Christmas!

Christmas was a LOT of fun at our house. First, a few days before we got snow, to get us all in the winter mood. My sisters were in town, and since my parents had nice level grass, as opposed to our gravel and arizona weeds, we headed over to my parent's house to play in the snow. I wasn't sure if I should let them, seeing as they were all sick/getting sick, but I figured, snow only comes about once a year, so heck with it, I'm lettin' em play!

As soon as Cory got to their house, he dropped on the grass and made this snow angel. I didn't even know he knew about snow angels!

Nanny and Bryson went to work on a snow-goat: my mom's tradition. They both had fun working away at it.

My mom initiated a snow-ball fight with her grandsons. Here's Dallin trying really hard to be one of the big boys and keep up with everything!

My mom and the boys and the snow-goat (which looks remarkably similar to a snowman)

On Christmas Eve, we had dinner over at my parents house. We were all sick at this point. We not only had colds, but the stomach flu too. Dallin ended up throwing up at the dinner table on Christmas Eve. Very appetizing. But the enchaladas my mom made were so good, everyone just kept on eating!

After dinner, we all hurried back to my place. My mom and dad gave the boys bunk beds for their Christmas presant! My dad and John spent the afternoon assembling it while the kids were out of the house. My parents and sisters got there a few minutes before we did and hid in their room, when the walked in, they got to see the bunk beds AND everyone hiding! It was awesome!

And now that Bryson has a full-grown twin size bed, Dallin has been promoted out of the crib and into a toddler bed! Hooray for Dallin! You're a big boy now! (And he's only fallen out of it once so far!)

The kiddos all tucked away Christmas Eve. Ahh, I love it!

Happy boys in their bunk beds. These beds now having matching quilts on top, hand made by my mother-in-law! I know I know, these kids are so lucky to be soooo loved!

Looks like Santa has been here - all the cookies are gone!

Bryson REALLY wanted a Christmas tree in his bedroom this year, so here's his little tree, with the empty cookie plate under.

I didn't take pictures of opening presants, only videos, but be assured that they were thoroughly spoiled and had a lot of fun.

After presant opening, we had a seriously yummy breakfast! John made an AWESOME omlette, alongside danishes and egg nog. I think I gained about 20 lbs from this meal alone, but it was soo soo soo worth it!

Christmas breakfast!

Me making a complete pig of myself, and enjoying it!

....and Cory's eye.

We had originally planned on heading over to my in-laws house mid-afternoon for Christmas dinner, but after "the incident" the night before, we decided to stay home. Instead, they brought Christmas dinner to us, complete with a pie sampler of all the different pies. MMM mmm mmm. Thank goodness I wasn't the one with the stomach flu! (oh dear, did I just say that!?!?) My parents and sisters came by during the day too. It was actually a nice change of pace to be able to stay at home all day.

Emotional Rollercoasters - over nothing!

So, ladies, tell me, am I loosing my mind? I think I must have had a new batch of pregnancy hormones today or something! I've been seriously grouchy all day, just everything has tested my patience.

Tonight, to help myself feel better, I cuddle with John. He's wonderful and even makes me laugh. I've been recovering from a chest cold, and as I was laughing, I realized that I sounded like a dirty old man, all wheezy. It makes me laugh more. So, I'm laughing uncontrolably and then I get the sudden urge to bawl. Trying to hold back the tears, and still laughing hysterically, John notices the shift and asks me, "Are you gonna cry?" And I BURST into to tears. He's trying desperately to hold back the laughter (like a good husband should), and I'm just trying to figure out if I'm laughing or crying.

Finally, I am able to control myself. I take a minute to wipe the tears, blow my nose, etc. and I can't help but give a little giggle about what just happened, but I start laughing like a dirty old man again, and the whole process starts AGAIN!!! Poor John didn't have a clue what to do. He just held me. As I was recovering from my second episode I burst into tears for a third time. Yes, that's right, a THIRD time. My wonderful husband just held me again, and only laughed a little. After I had FINALLY got myself put back together he had a few comments like, "Wow, that's the biggest mood swing I've ever seen you have." and "I've heard of that happening before, but I've never actually seen it." and "I'm sorry, I thought I was cheering you up." ha ha ha, the poor guy.

Anyways, I am feeling much better now (not that I even felt that bad to begin with!) I'm just wondering if I'm the only one who's done this??? ah, now I'm going to get some chocolate.

Cory turns 7

Yesterday, my "baby" turned 7! It's so hard to believe THAT much time has passed, but apparently it has. I am so blessed to have Cory as my boy, he has taught me so so so so much, and I love him!

If anyone asked him what he wanted for his birthday or for Christmas, he would answer "Transformers!" without hesitation, so that's what Daddy and I got him. I don't think he actually expected to get them. The look on his face when he saw his transformer was PRICELESS! We got him Megatron and Stratosphere. He was one happy camper!!!

Unfortunately he was sick on his birthday. He caught a cold, and had that tangled up with a good asthma attack. He spent half his birthday doing this:

We had to cancel his friend coming over for the afternoon to make cookies because he was coughing and had a low-grade fever, but we decided to still hold his family b-day party in the evening at Nanny and Grampa's house.

The boys had fun having aunt Isha and Reenie here.

Nanny Goates made her yummy potato cheese soup with some awesome rolls. Cory wasn't really up to eating much, so he hung out on the couch with Aunt Reenie for most of the evening.

Here's their house all decked out in Christmas/Birthday decorations. We had Nana and Grandpa Tilton over for the special occasion, and Jacob came too.

My awesome Dado:

Because Cory's asthma was flaring up, we couldn't light the candles on his cake, but we put the candles in and let him take them out and lick them. That's the fun part anyway, right?

Here's a few pics of Dallin and Cory the day before Cory's b-day. They're all ready for church. They've got the sweetest relationship. Cory puts up with so much from Dallin, and Dallin completely idolizes his big brother.

Dallin looks like he's scheming in this one. ha ha ha

"Cheese" and bunny ears, too bad they didn't come out in the pic!

And here's my baby bump. Not too big yet, but growing every day...a lot. It actually aches because I can feel it stretching every day, and I can literally see a notable difference every day this past week. On Monday I had a monster appetite that just wouldn't quit until I'd eaten anything and everything, and the next morning I literally fell forward climbing out of bed because the weight had re-distributed over night. John just laughed!

Oh, and this is just the beginning. The remarkable thing is that I haven't gained any more weight, despite the growth, I'm holding steady at a 10lb weight gain for the pregnancy so far.

Also, we found out some good news at a doc appointment today, the nodules they found on my thryroid about six months ago haven't grown, which means they are most likely nothing to be concerned about. AND for the first time since this whole mess started, my thyroid levels are right where they should be. I feel so much better, ahhh!

A morning chuckle

So this morning for breakfast, Cory won the toss up of who was going to say the prayer. Here's an excerpt...



"....and Jesus, bless our family because you're so so good at it."



ha ha ha Ahhh, he's sweet.

Uh oh...KABOOM

Well, food is once again tasting good to me. And I mean GOOD, as only a pregnant woman would understand. Like I want to savor every bite kind of GOOD. MMMM

And I crave it all, junk food, healthy food, it's all GOOD. :)

The scary part is that the past three months when food has barely tasted edible, I've put on ten pounds. So now what?? Yeah, just don't answer that.

This is why I gain about 50lbs per pregnancy. ha ha ha

But I have to say, it's worth it.

:)

Officially pregnant!

I never feel officially pregnant until I hear the baby's heartbeat. I guess I have a fear that the pregnancy is in my head and I'm making myself fat or something...I dunno...but either way, I was able to confirm the pregnancy to myself today. And yes, definately prego.

I have never recorded the stats on my pregnancies, and now I wish I had, so I'm going to with this one. Better late than never, right?

I was supposed to have this appointment over a month ago, but had to cancel not once, but TWICE due to the stomach flu (first Bryson, then myself). They weren't able to schedule me for another month, and so I have tried to wait patiently for the month to pass so I could FINALLY hear the heartbeat.

This little child was quite active, and we never could hear how fast the heart rate was. He/she kept flipping, wiggling, and kicking. We tried twice during the appointment to get the rate, but had to give up after several minutes. At least we know it's alive and well in there!

I have gained ten pounds so far (I'm 16 weeks), so that sounds about right for me, since I tend to gain massive amounts of weight per pregnancy.

I really liked the lady I saw in the office. She's worked there for a while, but I've only met with her once in the past three pregnancies. I've heard that OB's are REALLY pushing, even insisting on the H1N1 flu vaccine, and even in this office I've heard complaints of that, but the Nurse Practitioner I saw didn't put any pressure on me, and after I told her I didn't want it she told me she had never gotten a flu vaccine in her life, even after the army was threatening her if she didn't.

So, all in all, a good visit. Next appointment will be in a month, and I will get to schedule my ultrasound at that point. Yah!

Yummy BOOGERS

No pictures on this post, just a little boy story from our vacation.

One night we were watching a movie and Dallin was cuddling with me (so sweet and innocent, but just wait!). I noticed he was picking his nose and I told him, "Noooo, YUCKY!" and I patted his little hand away from his nose. He looked at me and said, "NO! YUMMY!" Totally grossed out, I insisted that it was 'yucky', which of course made him insist all the harder that it was indeed 'YUMMY'. Then, before I knew what was happening, a little pudgy finger with a booger on it was headed for my mouth!!! He was trying to show me how 'yummy' his boogers were! AHHHHH. Luckily I was able to stop the booger-coated finger before it made it to my mouth, but it took quite a struggle because I was in a weakened state from laughing so hard.

Letter to Santa

Cory wrote this letter to santa the other day, and I thought it was too cute! He came up to me while working on it asking for our phone number, a little confused, I asked him why he needed our phone number. He said santa needed to know his phone number. So, I gave him the number (which maybe I should black out because it's going on the internet, but whatever). After he carefully wrote the number he said, "ok, now what's our house phone?" Where does he learn these terms??? So, I told him it was the same as our phone number, and he insisted it wasn't, so I just told him the same number again. He's so crazy, he cracks me up!!!

VACATION!!!

This past week our family had the FABULOUS opportunity to go to a Tilton Family reunion in Dallas, TX. We all had SO MUCH FUN, and were a bit sad to leave the family as well as the beautiful area. I was having so much fun, in fact, that I neglected to take pictures for most of the trip. Pretty much the only pictures are at the temple or while the kids are sleeping...sigh...oh well. At least the pics I did actually take turned out!

Here are Cory, Bryson, and Dallin at the temple in front of the nativity. Dallin was so cute, he didn't want to get up from that little spot. He sat there for quite some time just starring at the display.

A bunch of the siblings had planned to do a trip to the temple, so I decided I would take the kids. Kim (sister-in-law) decided to come too and take two of her kids. I think we are all glad we did it.

Cory is getting so old, it amazes me, even bewilders me at how fast it's going by. Here he is trying to smile, but actually just making a dorky face in front of the temple. Hey, at least he let me take his picture. :) I love my boy, he was so good on the trip. I mean, TRULY EXCEPTIONAL. I was a proud mom. He enjoyed taking care of his smaller cousins and trying to keep up with the older ones.

Below is little Bryson, although, he's not so little anymore either. The sweet thing got so homesick after only a couple days in TX (we were gone from home a total of ten days). Other than that, he had a LOT of fun playing with the cousins, especially on the trampoline. I felt like some days on the trip I barely even saw him because he was outside playing with his cousins all day.

...And little Dallin. Oh boy, he was a character on the trip. He has so much affection, especially for the little babies, that it would come out in big bursts of hugs and kisses, and he'd end up knocking the poor little things over! He is definately going to have to be taught how to interact with children smaller than him before our next little guy (or maybe gal) is born. He was even a bit of a bully at times...ughh...but he's only two, I guess what can you expect? He was at an akward stage where he wasn't a baby, but he wasn't just one of the kids either. He REALLY enjoyed wrestling each night with whoever would wrestle with him...uncles, cousins, or whoever. And before he went to bed, he went around and gave everyone he could find a hug. (There were about 40 people at the reunion, half kids, and all of us under two roofs).

Here's Bryson with Jayson, his three year old cousin. They were good buds.

Bryson and Jayson with Aunt Maria, Jim's wife. She did a much better job than I did at taking pictures...maybe I should snag some of the ones she took!

There were a bunch of acorns on the ground, and the boys had SO much fun finding them. We got home and Bryson's pockets were full to the brim with little acorns...and his pockets were NOT small. ha ha What a nut! (A little play on words there for the cheesy folk)

Unfortunately while we were there, the kids (and I mean ALL the kids, not just mine) got sick. It was something like the croup, which in general is not fun, but for asthmatics like Cory, it's just plain scary. At one point I was quite concerned because Cory's nebulizer treatment was having virtually no effect on his asthma. I wasn't sure if the insurance would cover something like a hospital trip out of network (I've heard they're a pain about that sort of thing), so I was doubly concerned. John called Jeb and Evan in (two of his brothers), and they gave him a blessing that his body would be able to heal on its own. Within an hour we realized that the nebulzer wasn't hooked up quite right, so he wasn't getting the much-needed meds, and within about three hours he was showing a significant amount of improvement. Ahhhh, blessings!!!

So, back to the pictures...we found a lady bug while on the temple grounds. I posted this picture more because of Cory's cute little hand than because of the lady bug, though. He's getting old, but he still has the pudgy little-boy hands. Ahhh, I know they're not going to last much longer, so I've got to cherish them while they're around.

Below is uncle Jim carrying Bryson and Jayson. What a sport. Maria and Kim are also sort of in the pic....I wish I had better shots of me and the sister-in-laws. We all had SO MUCH FUN together. We'd leave the kids with our husbands and take off and have fun. We went shopping several of the times, and did the New Moon movie. The sisters all went to get mani/pedi's, but I just wasn't up to it (darn fatigue kicked my tooshy), so when they came back, they all sat me down in a "princess chair" and gave me my own mani/pedi. I know, how totally sweet, right? They even cut my toe-nails!!! Yeah, after that they deserve better pictures, but alas...

Dallin was hilarious while he slept. He never woke up in the same spot twice. We'd hear him during the night bumping into different pieces of funriture. He never woke up. Anyway, this was one of the mornings. He cracks me up!

Here's Cory and Bryson asleep in the hotel room. We were able to break up our 16 hour drive at the hotel each way, thanks to a VERY generous family member (THANK YOU!!). They are just so cute, I had to snap a shot.

I have been accused of not taking enough pictures by my brother and sister, so here's another one of them falling asleep together. They're the best of friends, I love watching their bond form stronger and stronger, especially now that they're both in school. They even sit next to eachother on the bus. I love my boys!

And here's another random picture for my siblings who've been asking for more. The kids were cute at breakfast this morning. They're all crazy, I swear!!!