Christmas 2010

So this year we were supposed to get 3 to 4 presents per kid but thanks to Dan I think we ended with 5 per kid... ah well at least it wasn't the usual 8 :)  only if you add the Santa present and the sibling present.  We all had fun and were anticipating the day when they could all open their presents.  It was a lot of fun.
Christmas Eve we had a nice meal which consisted of a Ham, potatoes, rice and some vegetables and of course home made rolls.  Tristan and I also baked some cookies.  After dinner we waited for Steven and family to come over so we could have a little family Christmas program.  We started out with a nativity, Steven read the birth of Christ story in the bible and the kids acted out the story with the help of Dan  and  aunt Amber.  I have to say that the best actress that night was Carmen, she did everything perfect :)
We then let the kids open one present each and then chatted for a while, ate some more and right at the end we sang some Christmas songs.  We sent the kid to bed around 10:30 I think and then sent our selves to bed as well.  The next morning we waited in bed until the kids woke up and started going downstairs to check out what Santa brought them, they were very excited. Santa was very generous this year and brought Shayna a new sewing machine just for her, Victor got a skate board, Tristan got his own scooter and Aaron got his cool digital camera.  We opened all of our presents and then everybody started having fun with their new toys.

 I was able to find a new set of stockings for the entire family including one for our baby girl, each was $.0.89 a really good steal if I say so myself.   They are the cutest things ever.

 The cast of the Navity

 Aaron and his new camera, he loves it.

 Tristan and his scooter.

 I am still not sure how I feel about this skateboard but he loves it.

 Shayna and her brand new sewing machine.

 Aaron and his pile of presents.

 Victor and all his goodies.

 Shayna and her stash.

 Tristan and his things but he was more interested in his new game boy than anything else.

 My kids got me a new jewelry box, it is really cute.   And Dan of course got a couple of Sunday shirts from the kids.

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I have to say that it was a very relaxed Christmas day and I even felt like making a special breakfast, I made an omelet for everybody with the left over ham and they loved it.  So far they still enjoy playing with their presents and are very happy with them.  So am I :)  Hope everybody had a great Christmas as well.

The latest.

My pregnancy has been keeping me from posting as often as I like to regularly do it, but I will try to create a post here with lots of pictures and less words to proof that we have been doing things as a family.
My mother left us November 27th, right after Thanksgiving (which was great but no pictures).  That week for our Family Home Evening we had a little bell choir with the kids and she participated as well.
We miss her so much but know that she is very happy to be back home eating all her favorite food and we also know that we will see her again next year (hopefully soon).  After we dropped her off we went to the Rennasaissance Festival and we had a wonderful day eating, walking and entertaining the kids with various activities.  We really enjoyed it.

 The kids trying archery again, I think they are getting a little bit better.

 Aaron was super excited to be able to do it this time around.

 Here we are trying to see and listen to "Tartanic"  They are the best!!

 Tristan posing with this executioner guy.

 He was also surprised at the size of his corn dog and he ate it all gone.

 Victor and Shayna found this interesting looking creature, his costume was awesome.,

 At the beginning of the Month Tristan lost his first tooth, doesn't he look different?  He is growing up.

 Shayna had her first choir performance at the Stake Center and I think she did great.


We went to the drive in one night and enjoyed two kids movies, I loved Tangled by the way :)

 The kids had been saving all year as a team and they got $27.00 all together, so they decided to go and buy some Legos, we offered to buy one set so they could get the other one 50% off and they love them.  They got an early Christmas present.

 We went to our Ward Christmas party and the kids were able to see Santa.  The sweetest thing was to see Aaron give Santa a big hug when he climbed on his lap.

I think Shayna is getting a little old for Santa :)

Halloween

Yes I know it is a little late for the Halloween post but don't worry it is only pictures, I need to keep updating my blog before I forget the details.
Halloween this year was kind of boring since it fell on a Sunday. I told my family that we were not going to go out trick or treating or give away candy since it was Sunday and it just didn't feel right to dress up as vampires and what not on the day of rest. They didn't agree at the beginning but after a while they were OK with it. We did go to our trunk or treat at church and Dan, my mom and I wore our old outfits from years past, the kids got their outfits from the store this year and had a variety of costumes :) Aaron was a a pirate, Tristan was Iron Man, Victor was death or something like that and Shayna was a vampire. We had the most fun with Shayna's outfit because she got to wear a wig and I worked really hard on the make up... too bad she didn't win the contest at church :) They got more than enough candy and everybody was happy in the end.






Shayna's make up was a lot of fun, she sparkles all over herself so she could shine :)


Here is Dan with his cool cat eyes he found online, people really didn't notice it until they had been talking to him for a while.

And here I am wearing the same outfit I wore last year but this time I had a little extra roundness about me :)

Update

Wow two posts in one day... But now I can breath a sigh of relief :)
I went to my appointment with the high risk doctor and after waiting for almost two hours (the waiting is the most horrible part), I go in there and it only takes 20 minutes for the whole thing to be over. They did a very detailed ultrasound and checked the fluids and everything looked good, the doctor did not show any concern about the echogenic bowel syndrome because all the other tests they had done came back normal. She told me there is a chance of 1% of having a baby with Down Syndrome and she honestly didn't know why I was there in the first place... they were concern about the diabetes but the baby has a good weight, kind of small for her age (4 lbs 3 oz.) but since I am doing great with keeping my numbers down with the diabetes there should not be any problem at all. She told me that she thinks the baby will be just fine and whatever is in the intestines right now is probably due to an infection I had at the beginning of the pregnancy and the deposits should come out after she poops for the first time...
I can not tell you how relieved I felt when I heard this and grateful that my baby girl will be OK, my main concern was her health, I was already thinking about medical problems and all sorts of things. Thank you all for your support and prayers, they are greatly appreciated.
Also a big thanks to my sis in law who watched my kids today for almost 4 hours so I could get this done, you are a lifesaver Amber :)
I also got to see a 3D image of the baby and she looks so cute already. I really can't wait now.

Wish me luck!!

It is a little early for me to blog but I need to write this down now so I can feel better. Today I go and see the high risk doctor and hopefully all my doubts will be cleared out. I am feeling nervous, anxious and preoccupied which is probably all very normal after being told your baby might not be normal at the time of birth...
I have been praying and thinking positive thoughts and all that but still there is the unknown factor and that is what is killing me. I talked to my doctor yesterday and they have been doing stress test on the baby, she seems to be doing fine in there, very active and resting her little feet right up against my ribs (very painful at times if I might add). The doctor said that I should be able to understand a little bit more of what is going on with the baby and what the ultrasounds have been showing really is, she thinks it might go away and that it is probably just stool sitting there but we'll see. In any case the uncertainty will definitely go away after today (I hope) and I can move on and know a definitive answer. What ever the outcome I will still stay positive and prepare my self even more for what the future might bring to us. Thanks to the people that are willing to listen to me and give me advice, it is very helpful :)

On a good note my morning sickness is completely gone, it has been officially 2 weeks since I last had to deal with morning sickness. I am now giving myself insulin shots since I was not able to manage the gestational diabetes with the diet, I was starving, not getting enough food in my body for baby and me and dropped another 3 pounds which is not good. So far I am staying right between 8 and 10 pounds of weight gain for this pregnancy. I am eating a lot better now and even with all the poking, enjoying life a whole lot more. I organized the guest room and transformed it into the nursery, the crib is set up and the baby clothes washed and put away, I still need to finish some other things but so far we are just waiting for little baby girl to make her big debut in a month or so...

At night I sit on the couch and enjoy watching my alien like movements on my belly, everybody rubs my belly at home and kiss it, the kids are all excited and love feeling her move in there. It has freaked them out a couple of times and I am surely going to miss that part of the pregnancy, the connection with that precious little life inside of me. I just love it.
I will keep every one posted on what is going on later on.

I am feeling blessed.

It has been kind of hard to think about the good side of thing lately (during the last few months actually), I guess we tend to concentrate in the bad things rather than the good things. It comes natural to me and I really need to stop doing that.
Here is a list of the thing that have been hard on me:

-Having to deal with two miscarriages and ectopic pregnancy before finally getting pregnant and staying pregnant.
-Even though I was extremely excited about getting pregnant, being sick for the last 30 weeks have not been fun at all.
-Not being able to have a good summer with the kids this year, even though they know I tried to make it work. The medication to keep me from throwing up kept me passed out most of the summer.
-Being told by my doctor that they found a soft marker for Down Syndrome on my baby....(I will explain this later)
-Being told that I have anemia and now need to take another gross pill to get my iron levels to where they need to be.
-Being told that I have Gestational Diabetes (again) and now that I can finally eat... well I can't :)

I have talked to friends and family members that are close to me about all this issues and probably complained more than I had to but you need to air all of this out right? Other wise you can go insane. They all have been supportive and kind to me but it still makes me feel a little down because I was hoping for the best pregnancy ever, I took a big break to give my body time to feel great for this last pregnancy, I wanted to enjoy it as much as I could being that last time that I get to carry life inside of me... It still is special but it is just not the same.

The hardest thing has been wondering what the outcome of this pregnancy is going to be. When the doctor told me there was something that was not right with the baby it broke my heart and I felt like it was a slap to my face. They told me she has Echogenic Bowl Syndrome, which basically means that her bowl seems a little dense and they usually see that in babies that are born with down syndrome... they are not sure 100% about it and I was supposed to get refereed to a High Risk pregnancy doctor but so far they haven't done that. I have to be honest, when I first heard about it I just cried like crazy, I felt like I really didn't deserve to go through something like that at all, after all the trials to get pregnant and then you are told your idea of a perfect baby is gone. I feel selfish now for having those feelings. After I talked to Dan about it I stopped at a park and prayed to my Heavenly Father to give me the strength to deal with what ever will happen, if she is meant to have DS, it will be OK, I know that now. I have been blessed with understanding and encouragement to deal with it and I know that she will be perfect no matter what and we will love her just the same. I hate it that they had to tell me and have me waiting for the day she arrives to find out if she will be or not.
Heavenly Father does not give us trial that we can't handle, I know that for a fact. I never thought that I could be strong enough to deal with a situation like that but I know he will be with me every step of the way.
The only thing I ask is that people do not look at my baby with pity or feel bad for me, that would just brake my heart. We love her already, we can't wait to meet her and hold her in our arms for the first time. It has been a rough pregnancy, the hardest one I have had to deal with and I can honestly say that we can't wait for it to be over... my body can't take it anymore, everything, EVERYTHING hurts but I know that at the end of the road we will have the cutest baby to hug and love for the rest of our lives and suddenly it doesn't seem too bad anymore.

I have been blessed with a wonderful family, a great husband and kids. I have more blessing that I can count and the list is definitely longer than the one I previously wrote down. I love this time of year and even if I can't enjoy a big meal for Thanksgiving I know that my life will be for ever full with all the blessings Heavenly Father has given me.
Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving.

My birthday... not so fun.

I decided to officially cancel my birthday for this year due to a massive attack of the flu to my dear family.
I just don't know if I should cry or what. It all started last week with Dan and Tristan getting sick first and then me and my mom. We are slowly recuperating but now my Aaron is also sick with the flu, a really bad ear infection and respiratory issues. The poor thing had a seizure Saturday night after throwing up due to his high fever and I didn't even know it. He started acting kind of funny and did not make any sense at all. I feel so bad for not taking him to the ER right then and there but now I know what a seizure looks like... The doctor gave him TONS of medications and we are hoping he can feel better soon. He got a cute mask to go with the breathing treatments that we have to do at home, my poor boy. He had RSV about 3 years ago and he got to have a breathing treatment at home but his time is different, he was wheezing but his oxygen levels were fine, so he is getting 2 puffs of two different medications twice a day, he will do one of the medications for a month and we will see how he is doing by Thursday back with his doctor and then she will decide if he can stop one of the medications...
And so my birthday is on hold, I am not up to 100% yet, I can't taste anything so there is no point going out to eat, my body aches so no going to the movies or anything.
My mom was crying this morning because she really wanted to cook this really yummy meal for my birthday and make me a cake but she is also sick and I don't want her to work hard right now. Wish us luck and that the sickness can leave my home soon, I can't take this anymore!!!

Aaron turns 4

So I am giving myself the award for the worst mom ever for taking me this long to post about Aaron's birthday. Just because he is the last one it doesn't mean we love him any less or his birthday is less important... it's just me and being sick all the time that has not allowed me to sit down in the office and actually upload the pics and write about.
Aaron turned 4 on October 12, he was a very happy boy waiting and waiting for his birthday to come. We did not have a birthday party for him because the school wont allow me to send invitations to his friends and I just didn't know what else to do. Since his birthday was on a Tuesday we figured we would start the celebration earlier and we gave him his presents on Sunday when the whole family was at home and that way he didn't have to wait until after work to give him his presents. Yes horrible mom again did not want to wrap the presents so we just made him close his eyes and wait for them... he actually liked it very much. He got a cool construction site thingy that he just loves, magic markers that only work on a special paper (for my own peace of mind), a singing stuffed animal that is my favorite toy in the whole world, a little battle mouse that talks all the time and walks all over the place, cars and many other things. On Tuesday for his actual birthday I made him his birthday cake, nothing fancy just a race track with 4 cars since he was turning 4 and he just loved it. Funny thing is that I had it on top of the stove to keep it safe from the little fingers and I forgot the oven was still on, the cake melted in the back and so did the cars.... see??? Horrible mom.
That night we took him to Chuck E Cheese's to celebrate and spent almost 200 tokens playing for a couple of hours and we got a good amount of tickets to trade in, Aaron got to pick most of the stuff for him but the other kids also got some goodies. He was very happy and I am glad he enjoyed his two day celebration.


I just want to say for the record that Aaron is a bright little boy with lots of imagination, some times way too much (he tells me stories of how things happen around him even though we know he is the one doing it). He is very enthusiastic about school and absolutely loves Tristan, he says he is his bestest friend. He has a crush on his PK teacher and I think she does too :) He is learning how to be helpful and trying really hard to clean up after himself. He is a joy to have around and we love him so so much. I can't believe he is 4 already!!

Just a quick thought.

I have been dealing with morning sickness for the last 5 months officially now. I had never gone this far being sick like this and let me tell you that is not fun at all. My mark was always around 20 weeks. I was done puking and feeling gross all day, today I am at 25 weeks and a few days and I feel like I can't take this anymore. I had been feeling better but for some reason it is all coming back again. I am thankful to have my mom here because she helps me out and I can take naps without leaving my kids on their own, but seriously I am getting SICK of this.
I usually deal with gestational diabetes after my morning sickness but I still have to go and do the test, I have been putting it off because it is something I don't want to deal with right now, so I will be praying that I wont get it this time. I feel like this is the worst pregnancy so far, I know it is all worth it and in the end I will forget all about it, I want to be able to enjoy what is left of it, wake up in the morning and be excited about my little projects for the baby but so far that is not happening. I am hanging in there, just watching the time go by and I think to myself sometimes it is too much. I am glad my other pregnancies were easier or I would have been done after two.... really.

The beach!!!

One of the reasons I was so excited to move to Texas was because of the proximity to the beach. I grew up in a country where going to beach was something we did regularly. The water was always clean and warm and the weather was perfect, we used to spend the weekend there when ever we could. Since I came to the USA that was not the case, I never went to VA beach while we lived there, I went to the beach in New Jersey and I froze my butt off. We have not been to the beach as much as I would love to but at least once year we have done the trip down there. We went to Galveston last month when my mom came back from Utah and we had a blast, it was the perfect day, perfect weather, it wasn't crowded, no jelly fish stinging us and the water was kind of clear. We played in the sand, jumped in the water, buried our feet in the sand and just enjoyed ourselves there.




The kids and my mom were mostly in the water playing and the kids were amazed at how far they could go before it started to get really deep.
I wanted to go back but I am not sure we will have the time to do it.

Halloween decorations.

I haven't been feeling like blogging lately but honestly I don't even know if that many people read it anymore so sometimes I wonder why do I even care... oh yeah because this blog is mainly for me and my posterity :)

We have been doing things, going places and taking pictures but I just can't find the time to sit down and get the pictures in here and write about it, also lots of thinking going on and to get silly thoughts out of my head I better get busy I guess.

The kids and I decorated a Halloween house that we got at Walmart. I usually get into the decorating thing 100% but this year it has not been the case. The kids basically decorated the outside of the house so if you were to come to my house then you would understand what I mean, they did a good job, basically it is the same old decorations so it was easy for them to figure out how to put them up.


I also worked on a little project of mine this year, I had seen this Halloween counters before and think they are really cute but when I went to the store to look for the materials they did not have them, apparently you have to buy a piece of wood and cut to size and all that fun stuff, so we went a different direction and thanks to my crafty daughter Shayna we managed to find a way to make it and I really like it. We bought the blocks at Michaels and also the little boxes the are in, I painted the boxes, covered the blocks with paper and added the numbers (I used a marker and did it by hand instead of using stickers or anything else). I think it all came together very well and it was easy to make.






These are my dollar store finds, two plates a little jar that go together, aren't they cute?