year when we all have babies with us!!

Saturday we enjoyed a delicious breakfast at the HUB Cafe in Heber and then headed to go shopping at the outlets in Park City. I had never been and it was fun to shop with girls instead of kids!! ;-) I was able to find a couple of tops at Motherhood there and many were able to find jeans, clothes for kids, etc. We stopped in Heber for Granny's shakes and then after naps and relaxing back up at the cabin, finished the reunion with a great diner at a Mexican restaurant that night.

Andrea (with Alice), Camille, Lonica, me (with Hailey), Jessika, Melinda, Becky, AnnDee, Nina (with Graham) & Kirsten

And with Laura at the HUB before she took off...

Becky, Camille, Melinda (due in March), Barbie, AnnDee, Jessica (due in March), Me (due in Jan) and Lonica (due in March)

Us with all of our bags...thanks to whoever caught this nutty one of me!

I just love all these girls and feel so incredibly blessed to have them in my life. I gain so much strength from them and our friendships. This reunion was a sacrifice to many-financially to all those who flew in or helped people fly in, those who helped plan it and buy food, the many husbands who stayed behind to watch children, the hours of planning on Andrea and Jeannette's part but it was so worth it. I miss these girls on a daily basis. This reunion has become so important to me and a great way to stay in touch with everyone. I don't know how it will work this next year, especially with the baby, but somehow I have to find a way to make it back next September.

As I drove down the canyon that Sunday morning, heading toward Orem to meet up with my siblings and to say goodbye, I felt so overwhelmed and lucky to have been there. I was listening to the Tabernacle Choir and driving all way down the canyon with the windows down, my hair blowing in the wind, and had such a feeling of contentment. I passed Sundance and so many memories of college, roommates and Ammon came flooding back. No matter where I live, Utah holds a very special place in my heart. It was so beautiful that morning and I really had a chance to fill up my cup this weekend. Thanks so much to Andrea and Jeannette and all those who attended for a fabulous time.

In Midvale by the cabin....

Pictures taken out the side windows while I was driving down the canyon...this may be Deer Creek...by Sundance...

My Siblings

2011-12-12T17:04:00.001-05:00

Part of the fun part of going to Utah, was a chance to meet up with all of my siblings. Trevor and Katelyn recently just moved back from Denver, Ashley lives there now and Chelsea and Jed had flown in from Denver for the weekend. So fun to be all together even if it was just for a few hours.

I mentioned before we got together at Sweet Tomatoes the night I flew in. Ashley was supossed to meet us there, but was unable to make it at the last minute. We caught some of these pictures in the parking lot after dinner. I was looking a bit tired by then since it was 10:30pm Ohio time!

The three of us look so much alike here...can you see the family resemblance?

And this one was so unflattering of Trevor, but it makes me laugh everytime I see it so I had to post it. I come from a family of nuts...myself included!!!

Katelyn is such a fun part of our family and such a cute sis in law! We missed Ashley!

And another shot of Bugsy....I could dip Andrew in chocolate and eat him up. He is such a cutie and was so good during dinner!

After the reunion was over, I headed to Jed and Chelsea's condo for a quick lunch with everyone before they took me to the airport. This time my sister Ashley was able to join us. That was the first time the four of us siblings had been all together in a really long time. It was also the first time we had gotten a sibling picture in years and years. I treasure this photo!

Here we are in age order....from youngest (Trevor) to oldest (me)....I think someone played a joke on me by saving all height genes for anyone born after me!!!!

T, K, C and J all made a delicious lunch. It was fun to talk and spend sometime together before the airport. I was grateful for the chance to see Ashley as well and there is always a good time to be had when I am with my siblings. They are a fun group and some of my closest friends.

Ashley and I

My sisters!!!!

Missing Ammon in this picture. ;-(

Grandma's Visit to Ohio

2011-12-12T17:03:00.000-05:00

In October, my mom flew out to be with us for eight days in Ohio. She had been planning on coming for ten months, so it was fun that it finally happened. She had loved her trip to Ohio two years previous in October when we had done Amish Country, and fall is gorgeous around here so it was the perfect time to come.

We had a wonderful time and I am so grateful to her. She helped me catch up on all the laundry, get things cleaned, and did her traditional "Grandma Date" with the kids-taking them to a movie and to dinner with her which allowed Ammon and I to go on a long dinner/movie date which we hadn't gotten to do for his birthday. So nice to date Ammon again! The kids were in heaven and soak up visits from family so much.

While she was here, we made several day trips, mostly with Karli, while the kids were in school, meaning we always had to be back by 3pm. That was a bit nuts but we did it-always pulling in about one minute before the bus did! We went shopping in Easton and loved walking through William Sonoma and Pottery Barn. On Friday, I did take Brynlee and Hailey out of school to join us in Amish Country for the day while Ethan opted to stay behind for a school project.

My sister Chelsea was also able to fly in for part of the time my mom was here. What a fun reunion to have my sister and my mom here in Ohio at the same time!! Chelsea and Andrew stayed with me the next week too while Ammon was gone in San Fransisco for the week.

It was so nice to have help and company!

Day Trip 1: Longaberger and Roscoe Villiage

We did a day trip to Longaberger Homestead to show my mom where the famous baskets are made. It was pouring the whole time and a bit dreary but fun to show her the huge basket on the property.

Next we headed to Roscoe Villiage, an old period village between Longaberger and Amish Country that the people all still dress up in old clothing and the buildings are open to tour. Since it was raining so hard, we didn't stay long but it was fun to see it up close since I had heard so much about it.

The old general store-still running and set up like olden times...

Around the corner from Roscoe Villiage is the Erie Canal. I thought it would be more impressive and much, much bigger, but this is pretty much it. It was raining and so windy so we jumped out of the car for just a minute for a picture but neat to see in person. They run tours down the canal now...

Day Trip 2: Amish Country

When Chelsea flew in, we headed back to Amish Country to show my mom. We stopped at Hershberger's again, to show my mom the giant horse and it was crazy because all the animals that we had seen as tiny little babies in August when Chelsea was here last, were so much bigger and grown up!

The girls petting the tiniest little horse I have ever seen. It was so shy and almost embarrassed to have us there...

The kids loved holding the little puppies...so did grandma.

This is such a cute picture of her, Karli and a puppy.....

Back the picture out and you can see what was really happening!! LOL!

Andrew must have thought Grandma was the puppy!

At the Kountry Kottage to by candles like we always do!

The Fall harvest was in full swing at Hershberger's and I love, LOVE seeing all the colored fall pumpkins, gourds and corn. It is so autumn to me when I am there surrounded by all these good things.

We headed into the town and went through this old Victorian House. It looked like something from a movie.

It was so cold after that we stopped for warm hot chocolate and to get out of the rain.

Before leaving for home, we stopped at one more place I hadn't been to before. Shrock's Amish Farm....most stores were closed for the night but we stopped for a while at the Christmas Shoppe...the most impressive Christmas store I have ever been to. Four levels of all Christmas things...it totally got me in the mood for the holidays!

Candy Land display and tree

A "Fruitful" Christmas and a Patriotic One

My mom was able to be there on a Saturday for all the kids soccer games. It was wonderful to have family at a sporting event of the kids and she was a good sport even though it was windy and cold and the kids loved having someone else cheering for them.

My mom and sister were also able to be here for the kids' Primary Program, which was a surprise that we found out about after the flights and plans had already been made. They picked a good week to come!!! I loved sitting in the congregation with Ammon, my mom, and my sister and having them see the kids do such a great job.

And we finally got a cute one (in pajamas!!!) of Grandma and all five of her grandkids so far. It's fun to see that there are other faces in this picture besides just our kids and I can't wait until our next baby is born, and Chelsea, Ashley and Trevor have more kids. Our family is growing and it's fun to see my mom as a Grandma now!!

Thanks again to my mom and Chelsea who made the trip out here. I am so grateful for time sacrifices, money sacrifices with plane tickets, missed work and time that everyone has taken in the past couple of months, but it has been a tremendous help during this pregnancy, with the kids, passing by hours without Ammon home or out of town, help with laundry, spoiling the kids, etc. I have been lifted up by these gracious acts and I dream of a time of living closer to everyone...Ammon's family included.

Kentucky Trip: Lexington

2011-12-06T14:06:00.000-05:00

The last stop of this fun, four day trip was Lexington. It was an extra forty five minute drive out of the way, but I was thrilled when Ammon agreed to it and took the Lexington route home.

When I had previously imagined what Kentuckey would possibly be like, I had imagined horses...everywhere. Horse stables, rolling green landscapes and pastures with horses dotting them and grazing everywhere.

Haha...Not so much driving through the main highways of Kentucky. That was a bit disappointing. I started to wonderful just where I had gotten this picturesque image in my head.

That was until we got to Lexington.

Finally, horses and all things related to the animal!!!! The city was so pretty and quaint and I loved driving through it. There were fences all over the place, huge properties with horse ranches and those signs outside the property just to let you know exactly who those large pieces of land belonged to!

It was just how I had pictured it all being.

We discovered they had a small Children's Museum downtown in the city and decided to stop for a couple of hours to let the kids stretch their legs out and get out some energy. It is so nice have reciprocal museum passes!!!!

We rode fake horses, attended an art studio they had there, played in huge bubbles and in the culture town. It was nothing like the other museums we had been to, but neat and different in it's own way. And, since it was the middle of the school week and in the afternoon on a Wednesday, we had the WHOLE museum to ourselves. There was only one other small family while we were there. Not bad!

Enjoying the bubble room!

Landing on the moon...

Climbing the alps...

Our little pueblo dwellers!

And even the bigger kid in us had some fun!

We then quickly went to the Kentucky Horse Park before getting on the road and it starting to get dark-"The Kentucky Horse Park is the epicenter of equestrian life, sports and business because this is where the heart of the horse finds its earthly counterpart in the people whose hearts beat in rhythm with his. It is the place where the essence of that remarkable relationship between man and horse is appreciated and honored in everything that they do."

We didn't get a chance to get out and do as much as I would have liked but it was so fun to see it up close. We were needing to get home that night so the kids could go to school the next morning and I could fly to Utah at 9am. It was enough for me to get a horse fill in though. I am such a dreamer and used to picture myself living on a horse ranch with several horses, riding through the grasses bareback on top of horse with my hair blowing wild. Still have that dream but I don't think it will happen in this lifetime! This was such a fun adventure and Ammon even trespassed with the car so I could get a good picture of me with a horse! ;-) I know, honestly right? The things I get him to do for me!

And I only had to feed this horse a couple of carrots to lure him over to the fence for the picture...

And finally...heading home. We ate the one meal we budgeted eating out...you got it...Kentucky Fried Chicken!! Ethan's one request was that we at there while still in Kentucky and it was nice after eating camping food for three days. They had a buffet and everything...although, after completing the meal we all wondered why we had been craving it for a couple of days! Kind of like our love/hate relationship with Home Town! ;-)

It was so fun to cross another couple of things of our bucket list...little by little we are getting the chance to see different parts of the United States and to show the kids how much is out there. I am SO LUCKY I married someone who shares my love of road trips and doesn't ever complain about where I have planned next. Kentucky was beautiful and I really enjoyed the escape from our life for a couple of days and the time to be together and relax. It was a great learning experience to see that a fun trip that I know we'll always remember didn't have to be planned in a fancy hotel or with the best food available. We had to be more open minded than usual, more frugal than ever and compromise on what we wanted to do with the funds we had, but I am almost glad Chicago fell through and this worked out for us. It was a perfect trip (ok, except for all those darn spiders, racoons and bees!!!)

Kentucky Trip: Lost River Cave

2011-12-05T16:56:00.001-05:00

The third day of our trip, we left our camp site and headed south toward Bowling Green, Kentucky-home to the Lost River Cave, the other tour we had planned on taking. Bowling Green wasn't supossed to have been much further away than Mammoth Caves...maybe an hour or so. We headed out that morning after a good breakfast, camping showers and packing up lunch.

Driving down the freeway, we were almost there, when we decided to think we knew better then the GPS and skipped an exit hoping to take the next one due to construction, etc. That ended up being a very bad mistake!! The next exit we learned wasn't for at least thirteen miles down the freeway. Ha. We were in the middle of no where. That's when we started seeing the Tennessee signs up ahead and Nashville was only an hour more.

We debated heavily...go on to Nashville and switch our plans or continue on with the Lost River Cave...

We made a compromise....we drove just far enough into Tennessee to make sure we counted that as a state we had been to. We decided not to go to Nashville, but instead spent a half hour in the visitor's center which ended up being the nicest visitor's cener we had ever been too. We came to the conclusion this was our Kentucky trip and we would choose Nashville in the future. Crossing into Tennessee made the 20th state we've been to as a family...not bad! The kind lady at the visitor's center gave each of the kids a Tennessee pin to wear, which they proudly did (and made nice wonderful holes in their shirts!!!) for the next two days straight.

After that quick stop, we headed back into Kentucky and proceeded on to the Lost River Cave. I would have to say that this probably was our very favorite part of the trip. Maybe I am only speaking for myself but everyone enjoyed this afternoon. We felt like true adventurerers!

The kids got to pan for jewels while we waited for the tour to start....

We then headed down to the start of the trail, which was right here, but one of the sink holes. We had a funny tour guide who made everything interesting enough that the kids remembered parts of the stories and tours when we returned home. It was quiet and so green. We even saw an albino squirrel running around which I hadn't seen in a really long time.

We then approached the entrance of the Cave. It was so dark but neat looking. Across the river you can see parts of the cave ballroom...a place where they used to hold dances and balls years and years ago. The kids (girls) loved dancing around and pretending they were in a grand ballroom. Well, you see the boat below...that's what we had to take into the cave for the tour. At least 20 people were fit into that boat...it was a tight squeeze as you'll see below!

The cave was so neat....this is what the website had to say about it:

"The guided tour includes a beautiful, historic river walk which leads you to one of the largest cave entrances east of the Mississippi River. Upon arriving at the cave, visitors embark on their journey into the unique world that exists beneath the city of Bowling Green. Daylight disappears as you board the boat on the river that Ripley’s Believe It or Not claims is the shortest, deepest in the world. Prehistoric Native Americans, thousands of Civil War troops, Col. John Hunt Morgan and even the notorious Jesse James are said to be among the cave’s legendary visitors. Stroll along the historic river walk and visit the site of the famous 1930s underground Nite Club."

I couldn't get too many great pictures inside the cave because it was so dark, but this one below shows just how low the entrance gets. You have to lean down into the center of the boat and there was a point where Ammon and my head was touching from leaning over so far. It was a low ceiling!!

The kids loved that Jesse James (notorious robber) was said to have hidden in the cave back in the day. They thought that was so cool and you see his name just outside the cave before the tour. He supossedly hid in the cave for three days to escape being caught.

After the boat tour we were free to roam. Most everyone on our tour headed back but Ammon, the kids and I decided to go hiking down the Valley Trail and went and found all the sink holes. There was also this amazing butterfly house in the middle of nowhere on the hike. I was hoping we would get a chance to see it but it was supossed to have closed the week before we visited. Luckily for us, since the weather was still warm, they must have kept it open longer for the season. We spent at least a half hour in there and the kids probably could have spent much, much longer. I had so much fun with the camera trying to capture all the different kinds of butterflies. It was enchanting to see so many butterflies around and they would stop and land on Hailey quite often. We think it was due to her flower shirt. We saw so many beautiful types and you could just stand there while they flew all around you. It reminded me of something straight out of the Fablehaven Books.

And yes, Mr. Fearless actually climbed down into that hole and found water down below....then he convinced all of our kids to go down with him. I was freaking out there was a wild animal down there or they were going to get sucked under some current below, but they came up fine and unharmed. That just proved even more to Ammon that being a daredevil and teaching your children to do it is a good thing....

Lastly we came to the Lost River Spring in the trail. It was neat to see where all the water started from and Ammon and kids climbed up it. What a neat adventure, beautiful scenery and was we all dropped into bed after we fixed dinner that night. If anyone heads to Kentucky, make sure you find Bowling Green and head to the Lost River Cave!

Kentucky Trip: Into the Caves

2011-12-04T23:42:00.000-05:00

Getting to actually go into the caves was the really fun part of the trip. This was the part that had been on our Bucket List for years and it was definately worth the trip. Mammoth Cave is known as one of the longest caving systems in the world with over 390 miles of passage ways.

Financially we were able to only afford one tour and I believe that was the Historic Tour. We researched all of them before we got there and found one that would be a moderate hike, one we could take kids on and that we could afford. This particular tour took about two hours and it was quiet the adventure!

Here is the description of the Historic Tour: Entering the cave through the Historic Entrance, you will feel the excitement that intrigued the earliest explorers and visitors. Experience the history and the role Mammoth Cave played during the War of 1812. Large passages invite you to imagine what it would have been like for prehistoric discoverers who walked these passages more than 2,000 years ago. Descend into the lower levels of the cave and follow in the footsteps of the first explorers who crossed the Bottomless Pit. Squeeze through Fat Man’s Misery. Climb 155 stairs up Mammoth Dome and exit through the Historic Entrance. •2 hours, 2 miles. Tour limit: 120. Total stairs: 440, including 155 at Mammoth Dome. Elevation change: 300’.

We enjoyed a quiet picnic nearby before our tour started. It was serene and beautiful. Ammon took the kids on a hike for an hour and let me sit and read a book, and took the kids on some adventuring to get some of their energy out. Again, Ammon was so good to let me relax when I needed to get off my feet for a bit. The hikes were the kids' favorite parts of the trip.

Entering the cave...reminder to self...next time bring sweatshirts...don't leave them in the car!!

The caves themselves were dark and cold but HUGE inside and went on for miles. If they hadn't had the lighting inside it would have been pitch black. Below shows the entrance and the grand "room" at the beginning.

We even found some OSU graffitti carved into the stone!

There were times that things got so steep the deeper we got. They had cages and bridges over the pits but there were times standing on those bridges where we would look down below and couldn't see the bottom. It went down hundreds and hundreds of feet and our stomachs felt the fear a bit of standing over those water filled holes.

The first part of the tour was seeing a bunch of rocks and pathways in seemed like until we got to the middle of the tour. Then the fun and spelunking began! Our tour headed down what was called the Cave Drain and it literally was a drain, a way for the water to escape the caves. We climbed down, down, down. It got steeper and the ceilings got lower and the sides got narrower. I was afraid with my pregnant tummy I wouldn't be able to go through. Luckily that was then and not me in my current state or I for sure would have gotten stuck!

The narrowest part (and most fun!) was Fat Man's Misery and that's where things got super narrow and the pathway was all zig zagged just like a river would have carved in the stone.

LOL! Can you see how narrow and low it got? It was so awesome and we LOVED this part of the tour!

Rocking out in the cave before we had to climb up, up, up hundreds of stairs to get back out of the cave.

After the cave tour, we still had some daylight to kill so we decided to hike a couple of miles down to some natural springs down by the Green River. We forgot though that when you hike down, you must hike that same distance back up. I think the kids and Ammon (with their earlier hike) hiked over seven miles or more that day...for me it was more like four or five. Needless to say, we slept well that night!!

Along the way the kids caught frogs-thirteen of them in 30 minutes! They were tiny and they made the kids giggle as we tried to capture pictures of them. They were all over the paths but my adult eyes could never see them. The kids though could spot them instantly camoflauged in the rocks.

Their little hands are loaded with frogs!

Ethan's little frog...we almost squeezed the life out of him for this picture though!

The best close up I could get of all four of them holding a frog...they kept hoping away the moment they would open their hands up!

The Green River....and yes it really was green!

Natural springs

The thing I loved about this trip was there was so much nature to explore. So different then the life we normally lead with computers, phones, pagers, IPAD, facebook, Wii, etc. On the trip it was all about frogs, acorns, spiders and bees (I could have done without those), deer, caves, water, etc. It was so refreshing to escape it all. While hiking up we even spotted several deer, many of them being tiny little babies with their moms.

I am so grateful to Ammon for humoring my adventurous, traveling bug and making the trips so worth it and fun. The next stop was Bowling Green, Kentucky....

Kentucky Trip: The Camping Adventure

2011-12-03T21:53:00.000-05:00

It's time to play catch up for about a week of some fun things that have since passed that I can't forget to blog about. These are some of my favorite memories from this year and cannot be left unjournaled. Forgive me for the next couple of days while we jump back to September of this year...

A couple of months ago, and yes after school had already started in September, we decided to take a family trip to Kentucky. Originally this week had been planned for a trip to Chicago but when it came down to it financially, and paying cash for the trip, we didn't quite have enough for our Chicago week and the things that I wanted to do on that trip. We were disappointed but changed plans. We are hoping that maybe Ammon will attend the National Surgery Conference in Chicago this coming September (2012) and we'll join him for the week which would be nice since the hotel would be covered and it wouldn't use one of his vacation weeks.

One of the other things on our bucket list though has been to go down and see Mammoth Caves National Park in Kentucky. Years ago, while perusing an atlas on our move out East, I remember seeing "Mammoth Caves" as being one of the top 50 things to do in the United States. It has one of the longest caving systems in the world and I knew that we had to see it before we ever moved from Ohio.

Ammon graciously took one of his three vactation weeks off he has each year, so that I could go to Utah to a girls' retreat at the end of this week off, so we had a good four days to go down to Kentucky before I left for my getaway. Being that money was especially tight due to all the school fees we had just paid to start the kids in school, we knew we had only a certain amount in our budget. Ethan was included on the planning of this trip to help earn his Family Travel Belt Loop for scouts. We first decided to camp (that is a leap for me but I'm getting better!!!) to save on hotel fees. That was also at 20 weeks pregnant! We decided we could only eat dinner out one time and Ethan had decided long ago that it was going to be at Kentucky Fried Chicken in Kentucky! All other meals were going to have to be brought with us which meant for careful planning. We budgeted one tour in Mammoth Caves and one tour at the Lost River Cave in Bowling Green. Showers cost money at the campsite, so for three days, that was budgeted in as well as firewood, gas and ice. I was so intimidated by this trip, but lack of money was not going to keep us from having an adventure. I will admit this was traveling like we had never done before. It was a bit refreshing to set financial limits and while we made plans, there were no time restraints or schedules made, no where to be on a certain day and nothing stressful about everything. We just packed, left and for the first time decided to see how a more planned.

We had an awesome time and it was so relaxing and refreshing. We left for Kentucky around noon on Sunday after attending sacrament meeting. Our first stop was to the Louisville Kentucky Temple. It was a pretty sight at sunset and we enjoyed the quiet, serene atmosphere especially on a Sunday evening. We also made our first meal in the parking lot with our propane stove. Dogfood. Ha...just kidding, Dinty Moore Beef Stew, but Brynlee said it looked an awful lot like dogfood!! ;-)

And since we get a sleeping picture during most of our adventures, here is a visual representation of Ammon's cat nap on the the grass due to him being post call.

Preparing the dogfood...Brynlee looks a little skeptical....I won't even show you Hailey's facial expressions!!

Thankfully the rainstorm held off until five minutes after we got dinner cleaned up and were back on the road. Then torrential downpour hit....we were so lucky we had had time to prepare and eat dinner and get cleaned up.

Three hours later (around 10pm), we pulled into the Mammoth Cave Campground and found a site in the dark, and thankfully it was close to the bathroom. I did not like setting up camp in the dark, but we are used to it and made do. It took a while for all of us to fall asleep that night, but eventually we did.

The next morning, we awoke to this....a beautiful campground already touched by autumn.

Camping provided new entertainment for the kids. While we would get breakfast set up, they would play leaf catch and would see who could run and catch the most leaves from the falling trees....

There were chores to be done that we all had to participate in, including carrying the firewood from the camp store.

We all helped with meal times and Ammon did such a great job of orchestrating everything. He made the load so much lighter on me this trip and was such a help and so patient with teaching the kids what they needed to do like stirring juice, flipping pancakes, etc. He took care of most of the meals and clean up and was such a support.

Ethan became our great fire builder!

Camping had it's downfalls too...bugs and creatures!! Spiders as big as the kids hands would crawl around on the tents and chairs. Catydids were around and these afros-catepillars as the kids named them, were everywhere too. The worse was the bees....they would swarm every meal, fly in the car and get into the food. It would have been perfect if it weren't for those darn bees!

We did get to see a lot of deer though, especially during sunrise and sunset. One morning, I heard a creature sniffing around oustide our tent. I was so scared and it was about 5:30am. I had to go the bathroom SO bad and knew I would have to go out there with whatever was sniffing. Then Brynlee woke up needing to go too. Darn! I got the courage up, peeked outside the tent expecting to see a bear (I know...I'm ridiculous) and instead saw these two deer nosing around our site. It was fun to sit there and watch them for a couple of minutes with Brynlee that morning...

Camping showers were interesting. We bought six tokens, enough for six ten minute showers during the three days we were there. Ammon and Ethan would take one token each morning, and I would take the three girls with the other one token. Trying to shower three girls, get them out and dried off and shower myself in ten minutes was a tiring adventure each morning, but we did it!!! We have now coined the term "camping showers" in our house when I need the kids to shower quickly before church or school. All I have to say is "Go take a camping shower" and they know exactly what I mean!

Then we'd head outside and while the boys would play football or catch, we would have beauty parlor on the front steps. It was also in those mornings that I taught Ammon some hairstyles on the girls so he could do there hair later in the week while I was gone. And I had three cute hairstylist to do my hair each morning too!

Ethan loved bringing his BB gun and would shoot at cans, etc while we would cook a meal. He has a darn good shot!

I do have to share one story on here that I personally didn't want to forget. If anyone remembers when we went camping a couple of years ago, and the whole raccoon experience (here) you'll have some sympathy for me....

One night, after dinner, Ammon offered to take the kids on a night-glow stick hike. We had a fire going that we were waiting to burn down to make smores and he told me to sit and enjoy the fire, read a book while he took the kids for a short hike in the dark. I told him that there had better not be any raccoons appearing like last time!! He laughed and told me there was no way.

I made myself comfortable. I put myself in one camping chair and my feet up on another as to avoid those big spiders that would crawl up our legs or on our feet sometimes. So gross....I got a flashlight (to make sure those spiders weren't around) and a book and made myself comfortable. After 30 minutes, the lantern on the table went out. That was a bummer and it started to get a lot darker. I didn't freak out, just continued reading my book. Then, the campfire flames got really low and it was just the embers all ready for the smores. Forty five minutes had passed since they had left on their hike. Now I was scared. I kept shining my flashlight around just to be sure.

Then five minutes later, it was dark....really dark and I was alone. That's when I heard it. Just like last time....noises....I shone my light around and sure enough, two pesky little raccoons were coming up for a visit. I saw their beady little eyes and badit looking faces. I jumped up out of my chair and shone my flashlight on them and started making noises like a crazy woman. Thankfully they only stayed around a couple of more minutes before they ran off. When Ammon and the kids returned only two minutes later, they were gone. I tried to tell them what happened, and no one believed me. I sounded crazy!!! But now I know, no more being left by Ammon with a lantern, a fire and myself....raccoons are always sure to show up!!!

At night (usually around 8pm or so) we'd enjoy dominoes by the lantern light before heading to the bathrooms to brush teeth and head to bed. Crazy that we were all usually in bed by 8:30pm since it had been dark for hours and there was nothing else to do! Dominoes has become one of our favorite family games now.

Tomorrow I'll post about our first cave adventure....

Our life day to day...

2011-12-02T14:09:00.000-05:00

A lot of times when I have the chance to get on here, it's to blog about some great event we've experienced, a fun adventure when we travel or holiday celebrations. But there are times I realized I need to just document the day to day in our home which I am going to try to do a bit more around here. Cooking dinner, homework, styling lots of little girls' hair, how we are dealing with allowances, etc. We are a busy family and while things are getting only busier and more tiring, it has been really fun to watch and enjoy the changes that are happening in our family with growth.

Ammon continues to amaze me with his optimism and personal growth at work. If I were in his shoes, I would not be so positive and happy about what I do or the work load he carries. I was thrilled when a nurse snapped this picture of him a couple of weeks ago during surgery. Without going into too much detail for HIPA reasons, he removed this huge tumor out of the patient's abdomen. It was so fun to catch an actual glimpse of what Ammon does multiple times and a day, and bless the nurse who captured a visual picture of it!

I have reached the 31 week mark of this pregnancy!!! It is always rewarding when you cross those "ten week" marks and now I am in the final one. People ask constantly how I am doing. To be honest, not great and this has been a hard pregnancy. The hardest yet. I still throw up at least three times a week and need to be on the medication constantly. This is the first time in five pregnancies I've been this sick. Being sick is one thing...being big pregnant and uncomfortable is another, being both at the same time...NOT FUN! My energy is gone too which is hard to celebrate the holidays and keep up with the zillion mom things but that's life and I am grateful to be having this experience.

Other than that, we are axiously awaiting this sweet ones arrival. My doctor has set my induction date for Jan. 24th, 7 1/2 weeks from now and it's nice to know there is an end coming in sight! I have been just starting the process of buying her some clothes. We can't use much from the other three girls, at least with the newborn-6 month clothes since they were all late spring/summer babies. I haven't bought much but have fallen in love with some of the outfits I have gotten. I even picked up a matching dress to her sisters and can't wait until all four girls are dressed up together. We still have some major things to purchase...a stroller/carseat, a crib mattress, some sort of dresser/tupperware drawers, bouncer, diapers, formula and a diaper bag but we financially have to wait until after Christmas to afford it so it's been nice to not have to worry about the extra clutter of all that stuff yet.

1. The one for bringing her home 2. The matching "sister" dress 3. One my mom got for her when she was here

4. The one I waited and waited for it to go on sale, and when it finally did it was the last one left!!

With four kiddos relatively around the same age, you get to do fun stages sometimes together!! Brynlee officially lost her first big tooth a week ago. Now she matches Hailey's big tooth hole from the accident two and a half years ago. They look even more like sisters and twins now!! (The dentist informed me last week that Hailey has about one year left before her big tooth should come down.) Since this picture was taken, Hailey has since lost her first bottom tooth, making that gap in her mouth pretty big. This tooth fairy is going to be very poor in the next few months!! I even actually got a little weepy with the loss of Brynlee's big tooth. For me it's a cross over into getting to be a big kid. You lose that innocent baby smile and the big teeth come in and it takes a couple of years for your face to grow into them!! That sounds terrible but it is a bit of an awkward stage and it signifies growing up to me which I am not ready for this fast!

We had the primary program a few weeks ago. My mom and sister were able to be in town for it, so it was extra special that day. The kids did such a great job and it was the first time that Ammon and I sat together without any kids by us. It was a strange feeling to have all of them up on stage together and all in primary. They all had their parts memorize and Ethan sang in a trio too. I was so proud of the good job they did. This is one of my new favorite pictures of them too (taken after the primary program).

Karli-always my helper and finding ways to make the chores fun! She used her plasma car to help unload all groceries one day. Nevermind that the milk came in all muddy and dented from the numerous times it was dropped on the plasma ride from the car to the house, but hey...I didn't have to do the unloading all by myself!

Pictures of our two redheads at home!

Daddy's buddy...and her wax lips from Halloween.

One of the things I've tried to do this year, before the baby comes, is try to attend the kids' different field trips with them, to get a little more one on one time and with Karli in preschool, I have only had to get a baby sitter once so far. It's been really nice to be able to do this before I am homebound when the baby comes. So far I've been able to go to La Chatelaine (a french restaurant), the firestation and next week the ice cream store with Karli and her preschool class. The firestation with Hailey and her girl scout troop. Ethan and his class to Slate Run Farm and with Brynlee and her girl scout troop out to the Girl Scout Camp for an evening of dinner, star gazing and space crafts. It's been a fun experience so far and I am grateful for the time to be able to do it and time to see them with their friends.

Karl's fieldtrip to La Chatelaine to see how bread was made for "B" week.

Firestation with Hailey's troop

Stargazing with Brynlee's troop

And Slate Run Farm this week with Ethan's class

The boys I was assigned with for the day...luckily they were all good and some of Ethan's closest friends.

Getting the corn ready for the animals

LOL!! Ethan made the whole of turkeys mad and spent ten minutes by being chased by them. It was soo fun and he loved every second of it!!

Some of Ethan's good friends (Izzy-the one in the red hat is secretly the one that Ethan has a soft spot for....shhh...she's also the daughter of the kids' kindergarten teacher).

Karli got to bring Beaugard the Bear home with her from preschool and spend two days with him. She got super attached and brought him everywhere...dance, the car, etc.

Karli also made this chain with me for counting down when the baby comes. She was asking me about twenty times a day when the baby was coming, when Christmas was, when Trevor and Katelyn were coming, etc so one Sunday night, she and I spent an hour making this chain together. She gets to rip one off a day. The fall ones were for November, the red/green for December, blue for January and pink for the week that the baby is due. Before (there were about 20 more links on here!!) it was so daunting to see that many circles and know I had to be pregnant that many more days. Now though, it is nice to see that slowly (very slowly!) that chain is getting shorter and it is one of the first things Karli asks to do when she gets out of the bed in the morning.

We've been working on projects like crazy lately for school. It seemed that all four kids had something in the same week. Ethan had to make a board game with all kinds of details he had to include...his turned out like an Ohioland (similar to Candyland) with real buckeyes as the playing pieces and real places in Ohio as the mini lands. Brynlee had to design a robot. We gathered the supplies together at home but then she made it and put it together at school. She did a great job and the "cleaning room" robot turned out so cute. Hailey (not pictured) had to do a big Fantastic Reader project with all kinds of book illustrations and descriptions that she had to do. These projects kept us up well past ten o'clock a couple of nights in a row! Needless to say, I sure hope that was it for a little while or at least until after the baby comes!

Hmm....and finally we got Ammon's Christmas schedule. He's on call the whole week before Christmas, Christmas Day, the day after Christmas and post call two days after. This is the most he's ever been on call at once so we are celebrating Christmas on December 28th. The kids have written to Santa to let him know that he'll need to come back a few days later so he doesn't miss our house. This residency schedule stinks but that's why I lived up Thanksgiving so much. We'll just look forward more to New Year's this year and celebrating Christmas when Ammon is home and rested. I wish I had the energy to take the kids skating or sledding in those days while Ammon is gone but I'm think we'll be watching movies, burning energy at the park, preparing for the baby and playing with playdoh and the Wii. It will be nice to be closer to family again someday and be able to visit people when Ammon's on call.

The four day tale of decorating our Christmas tree...

2011-11-30T22:32:00.000-05:00

Tonight I quickly wanted to blog about decorating our Christmas tree because it was a much different experience than it has been in the past. While it's been a similar tradition in our house year after year, this time it was very different than what I was accustomed too.

Normally in our home, we set up our tree the day after Thanksgiving and Ammon even had that day off this year. But, we had Trevor and Katelyn still in town and it being their last day, we put Christmas aside and had a major fun, full day instead. With Ammon on call Saturday, we were finally able to get the tree out Sunday....lol, Sunday night after church and dinner. But that's when reality hit. At 31 weeks pregnant and this being Ammon's crazy time of the year with new applicants and all the dinners he has to attend, plus call there isn't a lot of energy left as parents in the evening.

Sunday we managed to get the actual artificial tree assembled.

Monday we gathered the energy to get the lights up. And thankfully it was easier and faster this year with the kids able to help with this part. LOL...and that's it. That's as far as we got.

Last night (Tuesday) Ammon had a dinner and Ethan had basketball practice and by 10pm there was no time or energy left in the day.

So that left tonight...now Wednesday...It has NEVER taken us four whole days to get a tree up. I can't even recall if it has ever taken us longer than one afternoon!! Ammon got home from work and we left for the cub scout pack meeting 10 minutes later. Two hours later, at 8:45pm, we pulled back into our driveway and the kids begged to finally put the ornaments on. Everything in my tired body (I went on a six hour field trip with Ethan's 4th grade class today) wanted to sigh and say, "No you guys...we'll just do it tomorrow" and post pone it one more day.

Then I remembered Ammon was on call tomorrow and wouldn't be home until Friday. Darn it! So, Ammon and I looked at each other, read each other's thoughts, and told the kids that we would do the ornaments tonight. They were excited!

Rasmussen tree-2011

Now, normally we have a decorative tree upstairs that we've been doing the same way for nine years now. Then we've always had the kids' tree with their special ornaments in the playroom to enjoy all of December. Since you can tell just how long and how much energy it took to get one tree up, Ammon and I decided to go simple this year and not bother with the basement tree. We didn't add the gold ribbon, we left all our decorative bulbs in their boxes and instead brought the kids' ornaments boxes upstairs and combined the two trees into one.

That's when the sweetest (and loudest!!!!) 15 minutes of decorating went down. I wanted to remember this part of the evening most especially tonight. The kids were thrilled with each ornament that was pulled out of the box and the memories from all those years and Christmas' came flooding back. They couldn't believe that some ornaments were from five, six, seven years before. They loved the ones grandma had sent in year's past. Sometimes they would pull out one of their ornaments they had made at school and say "Awww...I decorated this so cute". They loved seeing Ammon's ornaments from when he was little, like the one he got as a seven year old in 1985. I personally loved unwrapping the ceramic hands their Aunt Emily made for them of the their handprints a couple of years ago, and watching them place their little hands on them now and seeing how much those handprints had changed. And every once in a while they came across the memory ones like the nutcrackers I got last year after we took them to see the Nutcracker on stage, or the Abraham Lincoln one we got in Illinois last summer on our big trip. It only lasted 15 minutes with six pairs of hands able to decorate it but it was impressive when it was done. (Just don't look too close at the ornament placing...I may have to fix some of the clusters before they wake up in the morning!)

When all the kids climbed into bed, I turned off all the lights and stood back looking at our tree. I got a little choked up thinking of how many memories are on those branches. It wasn't the bulbs I was used to seeing hanging from the tree. Instead, I saw our life displayed in clusters all over and how fast time is passing. I couldn't believe how many ornaments represented Ethan's life and how many Christmas' he's been around and before long he will be mission bound. I also couldn't believe that next year there will be another little person (albeit crawling or walking!!) trying to grab at all those ornaments on the tree and that next year's tree may have to be decorated from three feet high and up! Our parenting years are going fast.

Ammon and I talked tonight about how we are really in the best part of raising kids. We are no longer the newlyweds with infants and toddlers. Our kids are getting older and we have reached the parenting stage we used to talk about in college...we are in the thick of parenthood right now and it is passing by quickly. Our kids are old enough to remember these traditions and the memories associated with each of them.

There was something really enjoyable about going simple this year and while it took us four days to get one simple tree up, it was worth it for tonight and the joy the kids found in the whole experience.

Well, seeing how long that process took...I'm accepting that it may take a whole other week to get the outside lights up on the house! Are we just getting old and tired or does this coincidently coincide with being huge pregnant and a fourth year resident? I'd like to think it was the latter or we had better find some major energy somewhere before we add a newborn to the mix!

Thanksgiving Break

2011-11-29T18:18:00.000-05:00

This was by far one of my most favorite Thanksgivings ever. In 8 years of Thanksgivings here in Ohio, we've only ever had family one other time when Chelsea came to visit three or four years ago. I did miss a lot of the friends that we have celebrated with in the past and will always remember those happy past Thanksgivings. We've had so many friends that have become family over the years and I wouldn't replace that for the world, but it was really fun to do Thanksgiving in our own home, make the whole meal and have family in town visiting. My family has been so great the past couple of months with coming to visit and has gotten me through what usually is my hardest time of year. I am so grateful to them for helping pass by the time and this pregnancy with their visits!!

Karli was so, SO excited for their visit and asked everyday when they were getting there. She couldn't think of anything else. Trevor and Katelyn (my younger brother and sis in law) arrived Monday evening and we had a great week. Ammon was on call Tuesday to Wednesday but other than that, he was able to be around most of the time T & K were. Trevor and Katelyn were incredible with the kids and I can't wait to see them as parents of their own kids in the future. They entertained them, let the kids hang all over them, did their hair, tickle fights, read stories at bedtime, etc. The kids were in heaven!! During the week we were able to go to the science museum by our house-COSI, swim at the gym, play racquetball, play multiple lacrosee games in our yard, go see the movie Hugo, out to eat, make music vidoes and play games.

It was a fun, relaxing but busy couple of days.

Hanging Out...

We love that Katelyn is a hairstylist! She gave all the girls trims and styled their hair so pretty everyday!! Here are some of her creations!

Visiting COSI

War Heads Candy-

T & K bought War Heads to test the kids and see what kind of reaction they would get. It worked like a charm and the next series of pictures were so funny. Sorry there are so many but it made me laugh to see all the kids' different expressions as they went from excited, to actually tasting the candy, to disgusted, to eyes watering everywhere!

We lined them up and got the happy little reactions before they stuck them in their mouths...then watched what happened with those sour little candies!

Thanksgiving itself was really fun. Ammon and Trevor went and played in the Turkey Bowl with our ward and a couple of other wards in the morning. I was so happy Ammon had someone to go play with this year instead of heading out alone. That left Katelyn and I to take care of the disgusting, raw turkey. We laughed, we gagged, we made faces and we got the job done. Katelyn was a trooper as this was her first time cooking a Thanksgiving meal and turkey. She stuck by me the whole day and was such a help! It was nice to have someone to share my misery with and the turkey actually turned out well!

While I was finishing parts of the meal inside, they played an intense game of lacrosse outside in our yard. It made me laugh to watch them all out the window while I made the mashed potatoes. Thanks to Katelyn, I have a lot more pictures than I would have because she got many while we were bringing the food down. I was grateful to have someone else behind the camera!

During the day, we also watched the Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade just like when I was little and the kids enjoyed seeing all the floats on TV. The boys, when they returned, were a great help with peeling all those potatoes too.

The kids made crafts during the day too which was really nice to keep them entertained and happy with all the cooking that we had to do.

These don't have face but bean turkeys....

And apple turkies like when I was little for the place settings. And yes, their "wobblers" as Ethan calls them, were creatively made with already chewed Halloween gum. By the time I found out, the wobblers had already been made! Yuck!

Our turkey!

I love these two! My brother is so grown up now...crazy!

Look at that huge tummy!!! Looks like I ate the whole turkey myself! ;-)

What a handsome turkey carver!!!

This year we had a 20 lb. turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy (always made by Ammon!), stuffing (recipe from when I was young), new this year-sweet potato casserole (made by Katelyn as done in her family), cranberry salad (adapted from our Thanksgivings with the Bowens), green bean casserole, rolls and sparkling apple cider like I always had growing up. It was a great feast and it reminded me of so many people and past Thanksgivings! For dessert, I went easy this year!! I decided Giant Eagle could make the pies and we ordered chocolate and pumpkin....so easy and so good! Next year, I want to remember to add cranberry sauce for the turkey, regular jello for the kids, and another vegetable for color and some nutrition...brussel sprouts (like the Rowleys do?)-hmmm...I'll have to think on that one...

I don't why I love this picture but Katelyn captured the meal...the loaded plates, the different sparkling ciders (apple and grape), the disgusted expression of Hailey trying something she didn't like and the multiple glasses of cider that Brynlee downed! It was delicious!

Someday I hope we are in a home with a large dining room, instead of our cramped playroom, surrounded by toys and dress up clothes, but nevertheless it was a good day. I have nothing to truly complain about. We are thankful and grateful for so much in our life and it made me look forward to more Thanksgivings in the future spent with family and maybe a little closer to home.