A Quick Thank You

Yes, the soldier that died in Iraq is my sweet brother (in-law), Micheal. It has been a very hard time for our family. It has been a very bitter sweet time. A new life came into the world and just 3 days later a beloved brother left this world. Micheal will be very missed.

I wanted to write a quick thank you to everyone for their emails and phone calls, offering their condolences at this difficult time in our lives. We have felt an overwhelming amount of love from everyone with their concern and prayers. Many of you have asked how you can help, or if you can donate money and how. There has been an account set up at Wells Fargo, anyone who is interested in donating money to Amy and her boys, you can do so at any Wells Fargo branch. The fund is set up under the name Amy Alleman. Thank you for all of your love and support.

Please keep our family in your prayers, especially Amy and her 2 boys. I am putting a few links on here if you want to read some of the articles about Micheal that have been in the newspapers.

http://hjnews.townnews.com/articles/2009/02/26/news/news01-02-26-09.txt

http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=148&sid=5686863

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=5696795

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,705287226,00.html

Our Baby Girl...

Our baby girl was born yesterday, February 20th at 6:12 pm.  She was exactly 2 weeks early, weighing in at 8 lbs 3 oz and 20 inches.  We named her Halle Paige Adams.  She would have been over 10 lbs if I'd gone full term.  She was only 1 oz and 1/2" less than Chloee was.  Everyone is doing well.  I'll post more pics and more about it when we get home from the hospital.  

Our Valentine's Day!

We started Valentine's Day off with all of the wonderful snow that Mother Nature decided to dump on us. Josh and Chloee went out and shoveled the driveway and then proceeded to play.

Here they are packing the snow down for their snowman. This picture is too precious!

Daddy / Daughter time is the best.

After all the fun in the snow, Josh took Chloee to Lowe's for their Build and Grow! They do these workshops that are free for your kids. You have to sign up a bit in advance or the class gets full. Chloee has an obsession with the store, Lowe's. It is so weird. I hate it with a passion, in fact, I hate to even THINK about setting foot in that store. She always goes with Josh and imitates him when he's looking at his list, she pulls out hers. It is really quite cute. You can only imagine her excitement when she heard she got to go to Lowe's. They made this cute little jewelry box. She gets to keep the apron and the safety goggles and she just takes them back every time she goes to do a project. Needless to say, they had a blast!

For Valentine's Day we gave Chloee this CD player. We have been looking for one forever. My CD player sits in her room because she listens to her primary songs as she goes to sleep and we wanted to get one that just stayed in her room. She loves it. We also got her this apron. She loves to cook with her daddy. She was excited and thanked us both over and over again!

This box showed up at my doorstep. Poor Josh, he was so mad, he thought that someone actually delivered the flowers when he ordered them. They came in this box UPS.

He also didn't know that they come NOT bloomed. I love them. It is a dozen Stargazer Lillies and Blue Irises. It was very thoughtful and sweet. He knows how much I love being surprised with flowers. When I used to work, he'd send them all the time to my work before we'd go out on a date.

I found this picture of what they will look like when they bloom. Gorgeous, if I do say so myself. I gave Josh some new shirts that he has been wanting. Our Valentine's Day was really low key, just the way it needed to be.

Josh made a really nice dinner and we just vegged for the rest of the night. Oh yes and Josh had to shovel again that night. The snow was insane yesterday. Josh kept wanting me to go into labor and the contractions are there, just not consistent enough. Sometimes I'll contract for 1 hour all the same, then they'll just stop. Who knows!

FRIDAY THE 13TH...

When I had my dr appt on Friday, we celebrated Valentine's Day and Jordan's birthday when we got back to my mom's house. Yes Jordan WAS born on an actual FRIDAY, the 13th. Spooky!

Chloee and my mom made cookies, which is their tradition every time we go to a dr visit. After we all frosted them. Chloee would put the entire bottle of sprinkles on one cookie. One time, I actually caught her with the bottle against her lips and she was inhaling all of the sprinkles.

Happy 22nd, JD! My mom made these really good pizzas for dinner too! She's all pro with all of her accessories she has. The boys love when she tries a new pizza recipe and they get to "test" it!

Jordan was kind enough to let Chloee help him blow out his candles. Then when it was all over, she had him light them again, so that she could blow them out over and over.

What better birthday present than a kiss from the Chlo!

Yes, I am enormous. I take up majority of this picture!

For Valentine's Day my mom made Chloee this adorable little apron. Chloee always has to wear one when they do cookies and now she has one that fits. So cute!

They also made these little heart bean bags. My mom said that Chloee even helped sew it. She would push the back-stitch button and run the wheel.

She bawls every time we leave my mom's house. It's sad because she looks forward to it all week and then it's over so fast. What will she do when we aren't up there every week due to doctors visits? Scary! I don't even want to think about it.

The girls! Sorry your eyes are shut, mom, but this is the only picture where Josh didn't cut my head off.

Thanks for the great time! Happy Birthday Jordan!

37 Weeks & Good News

I went in for my doctors appointment today. Here I am with 3 more weeks to go and I have been feeling like I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. March 6th? I can't go until March 6th, and thankfully, I won't!

He checked me and I'm dilated to a 2.5 and 80% effaced. I was so happy, I couldn't stop smiling. As if that wasn't enough good news. He set up Monday, February 23rd to induce me. That's right, no matter what, I only have 9 more days, not 21! He did say that he doesn't think I will remotely get to the 23rd. He thinks I'll come in the next few days. I must say since he checked me, the contractions have picked up quite a bit! We'll see...

Sweet Valentine

This adorable little girl is Anna. I'm sure you've heard me talk about her on my blog before. Her mama is my friend, Maren. I know these pics should probably "technically" go on my photography blog but I have other ones ahead of these that need to go on. I actually just did these last night. I'm trying to get them done before I go to the doctor, just in case I go into labor while I'm there.

I thought I'd share just a FEW of my favorites!

Pregnant Ramblings

Yesterday I was reading books to Chloee on the couch. We sit there together and she has to find the perfect spot between me and the inside of the couch. After trying to adjust herself many times, she finally said to me, "Mom, you're just too big and this spot is just too small! You need to move." Ok, I get it! No one knows more than me how huge I am.

I have a doctors appointment this Friday... the 13th (insert scary music here)! I will be 37 weeks so the baby is not considered a preemie at that point. I really don't want to have a baby on the 13th, it's Jordan's birthday. I also don't want to go into labor and have her on Valentine's Day. Oh, if I could just do one more week! My body is saying, NO! Who knows what I'll find out when I go up there in 2 days. I am so miserable, I might be just fine if I did go into labor after he checks me.

I think I sleep about 2-4 hours a night and that is interrupted sleep from being so uncomfortable to having to pee all the live long day & night! I am exhausted. Chloee keeps asking me when the baby will finally be here. She is obsessed with my friends little baby. She always asks me if she can go see baby Anna. Yesterday when I was at Maren's, Chloee kept telling Anna that she was so cute and that she loved her so much. Maybe she won't be a total terror when ours comes, maybe she will just be a little terror that wants to help. I'm afraid the terror thing is inevitable.

Josh came home from work on Monday with a little gift for me from someone. See if you follow. Josh works with a guy named Jake, I have become friends with Jake's wife, Heather. Through blogs and emails alone, I have had the chance to get to know Heather's mom, Janet. I have never met Janet, but we email and check one anothers blogs. She usually always emails me or leaves a comment when I'm blue and ALWAYS says the right things and exactly what I need to hear. I HAVE NEVER MET HER, which is so weird to me because I really feel like I know her. Anyway, she had sent a present for the baby AND Chloee. There were 2 adorable blankets. The one for the baby is beautiful oranges and yellows and she even did all the edging, I don't know what that is called, but it's gorgeous. She also sent this adorable fleece one for Chloee, with the edging too, for her or for her to use for her dolls. It really meant a lot to me and I love that they are special with her hand-work. What a sweet woman!

What! You Didn't Know...

...that Micheal is secretly a model.

...that Chloee was a wizard and is wanted in Russia.

...that Paris Hilton has a secret crush on my husband.

...that good old Benjamin retired and the $100 bill was replaced with my gorgeous face.

...that my sister, mom and I make great graffiti work.

...that my little family is famous on streets everywhere.

Well, there are a lot of things you don't know about me and my family! I thought I'd share just a few.

Groundhog Day

I realize that Groundhog Day was on Monday and I'm just talking about it now on Friday the 6th but I really don't care. How dare that little rodent predict 6 more weeks of winter with his all magical shadow. Really no matter what the verdict is, it's always 6 more weeks of winter here in Utah. Winter makes me blue, throw being fat and pregnant on top, not the best concoction.

Today has been one of those days. You know the ones where everyone bugs you. Anything they say or do pushes you to your limits of breaking. Even when we are out and I see people smiling, I am irritated. I'm irritated with stupid people who annoy me. Pretty much EVERYTHING grits on my nerves.

Today, I have felt much like the picture of this groundhog. I guess I can't totally hate him, obviously we have something in common.

Little Spirits

In the beginning of January when I was so sick, I stayed home from church. One of those Sundays I had decided to watch the KBYU channel, which has devotionals on it. I watched a few that were from broadcasts back in 2000 and before at BYU Idaho. After the devotionals were done there was another talk that came on, it was more like a seminar that had been taped. The gentleman that was giving the talk kept quoting this book called, "The Five Love Languages", by Gary Chapman. His entire presentation was pretty much about this book. It was a really neat talk and I thought, I want to read this book, it sounds so good. He went on talking about how there are 5 love languages and more than likely you and your spouse don't speak the same one. It was very interesting and I really wanted this book more than ever... but it became jumbled into my everyday thoughts and I forgot about it.

Last Saturday I was sitting on the computer looking up something and Chloee was sitting next to me. She started to unload the bookcase, which is an everyday occurrence here. She sifted through books and then we had a conversation that went as follows:

Chloee: "Mom, look at this book"

Me: (Staring at the computer screen) "Yeah sweetie, that's a cool book"

Chloee: "This is your favorite book, huh mom!"

Me: (Still not looking at her) "Yep, sure is sweetie" *I know I sound like this awful parent at this point but she shows me so many things over and over again, I just answer without looking. Bad, I know*

Chloee: "No mom, LOOK! I know this is your favorite book" (now she's waving it around trying to get it in my eyesight)

Me: "Chloee, I know you found a book, that's great" (still not looking)

Chloee: "Please mom, look, I found your favorite book"

Me: (as I glance over to see what all the fuss is about) "Oh my gosh, Chloee. Where did you find this? How did you know? What?..." *proceeded with some tears*

Chloee: (big smile on her face) "See mom, I told you it was your favorite. I love you!" *Then she walked out of the room.*

The book as you can guess was "The Five Love Languages". How? How was it here at my house all this time and I didn't know and how did it get here? As I opened it, I remembered that it was a wedding present that someone had given us. UNBELIEVABLE!

My daughter was prompted by the spirit to show it to me and to not give up until I did so. Sometimes I forget how close they still are to Heaven. It got me thinking about how many times the spirit is trying to speak to me and I refuse it because I have something "more important" that I am focused on. Chloee was a great instrument that day, an instrument that The Lord used to get through to me.

There are no coincidences...