Happy Halloween!

I have to say, i particularly enjoyed this years :) I love that my kids are getting to the age where they really put their own thought into what they want to be. I used to pick their outfits for them and they would be thrilled. Not this year!

This year Gracie got it in her head that she was going to be a witch fairy. Not knowing what that looks like we got our inspiration from Aunt Christas blog. Gracie decided she wanted it to be more of a colorful witch than a fairy really. I have to say her imagination of what she wanted turned out pretty cute. She of course had to have jewels on her face like Aunt Christa did. They kept falling off and frustrating her. Her hat kept blowing off so all the pictures i have of her she wasn't smiling. She was so worried about her outfit looking perfect. Poor child, she is such a perfectionist!

Colyn took the boys this year to get them cowboy outfits. Matching their shirts and hats and boots! It would have been so cute. Problem is that was a month before halloween and Conner lived in those boots and the hat for all of October so by the time Halloween even came he was tired of the idea. Good thing we had some back up outfits from previous years. He thought it was pretty cool to be SKITCH (as he called it) for the night! He said to me "MOM, I bet everyone will say....Conner is the cutest boy i've ever seen in the whole wide world!!!" In fact i think he asked our bishop if he thought so :) He is a cutie thats for sure! Jaxon made sure he was authentic and dirtied up his face for the occasion. He was very proud of the fact that he really looked like a cowboy, not just pretend.

Oh and Liv makes a cute lady bug! She melts my heart.

It was such a fun halloween and I wish we could have seen all the cousins in their outfits! I hope everyone had a fantastic Halloween this year!

Huntington Beach

So we ventured back to the beach this last week! It was a lot of fun to get out of the heat and get to cooler weather. First we went to Charlottes house in Hemet for General Conference and then spent 2 days couped up in the condo because of rain :( The rest of the trip was sunny and warm and we had a lot of fun relaxing by the ocean!!! We cant wait to go back soon.


Not an unusual image of Colyn playing on his phone!






Colyn buried Olivia and Conner! At first they thought it was really amusing


This is a few pictures later! Panic set in and they both freaked




This is Colyn comforting livi becuase he accidentally struck her foot with the shovel while digging in the sand. It could have been much much worse


A picture of her wound :(












The kids spent most their time in the water and playing with their boogie boards! I loved watching them have so much fun. They are old enough now to hopefully remember these trips from their childhood!

Olivia

I realized the other day that I have never devoted a post solely to this angel. Olivia is just that. She is the star of our family. She is full of personality and we love her to pieces. She was my first baby that I didn't feel overwhelmed with. I attribute that to the fact that I actually put some space between her and Conner (3 years) and didn't have another baby to care for.
I remember the night she was born. Nothing was going like we had planned. She wasn't wanting to come and Colyn and I were so frustrated with how I was progressing. I was in light labor for 4 and a half days. In that time the doctor had tried just about everything twice. I was at my due date and nothing. Well except that I was out of my mind tired from 4 nights of walking the halls in my house. We were both really confused about what was happening seeing that all my deliveries have been 6 hours or less from first contraction to birth.
Finally I went into labor, and we went to the hospital. My doctor followed immediately after I called him certain that he would be back home in an hour or two. My body was totally tired. I think it was too tired to kick into gear. I had told Colyn that entire pregnancy that I didn't want an epidural. He thought I was nuts. I in the end got one because I could hardly stand I was so tired. I am scared of epidurals. I had a bad experience with Jaxon. Ever since, I've been apprehensive of the thought of getting another one. I had a bad feeling about this one though. I just felt really uneasy, but against my better judgment had it done anyway. It is possible that this epidural caused nerve damage that eventually lead to my health issues in 2009 but we will never know. However, I knew it was a mistake from the moment it was put in. No more than 20 minutes later my entire body was numb. My breathing was labored because my chest muscles were numb. My face was numb down to my gums and eyes. You know what this feels like if you have ever had your pupils dilated and they numb your eyes. It was freaky. So there I was at 1 am having to sit up straight in bed. Not being able to rest after 5 days now of labor. It was a nightmare. They had to let the medicine wear off so that I could breath easily again.
The labor was still not even progressing normally so they gave me pitocin. Contractions were at 2 minutes apart, then 8 minutes, then 5. It was slowly coming along. The nurse checked me at 3:00 am and I was at an 8. She said she would come back in an hour. It wasn't probably even 3 minutes later that my epidural had worn off and I could feel quite a bit. I started screaming to have the nurse come back in. She checked me again and Olivia was right there. The bed hadn't been broken down, my doctor was sleeping and hadn't been paged, and they told me not to push. Now for all of you that have had a natural birth know this is sort of impossible right? I held it, I don't know how. I have always had an incredible tolerance for pain, my mom says that I just go to my happy place. Almost like I check out mentally of what is actually going on. I guess I kind of do. I just stared into the ceiling light in a trance until something snapped me out of it. As soon as I heard my doc walk in I screamed and pushed and she was on her way. He had enough time to get one glove on to deliver her on top of the hospital bed. I remember how bad it hurt, my doc said that my epidural had completely worn off. A lot after that is a blur. I got one picture of the delivery:(
Having experienced both natural and unnatural deliveries (even though I did have pain medication for part of this one) I have to say that this was such an amazing experience. Does that sound crazy? I cant imagine having had birthed 4 children and never experiencing what it felt like, what my body was actually capable of doing. I would never get another epidural again. Not just because it was a bad one but because I felt so connected to the experience. It was such an adrenaline rush and I felt so proud of myself after it was all done and over with. I felt so connected to Olivia. It makes it all so real when your body is experiencing it and not just your mind and your soul. I know that sounds crazy too. We have had such a strong bond, Im sure she wanted to make sure that we got off to a great start. Going through all of that was a bitter sweet experience. I wouldn't change it. It was perfect despite all of the bad.
I have had such an amazing time so far with this sweet little girl. It has gone by way too fast. I wish life would slow down so that I could enjoy her as my baby for a few more years. I love her so much. She has changed our family. Little girls are such a special gift. They are truly princesses. Thats what we call her. Our princess. That may come back to haunt us in about a year or so, but it is what she is to us :) I think she was worth all the pain to get her here. She is amazing!

Mrs. Ashlee's Preschool!

Conner goes to such an incredible pre-k this year! Mrs. Ashlee
is an amazing teacher. She really is passionate about teaching children.
I love how fun her classroom is for the kids.
Today was her birthday. We went to celebrate it with the kids and
throw her a party. Conner had alot of fun! Happy Birthday Mrs. Ashlee!

Potato Lake

This summer was crazy busy, so we unfortunately weren't able to camp as much as we would have liked to :( Of course, right when school starts, Colyn gets off work and says we are going to go. So, we pulled the kids out of school at 10 am on Friday on got out of town as fast as our hot feet could move. It was so beautiful up there! Everything is really green right now because of the enormous amounts of rain the mountains have gotten this monsoon season. I love the green. I think thats one of the hardest things about living in the desert. We were sad to have to go home Saturday night but needless to say it was worth it for only 28 hours of fun. We are crossing our fingers we will get to go soon again! More pictures to come when I can find the time.......

Huntington Beach 2010

If a picture is worth 1000 words.....what would this picture say?

So then, what does this picture say? Not sure if you can see me too well in this photo but I literally had water dripping off of my chin, hence the reason I look very unhappy. To start this story off then! It was an overcast and cold Monday morning at Legoland! This was one of the first rides we went on and my kids were so excited to get to go on this ride and shoot the water guns! I wanted Colyn to go with them, but no! He suckered me into it somehow. Right as we were about to get on the ride I turned and asked the boys that were operating the ride if I was going to get wet! They said only a little bit! Okay then, I could do this. Nothing to worry about. Doing my best to dodge every little splash of water, about halfway through the ride I wasn't the least bit wet. Then I see her......glaring at me with this smirk on her face. Straight out of the stix from Oklahoma Im sure. Red frizzy hair and over-alls, how could she not be? On top of that she looked like trouble, and immediately it made me worried as to why she was staring at me with that expression. Then......it happened. This ride at the very end was lined with spray guns that the observers could spray at the ones on the ride. So she embraced the opportunity to soak me, and soak me she did! There she stood at the the first gun and started spraying me right in the face. Not kidding, she had really good aim. Thats when I noticed how incredibly slow that boat was actually moving. Did it stop there? No!!! She then moved to the next gun, and the next, and the next! Seriously? It took everything I had not to yell at her but for the sake of my kids I didn't. Thus the picture. This was me, soaked and very very mad. Mad at that awful lady and at Colyn. Of course I had to be upset with him too! He was the one that talked me into going after all. Gracefully, I put on a happy face (after this picture of course) rung out my hair with paper towels and pretended not to be freezing cold for the rest of the day. However, I will forever curse this ride. And that Lady, wherever she is. So, take this as a warning and never ever ride this ride. And if you do, don't appear to be a total priss trying to avoid getting wet or some trouble maker might soak you!!!!!