If time could go faster.......

On our agenda this month if all goes as planned.. In this order:

1. Have a baby! We can't wait for Alexis to get here! I am hoping that I can go into labor naturally and not have to be induced. (only because they wont induce me until 39 weeks)

2. Find a place to move to, we will be moving in June, preferably toward the end because we have to pay the whole months rent for June no matter what.

3. Start Packing..... ugh I hate moving but oh well.

This to do list is not that long however all three things are easier said than done. We hope that everything goes smoothly and that we can get as much done before the move as we can to make the move "easy". Not sure how that is going to go but we will see. Wish us luck!! :-)

April 2011

What a month April has been...
Ella is still growing like a weed and continuing to pick up on new words she hears every day. The most recent thing she says that cracks us up, is she calls us by our first names. When Tim is in the restroom she pounds on the door yelling "DIM, DIM, you done DIM?" she yells for "herder" (me) when I am not in the same room as her. We correct her by telling her mommy or daddy, its cute though.

Tim finished school! Well at least at LDS Business college. He now has his associates degree. I am so proud of him, he beats himself up for not being further along in school but what can you do when you are working full time, trying to support a family and doing school all at once? He is an amazing father and husband, we couldn't ask for more! As of right now, he is looking for a higher paying job, in the marketing/advertising field. Pending what job he finds, the plan from here is to start at Weber State in the fall, working toward a bachelor's degree.

As for me, I am currently 35 weeks pregnant and so ready to be done!! at 31 weeks we had a scare. it was a Saturday night and I was having all sorts of back pain and contractions, I didn't think that they were close enough together to go in, so I sucked it up and kept playing games with our friends that were over.
Well... I was up all night! every 15 to 30 minutes in so much pain it was all I could do not to cry! I kept going in to sit on the toilet thinking maybe if I empty my bladder it will help, no such luck... about 830 in the morning (Sunday) Ella woke up, Tim was trying to give me a back massage, feed Ella breakfast and look up stuff on the Internet to see if he thought I was in labor. we got Ella in the bath and I told him I was sure that I was in labor and we had to go! we called my mom and sister who came over to take Ella. We were off... I was freaking out the whole way to the hospital. Every bump in the road made the pain worse, and I knew that if I were to give birth that day that my baby would have a rough time and be in the NICU. We got there and the first thing the nurse asked (just from the look on my face) was "has your water broke?" I said "no, I am only 31 weeks I can't have the baby yet!!" they rushed us straight to a room and got the monitors hooked up. I was having strong contractions 3 to 4 minutes apart. The baby's heart beat looked fine and she was kicking like she was angry between contractions. The pain by this point was so bad I was in tears and I couldn't stop myself. They gave me a shot in my arm to stop the contractions and came back 20 minutes later with pain killers. The contractions had not even slowed and they said it should have been working by now. The nurse told us that the OB on call was on her way in, and we might be having a baby today. I got really nervous and couldn't think of anything except what if she doesn't make it, her lungs are not ready, I want a healthy baby that I can take home... panic, which I think made the pain worse... when the Doctor came in she gave me another medicine through my IV this time to try and stop the contractions, they gave me more pain meds, and she informed us that there was a lot of blood in my urine and she had ordered an ultrasound to check my kidney function. Tim and I both calmed down a little at this point, kidney stones I could handle, but I didn't want the baby to come yet. The contractions slowed to only about 2 an hour and the ultra sound tech came in. He said he couldn't see any stones, but that didn't mean they weren't there. worry started again, if there were not stones then what was wrong, the pain in my back was getting worse not better. They showed the urologist the results of the ultra sound (this took hours) and finally around 6 pm they decided it was most likely kidney stones, they wanted to keep me in the hospital to monitor the baby and myself while I passed them, the next night I had still not passed these invisible stones and my doctors told me that it would really be best for me and the baby to have surgery to remove them. What!! surgery? I was 31 weeks pregnant! how could that be safe? We had lots of questions and our doctors were able to answer them all and reassure us that the baby and I would be fine. Tuesday afternoon I had surgery, they removed 3 huge stones! one was so big that it was cutting off function from my kidney, they said had they left it there I wouldn't have been able to pass it on my own and it could have caused permanent damage to my kidney. With in an hour after surgery I was nearly pain free! They sent me home and it took a few days to feel good enough to be completely on my own. Both of my wonderful Grandma's and my mom took turns babysitting me and Ella. My sister and my aunt cherry had Ella the whole time I was in the hospital. I cannot thank all my family and friends enough for all the help and prayers during that week. We made it through and now are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our little princess Alexis Marie.

NO DINNER!!

Ella's favorite meal of the day is Breakfast! She is obsessed with rice crispy cereal, and I am happy about this because she doesn't even realize that it would be better with sugar. I think its great to start her out with fruit and a bowl of her favorite cereal rather than load her up with sugar to start the day!




Well When she finished her breakfast today I asked her if she wanted to help me with dinner. she looked at me with a blank dumb stare. I let her keep eating and pulled out the potatoes that I needed to peel and chop up. Yummy potato and cheese casserole, It smells good already! I love my crock pot! once Ella was done eating she let me know by yelling "done done down now down now.. PLEEEEESE" so I cleaned her up and brought a chair over the counter. I asked her again, "Ella do you want to help mommy with dinner?" her reply was:

"NO DINNER ME FULL!" "NO DINNER, NO DINNER!"

Needless to say my cute little girl was very worried about why I thought we should be making dinner the minute we were done with breakfast. Some day she will understand that the funny looking red bowl that plugs in has to cook for 8-10 hours. I get a kick out of the new things she says and does each day.

Our Big Girl

This update is on our precious 20 month old, I can't believe how close her two year old birthday is approaching! She is getting so big, well sort of.. She is very small for her age, only in the tenth percentile for height and weight. But she is talking so much! I was so proud of her when her pediatrician informed me that a lot of kids her age only say 10 or so words, our little smartie pants is saying more like 50+ and putting together sentences! She also comprehends so much, every day she is surprising us with new things we didn't know she knew! some of my favorite, words and phrases she says:
"bye bye, see you!" followed with a blown kiss
"luv you more" "dramas flowers" (code for grandma's flower shop)
"daddy doing?" (what you doing daddy) "I want to eat" "I want up" "snacks please" "bapple" (apple) "go outside" "my toys play funny"

She says so much more but those ones our some of the funny/cute ones I can think of right now.. She is very excited for her baby sister to come, or at least she thinks she is. She gives my tummy hugs and kisses all the time and says in a very high pitched voice "hi baby, luv you"

Ella is also working on potty training, sort of... I thought we had her trained for a few days and then she got sick.. so we back tracked, but she is still young and I am going to let her do it on her own time..

Update!

Well I am terrible at updating our blog!!
some of the things that have gone on since my last post are, Ella turned 1 and I can't believe that she is now already 17 almost 18 months old!




Thanksgiving was a blast out in Ohio spent with Tim's family it was a lot of fun to see all them and get to spend time there. Ella and her cousin Alyssa who is just 4 months older had a blast together while we were out there and Grandma Cartwright got the girls pictures taken while we were there too.

Uncle Richie, Alyssa, Daddy and Ella

Next was Tim Crashed his car and we said goodbye to totaled bumblebee, I have to say it was horrible timing right before Christmas and an expense we didn't need at all, however I am sort of happy that the two door sports car is gone and now we have a family friendly 4 door car! We managed to find a bright yellow one to please Tim, but we will NOT be adding racing stripes like his previous car had :)

Bumble Bee
The replacement

Christmas was a lot of fun this year, it was so much fun for Tim and I this year to see Ella get so excited Christmas morning. We spent the night at my Aunt Cherry's house and Santa came Christmas eve to give all the kids Slippers and a toy before they had to go to bed, Ella was scared to death of him, she screamed and started shaking if we got her even a little bit close to him! my grandma also had games planed that filled the evening until we all went to bed, Christmas morning we ate a huge breakfast together and then went our own ways. At which point we went home and got ready for the day and then headed to my Grandparents house (Reaveley side) for Dinner and games! It was really a lot of fun! being mommy at Christmas is more fun than being the kid who gets to open the gifts! Ella had no clue what was going on the night before or why all her cousins were so excited. But when she walked into the room Christmas morning and daddy told her that the giant stack of presents were hers and told her to open them, her grin from ear to ear didn't go away until she fell asleep at 12:00.

Loving the wrapping paper!
Showing off her movie!
Rocking out on her Guitar :)

on Dec, 30th Jaclyn was married, She looked beautiful and her reception was great! It was a lot of fun but snowing really hard that night! Congrats to her and her Hubby Brad, we love you guys!!

Unfortunately she has yet to give me any pictures and I have misplaced the memory card that has the ones I took on it! Grrr...

For New years we went to dinner at fire house pizza and then went to my mom's house and spent the evening playing games with my Mom, Bryan, and some family friends Tonya, her daughter Mackenzie, Trevor and their two little boys, Hudson and Bronx Ella is between them in age and so we all had a really great time!

About 5 minutes to midnight, can't wait to make these things honk!
Mommy and Ella Ready to go outside and make some noise!

New years day Tim, Ella and I all got sick, we thought it was nothing more than just a cold and none of us went to the Dr.. until Tim missed two days of work, then I made him go, and Ella was on her way to being better, Tim was given an antibiotic and He was getting better too... Well on Monday the tenth I caved in and went to the Dr. as well I was told my Bronchitis and Terrible sinus infection were turning into pneumonia and it is good I didn't wait any longer.. I got a shot and two prescriptions and was told to stay down and rest as much as possible for one week, so I am hoping that by this Monday I will be as good as new and able to start up my babysitting gig again! Ella has missed her buddy Wyatt a lot!!

And... I am pregnant with our second child, We will be welcoming another little GIRL into our family this May, we are very excited and can't wait to meet her! Ella calls her sissy baby already when she points to my stomach or this blanket that I am crocheting for her.

Our little princess

July 24th weekend to Setpt 27th

For the weekend of the 24th Tim's parents came into town. Ella fell quickly back in love with her grandparents during their short stay. It was a lot of fun to have them here and we miss them already! While they were here we had Ella's one year old birthday party! I can't believe my baby is already one! we also went to the 24th parade in bountiful, and had fireworks of our own at the close of Ella's party.

Directly following the Cartwright's departure from salt lake, my cousin's the Deveraux came into town, and we had my little cousin Alex Hoffman baptized. She looked beautiful! we are so proud of her decision.

We had an awesome trip up to midway, with my mom's whole side of the family. We played on the beach, at the pool, and just relaxed at the time share. We went to a park at like 10 pm to let all the kids run around and drain their energy as well. When we came back from midway we went to Raging Waters, it was a good 2 hours of play before we got rained out and were given "rain checks" to come back another day.

On Sunday Aug 8th my mom's side of the family did family pictures, and then Ella and I left for Bear lake with my dad's side of the family. Tim had to work and therefore stayed to hang out with my mom's family once his work day was finished until Thursday, when he came up to join us at Bear Lake. It was a blast! Ella loves the boat, the sand, the pool, the lake, and most of all Tubing! She was a natural! It was a very very busy and fun month!

Ella prefers to swim on her own it the pool, she has to be either in her tube or life jacket, however with neither she can float on her back for a second by her self! I love my little fish!

Tim started school back up, and so did my friend Mandy, this means Tim leaves for work in the morning, and I don't see him again until pretty late at night after school. To keep me busy I am watching Mandy's kids while she is at school. Maycee is in Kindergarten so she is gone half the day, and Emma is gone most the Day in second grade! That means Wyatt (16 months) and Ella (14 months) get to entertain each other and me all day long! Ella and Wyatt play really well together and I think Ella will be very sad when summer comes around and she wont have her boyfriend to play with everyday!

Other news, most of you know my best friend Jaclyn, She is getting married! I am so excited for her and her husband to be, Brad, they make a very cute couple! Congrats guys! love you!

We went to the State Fair with our good friends, Ty and Cristi, as well as Katy, Jared and all of our little munchkins, it was a lot of fun, just like old times!

We went down to St. George just last weekend for my new little niece to be blessed! She is gorgeous! My brother Dan did a very good, it was spiritual, fun and I really wish we lived closer, Ella had so much fun playing her cousins all weekend!

I think that is about it as far as updates go! sorry there are no pictures, I promise some will come soon!

Since my last post.......

The first thing that happened after my last post as most of you know, we moved. It sucks not having our friends to play games with every night, but it is really nice to be closer to my mom. Ella loves her grandma and being able to see her pretty much everyday now!



Ella and I got a pass to raging waters and go as often as we can! She loves the water and I have no doubt she will be swimming by the time she is two.. She can almost float on her back by herself! When I put her in her life jacket, like any baby she screams! but her little tube she loves, she learned that if she kicks really hard she can go across the pool and swim away from me!






Over father's day my adorable niece and nephew were blessed. My sister is a very strong and crazy woman! She was the proud mommy of a cute little three year old and one year old until March 23, when her twins Presley and Porter were born! The very next day Madicyn turned 4 and now she has 4 kids 4 and under! Go Monica!



We were invited to go down to Mayfield with some friends, Jason and Christie, for the last weekend of June. We got there late Friday night and pulled the four wheelers out first thing after breakfast on Sat. We took turns riding the four wheelers and taking Ella for little rides up the street and back. Sat. night we went to the Manti Pageant. It was a great experience. Tim had never seen it before and loved it! I walked up and down the streets of the near by neighborhoods to get Ella to stop crying for the first hour of it, but I got her to fall asleep and the rest was great!



The fourth of July was great! We went to the Centerville parade and had juice and doughnuts at my mom's house for breakfast! Ella clapped and waved to all the floats, but got really mad when her cousin Carter kept climbing into her little car. After the parade Ella proceeded to eat another whole doughnut by her self (I wasn't watching) and threw it up.. Joy! So she wore another of her 5 4th of July outfits up the cabin. Our good family friends invited us up to their cabin near Pineview for a BBQ, party and Fireworks! Ella loved playing with Bronx (4 months old) and his bouncy seat. I had to remind her 100+ times to not touch his face and be soft! She tried to play with Hudson (2 years) but he could walk and run and she just couldn't keep up!They had a few pinatas and since the babies couldn't do it, Tonya (mom's friend) had toys for each of the babies to take home. Ella got really cute pink keys, they are now her favorite toy to chew on. Everyone went to the Huntsville park to walk around the carnival and dance to every kind of music you could imagine! Ella's favorite was the hokey pokey! Right before it got dark a few parachute-rs landed in the middle of the park, and then fireworks started! Then on Sunday we went to my Grandma and Grandpa Joe's house for dinner, it was really fun until the end when we ended up with my grandpa in the Emergency room, he has 9 lives and is home again. It was a great weekend!







Since then Ella and I have done our usual hang out at the house or the pool while daddy is at work. Once Tim gets home it is just spending time with him and taking him to the pool. We can't believe Ella is going to be 1 years old in less than a month! I have been getting things ready for her party, we are doing a family thing about a week early so that Tim's parents can be here for it. We went and got Ella's one year old pictures taken the other day and started buying all of our decorations.

Also, Ella climbed out of her crib and landed on her head one too many times, she is now in a toddler bed before her first birthday! AGH! Crazy child I have!