country livin'

Lately I have taken a few pictures that remind me of the sweet simple things in life. Although their are many things I miss about living in the city, I watch my girls live their lives each day enjoying the simple things that the country has to offer. They get to see and do the things that I did as a child, and I think I had a pretty terrific childhood!

Hanging out with grandma "W" and great

grandma Jibby

Picking strawberries with grandpa
We visit the goats at least once a week!
Macy's preschool...right down the street!

"You can take a girl out of the city but you can never take the city out of the girl" This is definitely true with me but I think my girls are pretty content living the country life!

Test results

I didn't include the test results in my last post. Kate has outgrown her reflux on her left side (yeah) but her right side is still at a grade 2-3. This means we will have to continue giving her the medicine every night. If it weren't for the antibiotic Kate would continue to get bad UTI's. The alternative is having the doctors go in and perform a procedure to make the problem go away. This makes me a little nervous. We are willing to wait it out and see if she will outgrow it.
On a side note, the doctor told me to wait on the potty training until Kate is completely ready. Apparently the reflux can get worse when a child goes through potty training because of the pressure put on the bladder by "holding it". No complaints here! I've decided I would rather change 15 poopy diapers than have to take my kids into public restrooms!

"Help me daddy!"

I had a moment yesterday where I felt a fraction of how our Heavenly Father must feel for each one of his children. I thought about it a lot throughout the day and wanted to share it.
We had taken Kate down to Primary Children's Hospital to have her reflux tested. (Background) Kate has urinary reflux. Instead of her pee all coming out when she has a full bladder, some of it goes back up through the ureters to the kidneys, causing infection. We have to take her to get tests done to know whether or not she is outgrowing this. Kate has had this particular procedure done several times before but both when she was a baby. I knew that this was a harmless procedure, uncomfortable yes, but I knew what it entailed and that by going through with the test we would know if Kate needed to continue the antibiotics she has been taking since she was 6 months old.
I got Kate ready for the procedure, taking off her clothes and putting the cute little hospital gown on her, waiting for it to hit her that this was not anything she was use toand that we were use to. Nothing happened, mostly due to the fact that she got to pick out a movie to watch during the procedure. It wasn't until we started to lay her down on the X-ray table that she suddenly broke out into hysterics. I tried to calm her down but things were only getting worse. The x-ray tech was great, very comforting with her, talking to her, trying to calm her down as he put "seat belts" on her legs which were fastened to 2 plastic boards and then weighted her arms down with sand bags. As her crying started to get harder and her eyes were getting wider, I could only imagine how my sweet little Kate felt staring up at us while all this was going on, the whole time we, her parents just watching and doing nothing to stop it. Meanwhile all we could do as her parents was to hold her hands, kiss her face and tell her "It was going to be O.K." knowing that the worst part was yet to come...the catheter. It was at this point of Kate's uncontrollable sobs when she looks over at Jason and says "Help me daddy!" That was hard. Soon after that she started repeatedly saying "Hold me mommy!" Even though I knew that this would all soon be over it was so hard to not be able to do anything but watch her discomfort and just say "It will be O.K." How hard it was not to just take off the sand bags and hold her. I could see the big picture but she couldn't. She didn't know how long this discomfort was going to last. She didn't know why she was being weighteted down. She didn't understand why her parents watched and did nothing to take the pain away or make things a little bit easier. All we could do was watch and try to comfort her.
As a parent this was very hard. I knew this was the procedure of the test. It was hard knowing what was coming up and watching her eyes as they inserted the catheter. It was hard not being able to hold her as she cried out in pain. I knew that Kate had to go through with it in order to find out if she needed to continue her medication. I knew that it had to be done. It was still hard.
I started to think about our Heavenly Father and how he must feel this same way. How everyday he watches us, being able to see the whole picture. Knowing what we are about to go through. Knowing we won't understand, but needing to go through it just the same. I wonder how often he wants to just make our pain go away, to just take the sand bags off and make it a little bit easier. But he doesn't because he knows it is for our own good and it is something we have to go through. It is part of the test.
I know for me the feeling I had when I finally got to pick Kate up and hold her after it was all over brought such a flood of emotions. To have her back in my arms again. For her to know that she was safe and that she wasn't going to go through any more pain. Gratitude.
I am so grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who is always with me, even though he can't physically hold me, he holds my hand through the hard tests, he tells me everything is going to be O.K. He aches for me when I am struggling. He cries when I cry, and I know that when I am done with this test called life, he is going to pick me up in his arms and there will be no words to describe that feeling.

Kate's Birthday pictures...one month later!

Because my camera broke on her birthday, it has taken me a little longer to post some pictures of the big day. Ididn't want it to go unnoticed so here are a few of my birthday girl!

My big 2 year old!
One of her favorite, a fishing puzzle!

It just comes so natural for her! We had a fun day. We started out openeing a couple of presents and then headed up to Bear Lake with some friends. After we had one of Kate's favorite dinners, pizza, and then opened some more presents. The best part was just spending the day celebrating my sweet, spunky little Katers.

I love you Boo-bean!

Birthday Bash

Likin the cheesey smile Macy!

My first experience with fondant. Macy wanted an Aerial cake

and so I did an "Under the Sea" theme, with fish for Kate's.

Once again, nice face Macy!

Great grandma's "Jibby"and Reed

"Ty! Tickle me!"

Jake, Annie, Ty, grandpa Reed
Jenni & Jessi
Trying to ge a picture with the grandaughters...yeah right!
Swingin with me and my cuz
Blowing out the candles
All four of them!
Just me and my sis

Tavaci

Any one who knows my Macy knows how much she LOVES to sing! Whether she's listening to singing, watching others singing or she is the one singing, she is so enthralled with music. For a long time she would only watch shows or movies that had a lot of singing in them. For this reason I have been searching for a singing/performing group for her to join.
After watching her face as a children's singing group performed at the 4th of July parade in Provo, I knew I had to get her in to something! I researched a couple of groups and decided on one called Tavaci. Macy has now gone twice and LOVES it! The teachers are great with the kids and have put some cute choreography to some fun songs. They have already started practicing some Christmas songs to perform for their Christmas concert. The thing I love about this program is how fun it is for the kids and how it has already helped her self confidence but also what it is teaching her. She is telling me terms like "first order"...I don't even know what this means! Even Kate picked up on a song and some of the actions the one time she went, "Who let the dogs out?" This is a warm up song that is one of the kids favorites...so cute!!

Grandpa's garden and "Sloppy Joans"

My cute dad playing with my girls. (If I ever get a working camera I will get a picture of his garden)!

One of the many things I have enjoyed so much since being back in Utah is how close we are to family. My girls jump at the chance to go visit any of their grandparents. One of their new favorite hobbies is to go pick vegetables out of grandpa Reed's garden. I was bummed that I didn't have a working camera to get some cute pictures of the girls out enjoying the fruits of his labor, you would have thought it was Christmas! "Look at that one!" "Kate here is some corn for you to pick!" "Mom, what are those?" "4,5,6,...9 pumpkins!" They had so much fun picking all their vegetables in the garden. My dad really does have an amazing garden though. I feel like I have just cut my grocery bill in half for the next month!


After raiding the garden my cute mom decided the girls needed some dinner. She mentioned that she would make the girls some sloppy joes. From then on Kate kept referring to them as "Sloppy Joans". It was pretty cute.


That night after returning back to their other grandparents house (where we are staying) Macy says to her grandpa Wilcock "My other grandpa has a garden, and it's bigger than yours!"

Madalyn's blog

Several people have asked about Madalyn. We now have a blog set up for her to keep family and friends updated on her progress. The blogs address is http://www.miraclesformadalyn.blogspot.com/

Park City

This past weekend we took the girls up to Park City for a little family weekend get-a-way. First we went up to my favorite little Utah town just outside of P.C., Midway. There we walked around one of my little childhood memory locations, the Homestead. We ate lunch at a cute little grill. It happened to be right over a little pond with ducks and fish (not my idea of appetizing) but it was great entertainment for the girls. After not being successful at convincing Jas that we need to live there, we headed to our hotel to check in.
The girls would have been content with just staying at the hotel for the rest of the weekend. As soon as we got there they were jumping up and down on the bed, so excited that they got to sleep in their own bed. I guess its much more exciting sleeping in a hotel bed than at home? As soon as "queen bed rush" wore off it was off to the pool for even more excitement! After swimming for while we headed in to Park City. The night just kept getting better for Macy who absolutely loved the free Trolley ride we took up and down the main street of P.C....oh to be a kid again!
That night the girls and I watched The Sound of Music while dad zonked out on the other bed. The girls didn't go to sleep until 11:00!!
The next morning we woke up to a high of 53 degrees and pouring rain. We decided to delay our ride on the "Alvin Slide" (alpine slide) and hit the outlets for some shopping. The girls were great during the 4 hours we spent there.
Finally the sun came out and we headed over to check out the Alpine Slide. I was a little curious to see the girls reaction when they saw "Alvin" and just as I thought, Macy changed her mind once she saw it. We opted for the carousel and kiddie rides instead. After making a mandatory stop at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate factory for some of the best chocolate (and bubble-gum ice cream), we were on our way back home.
But not before stopping to see some good friends the Mason's. Macy and Emma were so cute together. We really need to get together more often you guys!!