Catching Up

It's been so long since I wrote last, that I figured I needed to do something about it. There will be no pictures since I'm really bad at taking pictures and don't have any recent ones that aren't already on Facebook. I've actually been pretty busy lately. I finished 33 credits this semester and am working on some in-class tasks right now. I'm working with Victoria's teacher and she is really nice and easy to work with. My next semester starts in December and it will be the last one before I start student teaching next September. The end is in sight.

Something that I have been looking forward to for months is going to Louisiana for Christmas. I am SOOOO excited! I haven't been for the past 2 Christmases and am looking forward to visiting friends that I have found on Facebook that I haven't seen since high school. That would be a really LONG time ago! Brayden and I will be the only ones making the trip, though. Jonathan and Victoria will be going to Hong Kong from Dec. 9th-21st. I will be leaving the 18th. They are both so excited. I have been giving Victoria Chinese lessons and she's doing really well. Jonathan's good friend is getting married and that is why he is going. His sister and mom are buying Victoria's plane ticket so they can see her. So Brayden and I will be hanging out for a while by ourselves. I can't say that I'm too sad about that. Everyone needs to get away every once in a while, right?

My new love...

The loud music, the sweat, the pain...Ahhh, the gym. Yep, I love the gym. When I was working, I used that as an excuse not to lose weight. I had to sit at a computer for 8 hours a day. I did go through spurts of walking and eating better, but I like carbs too much. French fries, chips, bread, not to mention chocolate and all that good stuff. Well, when I quit working, I had time to walk and I really wanted to join a gym, but didn't want to spend the money. Jonathan, being the good husband that he is, encouraged me to do it. And also, since I am now in school, I get a student discount, even better! Several of the girls at church go to my gym and a couple even teach classes there. I love the kickboxing class and they just started another one, Butts and Guts. I need that one for sure. I have to say I am so sore from that class that was two days ago. I told Jonathan next year my goal is to get in a bikini! That should be interesting.

Well, here is a "fat picture". This was probably 5 years ago, back when Jonathan was thinner and I was fatter. Now it's the other way around :) He is doing better though. He has started walking on his lunch break.

Can I say that I look so retarded in that picture. You can't even really tell that I'm "fat". Oh well,

here is a better, much more recent picture. It's from far away, but with a lot less clothes on :).

I hope we get to go back to the beach next year. That was SO FUN!

Summer Fun

Well, I suppose I should write about our trips this summer before my memory fails me. First, for Victoria's birthday, we went to Atlanta and stayed a couple of nights. (We got a REALLY good deal on a 4 star hotel!) Anyway, we went to the Coke museum which was pretty cool. We went to the mall and of course ate lots of Chinese food.

At the Coke museum, Brayden loved that bear! Victoria refused to take a picture with him. Jonathan tried to bribe her saying that he would pay her $5 if she would stand by the bear with Brayden. I was like $5! Are you crazy? I don't think he ever gave it to her though :).

This is all they did in the hotel room. Watch cartoons. Too bad the room didn't have 2 tv's! Well, I guess that's not ALL they did. Brayden ran around the room most of the time, terrorizing everything.

Our next little trip was for 5 days in Sandestin, Fl. It was so awesome. We made it before the oil got there. It was so nice. We stayed at a Hilton resort that had a private beach and there weren't that many people there. A lot of people cancelled their reservations when they heard about the oil spill. So that meant there were also more rooms to choose from. We got a room with a partial ocean view and it had bunk beds for the kids and 2 double beds. Victoria loved sleeping on the top bunk and they also had a separate tv this time! Brayden loved looking out at the pool and couldn't get enough "outside time".

To say he loved the ocean and the beach is an understatement. He had no fear of the water and just ran out into it. Scary for us, but not for him. Jonathan loved swimming in the ocean and I loved laying on the beach.

We went a few miles down the road to an Air Force museum. Not too much fun for me, but Brayden and Jonathan liked it. Brayden LOVES airplanes and helicopters.

Well, that was our trip. We hope to be able to go back sooner than later.

Brayden's Turn

Well, our little boy came in the middle of two miscarriages, so we know he is supposed to be in our family. He is such a sweetie, most of the time. It's sad I don't have any pictures of when I was pregnant with him. Actually, I have some snapshots from a shower I was given, but not on the computer. My pregnancy with him was pretty uneventful just like his sister's. I was still working at Jacobs Wholesale Paper. I had the same sickness from week 7 to 14. By the way, I was also sick that same time frame during my pregnancies that ended in miscarriages. Four times the sickness for two babies. Oh well. Not long ago, Jonathan asked me didn't I want another baby. I knew he was kidding, but I said NO WAY. He said, "But I thought you wanted four kids." I said, "Actually, I do have four kids." Anyway, back to Brayden. I was induced with him too, but a few days before my due date instead of a week after, like Victoria. It was a lot easier this time. I knew how long I could last before the epidural. I wasn't checked many times, but I remember the last time, they were like, "Oh my gosh, the head is right there. Let me go get Leigh." I don't even think they had time to get everything ready for when he was born. When my midwife got in there, I pushed maybe 3 times and there he was. I was like, "That's what I'm talking about!" He was smaller than Victoria. He weighed 6lb10oz, I think. I know, that's bad. Anyway, I couldn't have asked for a better delivery. Actually, when he came out he DID give me a little scare. He didn't cry. I was like, "Is he ok? What's wrong with him?" They kept saying that he was fine. Eventually, he cried and I felt a little better.

Here he is just a few hours old. What a sweet sleeping boy!

He cracks us up. He always has something in his mouth. He has to free up his hands for more important things.

This is when he USED to sleep during church. All you mothers know what I'm talking about. Don't we wish our kids would sleep during church a little longer than they actually do? He wasn't like most babies and sleep ALL the way through church, but he usually slept through sacrament meeting.

Here he is when we visited my aunt and cousins in Louisiana. My mom bought that walker at Wal-Mart for him to use and then took it back when we left. :)

I just like this picture.

Anyway, that's our baby. He will be 2 on July 8th. He loves to be outside and LOVES to play with his sister, "YaYa". That's what he calls Victoria.

We're happy to have him!

Excited

Well, there won't be any pictures here, but we have a couple of exciting things coming up. Exciting for me, at least. Other than the fact that I finished my first semester of my online classes pretty early. My next semester doesn't start until June 1. So until then, we are going to be taking a couple of trips. Next weekend, for Victoria's birthday, we are going to spend a couple of days in Atlanta and probably will go to the aquarium. We went there when Brayden was 3 weeks old. At first it was fine, then he got hungry. Not to mention, ALL the people that were there! We should be more prepared this time and we will get there RIGHT when it opens!

Then a couple weeks later, we will be going to the BEACH!!! That's right, Florida. We have been to Florida once since we've been married. That was probably the second year we were married and only for about a day and a half. I'm excited to take the kids on a real vacation. We've never really been on one. I think I'm more excited than Victoria to go to the beach. When asked if she wanted to go to the beach or Gatlinburg, she said Gatlinburg! I said, "Are you crazy?" She just doesn't know how wonderful the beach is. I haven't really been since my senior year of high school. I hope I am not disappointed. Anyway, hopefully we will have pictures and lots of fun things to tell about when we get back.

Victoria - From the beginning

Well, everyone and their birth stories... I figured I would attempt it. It has been a long time, and not very eventful, but here it is none the less. My 1st pregnancy wasn't too bad. I had 24 hour sickness from week 7-14, but I could handle it because I was so excited to be pregnant. We had been married for about 6 years and I was ready for a baby. I was working at Jacobs Wholesale Paper company as the customer service representative when I got pregnant. They were like a second family to me. The owners of the company took me and Jonathan out to eat one night and I had just found out I was pregnant. We told them and they were so excited. They were the first people we told. We weren't big picture takers and still aren't, I guess. But here is one of the only pictures of me pregnant with Victoria. I was about 8 months I guess.

My mom came to visit for the birth, or when we thought the birth would be. She came about a week before my due date. Well, she was here for almost 2 weeks and she was supposed to leave in a couple of days. I went a week past my due date and my midwife said she would induce me. I didn't have one contraction before I went in to be induced, so I didn't really know what they felt like. Well, they started me on the pitocin after midnight. I couldn't sleep because I had to pee every hour. Such a pain with that I V. Anyway, the next morning around 7, I felt a contraction. I thought, "I can handle this." For some reason, I wanted to have her naturally. Not sure what I was thinking. Anyway, needless to say, the contractions got more intense real quick. At first they gave me stadol and I was able to sleep for a while. When I woke up, I got an epidural, and it wasn't bad after that. I could tell when I was ready to push. And I didn't have to do it very long. Probably about 30 minutes. And there she was. The first thing I thought when they gave her to me is that she was heavy. She was 7lb 11oz.

Here we are sitting on the floor with no furniture. We had moved into that house while I was pregnant. What a sweet sleeping baby.

She was actually a very good baby. I worked up until recently, so I feel I missed out on a lot. She had a good babysitter though that she loved. She was always happy.

As she grew, I enrolled her in dance class. She LOVED it. I did too. Seeing as how I loved to dance too. You know how sometimes you live out your dreams through your kids? I always wanted to be in a dance class too. The closest I got was in 4th grade, we were in gymnastics. That was pretty fun too.

This is her doing her yellow polka dot bikini dance. She was in it for 2 years, then our budget wouldn't allow it. Poor thing. Anyway, she turned out ok anyway. So, there she is. Our big girl.

My Dad

Tomorrow will be the 5 yr anniversary of my dad's death. It was very unexpected and made me realize how much I loved him. We had recently reunited after not speaking for many years. One day, he called me up out of the blue on a Sunday afternoon and said he was about 20 minutes away from us. He was a truck driver and was making a delivery in Ringgold, GA. We were about to lay down for a nap and Victoria was already asleep. She was a little over a year old. I recognized his voice immediately and couldn't wait to see him. He always called me his baby girl. I loved that. Well, we got up, got dressed and headed down to Ringgold. He looked exactly the same except with gray hair :). Victoria went right to him and she never did that to anyone. He also got to meet Jonathan. We had a nice little visit and exchanged e-mails and promised to keep in touch.

When we went to Louisiana for Christmas that year, we went to his house and had a crawfish boil. It was awesome! Victoria ate them about as fast as we could peel them. My dad thought it was the best thing that she liked crawfish. At the funeral, people came up to me and told me that he would brag that his 16 month old granddaughter LOVED crawfish.

We planned on coming for a visit that summer and go to a cabin they had. He died 2 months later and we didn't get to see him again. I am so grateful that he called me that day and that we were able to reconnect after all those years. I think about him all the time. At the time he died, there was a Carrie Underwood song that was always on the radio. "Don't Forget to Remember Me" Every time I would hear it, I would cry because of the part that said "and make sure you tell Daddy that I'm still his little girl" I'm sad that Brayden didn't get to meet him because I know they would have loved each other. My brother has done his temple work and I'm glad about that. He was AWESOME and I loved him!

This was in his younger days. Look how handsome.

I love this picture of him. It shows me that I have his eyes.

This is me and Michael counting all the change he always kept in one of those huge bottles. That was one of my favorite things to do when we visited him. I think the only reason he kept it was so that me and Michael could count it every time we visited :).