March Fun

So here's what we've been up to a bit in March. TC celebrated his birthday on March 6th. For some reason it looks like I don't have any pictures from that day. Bummer. For his birthday present he went to a boardgame convention all day and a good portion of the night all day the Friday and Saturday before his birthday. His brother and his uncle went with him. He had a good time. I guess he really loves playing games! Then on his birthday we just went to church,hung out as a family and made his favorite dinner-pasta primavera. Below are some pictures of TC and I's little getaway to Park City. Thanks to his brother, James, for watching the kids. We just went from Friday evening to early Sunday morning. The funny thing was Sunday was Daylights Saving Time and we had to be back by 7:30 so James could get to Provo because he was singing in his ward. Well we set the alarm clock and somehow it changed in the middle of the night so we got up at 5 (which actually felt like 4) and got back an hour earlier. Whoops! Anyway it was relaxing and we just enjoyed going out to dinner,walking the shops,seeing the art galleries, swimming at the hotel and hanging out.

Our chickens are now laying eggs! So the kids have been pretty excited about that! They've been laying about one to two a day. The kids and TC have even caught one of the chickens in the process of laying so that was fun. We just noticed the eggs last week and haven't actually eaten them yet but heard they taste delicious.

We had an early birthday party for Clark this past weekend since his birthday is so close to my due date. He wanted a Star Wars theme party and dressed up as Darth Mal. It was a bit crazy we had 22 kids there. James came to help halfway through though so that helped. We had it at a park and just did a few activities,games,cake and presents. We kept it pretty simple this year but Clark had a great time.

We went to the park on Sunday and Clark was flying one of his kites that he got from his party and he let go of it saying "The kite can fly all by itself!" and this is what happened. Whoops!

Other than that we've been busy with school activities,church,social stuff, etc. I'm due in 3.5 weeks can't even believe it! The kids are going off track the end of this week and when they go back we'll be a family of 6 instead of 5. Crazy,crazy!

Recent Kids' Quotes

I haven't done this in awhile and I try so hard to keep up with them. Here are a few I remember.

Linnea

• "I love you so,so much Mommy!"
• (To my belly) "Hi baby I'm your big sister!"
• "I can't wait for the baby to come out."
• (When she ate some gross food) "Oh that is disgusting!" 
• Me:"One day you'll be a good mommy." Linnea:"Yes and I'll have boobs and be big,big,big and I can go in the hot tub!" (Lol she has this preoccupation with getting old enough to go in the hot tub!)
• "When the baby comes out I'll feed her milk."
• Spenser: "Hi baby girl!" Linnea:"I'm not a baby girl!"
• Me:"You're my baby girl!" Linnea:"No I'm Nea!"

Clark 

• "I'm not doing my hair today because a girl in my class has a crush on me and now I don't have a crush on her and so I'm not doing my hair so she won't have a crush on me anymore."
• "Mommy it's funny when you say one of us is a pill!"
• "Mommy this tortilla is way too hot! I think I need to put ice cream on it!"
• "I am a handsome boy."
• "I didn't hit Linnea in the face with the toy Mom. I was just trying to get her to play with it." (Yeah right!)

Savanna 

• "Mom you have a humungous belly!" (She says this like every day!)
• "Mom if the baby came out now would her lungs be developed?"
• "I can't wait to be in a show for my ballet! I love it love it!"
• "I wish Grandma could move in and live here forever."
• "Oh my gosh Linnea is just so cute! She's just so adorable."

Linnea's 3!!!

Linnea is 3 now! I can't believe how quickly she has grown up. In a little over a month she became potty trained,potty trained at night,got rid of her binky, is now in a big girl bed and has gotten spotty with her naps but I'm hoping she'll still take them a bit longer.She is such a sweet little girl and we are so happy she is in our family. She is very affectionate and will tell me she loves me all the time. At 3 she loves Daniel the Tiger,dancing,singing,cats,playing school,and being outside. She loves her family very much. She had a great day on her birthday. She got pancakes in bed that her Grandpa made for her, then she got to watch a couple episodes of Daniel Tiger. Then I took the kids sledding, home for lunch, to the dinosaur musuem,picked up Linnea's Tigger cake and then back for dinner, presents, cake and ice cream. For her birthday she got a kitty cat costume, some bath toys,a new stool, some pizza play food, and I can't remember what else. Oh some clothes from my parents and a fun kitty/dog vet toy from Grandpa and Grandma and Kristin and a stuff animal from Grandpa and Grandma too. TC's dad was here for her birthday and Kristin and her family were in town so they came over too along with my brothers,Spenser, Jonathan and his wife Chelsea and son,Maximus. We also made Linnea's bed into a toddler bed that day and she's doing great with it. Here are some fun pictures from her birthday!

TC's Injury/Surgery

Hi I have not given an update on here about TC's health and recent surgery. The week before Thanksgiving, TC noticed that the left side of his body was numb from the back of his shoulder down to his foot. He went to the doctor and she told him to wait a couple of weeks and that it would go away. It started to spread a bit so he went to the emergency room one day and then he was referred to a neurologist who then ordered an MRI of his brain and his neck. The neurologist's best guess of what was going on was either spinal cord damage or MS. We also were a bit nervous because it is a symptom of a brain tumor but the neurologist said it was very unlikely that it was a brain tumor since he had no other symptoms. It was a bit nerve wracking waiting for the MRI and then waiting for the results. TC had his MRI on December 17th and we found out a few days later that everything looked clear in his brain but that he did have a herniated disc in his neck that was pressing on his spinal cord which was most likely the result of his numbness. They said he would most likely need surgery and referred him to a neurosurgeon. TC met with the neurosurgeon on January 7th and they confirmed that he would most definitely need surgery. They said that the spinal cord compression was severe. The surgery was scheduled for February 4th. He then had two other MRI's-one for research and another of the rest of his back to make sure there wasn't any other problems and those all came out clean-thank goodness. So his dad and mom came out before the surgery and TC's dad and his good friend gave him a blessing before surgery. The surgery went as well as could be and TC's dad and I were there all day while his mom stayed with the kids. Then the next day she had to fly to Arizona for her brother, Brian's funeral, who passed away from pancreatic cancer. That was very sad. The neurosurgeon told Tom and I after the surgery that it looked like the herniated disc was more a result of an injury than a bone spur because the bone spurs were quite mild. I think he injured himself when he fell when we went bowling on my birthday because the numbness started right after that but TC is more skeptical of that. TC's dad stayed until the following Tuesday and his mom returned last Sunday and stayed until this past Tuesday and they were a big help and we're really glad they could be here with us. TC's recovery is going well. He's doing much better this week than last week. He has more energy and he doesn't have much pain anymore. He had pain in his neck and shoulder muscles. He took a bit over two weeks off of work and is planning on returning to work on Monday. He does still have his numbness which we were hoping would go away but this is usually only the case in 40% of the people who get this surgery. They said the numbness can improve up to a year after surgery though so we will see what happens. Anyway it's been a bit crazy and a bit rough but we're making it through. TC can't lift more than 10 pounds for a month and I'm 7 months pregnant so yeah fun but we'll get through it. We've had a lot of meals and support so it's been really helpful. Anyway here are some pictures.

Florida Trip!

Savanna and I were able to go to Florida just her and I on a girls trip and spend some time with my parents. We spent the first couple of days in Disney World and had a great time!! It was not crowded and we used a lot of Fast Passes and walked on almost every ride. We started off on Wednesday and spent some time in Hollywood Studios. Savanna and my mom rode Star Tours,Tower of Terror, and we all rode the Great Movie Ride and Toy Story and did some shows. Then we spent a lot of time at Magic Kingdom and did almost all of Fantasy land. We had the Magic Hours for just those of us who were staying at a Disney hotel from 8-10 p.m. and that was great because we were able to do so much because it wasn't crowded. Savanna loved riding all the big rides! My dad surprised us and came up that night and spent the next day with us. That day we went to Magic Kingdom again,had a character breakfast,rode the rest of the rides and went over to Epcot. We were able to see the show on the water they did before we left Epcot too which was really cool. We also walked around and saw some of the countries. We stayed at the Grand Floridian and loved that hotel. It's so nice and was a lot of fun. The next day,Friday, there was a big storm with tornado warnings so we waited out the storm and then headed home once it had cleared out so we spent some time shopping. We ate dinner that night at my favorite place,Boston Market. Then we headed home. Saturday I was able to go through a session at the Ft. Lauderdale Temple with my mom which was really nice and we saw some people we knew. Then we took Savanna to the beach,ate the Cracker Barrel. Sunday we went to church,hung out, went to the park,ate a yummy pasta dinner and watched Mary Poppins. It was such a fun and relaxing trip. Really glad we were able to go! Here's some fun pictures!