2nd NICU Reunion

Can't believe it's been another year since this post. Not a lot has changed. Except that they remodeled the NICU. And now we live less than 10 minutes away. Almost makes me want to have another preemie just to enjoy the upgrades. Just kidding.

Just Pictures

Potpouri

• The sanctuary came through! Disneyland sent us our confirmation email. I guess it was meant to be.
• We need prayers to find our camera.
• We need prayers to find our fax machine cord.
• We are officially living in our new house.
• It's an official mess.
• Yes, we found tenets for our old house.
  
• Yes, we like them.
• No, the rent doesn't cover the mortgage, but close enough.
• We just spent a week in St. Louis with all my family: everyone from Gma Jones to Gracie dog.
  
• No, our kids did not love the dog. They got used to her.
• We went to the arch, zoo, butterfly house, park, movies, shopping, etc.
• No, they are not afraid of heights. or roaches.
  
• James counted all of the babies words. final count 37ish
• Tate taught them how to jump off the couch which they do even without a safety net.
• Annette taught them magic and ping pong.
• Davis pretty much ignored them.
• Josie stole their toys.
• Josie won March Madness.
• We need prayers to find our drill charger
• We need prayers to find appliances that work.
• No, we haven't been to our new ward yet.
  
• We still like our old one.
• Yes, the kids are still living on central time.
• Yes, I ignore them when they wake up at 6am
• Ryan did a magic show last night at his grandpa's retirement home.
• Yes, it took about 10 minutes for the volunteers to reach the front of the room.
• We had a couple of easter egg hunts.
  
• Yes, our kids loved it.
• No, they do not like peeps.
  
• They do like breakfast.
• I need to go give them some.
• We need prayers for sanity.
• We need to send thank you notes to all our friends who have helped us.
• We need to send our new address to everyone who wants it.
• No, I don't foresee those two things happening anytime soon.
• No, we didn't finish painting.
• I don't foresee us finishing soon.
• We need to watch conference since we couldn't hear among lots of cousins.
• Too bad you can't get it on Netflix.
• We need to take more pictures and record more of the funny moments in life.
• Can I hire someone to do that?
• note to family: I think I may have found the web cam so we can skype.
• note to all: our phone numbers are the same, so you know where to find us.
• now I really need to go.
• should I spend the day unpacking?
• or should I hide out at Target?
• I'll let you know...
• actually, probably not.
  

Ironic Again

So Ryan and I completed our "Day of Service" last week for our Disneyland tickets. We were going to volunteer at an elementary school, but we had to cancel that in order to close on our house. So our backup plan was to go to the Gilcrease Nature Sanctuary and talk to their birds. I'm not kidding. It was a very easy (albeit cold) way to spend our service time. Despite needing earplugs and being worried about sharp claws and beaks, we spent a lovely 4 hours conversing with parrots, trying to teach them new words, holding baby desert turtles, etc. For not being bird people, we grew pretty attached to these endangered parrots. Especially the one who asked me, "What's the matter?" when I was shivering from cold.

However, if you live locally you will have heard on the news that this lovely sanctuary was hit with a fire and over 200 of the birds and a dog died! Before our service day, I admit, we probably would have been more upset about the one dog (again, we're not bird people). But now that we "know" these birds, we have found ourselves wondering: Was it Max? PJ? Vegas? Reno? Baby? The turtles? The raven?

At some point we are planning to head back and find out what we can do to help. It's true that we only care about this place because we were planning on using them for something free. But now we're not even sure they would have had the time to send in our service hours (or maybe they burned!) so who knows if we'll get our free Disneyland tickets. So the way I see it, the sanctuary gets 4+ hours of our time, and Disneyland gets our money after all. (cause we still have to go this year). So in our particular case the Disney year of service lies:

Disneyland: 1 Us: 0

Ironic

If you know us, you have come to find out that we don't do things like everyone else. This post is no exception. It's ironic that we just painted and redid our bedroom. Because now we have to do it again--in our new house.


No joke--we are moving. By April 1. Into this house. Across town. If you are gasping right now, don't worry. We only made the final decision a few days ago. It's a long story. But we are excited about it. And slightly terrified.

The next three weeks are going to be a blur. So if anyone wants to babysit, clean, pack, paint, repair, call companies, or hold us up when we're about to fall over from exhaustion--feel free to come on by!

And as soon as we get our new house company ready (so in another 6 years) we'll have you over!
front

master bath

kitchen

main living room

master bedroom

office

Extreme Makeover: Bedroom Edition

After 6 years of living in this house and staring at blank, white walls-I finally decided to do something about it. Thanks to help from a friend (thanks!) and to Ryan's generous relatives who donated some furniture to us (thanks sooo much!) we have gone from

This:

To This:




and from This:To This:





I love my new room and I love that it was practically free to do!

The kids didn't want to be left out-this was their contribution:


Don't worry-it all came right out. But they're still not allowed in my new room!

Last But Not Least

I won't bore you with the antics of our almost terrible two toddlers, but I will force several pictures upon you:














As you can see, we have our share of fun and mischief around here. Included in that is a very important milestone I discovered today: our very first mural on the wall. I'm sure it will not be the last.