Sami's World

Sunday was a busy day. We both had to teach, Scott taught Sunday School and I taught two Sharing times. Both of our lessons went well and Keri once again slept through all of church and woke up as the closing prayer was being said in primary. Speaking of closing prayers, Afton HATES nursery. Worse than any of our other kids ever have. She starts crying as soon as the closing song is being sung in Sacrament meeting. I feel bad for her, but with both Scott and I teaching first hour, we don’t have much choice. She seems to cope though and the leaders say that she only cries for a few minutes and then calms down. I sure hope they are right. Scott stayed over to firm up the details about Keri’s blessing in Fresno. I brought the kids home and got them changed and almost fed and then went back and picked up Scott from church. Once the little ones were napping and Keri was content, we started the jam. We made on batch of apricot and one batch of plum. Both seem to have come out good. We haven’t tried one yet, but I’m sure they are awesome! We spent the rest of the day trying to stay cool and getting cleaned up for the arrival of Joy and kids. It was such a hot day made 10 times worse by the jam making but that was ok. We did have fun. The kids got to bed super late, but it was too hot to put them to bed sooner. We stayed up a while longer to get a few more things done and then I crashed with Keri. Scott was finishing up a few more things and Joy arrived.

Monday July 7, was a fun day for all. The kids were very excited to see each other. They played really well. Then we went to one of my friends house to play in her backyard and chat. That seemed to go well. Unfortunately Alix woke up not feeling to well but seemed to play ok. Then she just got worse. By the time we got home she was awful. She didn’t say anything hurt but her head and she was running a fever. She didn’t want to eat or drink. That was a little scary but she seemed content to lay on the couch and sleep so I just let her. After we got home from our friends house we had some quiet time. I actually slept a bit. Joy went to the store. Then I started cooking dinner. Jen Hansen in our ward just had her baby and so I was taking dinner to the family. We had decided to eat Mings, the best Chinese food place in the area. But unfortunately they were closed. We didn’t realize this till it was too late. So I took dinner to the Hansen’s and we ate some burgers and fries. That was ok though, they were good and we were all hungry!! After dinner and after Scott got home, Jaime got her first birthday celebration. A joint party with her cousin Kenneth. They both blew out a candle, opened presents and made themselves sick on brownies and ice cream. It was a great party with a happy ending. The kids stayed up late again since it was so hot but that was ok, they won’t be seeing each other again for a while I presume. They all get a long so well it’s fun to see them together. Joy decided to crash “early” with her kids while Scott and I stayed up to do some much needed chores and take care of Keri till she decided it was her bed time! We managed to get to bed before midnight….

What fun we have had since we last met….

July 3rd was our first official swim of the summer season. It was also my busiest day since Keri was born. We were all up and dressed and out the door by 7:45am. I dropped Milo off at Toby’s house, then picked up the Hooks (a cute couple in our ward) to take them to the airport. We didn’t hit any traffic and I was back home by 9 am. I had arranged to pick up Milo at 9:45 and Jessie Bennett so we could go swimming. We did just that. We went to Jaime’s piano lesson at 10 then got to the swimming pool by 11. My friend Laura just opens up her pool each summer and invites anyone who wants to to come swimming. Swimming went really well. Actually we had quite the adventures. Afton was first. She thought she could swim by herself and so in she went. Luckily she did have a vest on so she kept swimming circles (back to front) and gasping for air each time she was up. Jaime pulled her out for me. Then Milo decided he could swim and jumps right in (no vest on) once again Jaime was right there and rescued him. Except he decided to do it again when Jaime wasn’t there, but Niah was and he pulled her down too. Jaime and I joined in efforts to pull them out. Other than that, everyone was safe…. Neither Milo or Afton would get in the pool again though!! I hope they are not ruined for the rest of the season. Keri did pretty good. She slept in the beginning and end, but was awake in the middle but was good so that was fine. We left by 2 ish and were home by 3. We did some chores and got ready for dad to come home. Yay for us!!

Friday July 4 was a great day. It started out with an 8 am breakfast at church. We got home by 10 and were going to clean the garage but realized the inside needed some attention so we focused on that instead. By 12:30 though I was spent. I guess everything finally caught up with me and I petitioned to Scott that I go take a nap and he finish the house with the kids. He very kindly agreed and I went and crashed. I slept from 1 to 3:15 when Scott came in and hesitantly woke me up. We were suppose to be at Joey and Gayle’s by 4 and he knew we needed to get ready. It was hard to wake up but 30 minutes later I was down stairs ready to go. The house looked awesome, I really appreciated that! We got to Joey and Gayle’s house by 4:30 and got to meet Nina, their one month guest. It was fun to meet her and learn all about France (where she is from). The kids seemed to enjoy her too although they were a little shy at first. We had a wonderful meal (it always is!!) and then watched a Jerry Lewis movie. I have never seen one before and the first one we watched was pretty funny. Unfortunately he reminded me way to much of Jim Carey and I don’t like that guy. Anyway, after that we shot off some fireworks (they live in Newark and we can do stuff like that). There were fireworks going on all over the place. We could see ours plus two of their neighbors were out in the street too! We could also see someone having an air fireworks show which brought the police down the street to see if it was us. Not sure if they ever got caught cause the “show” went on for quite a while! Niah didn’t go out to the street she was too scared. Keri was asleep and Afton insisted that I hold her the whole time. No we don’t have any pictures, we left the camera at home. We did sparklers too, the kids seemed to enjoy that. After fireworks we had dessert and one more movie. We got home by 11:30 pm and we were all pretty tired, but it was well worth it.

Saturday July 5, we spent the morning cleaning the garage. It was a hard job but it had to be done. We emptied the garage, swept it out and then organized everything. We filled the back of our car with D.I stuff and were happy to rid ourselves of some of our junk. It’s so easy to accumulate stuff and so it feels good to get rid of it. The garage is so much better now and easy to walk in and easy to find the stuff we actually use!! The kids mostly played with the neighbors while we cleaned and all had a good time. It wiped us all out though. Mostly because the night before was such a late night. But we got it done. The kids did a few chores that needed to be re-done (funny how that works, chores need to be re-done….). We have a lot of fruit that has been given to us by ward members. We can eat a ton of fruit so I make the kids have self control and I make jam with some of it. However I needed pectin and so we decided we’d do the jam making on Sunday afternoon. So Jaime and I went out Saturday night after dinner in search of pectin. It was harder to find than I had thought and it was EXPENSIVE!! For the last three years I’ve been using pectin that I bought at Albertson’s when it was closing out. I could buy a 2 pack for $2. I’ve never had to actually buy it for the real price, ouch!! Anyway, we also got Jaime’s free ice cream from Baskin Robins for her birthday. She enjoyed that VERY much! The rest of the evening was spent handing Keri back and forth as we both tried to finish our lessons for Sunday morning.

It’s been way too long since I have updated anyone on our life and happenings.

I left off on Monday June 16. The 17-19 were spent getting used to the baby! Scott took the week off and he became Mr. Mom. He did a great job and I butted in every once in a while to put in my two cents, but mostly I just took care of Keri and Scott took care of the rest of the gang. It was a warm week and so we spent a lot time trying to stay cool. Lots of water activities and staying inside.

Friday June 20 we decided it was time for our first family outing. I planned the perfect afternoon with a time table. Not sure what I was thinking, new borns don’t do time tables very well. We were suppose to leave at three. Keri woke up at three and wanted the works. So we changed fed, changed, fed and finally left by 3:30. We had some extra chuck-e-cheese tokens and so we went and used those up first. The kids had a great time for an hour. We then walked across the parking lot to Chevy’s. The kids were awesome and we enjoyed a nice dinner. We were suppose to be at Milo’s last sports class by 6pm but didn’t arrive till 6:20pm. He still was able to have fun and participate in a game of soccer. He scored the first goal and was really good about getting in the crowd and trying to kick the ball. It was such a warm evening that we stayed and played at the park. We left at 8pm and headed home. We put the kids to bed and sighed with satisfaction that our first family outing went so well! Keri did eat once while at chuck-e-cheese but slept the rest of the time. What a gem!!

Saturday and Sunday were both very low key and easy. Scott took four kids to church with him and Afton and Keri and I stayed home. It was fun to play with Afton one on one and boy was it quiet!!

Sunday evening after all the kids were in bed, Scott and I were discussing how the last week went and how the kids seemed to need more that what we had done and on and on. I thought about it all night and Monday morning, June 23, I woke Scott up at 6:30am and informed him that if we wanted to accomplish something wonderful that week we should replace the downstairs flooring like we have been wanting to do. He looked at me like I was an idiot. I told him all my reasons why and finally he agreed. We had breakfast, our morning devotional and then we told the kids our plan. Monday would be rip up day, Tuesday and Wednesday new floor day and Thursday & Friday clean up day. They were all VERY excited and jumped right in to help. The first thing to do was to move all the furniture. So we used kids’ rooms and the garage and the play room to move all our books, computers, furniture etc

Monday went as planned. We even did a little more than expected. Tuesday started out great. We had to clear all the flooring of nails and other debris so we could lay the new sub flooring. Unfortunately that took a little longer than we had expected it too. We got a little bit of sub flooring laid and then we had to be done for the night. Wednesday was VERY slow. It took longer than expected to lay the sub flooring and we barely finished before it was too dark to continue. That was ok, we could have the flooring done by Thursday late afternoon and still start moving furniture back. Nope!! By Thursday morning we had all lost enthusiasm for the project! Keri decided to have a rough day that day. The other kids were all done being ignored (at this point there wasn’t much for them to help with anymore) and we had to go to Home Depot 4 times before 11 am because we kept forgetting that one thing! Needless to say, Scott got ditched and ended up finishing the project all by himself while I took care of the kids. Lucky for us Google is so generous with their employees and we were able to eat out every night for dinner. We had cereal every morning on the picnic tables outside. The kids said they felt like they were camping!! :0)

We started moving in furniture Saturday afternoon. We did enough to have a table and a couch. Sunday we moved a bit more. We’ve been slowly moving things in and it has been slow!! But it looks GREAT in here. Scott did an AWESOME job. We are grateful for such a great owner and I am grateful for such a great husband who is willing to take on these silly projects of mine. The next project…..the backyard!!

Besides the floor project we have done a few other things.

On Saturday June 28 we went to a wedding reception for Robyn Hutchings (no longer Hutchings). It was fun to see their family again and see how much they have grown and changed.

On Sunday I decided to go back to church. Because of the principle of the matter, I stay away from church for at least 4 Sundays, but I feel so good and am doing so well, I couldn’t see any reason why I should stay away. Keri is doing really well too and she slept the whole time so no one touched her or asked to hold her so I didn’t have to worry about germs or anything. It worked out very well.

Monday June 30 Keri had her 2 week appointment. That seemed to go well. She is a happy healthy baby. She now weighs 11 pounds 3 ounces. They still have her height at 22.5 inches. Her head grew an inch and is now 15 inches. She is in the 98% for all her stats. I’m sure she’ll even out eventually, all my girls do. Monday was also my first day ALONE!! I think it went ok, I guess you’d have to ask the kids! We worked on the house a little bit but mostly we just tried to get a routine going that involved Keri too.

Tuesday July 1 was a fun day. My friend Erika from Brentwood came to visit in the morning. They got here about 10 am and stayed till 1. That was fun and helped to fill the morning. Then my friend Li-Li came over at 3 and we made egg rolls together. That was fun and YUMMY!! Since it was kinda late it served as our dinner which was AWESOME! No cooking for me! Yay!

Today, Wednesday July 2 I was suppose to go to an appointment for Milo in Oakland. It was just a routine speech appointment. They just want to reevaluate him every year to make sure he is still progressing. I got a call about 2 hours before the appointment telling me that it was “canceled and by the way we will no longer be seeing Milo here. The craniofacial team has been eliminated from Oakland Children’s hospital. Goodbye and it was nice to know you.” Well, that’s not what they said exactly but pretty much. I guess if he “qualifies” he’ll be recommended to a new team in San Francisco, or Stanford, or somewhere, otherwise we are on our own. We have to wait for some letter to come in the mail before we’ll know for sure what’s in Milo’s future. So for now we just live life and wait for the letter to see what our next step is. We’ve always said that part of our desire to stay in this area and keep Milo’s insurance as it is is because we liked his craniofacial team so much. I guess we are being forced into change. I’m sure there is something better out there for Milo and we will need to find it.

Things seem to be going well. The kids seem to be adjusting well to our new life. I’m hoping to get more done around here and get more motivated to start doing some outings. The weather is so beautiful. The kids do spend a lot of time outside riding bikes and walking and playing with our neighbors.

Guess that’s all for now. Much love to all and we hope you all are doing well too!

Before I forget:

Yesterday, Saturday June 21, we were outside and Milo comes up to me and says ‘Mom, why is that you only make baby girls?’ I had a really hard time not just bursting out in laughter. I happily explained to him that Heavenly Father gets to decide if I have a boy or girl and that He’s decided we need a houseful of girls. He seemed satisfied with that answer and went about being a little boy!

Since I didn’t report on the happenings of the week before Keri was born, I am back tracking a bit for my own journaling purposes.

Wednesday, June 11, I was officially over due. I had a doctor appointment that morning. So I left Grandma Thompson with all the kids and headed to my appointment. The doctor decided to check me and was VERY surprised with the results. He said he was very surprised that I was even in the office that day and was sure I’d deliver before the week was out but would not be surprised if I delivered that day. Normally I think a woman would be excited to hear that. However, where I am concerned I’ve heard all that before and still have gone 2 more weeks. So I just laughed at his reaction and made a new appointment for the next week. I ran a couple of errands before coming home. I took a nap. In the afternoon we got out the cool sprinkler that Grandma got the kids and they all had a GREAT time getting wet and enjoying the warmth of summer.

Thursday June 12 was the official last day of school for Jaime and Alix. It was a good day for me because that meant I didn’t have to log in everyday and take attendance. Yay for me!! In the afternoon I took Jaime to piano and went for a walk. Besides being too hot and coming home with aching muscles, I don’t think it helped labor much!!

Friday, June 13 was the day I did not want to have the baby. I’m not really superstitious, but I didn’t want any of my kids to have a Friday the 13 birthday follow them the rest of their lives. My friend Mary Jo has one child born on Friday the 13 and another child whose birthday is 06/06/06!! Anyway, the day went well. I can’t really remember what we did during the day but as soon as Scott got home we had a FAST dinner, loaded in the car and went to Milo’s sports class. We were a little late, but got there in enough time to enjoy the class. I think Grandma enjoyed watching Milo play. Since it was Grandma’s last night we decided to have a party. So we stopped by Wal Mart and rented a movie from Redbox. We got Alvin and the Chipmunks. Grandma Thompson made some grandma Nielson popcorn and we ate popcorn and some cake someone gave us and watched the movie and had fun. The kids all went to bed with sadness at knowing they would not see grandma in the morning. Milo kept insisting that he was going to get on the plane and go home with grandma. It took a lot of convincing but finally he relented and went to bed knowing he would not see grandma in the morning.

Saturday, Scott got up early and took his mom to the airport. He got home a little after 5am and went back to bed. Sometime later, perhaps 6, he came to me and said he was going back to the airport to pick up his mom. To make a long story short, the airline said she did not have a reservation and that her flight was scheduled for Monday afternoon. No amount of convincing would get her on a plane, so, Yay, we had grandma for two more days. Oh ya, they did take her luggage. So all her stuff made it to Brawley just fine!! You should have seen the kids surprise when they woke up to see grandma. We still went on with the day as scheduled. We did our usual Saturday chores. Then in the afternoon Scott took the older kids and grandma to the store so grandma could have some clothes to wear for the next couple of days. When they got home we ordered pizza for dinner. We had to get the kids to bed on time so that we could have a successful Sunday.

Sunday, June 15, started out as any other day. However, Niah woke up pretty sick and, since grandma didn’t have clothes anyway, opted to stay home with Niah. We all wished Scott a happy Father’s day and gave him a few gifts. Milo gave him his light saber (which he gladly took back when Scott suggested Milo hold it for him). Jaime got him some swedish fish. The kids and I made a picture thing for him that says WE Love DAD. Scott loved it and the kids and I enjoyed making it. I think it was a successful father’s day so far. Grandma Thompson had promised a dinner of fry bread and homemade chili. Too bad we didn’t end up getting to eat it!! We went to church and it was a farewell for the Eyre’s in our ward. He has been called as the mission president in Canada. So the chapel was packed and so was the overflow. I felt like we had gone to a Sacrament meeting in Utah. Lots of little kids and lots of people! Sacrament meeting was great. The primary kids sang to their dads in between talks. After Sacrament, everyone went to their classes, except Afton. She decided nursery was not for her and pitched a huge fit. Since Scott was not teaching his class (he had gotten a sub in thinking the baby would have been born already) he took Afton and kept her with him while I was up in primary doing my stuff. The kids made paper bow ties to give to their dads for Father’s day and then we put a bag of M&M’s behind each tie. This is when it’s really good to have 4 kids in primary. Scott got four bags of M&M’s. What a lucky dad!! The rest of this story has been archived so I won’t write it again.

Monday, June 16 was grandma’s scheduled departure and my day to come home. So Scott found his mom a ride to the airport (Thanks Camille!!) and a babysitter for the kids (Thanks Lina!). He said his goodbyes and came to the hospital to get me. It was like pulling teeth to get out of there. We finally managed to get released by 1:30pm. We got home a little before 3 (soooo much traffic!!). The kids had made Keri a welcome home sign and were all VERY anxious to see her. After we did a round of holding, Keri was ready for some comfort and food. Lina left after we got settled and then things really got moving!! All the kids wanted another round with Keri (except Milo who didn’t want to go near her!!) and then we needed to do a little cleaning up and getting ready. We still hadn’t done anything about a bed for Keri, so we took care of that. We had dinner of pizza and soda (Thanks Jen Hansen!) and then put the kids to bed on time. We all needed it! Keri’s first night seemed to go well. I was pretty tired and so was VERY lazy about putting her to bed. She spent most of the night sleeping with me! We sure did miss having a grandma here the first week. Usually our kids spend the first week sleeping with their grandma. I guess I never really realized how good I had it!

That’s enough for now. I’ll get caught up again very soon! Till then much love!

I do feel bad that I haven’t posted anything to my blog. I was planning on posting something Sunday after church but I took a nap instead, good thing too…..

My water broke at church on Sunday. No it wasn’t a gushing in Sacrament meeting or anything! I went to the bathroom right after church before going downstairs to have root beer floats in celebration of Father’s Day. The water broke in the bathroom. I went down stairs as casual as I could. Talked to a few people, gathered the family and went home. I was going to try and do something productive in the early afternoon but just fell asleep instead. I woke up at 3 and Alix and Milo wanted to go for a walk so I did. At 3:30 I went upstairs to keep from being “noticed” when I had pain. By 4 I was in a HOT shower. We left for the hospital by 4:30pm. Hayward was full, Santa Clara was full so they sent us to Oakland. An hour later when we get to the hospital I was in a good amount of pain. We checked in a little after 5:30 and the baby was born at 6:45. When I got to the hospital I was at an 8, 90% effaced and 0 station. They rushed me into the room to have the baby but I just got distracted and frustrated and nightmares of 3 more hours of labor hit me and so I demanded an epidural. By the time the dr got there, asked me all the questions, I signed all the paper work and they inserted the needle it was time to push. I had the epidural for about 3 contractions, 3 pushes and they turned it off (a total of about 10 minutes max!!). But it was nice. Since it took a little while to wear off they were able to do a small repair inside, push on my tummy and move me around and I felt no pain. By the time the epidural wore off I hadn’t experienced any of the after birth pain. It was worth it to me.

Here are the stats:

Keri Ann was born on Sunday June 15 @ 6:45pm
She weighed: 10 pounds 6 ounces
Her length: 22 1/2 inches long
Head circum: 14 inches

She’s very happy and healthy. They were a little concerned about her blood sugar levels but they were all normal and rising each time they checked. We were discharged from the hospital today, Monday June 16 @ 1:30pm. The kids were all excited to see us come home. They made a welcome home sign for Keri and all wanted a chance to hold her. Except Milo, he has been a little apprehensive about holding his new sister. I’m sure he’ll get a desire to hold her soon. Afton, on the other hand, keeps walking around saying ‘I hold it, I hold it.’ It’s VERY cute.

Well, with only 3 hours left of the day, I suppose this baby will be considered “over due”. I’m ok with that…. :0)

I haven’t had any signs of labor. I have an OB appointment tomorrow, we’ll see what he says. Perhaps it will happen tonight and then I won’t have to go to my OB appointment.

I’m really glad that grandma Thompson has been here. The kids have enjoyed her tremendously. They get to play a lot and they get to be “spoiled” for a week. Jaime has learned a new song on the piano, learned to crochet and has learned to curl her hair on her own. What a great experience this has been for Jaime.

We miss grandpa a lot. He was here all day Saturday and half of Sunday. On Sunday morning I walked into the bedroom and Niah runs up to me and says ‘I’m going to marry grandpa!’ I told her she had to ask grandma. So she asks grandma. After a moment of thought grandma agrees. She runs up to grandpa ‘I get to marry you!! Lets get married.’ I told her she had to have a ring to give him. She said ‘No I don’t, he already has one.’ Boy was that little girl VERY happy. After grandpa had left and Niah woke up from her nap, all of a sudden she draws in her breath and her eyes get really big and sadly she says ‘I forgot to marry grandpa.’ I couldn’t help but laugh. She required a hug and some reassuring and then we decided she’d have to marry him next time she sees him. It was a very cute exchange!!

Saturday was a fun day with grandma and grandpa. Everyone just enjoyed a lazy morning of talking, wrestling and getting ready for the dance recital. Jaime did a great job once again and we all enjoyed watching her. Niah went on Saturday with grandma, grandpa and I. Scott stayed home with the other three. After each number Niah would turn to grandma and say ‘Wow, that was a great dance!’ She is going to be our next dancer, I’m sure!! Jaime was in the first number and then in the 5 number which is a VERY fast clothing change and her costume was quite involved. So I told her as soon as she went off stage I’d run down to her dressing room and get her ready. By the time I got there (about 2 minutes) she was already done with the hardest part! It was an eye opening experience that she is growing up and really doesn’t need me that much anymore. It was kinda sad for me! She was more than capable of doing her costume change without any help from me. After the recital we came home and then Scott and I left for about an hour. There is a girl in our ward that does massage therapy and said she’d give me a foot and hand massage to help me relax and sometimes, it helps to start labor. It was an amazing massage, the first “professional” massage I think I’ve ever gotten, and it did relax me very much, but as far as labor, no help!! But that’s ok, it was still a great experience. After that we came home and had pizza and then bed for the little ones. The adults stayed up for a while talking and enjoying each other’s company. We tried to get to bed early so we would be ready for Sunday.

Sunday was stake conference so we didn’t have to be at church till 10am. That extra hour really makes a difference. We had time for a nice sit down breakfast, wrestling and leisurely dressing times. We even brought a church bag. We gave up on taking things to church about a year ago, it was getting to be too much work and didn’t seem to help. But for two hours we realized we needed it. The kids were awesome!! We were very pleased by their behavior and we even made it to the end. As soon as we got home we had some lunch and then we had to say goodbye to grandpa. Too bad, we miss him very much. We took the chance to go for a family walk, without grandma though, but perhaps she enjoyed the quiet time. After putting the kids to bed we talked and then we all crashed too.

Monday, June 9 was a lazy day at home. Just the same ole’ routine but with an extra adult. That helped a ton!! I was able to get some school work done with Jaime and Alix and the little kids did not feel neglected. We did chores and naps and made dinner. We had shakes for dessert, FHE and then bed. We had a late bedtime because it was a hot day and it would not have worked to put the kids down any earlier. We stayed up late and watched a Atlantis. Grandma had not seen it so we all enjoyed it together.

Today, June 10 was an easy day. We spent the morning getting ready to go to Jaime and Alix’s end of the school year party at the park. I left early with the girls while grandma braved the little ones today. We ran a couple of errands and then went to the park. It was a great turn out and lots of good food. We played some relay games and just had a great time. We got home about 2:30 and I crashed. The kids watched a movie with grandma. After I woke up we got everyone dressed and headed to Wal Mart. Mostly because we all wanted to get out of the house and we did need a few things. After an hour in Wal Mart we went to Costco. After another good hour (or more) in there we finally told the kids we would go home. They were VERY good in both stores and we really had a good time with them. After a dinner of hamburger and french fries, we sent the kids to bed happy and tired.

Here we are tonight enjoying the cool night air and each other’s company. We are very glad that we are a family and all the kids are excited to have the baby come home. They are also very glad that grandma is here and they are all campaigning for her attention. She is so good about it and seems to please them all in the end.

Milo has been keeping us all in stitches. In his prayer the first night after grandma and grandpa were here, he said ‘Please bless grandma and her foot and bless that mean old bad dog.’

Grandma told Milo how cute he was and Milo informed her he was not. Grandma told him that she thought he was cute. Milo said ‘everyone says that I am cute, but I am not cute. I’m COOL.’ Grandma said ‘ok, you are cool and handsome.’ Milo agreed and was happy again.

Well, once again I’ll sign off with the proclamation that I may not write again for a little while. We shall see. Good night to all and happy dreams.

Well, I decided I should write an update now since you never know what could happen in the next 3 days. Although, knowing my luck, I’ll have plenty of time to update you on all our “adventures”…..

Monday June 2 was my trip to the tire place. I decided to make the appointment as early as possible so we could come back and still get things done. We left by 7:30 am. Our appointment was at 8 am. We got there with 5 minutes to spare. They were done by 8:45, I ran one errand and we were home by 9:15am. Plenty of time to get a lot of things done. Except I was exhausted by then and so we did nothing!! We ate again, everyone was hungry by then. The kids played. We did naps, a little school, I took a nap and then it was chore time and dinner time. When Scott got home we went out to the backyard and did another family clean up. The kids were awesome and we had a ton of fun. For dessert I made a Greek pastry we had eaten on Saturday that we all loved. It basically turned out to be fry bread made into balls and soaked in honey. It was amazing and VERY YUMMY!!

Tuesday was very low key. Nothing on the schedule. We made up for the lost time from the day before.

Wednesday June 3, was my “busy” day. We had P.E. in the morning. It was the last one till the end of summer and so we did a picnic. I made some cupcakes for all to share and it was a very fun, relaxing event. We didn’t get home till 2:30. Enough time to get our chores done and dinner cooked before Scott got home and Jaime and I ran off to Dance Recital Rehearsal. We got there in enough time to realize it was HOT in the dressing room and we could not hang out there except to change. Jaime and her class did well during the practice and we got home about 9:45pm. ***After dinner, I was bathing all the kids and getting them ready for bed so Scott could put them to bed as soon as he wanted to. I had Jaime, Niah and Afton in the shower and Milo and Alix were goofing off. I didn’t mind because it gets too crowded with all of them together. Anyway, just as I was getting Afton and Niah out (Jaime was already done) Alix comes bursting into the bathroom crying and blood coming from her mouth. She was way too upset to talk so I had her spit out the blood into the sink so I could see what was wrong. She spit 3 mouthfuls of blood into the sink before her mouth was clear enough to look at. I still had a hard time figuring out what she did. I had Jaime get back into the shower and help the little ones finish rinsing and then got them out (this while Alix is spitting blood into the sink). So what did she do? Her and Milo were trying to navigate the upstairs with their eyes closed. Alix decided she’d try and climb through the opening between her bed and Niah’s bed (they have bunk beds). She was about to go through and then somehow brought her head down on the bottom of the opening and bit her tongue (I figured out later she bit it all the way through). The blood finally stopped and her tongue was sore and bruised, her lip was swollen and bruised and she had a little cut on her chin. She was one miserable little girl. After a quick shower and a lot of love she finally calmed down. Anyway, when Jaime and I got back from the rehearsal she was up crying. Scott said she had not slept well since he put her down and he was trying to put some orajel on her tongue. Finally we were able to get some motrin down her and then we sat up for about 30 minutes trying to help her calm down. Both girls finally got to bed about 11pm.

Thursday was another “busy” day. I had my ob appointment at 9:30pm. I dropped the kids at the babysitters at 9. Got to my appointment on time. The dr was running 30 minutes behind. That’s fine. I read a good magazine….. Everything is fine. The baby is in position and I have another appointment next week. After grabbing the kids we came home and had lunch and naps. We had enough time to do some school and then we got ready for piano. After we got home from piano we made dinner. After dinner I got the kids bathed and Scott helped me put them to bed. I ran to the store for some last minute groceries while Scott mowed the front lawn. We actually had everyone in bed on time, even us!

Friday, today, was a busy day. We wanted to get as much cleaning done as we could so that when Grandma and Grandpa Thompson arrived, we could just enjoy their company and not worry too much about cleaning. The kids were awesome! They had everything done by 12:30 and even some extra stuff. We spent the afternoon eating lunch, doing a little bit of school and then watching a movie (after all, we didn’t want to dirty the house we just cleaned!!). I took a little nap in preparation for tonight. Scott got home at 4:45, the babysitter came at 5. We did a quick run down and we left by 5:15pm. We took Jaime and Alix out for dinner and then we headed over to Jaime’s dance recital. Scott and Alix found their seats no problem, I got Jaime down to her dressing room (with fan in hand. There was NO way I was going to spend another night in that hot dressing room. During and even after the show I had moms and girls thanking me for bringing the fan!), no problem, we went to change Jaime, NO TIGHTS!! AHHHHH!! I run upstairs, ask Scott to run to the nearest store and buy some. Even then he wouldn’t have made it back. Lucky for me there was a mom there from Jaime’s dance class who said she had an extra pair of tights and Jaime could use them. Yay for mom’s with extra stuff!! The recital went off without a problem. Everyone danced well and all the girls enjoyed themselves. Jaime felt like the queen of the night. It was also fun to go out to eat with just the older girls. It’s a much different experience than with all 5 kids. We got home by 9:30pm and the babysitters reported that all was well. They fed the kids, took them to the park, bathed them and put them to bed. AWESOME!! I took them home while Scott put Jaime and Alix to bed. We put the finishing touches on getting ready for grandma and grandpa and now Scott is out getting them at the airport and I sit here tapping away at the computer.

Scott has been awesome this week on working on my to do list. He has pretty much wiped out most of the list. The things left a big projects that require a Saturday to do. I’m so grateful for him and his willingness to do the things that need to be done and he does it with a smile and he even involves the kids if he can. What a great husband and father I have. Thanks Scott.