Giveaway

Here's a pretty awesome giveaway from the website Epiphanie. If you win, you get a choice of either a $2500 gift card to Southwest Airlines or a new Cannon 5D Mark II! Check it out - goes through tomorrow!

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

Zac had to work this morning and I was playing photographer for a birthday party. We all got home around 1:30 and decided that we HAD to head outside. It was a gorgeous day - a little breezy but absolutely wonderful! So we headed to Draper Park with the girls and had a fun afternoon enjoying the sunshine!!


Playing in the grass with Abby's soccer ball. The babies are getting so big! They've really been enjoying time outside in the sunshine and grass. (Can I just say that I think I have the cutest kids ever??)


Last fall, Abby would NOT climb up this rock wall. My big girl is getting brave!


Nor would she go down "the big slide." It is pretty steep but she mastered it today!


What do you do when you have two babies and a pre-schooler that all want to swing? You get creative....



Mmmmm...grass!!


Cami likes to chew on my aglets. (LOL, thanks Phineas and Ferb!)


CHEESE!!!



Emma looooooves to swing!!!

Downtown Salt Lake City

This week we had some friends from Arkansas visit us. Well, that wasn't the main reason they were in Utah - just an added bonus. hahaha Zac was Young Men's president in Arkansas for a couple of years and Joey Brown was one of his (two) boys. We LOVE Joey and are soooo very proud that he will be leaving in May to serve in the London, England mission!! Since he will report to the MTC in England, his family came out for spring break to get all of his stuff and also for a fun vacation.

When friends from AR are in town, I always do my best to get them over to our house....we love company. :) The Browns came over for dinner on Tuesday and we had so much fun catching up. We spent all of Friday hanging out with them, doing the tourist stuff in/around Temple Square. We saw a lot of stuff that we hadn't gotten to yet, which was fun. And I think Abby may be in love...with a much older man. :)





My pretty girl checking out the pretty flowers. "Mommy these flowers are so pretty!!"



Updated family pic in front of the Salt Lake temple. Can't really see the babies...but they were asleep and I wanted them to stay that way! :)



Some things you only see in Utah...and that's probably a good thing...



The Conference Center...this was a really cool tour. Pretty awesome building!



A good shot of the temple.



Joey didn't get all the attention. Abby was pretty fond of Jennifer, too. She pretty much eats up attention from new people...



The real size of the Moroni statues atop LDS temples. He's a pretty big guy...

Growing babies and a bad day

I usually try to save my blog posts for when I have pictures. I'll try to get some up soon but I wanted to update while I have a minute. These babies are GROWING. I know I say that in almost every post; but it just blows my mind how fast it happens!

Cami is pretty much a professional crawler. She's also started trying to pull up on stuff. She can get up on her knees and has tried to move around while kneeling. And she is into absolutely everything! I can leave her on one side of the living room while I go into the kitchen - and when I turn around, there she is crawling into the kitchen!

Both of them can manage to get from a sitting position onto their tummies. Then Cami takes off crawling and Emma starts rolling and scooting along.

Emma cracks me up with her jumping - she's nuts! She not only jumps in her Saucer, she jumps anywhere. If you're holding her, she bounces in your arms. If she's sitting on the floor, she bounces. I'm seeing a future as a trampoline artist or something. :) She's been a little fussy the last few days. I'm not sure if it's just the rest of the yuckiness going away or if she's starting to get teeth. Oh well - I'm not planning on our lives slowing down anytime soon. As long as I keep telling myself that, I think I can handle it. :)

This week has been so crazy busy. It seems like every day has had something going and yesterday it reached a boiling point. It seemed like if something could go wrong, it did. During my crossing, I almost got run over (twice), Abby got out of the car and started coming at me while I was in the road, Emma cried for half of my crossing, the cake I was making for church fell completely apart....ugh. I could go on...

Yeah, I know, pity party, right? My poor, sweet hubby called me on his way home and was totally caught off guard by the bawling, crazy lady that answered my phone. When he got home, he told me to leave and not come back until 10:00pm. Easier said than done since Draper pretty much shuts down at 9. But I walked around JoAnn, got some dinner, sat in the car and read a magazine in an empty parking lot...basically just got out of the house and away from the craziness. And it helped! Today was pretty crazy but I felt better able to handle it. Sometimes we just need a break...and I am so very grateful for an amazing husband that does his best to take care of my mental health. :)

Babies on the move!

My punkins are starting to figure out how to get around in their little world! I wish I'd had a camera with me yesterday; Abby had a playdate and when I picked her up, we ended up sitting on the lawn and chatting with several neighbors from our ward. Moms, kids and dogs all over the place - it was awesome! The babies had their first real experience with grass and loved the great weather! They weren't too sure about the dogs that kept licking their faces but they seemed ok with it. :)

The first video is of Emma doing her favorite thing - bouncing! This girl is crazy about bouncing in her Saucer! (This video really doesn't do it justice; she usually goes non-stop for 2-3 minutes at a time!)






I just took this video of Cami crawling. She's been doing the 'army crawl' for awhile now but in the last few days has really gotten the hang of 'real' crawling. She's not a pro by any means but she can definitely scoot around a LOT faster than I want her to! :) Note: The loud talking in the background is Emma; she was busy rolling around on the floor talking to her toys.

For my crafty friends..

Check out this giveaway for a Cricut!!! Just become a follower of the blog and she will draw later this week. If you don't want it, I'm sure someone would appreciate such an awesome gift! :)

Abby says...

Thursday morning, I was in the kitchen with Abby trying to figure out what she wanted for breakfast. (This can be a long process-she'll eat just about anything but can be indecisive.) Zac came in and told her she didn't get breakfast - she had to get a job. He kept teasing her, telling her she was going to be the fry cook at McDonalds; just picking at her. She was laughing at him and saying, "Noooo, Daddy. I don't have to get a job." When he walked away to finish getting ready for work, she looked at me, rolled her eyes and said, "Uggghh. Daddy makes me crazy!!"

I laughed my butt off, let me tell you....

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This morning, Zac was teasing her (can you see a recurring theme here?) about something. She looked at him and said, "Buzz off, Daddy!"

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She looks like me and acts like me - it's a scary thing, really....

Dance class!!!

Tuesday was Abby's final dance class. She's had SO MUCH fun in her class. The school district is starting another session at the end of the month but since we'll be gone for a good chunk of April/May, it wouldn't make much sense to start. She has told me that she wants to play soccer, too - so, we'll see what happens this fall.

Here are a few pictures and videos from dance class. I, personally, am going to miss the weekly dose of humor that came with it. :)


Sitting on the stage before class with Miss Erin and Ava.


Daddy wasn't able to come to class every week because of work. He made sure to come for her last class and brought her roses. I'm not sure she totally understood why - but she definitely understood that they are HER flowers. She talks about them every morning when she sees them in the vase. :)


Me and my big girl!


The whole class - a cute group of girls. (See the one in the bright pink tutu? She was a stinker, let me tell you...)


Abby and Miss Erin.


"Ballerina Octopus"
This was actually the last dance they did - they were supposed to curtsy at the end but Abby apparently prefers to just bow. :)




"Under the Sea"
Since we are starting to get very into princess stuff, this was one of her favorites.




"Visit the Moon"
This is a cute song from Sesame Street sung by Ernie.

Update...

An update on my little sickos....both of the babies are (slowly) getting better. Emma, of course, caught Cami's RSV. We've been to the Dr for 'professional grade' suctioning but, at that price, we've made due with 'Mommy grade.' Emma also has an ear infection - Cami avoided that one because she was already on antibiotics for her UTI. Emma also has eczema - not sure why, going to keep an eye on that. And I'll be calling Primary Children's tomorrow to set up Cami's kidney ultrasound and VCUG.

Did you get all of that? ;)

Going private...

Ok, here's one of those posts that will (hopefully) get comments.

I'm thinking about making this blog private. I'd leave my recipe blog open to public reading but close this one only to 'invited' readers. The more I think about all the weirdos out there, I tend to think it's a good idea. So (be honest) would those of you who read my blog still read if it were private? What is your opinion about public vs private family blogs?

Cami update...

We ended up in the ER last night with Cami. Thankfully, it was a short, productive visit. They tested her for RSV and it came back positive. I'm sure Emma will probably get it, too. Thankfully they are doing pretty well - we had to hospitalize Abby with RSV twice when she was a baby. So we'll just keep sucking snot and hopefully things won't get too bad. :)

We also heard back about her urine culture; she tested positive for the UTI. So I'll be talking with her pediatrician next week about whether he wants to run the kidney ultrasound and other tests. :/ We'll keep you updated!

Poor Cami...

My little Camers is sick. :( Tuesday she slept a lot - which I kind of noticed but didn't think anything of because she wasn't grumpy or anything. That night, we went out with some friends to a new Mexican restaurant in Draper. (Side note: Definitely the best Mexican food we 've found in Utah. Soooo yummy!) When we got home with the kiddos, we noticed that Cami was running a little bit of a fever. Gave her some Tylenol, off to bed and all seemed well.

Wednesday was not well. If she wasn't sleeping or I wasn't holding her, Cami was crying. She was running a fever (102.7° was the highest reading I got - mostly around 101°, though) and obviously felt miserable. So sad. I talked to the nurse at our pediatric clinic and she gave me a few things to keep an eye on; "Bring her in if she gets worse."

When Zac got home, we ate dinner and then I went to Wal-Mart for formula, diapers, etc. (Had to get out of the house after that day.) Zac had two kids asleep and thought he was home free - until Cami threw up all over him. When I came home, he had bathed her and was cleaning up. I snuggled with Cami and tried to make her feel better but she was pretty inconsolable. She threw up again before we all went to bed - her in the bed with me and Zac on the couch. We managed to get a little sleep but she was up for a large portion of the night.

So, this morning we called the office as soon as they opened and got an appointment. Dr. Clayton checked her ears and throat - everything looked fine. He said it could be a urinary tract infection and, if it was, that could signal other problems. We could either wait to see if she got better or go ahead and test a urine sample, which would mean the nurse using a catheter to get the sample. :( We decided to get that option ruled out, so they got the sample. Poor Cami was not happy about it but, thankfully, the nurses are fast! And we're glad we did it - she ended up having a pretty high level of whatever-it-is. They'll run a 48-hr culture and if that comes back as UTI positive, which we're assuming it will, then we'll have to take her to Primary Children's Hospital to have some tests run to be sure she doesn't have urinary reflux. Hopefully we'll know on Saturday if the tests are necessary but that depends on the timing of the lab...it might be Tuesday before we know.

So, if you have a little room in your prayers, please send one up for Cami. We are treating her with antibiotics, so hopefully she'll feel better this evening or tomorrow.


SIZE UPDATE: Cami, of course, was weighed today and we went ahead and weighed Emma, too. Left their clothes on, so it's not 100% accurate but close enough. Cami weighs 18 lbs, 14 oz and Emma is now a rotund 20 lbs, 4 oz. Fatty biscuits. :)