Our New Normal

Around the time Melanie was born I remember noticing Kaylee, on rare occasions, would look off in the distance or stare at nothing in particular.  She would sometimes talk in the softest little mumble that I couldn't really tell what she was saying, and sometimes she would point in some direction, but I couldn't see anything worth pointing at.  I would try to ask what she was pointing at or what she was seeing but she couldn't tell me.  I was hopeful that she was just seeing angels or something, and didn't think too much about it. As the new year progressed occurrences like this slowly became more common. I would occasionally talk to Joseph or my mom about it, but again, I wasn't too worried about it.  While my mom and I were in St. George Kaylee had one of these occurrences again, which we had begun calling "episodes." I pointed out to my mom what was going on as we waited for the episode to end so we could go home.  She was so unresponsive to things we would say, but she would repeat, "I'm okay," or, "I'm fine, Mommy" several times during the episode, would make a little low huming sound here and there, and occasionally point in some direction for no apparent reason.  After church Melanie & I took a nap.  When I woke up my mom said she had been googling Kaylee's symptoms during her episode, and she thought Kaylee was probably having an absence seizure.  When I took Austin to the neurologist at the end of July I mentioned Kaylee's situation and that we had an appointment to come see the neurologist again for her soon.  He suggested we schedule an EEG before hand so they would know better what was going on when we met. Kaylee was really good for the test.  We had to wake her up at 4:45am so that she would be tired enough during the test to sleep for part of it.  We dropped Lance & Melanie off at a friend's house and Joseph drove us while I sat in the back dancing and being silly with Kaylee to keep her awake.  The technitian gave her "rainbow hair" for the procedure which she thought was pretty cool.  She had to say the alphabet, blow on a pinwheel, and watch flashing lights.  Then they asked her to go to sleep.  When the test was done we woke her up and we went home.  I left a little bummed out that I didn't see her have an episode the entire time we were there, but I had prayed that whatever needed to happen for the doctors to know what was going on would happen and I had faith that my prayers would be answered.

When we met with the Neurologist the next day he said that we were right, she is having seizures... and that they are happening a lot when she is awake and even more often when she is asleep.  He said her episodes have characteristics of two types of seizures, absence and focal, and that they don't see two types occurring together very often so she is scheduled for an MRI on Oct 6th to help us understand what might be causing these to happen together. In the meantime, she is taking medicine that will hopefully control both types of seizures.  We are also hopeful that she will be able to grow out of this condition in high school.

We sure love our Kaylee.  It's a little hard to know she is only 4 and may have to take medicine every day for the rest of her life, but it is so nice to know that there are medicines out there that can control this and that she can still have a normal, happy life.  We have had amazing friends be willing to watch our kids and make us dinners while we go to doctors appointments and adjust to what is now our new normal.  I am so grateful to be surrounded by so many good friends and for the faith and prayers of those who love us too.

Father's Day

Here they are!  The Man of the Day and the kids that made him qualified!  They love their Dad, and so do I.  Happy Father's Day!

The Best Five Weeks

The last five weeks have been some of the best five weeks I could have ever asked for.  My brother-in-law graduated from ASU in May.  They came to stay with us for what we thought would just be a few days before they went off to California while Cuyler hunted for a job. I prayed that I would have some time with my sister before they moved away, but didn't expect it to be long, especially the closer their moving date got. They got here May 22nd.  Their house had been really sick with a stomach bug and it hit our house within the next few days.  We celebrated Joseph's birthday but he got sick that night too, so we spent the next week trying to recover.  We had a do-over birthday for Joseph doubled up with my nephew Andy's birthday celebration on Memorial Day.

The week after that Joseph was headed off to Europe so Sarah's family stayed for that.  We treated that week like we were on vacation, mostly by eating a few too many desserts.  Sarah & I started working out together the week after they got here and she invited me to a Meltdown Challenge which is a health competition where  you try to lose 4% of your body fat in a given time, which in our case is 4 weeks.  I had been working out before they got here, but wasn't seeing any results.  This health challenge has helped me stop my tendency to snack on chocolate several times a day and has helped me make more healthy choices about my food.  I've been working out 5 days a week for the past 4 weeks, which I know is helping... but this challenge has only been going for 2 weeks and I've already lost 4 lbs!  Here's to being healthy!

Cuyler took some family pictures for us while he was here.  He also taught me how to change my guitar strings... maybe now I'll start playing again.

The kids spent the last 5 weeks playing basically from the time they woke up until bed time every day. We are so glad they got to spend so much time together building their friendships. (This picture was at the Visitor's Center at the Mesa Temple... the only one missing is Melanie.)

My sister's family moved to California yesterday.  I'm not going to lie, I've cried several times already about it. Sarah moved down to Phoenix just after Austin was born.  She's lived less than an hour away from me all this time and we've always been able to get together on occasion.  We've been blessed to spend so many birthdays and holidays together during that time.  We've gotten to visit each other in the hospital for the births of several of our babies.  I feel like I have pretty much come to terms with the fact that she's moving, but I'm slowly realizing all of the things we're not going to have anymore and my heart sinks a little with each realization.  I am so blessed to have her in my life.  I love that we are close in age and got to grow up sharing a room, that we both ended up at BYU and even got to be roommates for a semester, and that we've both been in Phoenix for the past 6 years when she really only intended to be here for her one year of Grad School.  Thank goodness for modern technology that will make it so easy for us to keep in touch.

Sarah once gave me a gift with a quote that said, "I loved you too much to just be your friend, so God let me be your sister."  I have often thought of that quote over the years and I am so grateful that God let me be her sister... out of all of the girls in the world he let ME be her sister.  I will be forever grateful. Even though the living together in Phoenix chapter of our lives is closed, I have so many happy memories to think back on.  Dr. Seuss once said, "Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."  I think that's what I'll do. :)

Five Months Already?!?

So much for posting every month this year.  Here's hoping I'll start making up for it.  This year is flying by!

In January I realized I needed more hands than I had.  One day I was nursing Melanie and Lance was wet and needed a dry diaper.  I didn't want to make him sit in it but I had just started nursing and didn't want to make Melanie wait for me to change him, so I asked Kaylee if she'd like to change Lance's diaper.  She was THRILLED!  I supervised it all and she did so well!  This picture is fuzzy but I had to post it... it's my little diaper changer in action.  They were both so excited that she was able to change him, and so was I!

Melanie was blessed in December but I took her 12 week pictures in February in her blessing dress.

Joseph switched roles at Gore in February.  He's now a Supply Development Engineer.  He's enjoying the change of pace and getting to learn about the company from a new perspective. 

March was full of family time and cousins.  My brother's family stayed with us on their way to and from Mexico, and we're so glad they stayed a while!  We got together with our sister and our dear friend Megan (from our BYU days) and  her daughter who happened to be visiting Sarah that week.  We had a huge family home evening which we ended with a talent show featuring each of the kids. We finished it off with a dance party which the kids kicked off with "Whip Nae Nae"... of course. 

  

We took a trip to Utah.  We originally intended to just meet up with our two brothers there, but we were also blessed to met up with some of the Wilde siblings while they were there during their spring break. This meant we had to extend Austin's spring break an extra week, but he didn't seem to mind at all. :)  While we were there we got to go to several BYU sporting events, hike the Y, visited the Museum of Natural Curiosity, got a taste of what snow is like, walked around the new Provo City Center Temple, and enjoyed lots of family time... and of course we went souvenir shopping at the BYU bookstore. We love our family and we love BYU... this trip was the best of both worlds!

Lance & Austin got to meet Cosmo... Kaylee only wanted to look from a distance. 

Joseph had 2 kids sleeping on him during the volleyball game. 

Kaylee & I were at the volleyball game too. 

Harper and Melanie became great friends.

Cousins!

In April we celebrated Austin's 6th birthday (crazy!).  He is growing so much.  He is starting to be able to read a lot on his own and is picking up on the words we spell in front of our kids so they won't know what we're talking about... like if we should offer D-E-S-S-E-R-T after dinner or if we should try to tackle B-A-T-H-S tonight, or maybe if we should W-A-T-C-H a M-O-V-I-E after dinner on the weekend.  We're going to have to find another way to speak in code pretty soon here. We're so proud of our growing boy!  He is kind, loves helping me with Melanie, loves playing with Kaylee & Lance, doesn't like kisses, He says he doesn't like school work or homework but he excels at both. He often says things are "rediculous" (although he's pretty convinced it's pronounced "prediculous." He also likes what I call "replays" because he has begun to say, "I was like ____________" or "he/she was like ____________" when he thinks something that just happened was cool or funny.  He often surprises me with how capable he is and what he remembers. He also loves Ninjago and wants to be a Ninja when he grows up.

His birthday cake was Lloyd from Ninjago. We celebrated early since Daddy was going out of town.

Here he is on his birthday... this is the best my phone could do I guess. 

In May Lance potty trained.  We basically didn't have to do anything except offer him Jake and the Neverland Pirates Pull-ups.  We told him if he kept them clean and dry he could wear Jake all day.  Bada-bing, bada-boom.  He was trained... almost.  One day of accidents (which was day 1) and maybe one more accident mid week... only two weeks in pull-ups... and now he's in underwear.  We laugh because the day before we tried the pull-ups Joseph and I were beside ourselves wondering how we would ever train him because he insisted on going potty in his diaper.  He even seemed to know when it was coming he just refused to try on the toilet.  We were so blessed to find the right motivation on the first try. We love our fun loving, joke telling, sweet and silly little boy!

2015

2015 brought one of our sweetest blessings.  In March we found out I was pregnant with our 4th child.  We had been planning on a big deal 10th anniversary celebration and Joseph and I had just started talking about what those big plans might be a couple of days before I found out I was pregnant.  The morning I got the positive test I was talking to Joseph and said something along the lines of, "We might need to change our plans... we're going to have a newborn with us."  We were both so excited to be blessed with another baby.  Looking back on our struggle to get pregnant with our first baby, every time I find out I'm pregnant it feels like such a  miracle and I am so grateful Heavenly Father has blessed us with these 4 children.  This pregnancy had it's challenges and was harder than the others in some ways, but I didn't have to go on bed-rest at all, which is the first time since my pregnancy with Austin.  Joseph and I both got sick the week Melanie was born. We both felt better on Friday morning, November 13th. Melanie was due the 28th, but my doctor said she would try to get things moving for us if I hadn't had her by my appointment the morning of the 13th.  I had been having contractions for months, and we even went to the hospital at 32 & 34 weeks to have my contractions stopped because they were way too close together. After my appointment I was not having much change in my contractions so we went about getting ready for the baby.  We moved the furniture into our room and I did some baby laundry.  That night around 1am my contractions started being between 2-4 minutes apart, so we called a friend to come stay with the kids and we headed off to the hospital. Our sweet little Melanie Hazel was born at 7:00am sharp.  She weighed 8 lbs 1 oz and was 19-3/4 inches long. She is a good eater and a great sleeper.  Kaylee truly loves having a baby sister.  She loves to help change her diaper and dress her.  She often wants to hold her and she loves to give her kisses. Austin and Lance think she's pretty great too.  Austin is happy to hold her for me, and is usually willing to do so even if she is crying... although he likes it much better when she is happy in his arms.  Lance loves to give her kisses and calls her baby.

Joseph ran the Rim-to-Rim at the Grand Canyon with my brother in May.  It took them just over 7 hours.

Austin started Kindergarten this year.  He is doing great in school and we're pretty sure he loves it even though when we ask him all he says is, "I don't know."  We are so amazed at how much he has developed his reading skills in just 6 months.  He had a black eye on the first day of school from bonking heads with his cousin Lyla the week before. On the first day of school when we were waiting for the bus I asked him how he felt and he said, "big and strong." He's growing up so fast!

Fall has become birthday season as we now celebrate 4 in October-November, but it's a great lead into the most wonderful time of the year... Thanksgiving and Christmas!  I love the holiday season and the birthday business just helps the holiday season come even faster.

This year we spent Thanksgiving at home with the Meades & the Morin parents. They all spent Christmas with us as well.  We had Christmas Eve at the Meades where we did our first (hopefully annual) nativity reinactment.

Davey's family joined us on the 26th to finish up our Christmas celebration. Melanie was blessed in church on the 27th, and Josh (one of Joseph's best friends from growing up) and his wife Mary and their kids were able to join us.

Since the 29th was Gramps' birthday we surprised him Sunday morning (the 27th) with ties for him and all of the grandsons. 

The 29th also marked our 10th wedding anniversary.  We celebrated with dinner at a great restaurant called Firebirds, feeding our baby in the Costco parking lot, then shopping for toy storage solutions at Target. It was a little bit of romance and a little bit of real life, but that's the best thing about all of this... it's real.  I'm so grateful for a wonderful husband and children.  Life is so sweet and we are so blessed.

2014

2014 was an exciting year for our family.  Joseph and I bought our first house!  We found it in April, a new build in another city, but it was perfect for our family.  Joseph's commute increased from 4 to 20 minutes, but owning our own home makes it worth the drive. The house is the perfect floor plan for us.  It has room for the kids to run around and room for us to grow. Plus, there's still room for company too! :)  We absolutely love our home.

We moved into our house in the middle of October and got to have the Meades & Morin parents join us for Thanksgiving.  It was wonderful. 

We spent Christmas in Oregon with Joseph's siblings and parents for probably our last Oregon Christmas.  It looks like it's going to be every-other-summer family reunions for the Wildes from here on out.  We'll miss the closest thing to a white Christmas that we've had in our married life, and we'll miss our extended family celebrations but we look forward to making our own Christmas traditions together in our own home.

2013 continued...

... and we're back!

I really wish I hadn't stopped blogging, but I've made a goal to start up again.  I'm hoping to blog once a month in 2016.  Here we are at 11:20pm on Jan 31 and I'm writing my first post... but I'm not late yet! :)

So, that cute little running buddy of mine turned out to be a boy.  He was born November 4th and we named him Lawrence Alan, after his Great-Grandfather Lawrence Wilde, and Alan after his father (Joseph's middle name) and Grandfather.  We call him Lance for short.  He was such a happy baby, full of smiles even when he didn't feel well.  Even though he didn't feel well, he even made teething look easy, and he's always been an amazing sleeper.  (He's two years old now!  Boy how time does fly!)

We spent Christmas in California that year and my brother, sister, & I all stayed at my parent's house with our families.  It was definitely a full house, but it was so much fun to spend so much time together.  We even got to have a photo shoot with everyone.  It was a wonderful way to end the year!