Sarah's 4th birthday

Sometimes I feel bad that Sarah is the middle child, because she is such a good and easy going little kid that sometimes I think she can be looked over. Anyone who knows Sarah though will comment to me about how happy and easy going she is. This is such a blessing in my life. She is always optimistic and positive. She has the sweetest heart. So a couple of years ago, in draper they built a water park. Cowabunga. We would sometimes drive by it and Sarah thought it looked wonderful. She would ask me time after time when she could go there. I would always respond with something like, sometime soon or I don't know. My kids are pretty cautious when it comes to things like this so I didn't really think they would go on anything there. Then Sarah asked at the end of last summer if we could go there for her birthday next year. I thought sure, why not? She probably won't even remember. So when her birthday started to come close I asked her what she wanted to do and all she wanted was COWABUNGA! I kept trying to plan a friend party for her, until I realized she didn't really care, she just wanted to go to cowabunga. Even on sunday when they sang to her at church she asked me is this the day that we go to cowabunga? So I was lame and forgot my camera when we went to cowabunga, but the girls did so good. Grandama watched Abi and Grace and Sarah took their cousins Rachel and Emily to cowabunga. They were a little hesitant at first, but then they loved it! It was a good choice by Sarah. Then, after much needed naps, we had dinner at a park and did presents and cake. I asked Sarah what she wanted to eat at the park, like sandwiches or fried chicken, hamburgers. She replied that she wanted peanut butter and jelly. So Jamie picked up some KFC and I brought supplies to make Sarah and peanut butter and jelly sandwich. This little girls cracks me up!

This is a picture of Sarah and Rachel and Emily and Grace at the park.
Here is Sarah after seeing her big surprise present.

This is Sarah waiting for her big surprise present! We had the bike behind the bathrooms at the park so Sarah had to put this on her head so we knew there wasn't any peaking!

Here's a group shot of us enjoying some cake.

Here is Sarah with Rachel. Sarah was so excited to have Rachel here for her party, it meant so much to her that she came down from Hyrum just to see her.

Sarah wonderful homemade, or Harmon's made, cake.

The beautiful 4 year old!

Another one of my favorite parts of Sarah turning 4 was that she kept saying that when she was 4 she wouldn't suck her thumb anymore. So the night of her birthday I asked her if she was ready to stop, she said no I think I'll wait till I'm 5!

One last picture of Grace and Sarah playing at the park.

Abi's 2!

I always feel so uninspired for the 2nd birthday. There is always so much excitement for the first birthday that I want to have all the family over and do a big party. For the 2nd one, I feel like my kids don't really need anything, they are too young to have a friend party, so on and so on. So for Sarah's we decided to have the grandparents meet us at a park and have some dinner and open presents there. It was perfect! So Abi got the repeat of that. This was truly perfect for Abi though because she absolutally loves the park. Even if we are in the car and we just drive by a park she will start screaming, SLIDE! At me. I am a horrible baker, and not creative, and lazy, and well I have so many excuses as to why I don't make cute birthday cakes like so many moms out there, but here is Abi's wonderful store bought cake!
Jamie helping Abi blow her candles out, she mostly just wanted to grab them.

Oh my sweet little woman!

She loves drinking out of big cups. She loves doing anything and everything she sees her big sisters doing.

Again Abi working the cup.

Could it be? A new post from Brittany?

So I know it has oh so very long since I have posted anything, and that just made it that much harder to start! I feel like I should post about Christmas, and Valentines day and our trip to disneyland, and easter, and Grace's birthday. Oh it just makes me so tired thinking about it! So I probably won't blog about all of those things but I will start with Grace's birthday.

Grace's 6th Birthday!

This was a cake that we picked up from Harmons Bakery. It had fresh strawberries and real whipped cream inside with a diary based frosting. I thought it was pretty good. Jamie loved it. Everytime he had some of the left overs he would say, honestly this cake is just amazing! Amazing or not, Grace liked it.

Grace has many friends, we are so lucky to have so many kids her age in our neighborhood. Grace also has many cousins her age so I had to tell her that we couldn't invite any school friends, just neighborhood kids and cousins. She was a little sad about this, but even with these restrictions I think we had about 20 kids. We had pizza and cake and ice cream, then we went to see The Princess and the Frog at the dollar theater. The kids were so good at the movie, I couldn't believe it! That was the easiest part of the party! Now getting to and from the theater was a little more difficult, but luckily my sister Heather and sister in law Jenni were nice enough to help shuttle the little ones!

This picture is so great because the kids would honestly not give Grace any space while opening her gifts. Jamie and I struggle with this part of the party sometimes, because our kids have so much, sometimes it feels like they don't need anything else! But it is fun to see how much the kids enjoy giving at birthday parties!

Here is a picture of my beautiful 6 year old! She is honestly growing into such a beautiful girl. She has lost her little toddler look and now is looking so grown up! I can't believe it. So here are six things I love about Grace

1. She is determined. This can sometimes be hard, but ultimately this will be a blessing in Grace's life.

2. She is smart. This is just a natural gift that she has been blessed with. She is very curious and already asks me questions almost on a daily basis that I can't answer.

3. She love taking care of her sisters. She truly takes on that big sister role well. She loves getting things they can't reach or teaching them how to something new.

4. Grace has a tender, tender heart. She feels all of her emotions very strong.

5. She is a wonderful artist. Not sure where she picked up this talent, neither Jamie or I are artistic. Grace definitely has a natural eye for drawing.

6. Grace is learning to conquer her fears. Grace can be a very cautious person, I fear she got this from me. But she is learning the joy and satisfaction of feeling fear, and doing it anyway! I am so proud of her and all that she has accomplished at such a young age!

Where is the motivation?

Oh wow I have not felt motivated at all lately to post anything! My life has been busy but boring. I am so ready for spring/summer! Abi has been doing great, no seizures since the ones in November. I am hopeful that she won't have anymore. Grace is loving Kindergarten and Sarah is loving everything, she is so easy going. She loves school, dance, and even primary because these are things that big kids do and she is one! I have been working a lot lately and that is my main excuse as to the no blogging. Hopefully this work schedule wont last too long, but it is nice to have some extra money! Also my camera broke christmas morning, luckily I got a few pictures before it broke. So I will need to get a new one soon, so I'll have some pics to post. Love all of you!

My sweet little Abi

Oh wow, it has been a long time since I have posted anything! Sorry, so I have an update on Abi for all of you who don't know the whole story. I have some pictures, but they are too sad for me to post.

So mid October we took a trip to Las Vegas to go to the Utah vs. UNLV footbal game. While we were there Abi got sick and ended up having a seizure the night before we were coming home. She had a fever with this seizure but she was so non responsive after that it was really scary, so we called an ambulance. They came and told us to take off her pajamas, she was just too hot. Once we did that she started to cry and we were able to give her Tylenol. She slept with me the rest of the night, needless to say, but kept spiking a fever so I kept dosing her. We thought that was the end of it, and started our trip home. I kept checking on Abi to make sure she didn't have a fever, and she was fine. She fell asleep in the car and we were just outside of Mesquite. I turned back to check on Abi and saw that she was having another seizure! We hurried and pulled over, and at least after this one she was just angry, not so lethargic. We decided we better take her to the hospital so we drove on to St. George and took her to the ER. The Dr. there agreed that it was odd that she would have two febrile seizures so close together, so they ordered all sorts of tests. All of which came back normal. So they told us that she just had two febrile seizures which is pretty common in kids, and they usually outgrow this by the time they are 2-5 years old. So I thought, alright I can handle this if it happens again. It will probably be easier now that I have been through it before, right?

WRONG! So then mid November, a few weeks ago, I was getting the kids ready for church. Part of my Sunday morning routine is that after I shower, I put all three girls in the tub while I do my hair. The girls are usually really happy in the tub and play very well there, so this is why this works. So I was in the girls bathroom with them while they were in the tub. Abi went to stand up in the tub and when she did this put her face in the water for a second. She stood up and gasped, and was swolling some water. I was just about to turn to her and say,"Oh Abi did you swollow some water?" When I noticed she wasn't recovering from it. Just then she started to fall back onto her bottom. I reached for her and grabbed her out of the tub, she still was not breathing, or at least not very well. I turned her over and hit her back to try and get her to breathe and get rid of the water. Then I looked down at her and saw that she was having a seizure. It was probably the scariest moment of my life. I called 911 because I was so freaked out, but while I was on the phone with them Abi came out of the seizure. She was a little lethargic but not too bad. I told them I wouldn't need the ambulance, I would just take her into the ER, we live so close to Alta View Hospital. So I called Jamie, who was at church, and he came home. We took Abi to the ER. They started running basically all the same tests that they had in St. George. After her chest x-ray she was sleeping on my chest in her exam room and had another seizure. This one was the worst one she has had. I don't know if there were multiple seizures here or just one really long one. It lasted about 30 min. They had to order multiple anti-seizure medications from the pharmacy to pull her out of it. Meanwhile, the Dr. is having the crash cart brought into the room and telling me that we need to transfer Abi to Primary Children's by ambulance. The Dr. said that if she would stabalize she could go by sandy ambulance, if not then the pediatric flight team would have to take her by ambulance. I of course was a wreck. Abi did come out of the seizure and was just sleepy. I rode with Abi in the ambulance to Primary's we stayed there until monday night. They ran more tests, all of which came back normal. Good news, right? Then they told us that most kids who have seizures have normal results with these tests. So I guess they were just making sure nothing more serious was going on. So in the end, Abi may have another seizure, she may have many more, or she might not have any! The Neurologist told us we could start her on daily anti-seizure medication now if we wanted. These meds have a lot of side effects and once you start them you have to wait 2 years before you can start to taper off of them. Jamie and I did not feel that it was time for this yet. I am feeling very peaceful and calm about things, I am hoping that there will be no more seizures to come. It was been a little over 2 weeks and no seizures. One of the hardest things throughout all of this was not having my little Abi with me. She was so loopy from the sedation and medication she had received. It was not until Tuesday night that she was back to her normal self. That was practically three days of not having her with me. I am thankful everyday that I can see her and her crazy personality. Any of you who know Abi know that she is VERY BUSY! She is into everything. She never stops moving. Sometimes this can feel like a burden, but since we have been home from the hospital I am thankful for every moment I get to chase her around! Thank you so much to all of you for your love and support. When something like this happens in your life it is so nice to feel how much love there is for you and your family out there! Sorry it has taken me so long to post about this, it is kind of hard to do even now. But just know that we are all good and love you all very much!