All Hallow's Eve

No matter how prepared I THINK I am, I always end up running around like a crazy person trying to get everyone's costumes ready for Halloween the NIGHT OF. It all turned out peacefully and the kiddos had a blast. By the end of the night, Courtlyn was EXHAUSTED and crying and Landon and Nathan were flying high on sugar. SO glad we only do this once a year. :)

Cheese 'n' Rice!!!

I feed Courtlyn quite frequently. And quite frequently she fills up her diaper shortly thereafter.

Yesterday, on just such an occasion, Courtlyn EXPLODED and made a lot of noise in the process. Immediately after, I hear my son in the other room say "Jesus Christ" quite loudly. My first thought was, "Did he REALLY just use the Lord's name in vain?", followed by, "WHERE did he pick that up from?!"

Then, to my relief (and amusement), I found him sitting on the couch with his "kwippers" looking at a picture of our Savior.

:)

RefrigeRAIDER

Help yourself there, buddy.

6 weeks: Long and Lean

You know the line of jeans at Gap called Long and Lean? I use'ta'could wear 'em. I don't even know if they still carry them, but it doesn't really matter either way because I can't wear them now! *sigh* But my daughter is well on her way. :)

Courtlyn had her 6 week well baby visit today. There's good news and bad news. The bad news is that she had to get three vaccinations and it broke my heart. Ugh. I hate that. The good news is that she's growing quite well! I don't think I ever posted her two week stats, so I'll start with those for comparison. :)

Two weeks: 7 pounds, 4 ounces put her in the 25th percentile
22 inches long put her in the "I don't remember which" percentile

Six weeks: 9 pounds, 4 ounces jumping her up to 50th percentile
23 1/4 inches runnin' with the big dogs in the 95th percentile

So there you have it, my baby girl is Long and Lean. :)

Her growth wouldn't be properly documented without some pictures!




Aren't her little sneakers just "adorable"? Hehe!!

Grandpa Neil

I hesitate to share this in such a public setting, but I really feel like I should. :)

This picture is of my Grandpa Neil holding my mom when she was 10 days old. (We think Courtlyn kind of looks like her here.) (Wow, I just realized that means this picture was taken exactly 45 years ago, tomorrow.) (Sorry for divulging your age, mom. :) )



His face is so filled with love that it nearly brings tears to my eyes every time I look at it. My Grandpa Neil passed away from pancreatic cancer when my mom was 19 years old. Therefore, I never knew him. At least not in this life. Even so, I have from time to time felt very close to him. When I was a little girl, I remember dreaming of him. I would tell my parents things of him that I didn't have any way of knowing. For some reason, I felt bonded to him. I loved him!

As I got older, those experiences became less and less frequent, until they stopped all together. I was 7 or 8 years old the last time I remember "feeling" him. I didn't think of him often at all after that. Until last summer.

My mom and I went to Texas last August to visit my grandma. While were there we went "treasure hunting" in her garage. This picture was easily the greatest treasure we found. We took it to the photo lab and made copies for each of us to have.

That night, I could not sleep. Everyone else had long drifted off, so I sat downstairs in the quiet, with this picture in my hand. From the time we found it, I just couldn't help but want to stare at it. His eyes are so captivating. (Okay, I know this is probably the most "flowery" post EVER, but there is no other way for me to describe it.)

As I sat there, suddenly all those feelings I remembered having as a little girl came flooding back. My eyes welled with tears, and I KNEW he was there with me. It was undeniable and so incredible. I'll never forget it.

Fast forward to about a month before I had Courtlyn.

Landon and I were having lunch, but we were both kind of quiet. Landon is NEVER quiet and coherent at the same time, so I was certainly enjoying it. :) Then Landon started to talk, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. After a minute or so, I finally figured out what he was talking about. Or WHO, rather.

This is an excerpt from an email I sent my grandma not long thereafter:

Speaking of Grandpa, I have to tell you something crazy but so heartwarming. The other day Landon was talking about wanting to see Grandpa so-and-so but I couldn't figure out the name he was saying because it didn't sound like any of his grandpa's. Then I finally figured it out. He was talking about Grandpa Neil. When I asked him if it was Grandpa Neil he wanted to see he said, "YEAH!!". It nearly brought tears to my eyes.

When I didn't hear back from her, I got worried. But a few days later I received a hand written letter in the mail from her:

Lace,

I just read your e-mail. Grandpa was very close to you. You knew him like Landon when you didn't. At times like this there is a new life so close I think our loved ones watch over us a little closer.

She goes on, but I'd rather save the rest of it for just my family.



Anyway, like I said, I don't know why I felt I should share that, but I did. Maybe even just to have it written here in the closest thing I have to a journal. These experiences strengthen my testimony even more of the promise we have of everlasting life and eternal families. I hope that my children can feel the same love for their ancestors the way that I do. It has been such a blessing in my life.

I haven't had much to blog about in the last three weeks! Maybe I don't get out much? Maybe it's because I'm physically attached to an adorable baby girl that doesn't get out of the house much herself. :) Soon we'll be on a more regular schedule and "the happenings" will start happening again.

In the meantime, here are a few more pictures I took of that sweet baby girl.

More Courtlyn

Here's Clint getting suited up. It all happened so quickly that no one got a picture of him in the whole thing!


Proud big brothers.

SHE'S HERE!!!

Courtlyn Belle made her grand debut on Tuesday, August 18th, 2009, at 5:41 pm. She weighed 6 pounds 12 ounces, and measured 20 inches in length. Her daddy got to deliver her!!

I woke up Tuesday morning to leaking fluid. We got up, got ready, stopped at Sonic for breakfast, and then headed to the hospital. Long story short: I needed pitocin to increase my contractions, cried from the pain they caused, just about sang praises when I got my epidural, labored painlessly for another 2 hours, then had her out in about 5 pushes. Our totally awesome doctor suited Clint up and let him deliver our daughter. Although speedy, it was one of the most amazing experiences ever!

We are all doing well, and loving every minute with our new sweet baby girl. She is such a blessing.

I'll have more pictures to post once I can get my dumb card reader to work.

Nursery Nightmares

Last night Landon was wailing in his sleep. I got up and checked on him and when I went into his room he was crying/talking:

"NO!!! Dat's Yandon's puzzle!!!"

Considering his plaything of choice at home is anything with wheels, I'm left to assume that he usually plays with puzzles at nursery. He was really chewing someone out for taking "his" puzzle!! Any of you nursery mom's want to 'fess up to your kid being mean to mine? Huh?

Guess what we're having for dinner?

3D ultrasound

Here's our nameless baby girl!! These were taken last week at 31 weeks. They're not the greatest, so we'll get more next week when I go again. Hooray!!

Her mouth is open in this one.

A Fabulous Sunday

Today was the best Sunday I've had in...a long time. It was really, really great.

Getting everyone ready for church was a bit chaotic, but that is to be expected. Once we GOT to church is when the UNEXPECTED happened. I ACTUALLY heard everything that was said from the pulpit and felt the Spirit so strongly.

In one hour...

*Clint exercised his Melchizedek Priesthood authority for the first time by participating in a baby blessing. So awesome.

*Clint bore his testimony for the first time in Sacrament Meeting.

*The opening and closing hymns were both patriotic which I LOVED (but I was bummed because I couldn't sing either of them).

*I felt prompted to bare MY testimony for the first time in many, many months and acted upon that prompting.

*I bawled like a blubbering fool.

The End.



Oh wait. Not "The End". Primary was great too!! One of the other teachers had to leave early, so I had her kids in my class with me. We had a great lesson on missionary work and learned about Ammon and King Lamoni. The kids loved that Ammon chopped off the "bad guys'" arms! lol

Anyway, just thought I'd share my "feel-goods" for the day. And I also thought it might be a good idea for me to blog a bit about my spirituality. Ya'know, so that my posterity can know that I'm into that sorta thing.

Women Pee

That's right, Son, they sure do. You may find that many may try to deny it (along with the denial of other bodily functions), especially in their adolescent years, but women do indeed pee.

That thought came to me after Landon sang an excerpt from the "ABC" song that went something like this:

"H, I, J, K, Women, Pee...Q, R, S..."




P.S. I procrastinated a TON of blog posts, but I got caught up tonight!! See below.

No-poo

Okay, some of you may have read about my no-'poo experiment and have asked about my experience. Basically, I haven't shampooed my hair in a month. When I first heard of this concept, I pictured nasty dread-locks and stench. But that was back when I lived among the hippies in Flagstaff. I have since learned that not shampooing doesn't necessarily mean not CLEANING. So for those of you that are freaking out, don't worry, I still clean my hair.

Since I stopped shampooing and started using conditioners and styling products that are free of silicone products (CONES are evil), I have found that my hair is much healthier, shinier, easier to manage, and CURLIER! I used to have wave to my hair, but now I've got full blown curl. Nothing "kinky" (haha! I couldn't help it.), but curl nonetheless.

I've chronicled this experiment in photos for your viewing disgust, I mean, pleasure.

Week one:


Week two:


Week three:


Week four:



Oh, and as a funny side-note, at my doctor's appointment last week, I asked him if I should be concerned with the fact that I haven't "poo'ed" in three weeks. He just about had a heart attack. Ha!!!

YAY for Little Debbie!!

We are so blessed that Clint has a job that supports our family and also gives him such a great amount of time off.

This year's annual company party was a lot of fun!! We're not frilly, foo-foo, uptown kinda folk, so SCOOTERS in Bullhead was great, in our book. ;) In addition to the fabulous food (pizza, subs, PICKLES), there was an arcade, go-carts, a bounce house, and BINGO!!! BINGO was so much fun!!! Landon sat with us while we played and every time the caller would call out the letter/number, Landon had to repeat it as loud as he could. You know, just in case someone missed it.

June 11th

We celebrated our forth wedding anniversary earlier this month! We were originally just going to drop the boys off with one of the grandmas, order take-out, and rent a movie, but Clint informed me earlier that day that he wanted to take me out instead. Okay! I'm all for going out! We had dinner at the Hualapai Mountain Lodge. It was so pretty up there! We had both been craving red meat so we ordered the prime rib. Oh. My. Heck. It was FANTASTIC. My mouth is starting to water just remembering it. Yum-ohhhh.

There was a huge window right by our table. The deer come right up to check everyone out. Nevermind the bale of hay. ;) Clint commented that it was a good thing there wasn't venison on the menu because that would just be awkward.

We had a great time together! After talking about the last four years together, we decided that this last one was much better than any of the previous. Our first year was spent just trying to figure each other out. We are both very stubborn. Let's just say that it made things interesting. ;) We also started remodeling our house that year. Yikes. That also bled into year two of our marriage. Our house was in complete shambles and it put a LOT of strain on us. THEN we got pregnant and had a baby! Year three pretty much consisted of surviving the postpartum roller coaster which was LOADS of fun. Not. Which brought us to year four. Like I said before, it was our best yet as a couple.

We know each other's quirks and triggers, likes and dislikes. We know how to argue constructively, and we know how to bring each other up when we're down. We work well together as a team, and that just makes me so dang happy! Gotta love 'im.

Four years and thirty more pounds under each of our belts. :P

Thirty-one

Clint turned 31 in May. I feel bad, because for the last two years I've wanted to throw a big party for him for his birthday. But every year I find myself so bogged down with stress from my job around that time that I completely space planning it. :( One of these years he's going to get an AWESOME party. This year was very low-key, but still consisted of good food, good company, and of course, cake and ice cream.


Happy Belated Birthday, Babe!

Out of the mouths of babes.

I may have mentioned before that Landon doesn't always call me "mom". Sometimes it's "acey", and other times it's "babe". After all, he always hears Nathan call me "Lacey", and Clint call me "Babe".

Well, today in church, Landon was sitting a few seats away on Poppy's lap. He then yelled:

"'nack pease, Babe!"

That made for some looks. lol

Aww, the days of summer.

First of all, I almost posted a mega typo in the title. I hit the "s" twice instead of "w" in "Aww". :P

As so many people have made me well aware, I haven't blogged in far too long. I guess I'm just being blog lazy.

Summer is here! Wahoo!!!!! Some things I'm looking forward to:

*always having an empty sink/dishwasher
*clean laundry for all!
*SWIMMING!!!
*lake trips (we just got our boat re-upholstered and it looks great!)
*eating right (I eat like crap when I'm working)
*early morning/late evening walks
*oh yeah, and a BABY GIRL!!!!

I had an ultrasound the other day and she got the official "girl" stamp. She was breech and face down for so long that we never got a great look, but she finally flipped in the right direction and we were able to see! Hooray!

What else is new with me/us? Not much! Clint started a new route that gives him four day weekends now which is so nice! I love having him home. Nathan is loving riding his bike all over the place. A new family moved in next door and they have a little boy close to Nathan's age and they like to play together which is really nice. So between the neighbor boy and cousins visiting from Kansas for a month, he's not short of playmates! Landon is, well, testing me. HA! His favorite words are "NO!", "don't", and"UUUH!!". Thankfully he throws in a few "Wah-do's (I love you)", and a "pease" here and there. Oh and guess what he calls me now? Babe. Hmmm, wonder where he heard that?

My newest venture is no-pooing! That sounds gross. But I'll have you know that in this context, "poo" is short for "shampoo". Okay, so it still might sound gross to many of you, but I promise it's not! I'm already getting great results and my hair is much healthier and easier to manage than ever before, so POO on you!! :P I haven't shampooed my hair in 9 days now! But it's clean, I promise!



What is summer without a kid occasionally running around in his diaper?



Cheese grin:

He's TWO!

Okay, so he was two about two weeks ago. So I'm a little behind! We had his party the weekend after his birthday, so these are pictures from both his actual birthday and his party. Grandpa James, Grandma Bonnie, Uncle Tanner, Aunt Brianna, and Uncle Austin all came up to celebrate his birthday with us. It was great having them visit! We had a big breakfast, and then BBQed burgers later in the afternoon, followed up with some yummy birthday strawberry/pound cake deliciousness.







His party the following Saturday was complete with good food and good company! We had several friends drop by over the course of about FOUR hours. It made for a long day but it was a lot of fun to visit with everybody. Landon's big into cars, monster trucks, and anything else with wheels, so his cake was none other than that! However, there was a slight (well, not so slight) goof-up on my part. I made the cake the night before and I didn't want it to melt/slide, and since there wasn't much room in my refrigerator, I put it in the freezer thinking that if I took it out early in the morning it would thaw in plenty of time. Yeah. Well, the CAKE part thawed, but the pudding filling did not. Sooooo, we had chocolate cake with a vanilla icicle center. :)




One of the things that Landon got from us for his birthday was a big boy bed! Clint picked him out a pair of matching jammies to go with it. :) Landon had fun "helping" Daddy put it together. He was so excited about it! We haven't had a single problem (yet) with him getting out of it.