YOUTH CONFERENCE & BIRTHDAY

Talk about a crazy week. Thursday – Saturday was our annual Stake Youth Conference for church. Being YW President, attending most of it comes with the territory. We had 13 teenage girls plus adults stay at our home. This is my crew, I love them to death. They showed up Thursday night and announced they had a well-concocted plan if I went into labor. I said really? Christina was like “I am totally ready to deliver you because it would be totally cool just as long as no one died... Brittany (who does not yet officially have a license) is going to drive to the hospital, and the others are on the towel brigade”. The humorous part was they were completely serious, it was all planned out and “well researched”. Luckily for all parties involved I made it though the weekend, baby still intact.

I will admit by Saturday night after two nights past 1am, 12 hour days, a three hour service project in a cemetery with a 109 heat index and 38 weeks pregnant, I was completely and utterly exhausted. If I would have gone into labor last night, I am dang sure I would have slept through it.

Today I turned 28. Jared took the girls this morning so I could sleep in until 9:30. Growing up I always said I would never get married until 28…..now I am married with 2.9 kids and this is what I look like (mom you wanted a preggo photo, thank Erin for her great photography skills). And I wouldn’t change it for the world.

Jared got me a really nice Swiss hiking pack, which looks pretty hideous on me at this point. I am having this dilemma on how people go shopping with three kids, especially since Eliza can slide out of any shopping cart belt ever made…..I think Jared just solved my problem. I figure we will not be backpacking until at least until fall, but it’s big enough to put Eliza in when I go to the grocery store. I could just pack her in on my back; the material is breathable and has a hydration system in it. It would be perfect minus the fact it would probably look like I was hauling around a rabid badger….cps probably frowns on that eh?

Anyway, spent the afternoon at church and then Jared fixed dinner (chicken basil pasta and brushetta). Minus the point he cooked three pounds of pasta, it was wonderful. Erin helped make a cake and once again I am ready to hit the hay.

Bottoms up

This little guy finally decided Sunday night which way was south (lets hope he stays that way). Most babies face frontwards or backwards, he decides to face left, still not perfect but he still has a few weeks to rotate and its a much better situation. I was really getting concerned and not a big fan of the c-section thing, did some of the fun home exercises and guess it worked, or he just decided it was time.

I am now 37 weeks, and all lights are green, guess we just sit and twiddle our thumbs for the next three weeks and wait for the mad 30-mile dash in rush hour traffic downtown.

Brazos Bend

Some of my Young Women kids have what I call Boy Scout envy. They are always asking why as a girls youth group we don’t go camping, especially since the scouts go every month. This year I petitioned for a little extra money in our budget specifically for camping and it was approved.

So Friday night I headed to Brazos Bend State Park with 18 girls, ages 12-18 to go camping. We were anticipating about 10 would make it, but almost everyone did, which made it really fun.

Since I am 37 weeks along, I figured it was best to take Jared just incase I went into labor. We also took Erin and Eliza and several of the other leaders took their families.

Brazos Bend is a beautiful park known for its century live oaks and its alligator sanctuary. And they were out in full force, its mating season and we saw them everywhere. However, they were not the animals to be scared of; the raccoons at the park are malicious.

When we set up camp, I explained to the girls that there can be no food in their tents…no food, no candy, no toothpaste, no deodorant. It took about three raccoons unzipping tents and tearing through backpacks before they understood it. The last was the blood curdling scream at 1am when someone who was sleeping rolled over to snuggle up to one of the little critters.

Erin entertained herself most of the night by throwing rocks and running after raccoons that came into camp. She thought it was a great game.

The weather at night was beautiful for June (upper 60’s). It was perfect for sleeping, minus the fact I spent most of the night completing what I was thinking camping so pregnant, it was mildly uncomfortable to say the least.

Saturday morning, the girls went hiking. I made it through the night without going into labor, so we skipped the hike and went to the nature center. I was really proud of Erin, she pet a snake (several actually), a tarantula and a baby alligator. Eliza was enthralled with the alligator skulls that showed how big they can open their mouths. And Eliza was very found of the raccoon, which she kept of referring to kitty.

We took our fishing pole, but forgot bait. Erin really wanted to go, so Jared took a rock and tied it on the end of the string so she could catch a “rock fish”. This was one of the guys lurking below our fishing pier.

Finally around noon the summer heat caught up to us and we headed home. It was a really fun weekend and the FIRST time we have gone camping in Texas that we have not camping in sheeting rain.

Now I have to survive youth conference this week and then this little guy can come….

A Life in the Day of Eliza

Eliza has decided to hit her terrible twos just about the time I am so preggo I can’t keep up. Yesterday we had a rough day. I was cleaning the kitchen and they were both in the living room…hiding under the bar between the kitchen and living room where I could not see them. Erin denied collaborating in the crime. I walked out to see my wallet completely emptied. It took me over two hours to recover my debit card (toilet), drivers license (garbage can), temple recommend (washing machine) and one insurance card (under the couch). I decided that was enough to survive for the weekend. I am still missing my credit card (I decided it was just easier to put a stop on it and order a new one), insurance cards, grocery store cards, library cards and pretty much the rest of my life…..and that little incident sent the tone for the day, no one was in a good mood.

Eliza was being a pill. I was in the office when out of the corner of my eye I say something go over the stairs with the thunk, thunk, THUD…..Eliza had stuffed herself in a cylinder container and manage to bounce down the first flight of stairs it in. She actually scared herself for once, but for the first time that day I got a good laugh.

This is Elizas little friend Mikey. Typically she is really mean to him, but has been much nicer lately. Last week he was over and she decided she wanted to serve him dinner. Being a boy, he wasn’t into it, so when he got up for the table, he got a plastic strawberry (yes the same one I dig out of the printer a few months ago) chucked at his head.

Let hope this baby is born with a helmet on, I have a feeling the middle child syndrome is already starting.

Well I am off, I just heard….”Mom get down here and see what Lizza did”…and Friday begins….

Directional Funk

Jared had Friday off so he decided to tag along to my midwife appointment downtown and meet a few of them and get his crash course in how to deliver a baby if needed (for historical reference click here).

Everything looks great; minus one thing…this kid has got to figure out what direction is down. I am 35 ½ weeks and he is transverse breech (perpendicular to where he should be). Titi (the midwife I saw yesterday) was not overly concerned, she said he is a small baby and I still have plenty of fluid for him to turn. But he is cutting it a little short for comfort. If he does not turn by 37 weeks there is an O.B. in the office that has a successful external inversion rate. So for the next few weeks, if I get desperate enough, I may attempt the funky yoga positions, standing on my head in the water, and my favorite thought…. sticking a flashlight down my pants or putting a pack of frozen veggies up your ribs since babies tend to turn towards light and away from cold :) If that is the only little hiccup we can deal with that.

Jared got his crash course on how to deliver a baby if for some reason we are stuck in traffic on I-45. I think he was relativity relieved when her directions consisted of:

“The baby is going to come with or without you. Take lots of towels; turn on the car heater to keep it warm and WHATEVER YOU DO DON’T CUT ANYTHING!”

After the appointment we met up with Derek and Britt for lunch and then rented a pedal boat at Hermann Park. It was just a fun day out with the family.

Memorial Day Revamp

We had a great Memorial Day Weekend. Saturday night we hung out with some good friends and played boxing on the Wii. Jared can now proudly say he knocked out his pregnant wife.

This morning our ward had their annual pancake breakfast. There was a great turnout and for once it didn’t rain. Jared played kickball with all the little kids and I sat with Eliza as she chowed on watermelon.

Britt and Derek came over about lunch time. I loved our nursery, but for some reason the big purple daisy on the wall was not “manly” enough for Jared’s mini-me. I am too lazy to repaint the whole nursery so Britt and I just revamped to make it a little more masculine. We just painted over all the flowers (the green is the same, the photos were taken at different times during the day). It only took us a few hours, which was really nice so we had time to take the kids swimming.

Jared requested ribs for today. It has been years since I have tackled ribs. I forgot to marinate them the night before, so when I woke up at 2am this morning, I decided I might as well get it done. We cooked them in the oven for three hours and finished them on the grill and they were finger licking good. We had a great dinner, which resulted on me going on a walk so that great dinner does not add to my already swelling kankles.

Rude Awakening

Jared never he told me he was half Klingon….

Eliza was out a few nights ago playing at the neighborhoods house. By the time I got home Jared had put the girls to bed and said Eliza was a little warm. I saw some of her new fangs pushing through so figured she was just teething. I checked on Eliza about 11 pm and she was burning up…temp 104.2. Its not uncommon for my kids to run a fever that high, but the weird thing was her head, hands and feet were incredibly hot and the rest of her body was just warm. We gave her some motrin and were up most of the night, but the fever would not break under 102 until late morning.

I thought it was odd it was just a fever, she was not sick, but then again there is a lot of viral stuff going around. Thursday morning I woke up early and took Erin to her graduation practice and Jared brought Eliza right before the ceremony. When he sat down I looked at her face and her forehead was swollen, there was this massive hard knot right between her eyes. Our kid looked like a Klingon. The photos does not do it justice, her forehead was huge! We had no idea what it was from, but coupled with the high fever and a bloody nose I figured it was time to take a trip to the pedi office. I called and said I didn’t think they were related and asked if it was worth coming in and she said get in right away…

My suspension was that it was a spider bite,….after two hours of patiently waiting with two kids at the office the doc I saw decided it might be a bite….two hours and I got…”just watch it and if it gets worse come back.” Great thanks. I often wonder why there is a co-pay due for visits like that.

Today she is feeling much better but still swollen.

Trooper School Graduation

Erin is officially done with preschool for the year, now the question at hand is how am I going to entertain for the next three months? She has a late birthday so its one more year of preschool before starting kindergarten.

I was really impressed how much she learned over the past year. She can now write and identify all of her letters, recognize several words, and is picking up on the concepts of counting and math.

They had a really cute ceremony for those who are graduating and those returning for one more year.

In Full Bloom

For the last three years I have tinkered around with growing veggies, always have good luck with peppers, but tomatoes....they are my nemesis. I learned early that Iowans have gardening easy; you turn the sod, plant in the spring, pull some weeds and harvest in late summer. Here the growing season is year around, which is great, but you have to get plants in at just the right time. And there is no organic matter in the soil. They recommend growing tomatoes in pots because the soil is so nutrient deficient and if you do plant in soil, they recommend dousing them in fertilizer.

Mu goal this year is to go 100% organic in the yard. This spring I had a huge compost pile ready so Jared and I laid out a small 4'x8’ plot just to test how things would do in the ground. I assumed everything would die, so we just went down to Houston garden center and got a bunch of $1.25 plants (Houston garden center is the equivalent of low quality street drugs to a heroine addict, it feeds my gardening addiction for cheap) … Our result, 5 monstrous tomatoes plants! So much for the peppers this year, I think the tomots took everything over.

This week we had the first fruits and they were amazing, although I think only one actually made it to the kitchen, several times I found the girls sitting next to the patch devouring anything that was red….not that I can get mad at my kids for eating raw veggies. Hopefully by the end of next week, those little dollar plants will be in full production.

A Sunday Evening

Erin woke up Sunday morning with the stomach bug. She threw up most of the morning, but was feeling better by dinner. Oh the joys.... :)

Eliza decided to try on her new ISU outfit Grandma Sue sent her for Easter. After Erin being sick all morning, I think she was starved for attention....

Date Night - House of Blues & LIVE

It’s been years since I have been to a really good concert. My days of mosh pits and body surfing at concerts are long gone. But when we heard LIVE was coming (LIVE who was LIVE?......Throwing copper, Lighting crashes, I alone, Dolphins cry…. I’ll give you a minute to reminisce your glory days of the mid 90’s) we ordered some tickets and went with our friends Zoran and Melissa.

I was a total dork and forgot my camera, but the concert was at the Houston House of Blues. If you haven’t been before I HIGHLY recommend it. It’s a more mature venue, no mosh pits, no smoking, no crazy - naked people (although someone did throw their white grandma-looking bra up on stage and the lead signer looked a little digested). It’s very small and intimate venue with great acoustics and good sounds balance. It was a really interesting crowd, everyone from teens to an old grandpa in the balcony that rocked out the whole time. We had general admission tickets, which were standing only, I figured being pregnant I would be stuck in the back, but the crowd was tame and we were about 20 feet from the stage…..It was awesome!

LIVE put out some good tracks over the years (their new stuff is a lot more mellow) but they are great in concert! Good voices and just a great, fun stage performance. It turned out to be a really fun, relaxing night…one last major date night before the baby comes…

This one of their new tracks....

HEAVEN

Seriously, Enough with as Erin calls it "The Pig Flu"

Love the Houston Chronicle online since people can leave comments. I got a good laugh out of this one...

Article Title: WHO: Up to 2 billion might get swine flu

Comment with quotes from this article:
"The World Health Organization says up to 2 billion people could be infected by swine flu, if the current outbreak turns into a pandemic."
WE ARE ALL DOOMED!!!!!

WHO flu chief Keiji Fukuda says the number wasn’t a prediction
WHEW, I THOUGHT WE WERE GONERS....

Fukuda says that with a world population of 6 billion people, it’s “reasonable” to expect that kind of infection tally.
OH NO, WE ARE GOING TO DIE!!!!

He said WHO is unable to know what the future holds, and it is impossible now to say whether the pandemic would be mild or severe.
SOUNDS A LITTLE SHAKY, ARE WE ALL GOING TO DIE OR NOT?

WHO has said it believes a global swine flu outbreak is imminent, and last week it raised its alert to five, one step short of a pandemic.
NOW IT'S CONFIRMED, WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE.

...This conjecture is not factual news, it's fear mongering.

Photos

Its been a long week, but I don't have time to write, however here are a few photos of the girls....


Eliza is hitting the self- reliant two's. She mandates that she dresses herself....we are still working on that :)