The Lundgreen Family

Happy 4th of July - New Years Everybody!

2012-01-03T16:55:00.026-07:00

**BEWARE! EXTREMELY LONG POST BELOW!**

A lot has happened since Kamry’s birthday so I’ll just start with Kamry’s 1 year photos. We took these up on USU Campus back in May when it was freezing cold so Kamry really didn’t smile for very many of them, but I tell you what… they are still adorable!

The sneeze in sequence is adorable! I had to print those pictures.

My brother-in-law Ryan (Melanie's husband) retired from the USAF in June and me and mom went to his retirement ceremony. (It was in the middle of the week so pretty much everybody had to work.) It was at Hill AFB, and this is me and Kamry in front of one of the planes. As you can see, even in June I looked massively pregnant. Believe it or not, my belly got bigger!

Every year we go to Bear Lake with Nate's family and this was a picture of Kam in her cute bikini at the lake. You can tell by the bruise on her head that she was just getting the hang of walking.

Kamry and Nate on the 4th of July. Her little outfit was so cute. She barely had enough hair, but I was able to put it into a little pebbles pony tail on top of her head.

Nate had to make a delivery for work up in Moose (just outside of Jackson Hole) so me and Kamry went along for the ride. Being very pregnant and swollen, this was not a fabulous idea because sitting in truck that long made my ankles HUGE! And at this time, Kamry was not liking the car seat at all and was being a screaming beast of a child the entire way there and pretty much the whole way home until she fell asleep. We were seriously regretting that trip by the end of it.

In July my hands started going numb at night. And then after a few days they were numb all the time. It was really weird, but it didn’t hurt or anything so I figured it was just part of pregnancy. Then about a week later I started having really bad pains in my wrists and up my arms when I slept. These pains were so awful they would wake me up and I was almost to the point of crying. It finally got to the point that I couldn’t deal with it anymore so after googling some information I diagnosed myself with “Pregnancy Induced Carpal Tunnel”. At my next Dr’s appointment I asked her about it. Yes Yes Yes. I should be a doctor because my diagnosis was correct. SERIOUSLY!? Toxemia the first time, and now pregnancy carpal tunnel. It could have been so much worse but I was feeling bad for myself at that moment. I had tried creams and stuff and nothing was working so I ended up going to an Occupational Therapist once a week for 3 weeks for therapy. It helped, but never completely took away the pains.

At my 35 week appointment I was measuring at 41 weeks so my doctor was a little nervous. She figured that it was just excess amniotic fluid but she wanted to do an ultrasound to be sure. We did it and she said there was A LOT of fluid, which is a good thing, but the baby was measuring really big. At 35 weeks Paislee was measuring at 8 lbs. 8 oz. HOLY CRAP! When she told me that I about died. I just knew I was going to have a huge baby. My belly was big enough to prove it too. That measurement could be up to a pound over, but still, that’s a big baby after Kamry’s 2 lbs. I was hoping she would say that we could take the baby then, but that was not an option. I had to keep going.

Of course, because I am me and it was a really hot summer I was swelling really bad in my legs and feet again. All part of pregnancy. Each week when I went to the doctor I kept feeling even bigger, but at 36 weeks I went down to measuring at 39. I had felt Paislee shift up into my ribs so that was probably part of why I was measuring so big before. At 38 weeks, Paislee hadn’t dropped even slightly and I was still at a 0. Nothing was happening so I just told my doctor to schedule me for the C-section at 39 weeks because I was not about to wait for her to come on her own.

September 1, 2011

Nate and I had to be at the hospital by 5:30am so it was a very early morning and of course I wasn’t allowed to eat anything past midnight. I thought I was going to DIE of thirst! The last couple months of this pregnancy I couldn’t get enough water in my system. I was drinking like a camel! I somehow survived and was taken back to surgery at 7:30am. It was a very different experience because there was no emergency this time. It felt strange almost to know that in a few minutes we were going to have a baby. They got me on the table and the anesthesiologist proceeded to give me a spinal block. I didn’t realize there was a difference between that and an epidural, but there sure is. I remember with my epidural with Kamry I couldn’t feel anything but I could still move my feet and legs. He put the spinal block in this time and I felt a rush of warmth go down my legs and they were like “ok, put your legs up on the table.” YEAH RIGHT! I tried but I was completely paralyzed. I couldn’t do anything and my legs felt like they weighed 1000 pounds each. They were like “yeah it’s working right” and then they laid me down on the table. It was really weird.

Nate was able to watch this time too. He couldn’t see a whole lot because my big fat belly was blocking quite a bit, but he saw a little. Before the baby was about to be pulled out he grabbed the camera out of his pocket. I had checked the batteries before we left and they were good, but I grabbed extras just in case. Well, they were pulling the baby out, so he turns on the camera to get a picture and it dies. Batteries are dead. He was wearing scrubs over his clothes, so he had to dig below the pants and into his pants pocket to try and get the extra batteries. He missed the very beginning of them pulling her out, but he got some good pictures anyway. I was so mad! I hate cameras! Oh well. These are some the pictures he took. (I didn't include the ones when they were pulling her out.... they look pretty nasty, so I just went with these ones.)

Paislee Marie Lundgreen born September 1, 2011 7:58am 9 lbs. 6 oz. 20 inches.

When they broke my water, it went EVERYWHERE! It splashed all over the doctors and all over the floor. My doctor was like “Oh my gosh! That is A LOT of fluid!” She was even surprised. But none of us were very surprised to hear how big she was. With as big as my belly was, and how big she measured before, we were expecting over 9 lbs. Nate looked down when they were putting in my staples and was like “holy crap! You’re skinny!” It’s weird but it made me feel good to hear that J

I was hoping that I wouldn’t throw up in surgery like I did with Kamry but I still did once and dry heaved once. It was too bad this time. Later that day though I was still on my clear liquid diet and all of a sudden I had the urge and threw up all over myself and my bed because I didn’t have anything to catch it. It was pure liquid and surprisingly it didn’t hurt, but it was pretty gross. They got me a bucket and a little while later I did it again. It was weird though because I felt perfectly fine. Needless to say, I waited until Friday morning to eat anything solid. I stayed in the hospital until Saturday morning and then I was discharged. Nate’s parents kept Kamry for us so Nate was able to sleep good at night and we didn’t have to worry about meeting people every day to have her watched. It was really helpful.

On September 11 we had Paislee’s newborn pictures taken. She wasn’t exceptionally cooperative, but we were able to get some really cute pictures!

It was a bit of a transition having a new baby with Kamry but she actually did really well. I was worried about her trying to kill the baby, but she has been so sweet. She gives her kisses and instead of stealing her binky all the time, she now tries to give it back when it falls out of her mouth. She still hasn’t figured out that it’s not okay for her to sit on Paislee, but she is doing pretty good overall I think. Paislee has a little bit of colic so at night she gets pretty uncomfortable, but she isn’t too bad. From what I hear from other moms she could be a whole lot worse. I had her sleeping in her bouncy chair because the vibration seemed to soothe her and helped her sleep better, along with the help from being on an incline. I recently have put her back in her basinet and she seems to be doing just fine. She hasn’t been getting near as uncomfortable at night, so I think she is getting over her colic spell.

We blessed Paislee on October 16 at the Church in Lewiston. Nate's dad blessed her this time. My dad came, but was really sick and before we could even bless her he went home sick. He was sick for a few days after that too. I felt bad for him, but I totally understood. My brother Brent completely forgot we were blessing Paislee that day and I called him at about 3:10 (her blessing was at 3) and he had to hurry and drive up from Preston so we waited for him and the extra waiting time was just too much for my dads stomach. But her blessing was beautiful and Grandpa Allen did a great job.

Kilee was playing so cute with Kamry and we thought it was even cuter that they were walking around holding hands. ADORABLE!

My friend Sheena that I grew up with lives in New York now and she came home in October for a visit. This is Paislee with Sheena's little boy Hudson. Hudson is exactly 1 month older than Kamry (born on August 1). It was so fun to visit with Sheena and get to see the kids together.

For Halloween, we had both of the girls dressed up like Pumpkins. Well, Kamry was dressed up, but Paislee was in a onesie that said “Baby’s 1^st Halloween” and it was orange so I put her in black pants to match Kamry and they were both “pumpkins”. We trick or treated to each grandparents house and then went to the Lewiston Halloween Carnival. It was fun going back and kind of re-living my childhood. I did the cake walk with Kamry and we won a cake on our first go around! Then we did another walk and each of the girls won a stuffed animal and then Kamry did the fishing pond and got a little toy.

There was a kid there that had a snake wrapped around his body and we were thinking how real it looked when my brother Brian told us it was real. We looked over and it suddenly peeked it’s head over this kids shoulder. This kid had a freaking 4 foot long boa wrapped around his body as part of his costume! I tell you, I didn’t take my eyes off that kid the rest of the night. I had to make sure he didn’t come anywhere near me! I HATE SNAKES!

Thanksgiving this year was with my family. My grandma fell and broke her hip about a week before Paislee was born, and she did a little rehab time at Sunshine Terrace but was home in time for Halloween and was able to come celebrate Thanksgiving with us. She is a trooper and did really well with her recovery. Thanksgiving was a great time to spend with Grandma and the family.

I have a few random pictures below that were taken the past couple of months.

Kamry was so tired she didn't even make it to lunch time.

Kamry loves to sit on Nate and be goofy. She climbs all over the couches and step all over Nate.

Kamry loves to give kisses. She gives Paislee kisses without even being asked to do it. It's SO CUTE! I think they are going to be great friends.

We took the girls to see Santa on the 23rd of December at the Mall. Kamry didn't cry but she didn't want to sit on his lap, so she was only on there for a couple seconds. Of course, Paislee didn't do anything. She was just happy to be held.

For Christmas we had Christmas Eve with Nate’s immediate family. The extended family party was becoming too much of a hassle so they stopped doing it this year and we did just the immediate family at the house. They taught us how to play a card game called “Scum”. It was so fun and we played it for a long time that night. The next morning we woke up and opened presents and then had to quickly get ready for Church. The Bishop asked me to play a Piano Solo of “Joy to the World” so for the first time in 5 years we went to church in our ward. My turn came, and I got up and started to play my song. I didn’t anticipate the vibrations for the grand piano to be so strong they would knock one of my pages off the piano. Luckily, it was close enough I could grab it, so I just took my right hand off, kept playing with my left, grabbed the music and put it back up without missing a beat. And luckily most of the audience couldn’t see it happen because of the angle of the piano. I think overall I did a really good job on the song. I really liked the arrangement I found too.

After church we went up to Nate’s parents for lunch like we always do. Then we opened gifts and headed over to mom and dad’s for the rest of the evening. It was a really nice Christmas and especially nice because my brother Brent got engaged on Christmas Eve to my new sister in law Angie Dunkley! They decided to get married on New Years Eve (probably the shortest engagement in Utah ever) but we couldn’t have been more happy for them. They got married at Angie’s house with just the parents, Meghan and Angie’s daughter Shantell present. No siblings were invited. Some people would think that would be rude, but I was perfectly fine not being there for it. If that’s the way they wanted it, that was fine with me. I’m just very happy for them. They make a really cute couple.

Paislee was so tired!

My best friend Kelsey came over the other day and the kids were having so much fun. Baine and Kamry were right up by the TV when Mickey Mouse Clubhouse came on, but it wasn't too long before they were back playing with the toys.

Kelsey is letting me borrow her Bumbo for Paislee. She looks so big in it!

We've had a fabulous year, and hopefully 2012 is even better. Sorry for the extra long post- but now you know what we've been up to!

Happy 1st Birthday Kamry!

2011-05-25T09:57:00.012-06:00

Kamry Ann Lundgreen turned ONE year old on May 9, 2011! I can't believe our little girl is already 1!!!!

We had a birthday party for her at the Richmond Community Building. I decided that there were just too many people to try and squeeze it into someone's home so that was an easy option.

This is the birthday cake that I had designed for her. I found the design online and just loved it.

I had Lee's Marketplace make the cake and I ordered it 3 weeks in advance. I get there are 5:30 to pick it up and the girl was like "did you order it at this store or the Logan store?" and I told her it was the Smithfield store. She looked again and couldn't even find my order sheet! After a few minutes of searching, she found that it was hung up on the wrong day and came and informed me that Kamry's cake hadn't been made. Now, being pregnant, of course my emotions are running on extremely high and I seriously wanted to hit the girl. I almost started to cry but I held it back. I just looked at her and said "What? I ordered this cake 3 weeks ago!" The girl asked me what time the party was and I said 7, she told me that if I could give her 30 minutes it would be done. She was being so nice and she was profusely aplogizing so it was a little easier not to hit her. I called Melanie and made arrangements for her to pick up the cake on her way to the party, so I went and paid for it and left. I walked out and told Nate and he about died. He couldn't believe it. The girl did discount my price (a whopping $4) but still... at least my cake was getting done. When I got to Nate's parents house, his little brother Kade (who works at Lee's) was on the phone and was like "well you guys screwed up so you're going to deliver it for free". He got off the phone and told me they were going to deliver her cake for me. I thought that was really nice and cool of Kade to take charge like that. So I called Melanie and told her she didn't have to go get the cake after all.

This was the "smash" cake that came with it. (When you buy a birthday cake you get this one for free).

Nate and I had decided that we wanted the inside of this cake to be colored either blue or pink and then before Kamry dug into it we wanted to tell everyone that she had been keeping a secret and wanted to tell if she was going to have a little brother or sister. (Note: if you read previous posts you may remember that I said we couldn't tell what it was because the baby wouldn't cooperate. Well, that was a little bit of a lie. The baby really wouldn't cooperate, but after I walked around for a minute and emptied my bladder, the baby moved and we could finally tell.) Well Lee's gave me a tough time and made this big deal about it and said it was just impossible for them to color the inside. So what we finally decided was that they would cut the cake in half and put a layer of frosting in the middle. I thought that would be okay, but then as me and Nate talked about it, we decided that it would probably be a lot of work for Kamry to dig into the middle of the cake for them to see it, so I made this one:

You can definitely tell that I'm no cake decorator. I used a bread pan so it was a smaller cake and then colored the inside with neon food coloring. So that is the cake she dug into and we just saved the other one.

Her cute birthday balloon bouquet:

Our little family... luckily Kam is blocking my belly so you can't see how big I'm getting :)

She looked so cute! I love her sandals!

She didn't keep this hat on very long, but at least I was able to snap a picture before she ripped it off. I was surprised she kept the bow on as long as she did.

Kamry and her best friend Baine (Kelsey's little boy). They came and celebrated with us and it made it that much more special!

Time for presents! Of course Kamry wasn't really into it. She ripped a couple pieces but then just wanted to chew on it so I helped. On the last two presents we let the nieces and nephews come up and help rip them open. Nate could tell they were anxious to rip open some wrapping paper.

After presents we had Kamry dig into her cake. Nate made the introduction and announced to everyone that Kamry had something she wanted to say. Well, of course when he explained, Marie and Kallie started shouting saying how mean we were for keeping it a secret. They looked and me and said " you lied?" and I said, "well not entirely because the baby really wouldn't move but after I walked around we got her to move". Well DUH.... I totally said HER and gave it away. Yes, that is right, if you didn't know we are having ANOTHER GIRL! Anyway, so I ruined the big surprise that me and Nate had kept a secret for an entire month! It would have been spoiled anyway because when Nate put the cake on Kamry's high chair tray, you could totally see the bottom of it was pink.

Nate helped her dig in at first, but she wasn't too interested. Then all of a sudden she started just putting her face down into it. It was almost like she didn't want to get her hands dirty or something. It was hilarious!

Afterwards:

You can tell she's not too happy with daddy kissing her. I undressed her down to her diaper because there was no way I was going to let all of that frosting get all over her cute birthday outfit. We washed her off in the sink and then got her dressed again.

Her birthday was so much fun and they're just going to get funner as the years pass. We are very excited to welcome our new little girl into this world in September as well. I'm excited because Kamry will always have a friend to play with too.

Here are a few things Kamry is doing now:

On April 28 she got her first tooth! I had no idea she was even teething. Sharon (her babysitter) called me while I was at my internship and she said "did you know Kamry has a tooth?" I was like "um... NO!" She was so good about it. She cut her second tooth about 3 weeks later and that was one a little more noticeable. She had a runny nose and fever and was a little more ornery but still not too bad. Hopefully all of her teeth are like that! (I know... everyone that is a mom is saying "dream on".)

On Sunday May 15 she crawled for the first time. She was in a little spring dress so I couldn't tell completely if she did it, but later that day she did a little more so it was obvious. By that Wednesday she had figured it out completely and was all over the place. She has thoroughly enjoyed chasing our dog Tommy around and trying to steal his bones and chew toys. (One awesome thing about Tommy -he is a shih tzu- is that he never tries to take her toys and chew on them. He only chews on his own stuff. He's always been really good that way.)

At her 1 year appointment, the doctor told me he is so happy with her development and growth that I can take her off of formula now and transition her to whole milk. He originally wanted her on formula until July when she should have been born, but apparently she doesn't need it. She is growing so fast!

Her measurements at her appointment were:

Weight: 18 lbs. 2 oz. - 13th percentile

Length: 27 1/2 inches - 7th percentile

Head Circ: 44 1/2 inches - 31st percentile

The month of May has been a pretty busy one for us but it's been awesome! AHHH! WE HAVE A ONE YEAR OLD!

I'm a COLLEGE GRADUATE!

2011-05-19T09:50:00.013-06:00

On May 7, 2011 I officially graduated from Utah State University with a BS Degree in Social Work and a Minor in Family and Human Development. YAHOO!

(more pictures to be added soon - I have to get them from the in-laws and my parents first)

On the morning of graduation I did "the walk". This is a tradition at USU where the graduating students gather on the Quad and then walk to the Spectrum for the morning commencement ceremony. Well me and Nate had a lot going on that day, and I didn't know anything about the guy speaking so I decided not to go to the morning ceremony and just to my ceremony at 4pm.

I got up to the Quad and found some of my classmates. Then I ran into my friend Kristin Smith and I wanted a picture. Well for some odd reason my camera wouuldn't turn on, so as I inspected it, I realized there were no batteries in it! I realized that when Nate and I moved back into our house we didn't have any batteries so I told him to take the ones out of the camera and put in the remote, thinking that I would buy some and replace them. Well, that didn't happen. Luckily Kristin had her camera and took a picture. (that picture will be added soon when I get it from her)

I returned with my classmates and some kid overheard me telling one of the girls I didn't have any batteries and he pulled extra's out of his pocket for me. I thought that was really nice! Here are a few of the pics taken on the Quad before the walk:

I ran into Courtney Hall on the Quad so I had to get a picture. Me and Cort have been friends since we were tiny. I had no idea he was graduating that day until I saw him. It was exciting!

My "class" graduation ceremony was at 4, so we have a few pictures taken outside as we were waiting to go into the spectrum.

This isn't our entire class, but a good portion of us.

The ceremony wasn't too boring actually it and lasted about an hour and fifteen minutes so it wasn't horribly long. It was so exciting to see all of the kids I've been going to school with for so long get their diploma's. We were all very excited. Now we're all thinking about getting jobs or heading off to grad school. It's a strange transition.

This is me and Dana sitting in Graduation (Bob - the guy with glasses was also in our class).

When my row got up to get our diploma's Whitney, one of the girls in my class had her husband bring her little girl to her. I didn't know you could walk with your kids, so I went over and got Kamry. She walked across the stage with me and got my diploma. It was so fun! I know she won't remember it, but it was fun to take her with.

Our family after my graduation. (I have no idea why Nate is smiling like that. He's not usually one to cheese it in pictures).

My parents

Allen and Marie

Marie had this cake made for me that we enjoyed at the Coppermill after dinner. It was lemon filled - SO GOOD!

After the ceremony, we went to dinner at The Coppermill as a family. Nate, Kamry. my parents, Allen and Marie, Grandma King, Melanie and Ryan, Kade, Kallie, and Kory were there. Everyone else had other things going on and weren't able to make it. It was really fun to eat dinner with my family and celebrate "my moment". It was a great way to spend graduation day.

That night, Kelsey, Brady and Baine came over around 9:30. We put the kids to bed and soaked in the hot tub. It was nice to spend that night just relaxing. I don't know what I'm going to do with my life now, but I know me and Nate are very excited to move on to the next step.

YAY FOR COLLEGE GRADUATES!

April - Country Music, Kam's first Easter and another surgery

2011-04-25T10:30:00.006-06:00

Back in November Marie told me that George Strait, Reba McEntire and LeAnn Womack were coming to Salt Lake for a concert on April 2. George Strait and Reba are two of my absolute most favorite people in Country music. I have ALWAYS wanted to see them in concert. George doesn't come to Utah very often (maybe every 10 years) so I knew that we had to jump at the opportunity. We wanted everyone to come (all of the Nate's siblings) but it ended up that it was just as the parents going so we jumped online and bought tickets before it sold out. We bought the cheapest ones so we were in the upper bowl at the Energy Solutions Arena but the seats were still fabulous. We had a good view and could see everything.

LeAnn started. She only sang for 30 minutes and the band was so loud we couldn't hardly hear her. But she was still great. I like her music and she was fun to watch.

Reba came out after that. She sang for almost just under 2 hours and put on an awesome show! She sang new and old songs so it was great to hear the old stuff. She ended with the song Fancy as her encore song. She left and for a minute we didn't think she was coming back but then a the music video started showing on the jumbo tron and then a really old fashioned taxi drove out onto the floor and she got out in a sparkly red dress and sang Fancy while the music video kept playing. It was really cool! Marie said that Reba used to put on a HUGE show with tons of props and costume changes and stuff. That would have been cool to see but she definitely put on a good show for us.

Melissa Peterman joined Reba during the show and they did a little impromptu skit. She is so funny! If you don't know who she is, she plays Barbara Jean on the REBA show on tv. She also hosts the "Singing Bee" right now. She is hilarious and her and Reba play off of each other so good. She came out with a Jazz hat and a Jazz flag as a cape and a jersey on. She of course threw each item into the audience as they bantered back and forth. I think the funniest thing was she was holding a Budweiser bottle in her hand and taking sips from it. She looked at the guitarist and handed it to him and said "have a few of those and I'll start to look like Faith Hill". Hilarious! Then she handed it to Reba and said "look at that... The Queen of Country is holding the King of Beers!" Those two are just too funny.

George came out last. He sang for about 2 hours too. It was a little over 4 hours of country music! Some people don't like that he just hangs out with his guitar and sings but that's what I love. I love that he's just natural like that. He has seriously the most amazing voice! He sang good old songs and new ones too like Reba did. I'm pretty sure there isn't a single George Strait song that I hate. There are 1 or 2 that aren't my favorites but I still listen to them. One thing he pointed out was that he was singing a lot of #1 hits and the next song he was going to do wasn't one, but it's one of his favorite. It's was Amarillo By Mornin'. I had no idea that wasn't a #1! I thought for sure it was! That's one of my most favorite songs of his. Oh well... I'm just glad I got to hear him perform it live. He is just amazing to watch and listen to. I'm so glad we went!

On April 15 Kamry had to have tubes put in her ears. She got another ear infection (not as bad as the first one) but at that point I decided (along with the Dr and Nate) that we just didn't want her to deal with it anymore and we should put tubes in her ears. It was an easy breezy surgery - seriously in and out in 15 minutes but the thing that bugged me was that it was her 3rd surgery before her 1st birthday. She was such a trooper through it. A little later in the day after she had a good nap and you wouldn't have even known she had just had surgery that morning.

Nate was sitting by her on the bed when the anesthesiologist came in and was talking to us. All of a sudden we hear a noise and Nate seriously grabbed her right as her feet were leaving the bed. She would have landed on her head if he hadn't caught her. It's amazing how fast your parent instincts are. He seriously looked away from her for 2 seconds to look at the anesthesiologist. Luckily he caught her and everything was fine. Whew!

April 20: Nate and I went and got the ultrasound to find out what we're having. Darn baby would tell us! It kept it's feet crossed under its butt so we couldn't see the "necessary area" to see the sex of the baby. It was frustrating but we tried for about 40 minutes to get it to move and it just wouldn't. I even got up and walked around, emptied my bladder and came back. Still no luck. I guess we'll just have to try again. I for sure want to know what it is because if it's a boy I need to prepare myself with some boy clothes. Oh well... I guess we'll find out later.

Kamry's first Easter was fun. I got her this cute little basket from Smiths Marketplace and filled it with snacks that she can gum and eat. There were little cheese puffs (almost like cheetos), Apple Wagon Wheels and Yogurt drops. I also got her one of those little cups you can put treats in and she can reach in and get them but it's not supposed to let anything spill out. Hopefully it works. I guess we'll see. She had a ton of fun opening her gift too. She was good at grabbing the paper and ripping. She would just get distracted and try and eat the wrapping paper instead of continuously ripping at the presents. We just kept pulling the paper out of her hands when she would rip it off and then she would start over. It was cute to watch.

She is going to be crawling so soon it's insane. She started getting herself on her belly and she can now roll from her back to her belly like a champ. So full of life. It's awesome!

This was one of her gifts.

She loves the little piano. The center part lights up when the music plays and she grabs at it. It's so funny!

Daddy was playing with her one night on the couch and she was just all over the place. It was hilarious to watch him. He doesn't get to see her really active like that all the time so he was just getting a kick out of it. We let her stay up until 10 that night because she was having so much fun.

On April 23 we went to Ogden for a Memorial Service for a guy that Nate worked with that passed away. It was crazy. I think he was maybe 32 and one day he didn't show up for work. Joe Cardall went to check on him and when his truck was home but he didn't answer the door he called the cops. They went in and found Jimmy dead at the kitchen table. Preliminary autopsy showed it was some abnormality with his brain. We haven't got the final results yet from his brother but hopefully they can pinpoint what happened. He was so nice. He was just at our house talking to Nate for a while the day before it happened. He came a couple weekends before and helped us tile the kitchen too. He also gave Nate this really cool gun from like the 1870's. It's stock is broken and needs to be fixed, but it is an awesome gun. He was a really nice guy and I know Nate is going to miss him. He really liked Jimmy. But his brother put on a really nice Memorial (I think it's also called a Wake). They had a video thing of Jimmy going and they displayed a lot of items that he had made from wood and stuff. He was really talented.

Anyway, since we were going to be in Ogden anyway we took Kamry back to the NICU at McKay Dee to see everyone. It was a really busy day so we didn't stay long and we only saw a couple of nurses that we recognized. We're going to take her back again on the evening shift sometime to see them again. They all couldn't believe how big she was and how good she looked and of course they thought she was just adorable. We also donated Kamry's preemie clothes to them so they were excited about that. I kept one outfit for her memory box, but gave everything else.

April has been a pretty eventful month. We are also moving back into our house this coming weekend. The sale we had fell through so we've decided that we might as well be living in it since we are still paying the mortgage. It will be good to get Kamry home again and get into a routine at her own home. I graduate next month and am looking for a job so it's going to be a busy life when I get a job.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and lots more...

2011-03-23T09:42:00.013-06:00

I can't believe how fast time flies and how easy it is to put off updating your blog. Well we've got a few months to cover so here goes...

Saturday December 4: I had volunteered to wrap presents at Kmart for the Shop with a Cop event that happens every year. If you haven't heard of this event, it's when the cops take under privileged kids shopping for their families for Christmas so they can have a nice Christmas. It's been described as Black Friday for children. We were going to wrap presents for a couple hours in the morning and then we were leaving because the family was going to Temple Square to see the lights that day and to the Festival of Trees in Sandy at the Expo Center. Anyway - so that morning me and Marie went to Kmart and are getting things set up and Nate calls me. He said that Kamry has a "huge bump" on the side of her neck. I didn't know what to think because I had just fed her earlier that morning and I didn't notice anything. I told him to take a picture of it and send it to me. That picture is on my phone and being technologically retarded I don't know how to send it to the computer so I'm not posting it. Anyway, you could tell in this picture that the bump was pretty dang big. Me and Marie ran home without being able to participate at all and Nate and I got Kamry into the doctor. My pediatrician's office has a weekend clinic so I called and luckily they could get us in at 10. (I say luckily loosely because I kind of had to force my way into an appointment over the phone... but a frantic mom on the phone seems to get results.)

We saw the on-call doctor and he said that it was her lymph node and it was just infected. Sometimes when kids get infections if they're lymph nodes aren't able to fight off the infection it overwhelms them and they get swollen like hers was. So he put her on antibiotics and said he wanted to see her on Monday. Sweet. Hopefully this antibiotic took care of things and we would be fine. We went to the Festival of Trees and then to Temple Square. It was a lot of fun. We went with Marie's niece Sharon and all of her kids. They hadn't ever seen the lights before so it was a fun experience for them. I'm a slacker and didn't take hardly any pictures of that. This is pretty much the only one I got. This is Kamry sleeping in the stroller. I had her in warm fuzzy clothes, this hat (which has matching mittens) and then her bundle me. She was toasty warm the whole time and it's a good thing because it was pretty cold outside that day.

We were hoping that the antibiotic would take care of this lump but it didn't. Monday when I took her in to the doctor he was worried about it and recommended we take her over to an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist. I asked about Dr. Blotter because that's who Nate's dad Allen see's but he wasn't in so I said whoever was available. We got in to see Dr. Bennion. He is really nice and laid back. He agreed with the diagnosis that it was a swollen and infected lymph node but he was concerned because when it happens it's usually in kids that are older than Kamry and he worried about her ability to fight off the infection. They put her on a different antibiotic and gave her what they call a "peanut butter butt shot". It was a different antibiotic called rocephin and it goes in the top of the thigh. It's really thick like peanut butter so it hurts really bad going in. She screamed and I tried not to cry. He said he wanted to see me everyday that week so he could check it and so that they could give Kamry this shot. I wanted to die... this shot EVERYDAY in my baby? AHHH!

Here are two pictures that show you just how big this lump was. The first picture makes her look really weird but you can see the lump on the left side of the picture (her right side).

This one really shows the lump.

Well, we went back everyday and at first the lump was going away but when I woke up Thursday morning it was MASSIVE! Even bigger than before! I called and was able to move her appointment up so she could get in sooner. Dr. Bennion was right, her little body couldn't fight it off so we were going to have to do surgery. He said what they would do is make a small incision on her neck (about an inch long running horizontally) and drain the infection. They would pack it with an antibiotic gauze and I would have to bring her in every day so they could pull a little of the packing out and trim it. It needs to heal from the inside out so they would have to leave it open to allow that to heal. Her neck would be wrapped to keep bacteria out. Dr. Bennion was leaving town that night so Dr. Wood was going to be the one to do the procedure. We set the appointment for the next morning.

This is me holding Kamry at the hospital before she went in for her surgery. Her little gown was so big on her!

After her surgery, on the oxygen again. We had to have her stay overnight to be sure that she was breathing okay. Pretty much the same thing as when she had her hernia surgery. It's just a precaution and I wouldn't have it any other way. Nate and I slept on the bed in the room and she was in the giant crib next to us. The doctor told us everything went great but he was really surprised to see how much infection was in there. To make sure they had cleaned it all out they drained it with a whole gallon of saline!

The pink thing on her hand is her IV. They had to wrap her hand up so she couldn't pick at the IV. It made her look like she had a broken wrist or something.

You can see the wrapping on her neck in this one.

My angel. She was being so good through this whole thing.

This is a video of my happy little girl! Even when she had just had the surgery and was not feeling good she is happy! This was the first time she ever really giggled and I had her going so good that I just had to video it. SO CUTE!

I took her in to the doctor every day and they pulled some gauze out and then when it was all out, they repacked it again and we did it all over again. It was the worst thing in the world to see her get that pulled out. You could tell the it hurt so bad and she would scream so loud. I hated it. At the doctors office I had to help hold her down so she wouldn't squirm away. It was horrible, but I know that if Nate had to take her to the doctor there is no way he would have been able to handle it. It's amazing how "soft" dad's are when it comes to their little girls. By the time Christmas Eve rolled around she only had a band aid on it.

This is me and Kamry at my parents house on Christmas Eve for the King Family Party.

Kamry and Aunt DD

Here is Nate with Kamry on Christmas morning. She looks so sleepy still! I think the sugar plums were still dancing in her head.

Kamry with all her presents

Another shot of Kamry with her presents

Grandma and Grandpa Lundgreen gave Kam this rocking horse. It's still too big for her but when she's big enough she will love it! If you squeeze it's ears it will nay and make the "clicking" sound like it's running and it's tail will move. SO FUN!

For New Years, luckily Kamry was fully recovered because we had made plans to go to Denver with Kelsey and Brady. We had tickets to the Sunday Jan. 2 Broncos game! I'm not a huge football fan, mostly because I don't understand the rules and the scoring and stuff. But I didn't want to miss the opportunity to go to an NFL game. They played the San Diego Chargers. We left on December 30 and drove in Nate's new truck to Denver. I think normally it was supposed to be a 7 hour drive but we hit a horrible snow storm and I-80 was closed. Nate used his navigation and we found a different route. The roads weren't even terrible but we varied in speed from 20 mph to 55 mph at times. It took us 12 hours to get to Denver! We stopped in this po-dunk little down to get diesel and use the bathroom. While the guys were filling up I went in and asked if there was a restroom I could use. This beasty lady snapped at me and goes "It's for customers only!" so I looked at her and said "well my husband is filling up with diesel right now." I wasn't as snippy as she was but I was still a little snippy. I couldn't believe how rude she was! There was absolutely nobody else around and it amazed me that she didn't notice the giant truck outside fueling up. What a brat!

Denver was way fun. We ate awesome food the whole time and went shopping on 16th street. On New Years Eve we went to Market Street because apparently that's where "it all happens". It was a lot of fun. They shoot of fire works every hour to celebrate New Year's everywhere. There were a ton of people. It was SO FREEZING COLD though. I think if I celebrate New Year's somewhere other than Utah I'll for sure go SOUTH where it's warmer and can be in shorts instead of 12 layers of clothes. It was 25 below zero with wind chill that night!

Me and Nate

Me and Kelsey

Pictures from the Broncos game. The stadium really wasn't as big as I had pictured. On TV they look massive!

The Bronco that runs across the field a few times prior to the game.

They set up this huge bronco entrance and light of fire works and stuff. During the National Anthem they have fighter jets fly over. It was awesome and gave me the chills because it's right at the climax at the end of the song and the jets flew over. Kelsey was looking up with her camera and I was like "umm... what are you doing?" and then the jets flew over. WOW!

Me and Nate freezing at the game. It wasn't too bad when the sun was shining but of course the seats we were in were the only section of the stadium that didn't see the sun.

Me and Kelsey. She looked so cute and I looked like a scrounge with my hair in pig tails. I'm a dork.

During the game. We ended up losing 28-32 but we came back in the 4th quarter and were SO close to a win. It would have been so fun to see them win but oh well. The Broncos didn't have a great season and just a couple weeks before that game they had fired their head coach. It was definitely not their year.

The main entrance to Invesco Field

Invesco Field

New Years was a lot of fun but nothing compares to the week I had when we came home. That first week in January was quite the ride for me and Nate. We got home on Monday January 3. On Tuesday January 4 I wrecked my car. I was driving home from Sunshine Terrace where I'm doing my internship and an ambulance was coming toward the intersection at 400 North and main in Logan and the people in front of me could have made it through but they slammed on their brakes instead and I just skidded right into the back of them. I hit them at like 10 mph. The guy jumped out of the passenger seat and asked if I was okay. I was fine and they were fine so we pulled off the road into the 7-11 parking lot so we weren't blocking rush hour traffic. Of course I hit them right at 5pm. The couple was really nice and the guy even offered to buy me a hot chocolate while we waited. The cops came and got our statements. The guy I hit had his arm in a cast from his shoulder down so I couldn't help but ask him what happened. Well - apparently they had a really bad year too. In the beginning of December his wife got a brand new car. Well about 2 weeks before Christmas he was climbing over the doggy gate they have blocking the stairs to their basement when his foot got caught and he tumbled down their stairs. He had a compound fracture on his arm (if you don't know what that is, it's when the bone in actually sticking out of the skin!) so the wife was rushing him to the hospital and they hit a deer and wrecked her new car. The car that I hit them in was their rental! I felt so much worse after hearing that story. The cop just couldn't believe it either. I was just happy that I didn't have Kamry with me when it happened. Whew! Anyway, so I called Nate and luckily he was just in Wellsville on his way home from work so he came to 7-11 and picked me up.

The week is going on and I'm working with the insurance but Kamry had not been sleeping well. Two nights in a row she woke up screaming bloody murder and didn't sleep hardly at all. I was able to make her an appointment with Dr. Wood (the ENT that did her neck surgery) for Friday. Well, Friday morning January 7 I got a call from the insurance saying that they decided to total out my car because the repair work was going to cost $7,000 and they only valued my car at $9,000 so it wasn't worth it. Okay... so that's one more thing happening. Nate and I had refinanced my car in October because interest rates were so much lower (3.4% vs. 7%) and we pulled a little extra off to pay off his dirt bike. When the value of my car came back from the insurance and everything was said and done, I owed the bank a whopping $64. I could live with that... my loan was getting paid off and the dirt bike is officially paid for. The day was looking up.
Well, I get Kamry into her appointment and find out she has an ear infection and a ruptured right ear drum! Things were not looking so good. We got her on an antibiotic and I just had to make a return appointment to get her looked at in 2 weeks. I felt so bad. This poor girl just can't catch a break! To top things off... my period was a week late. That's just not normal for me so I took an at home pregnancy test. IT WAS POSITIVE! WHAT THE HELL?!?!? I ran up to the hospital lab to get a blood test and they had a sign that said "All pregnancy tests will now require a doctors order". I made the fastest call to Dr. McCulloch's office and talked to her nurse Becky. She is so nice and was like "Um.. didn't you just have a baby?" I was like "YEAH! I NEED THE TEST!" so she called it in for me. I got the blood test, and 2 hours later when I called for the results they said "Congratulations! It's Positive! You're pregnant!" I almost fell off the couch. I think I would have passed out if I hadn't have already been sitting down. I didn't know what to say. Then my thoughts were.... how do I tell Nate?

How I told him: When I got home that night I got out my new 2011 calendar that my mom gave me for Christmas. I started going through and writing birthdays on it. The doctors office told me I was due September 9th (it's now since been changed to the 8th) so when I got to September on the 9th I wrote "BABY DUE" in big letters. When Nate got home I said, "Hey honey I've got a funny story for you." I grabbed the calendar and go "I was filling in the birthdays and the weirdest thing showed up in September. Look at this" and I pointed to September 9th. He was like "baby due. baby due. why would your mom give us a calendar with stuff written on it?" and I just stared at him quietly thinking to myself "proudly" that this was my husband and oh he is just so smart. haha. Anyway - I looked at him with a serious face and just said "Nate! BABY DUE!" and he continued to stare at me so I finally just said "I'M PREGNANT!" and he just busted up laughing! He thought it was so funny! He had been telling me for like 3 weeks that he thought I was pregnant and I just kept telling him he was crazy. Ha! Who's the crazy one now?

We waited a couple weeks to tell family but once I started getting sick I told him we just had to tell them because it was going to become obvious soon enough. We were at Sunday dinner with my family and previously that week my dad had surgery on his sinus' and nobody had told me until after the surgery. So during dinner I kept making a big deal about how nobody tells me anything and how everybody is keeping secrets. So I looked at everyone and said "lets just go around the table and have everybody tell what they're keeping secret" so my mom just said nothing, Brian and Kelli said nothing and then Kevin goes "well Jeneil's not pregnant that's for sure" so I piped up and said "well I am!" and everyone just stared. My mom kind of laughed and goes "you're not serious, right?" and we just looked at everyone and said "yup. we're having another baby." Of course everyone was way excited but it took us all a minute to let it sink in that we were serious. Pretty funny. Then when we got home (to Allen and Maries where we are currently living) Kallie and Kory were here. We sat down around the table with them where they were chatting and Nate was trying to get everyone's attention with Kamry and finally he raised her arms in the air and just said "I'm going to be the best big sister in the world!" and Kallie goes "WHAT!? ARE YOU PREGNANT?" Marie wasn't listening to Nate so all of a sudden she just goes, "WHAT?" and then after a couple seconds she goes... "IN MY BASEMENT?" haha. It's like it just clued into her that we "do that" in the basement. It was pretty funny. So that's how we told the families. I just called the other siblings that weren't there and then called my Grandma. It was a crazy beginning of January that is for sure!

Kamry is getting so big! She is sitting up perfectly on her own and can even rock a little and keep her balance. She can grab things like a champ and switch hands without issues. She eats anything I put in her mouth and is so happy all the time. She takes awesome naps and wakes up smiling. I couldn't ask for a better baby.

At her 9 month appointment her stats were as follows:

Weight: 16 lbs. 2 oz. in the 7th percentile
Length: 28 1/2 in. in the 3rd percentile
Head Circ: 42cm in the 5th percentile

She has never been in the percentiles before! The doctor is really happy with her growth and said she is developing wonderfully. He's not concerned at all about her. I'm so happy. And she is getting to be such a chunk!

This is her sitting on the floor so good

Her first time playing and sucking on licorice. Trust me, it was everywhere.

Grandma Marie had a valve replacement done last June so she has a "ticker" (mechanical valve) and Kamry just loves to listen to it and fall asleep on Grandmas chest.

Marie has this fuzzy red blanket. We love to take off Kam's pants and let her lay or sit on it. She loves to rub it with her legs and feet. Marie said we get to take it with us when we move out because Kamry loves it so much.

I have a new goal to update my blog at least once a month. We'll see how well I do. If my next post is before the end of April I think I'm doing dang good!

Oh to catch up...

2010-12-06T15:12:00.025-07:00

WOW! I can't believe I haven't posted since July! What is wrong with me? Oh yeah, I had a baby, my brain fell out of my butt, I started school again and amazingly enough it's really hard to find the time to do this now! Haha. I'll get off my soap box on how busy my life is because it really isn't that busy, but it's amazing how much time a very small person can consume from my life. Kamry came home, and things just really started to settle into a routine. I was able to take a leave of absence from work the month of August so I could be home with her. That was really nice.

Before Kamry left the hospital we found out that she had a hernia on her left side on her pubic bone. The nurse noticed a small bump and they did an ultrasound. So when they did that they found out about the hernia. The nurse said that she had a baby that had that and they didn't catch it fast enough and it caused all sorts of problems. When you looked at her you couldn't even see the bump, you had to feel it. The nurse was doing her assessment and felt for it just to be safe. It was crazy how she found it. Anyway, so the day after Kamry came home we had to take her down to Primary Childrens Hospital for a consult. We met with Dr. Barnhart who was so nice and scheduled her surgery. So on August 10 Kamry had her hernia surgery. It was so sad to put her in a tiny little gown and watch the anesthesiologist walk away with her. Me and Nate were really stressing. Everything went fine and when they got in there they found that she had a hernia on each side so they repaired them both. I guess in preemies hernias right there on their pubic bone are actually really common. Dr. Barnhart said it was the most common surgery they do. Apparently their abdomen wall just doesn't close off all the way and the opening leaves space for a hernia to happen. Everything went great and she handled the surgery really well. My sister Deanna works in the Infant Med. Surg. unit at Primary's and she was nice and stayed the night with Kamry at the hospital (she was off duty) so me and Nate could sleep at her house and get a full nights rest. At first I thought her incision was a big one like my c-section incision, but once the glue like stuff came off of her there were just two very small incisions on each side. As she grows you probably won't even be able to notice them.

Once it came to going back to work though I started getting really nervous. She was still on the oxygen, and I hadn't nailed down a babysitter yet. So I started making calls and made arrangements with a really nice lady named Desi. She had a small daycare at her home and only had a few kids at the time which I thought was a good idea because then that means, less of a chance for Kamry to get sick from other kids. Sweet. Well, things worked out good for the first 2 days. Then I noticed that Kam was having a harder time breathing through her nose and was really stuffy. I mentioned it to the doctor and he thought she may have an allergy to the babysitters cat... and her house just wasn't quite as clean as I thought it should be. Those of you who know me, know my standards when it comes to clean.... they're kinda high. Clutter is one thing, but clean is another. So... after 3 days of having her at that daycare, we quit. Luckily, Nate was working with a guy, El (that's short for Ellery), and his wife is a stay at home mom and all 3 of their kids are in school. So I immediately had another babysitter. This girl, Jeanette was a clean freak. I loved it. Her house was sparkling 24/7. That worked out wonderfully. I started working again in the beginning of September. Before I had Kamry we had agreed that it was okay for me to go 3/4 time and only work 30 hours a week. That way I get to keep my benefits and everything. Well... when I analyzed it and realized that I was going to be working 30 hours a week, attending classes and doing 16 hours a week of internship... I would never be able to see Kamry. I was going to be gone way too much. Nate and I discussed it and decided that I only had 1 more semester of school to pay for so we didn't need my half tuition anymore. We could just pay full tuition my last semester. And we can get insurance through Nate's work, so just a few days before I went back I met with my boss and told her that I wanted to go part time and just work 20 hours. Well, I came back to work and about 3 days into it I decided I couldn't handle being away from Kamry that much. It was just too hard. So Nate and I discussed it again and decided that we could afford for me to stay home and just finish school. So I gave my notice at work. We were able to work it out so I only worked about 15 hours a week and we used up my remaining vacation leave to get me through the rest of September. Then, September 24 was my last day at work. I had been at my job for 4 years. It was sad to leave, but relieving that I could spend more time with Kamry where I was needed the most.

Friday Night, September 10 we decided to unhook Kamry's oxygen and let her try it on her own. The doctor had given us one of those oxygen saturation monitors that we hook onto her foot (because her fingers are too small) and we let her try it out. Let me tell you I didn't sleep much that night because I was so scared she was going to stop breathing. However, the night went great and that next morning we kept the oxygen off of her and it was official! She was off the oxygen and breathing completely on her own! YAY! That was a joyous day for me. No more hauling that stupid tank around and cute little Kamry could have a normal face and nose without a tube in it!

Anyway, so things were working out great with my babysitter, and then her husband got a job with the union and was stationed up in po-dunkville Montana like 15 minutes from the Canada border. Their initial plan was to keep living here in Utah, and have him stay up there and come home on the weekends because he was going to be working 4 - 16 hour days, but as it got further into the details of the job they found out he was going to be working 6 days on and 1 off so that plan kinda went down the tube. They then found out that he is going to be in Montana until July or August, so they decided to move. I had 1 week notice that they were going to move. It was insane. Luckily (AGAIN), Nate's cousin Sharon (that moved down from Idaho with her family in June) is a stay at home mom and said she would love to watch Kamry. It's working out fabulously! Kamry loves going there and Sharon and her kids just adore Kam so it works out perfect. One initial bump about it was that they live in Richmond and we live at the south end of Logan. So I was commuting her to Richmond every day and then coming back to pick her up. (I know it sounds crazy, but it will all make sense in a minute.)

We blessed Kamry on October 17th at my parents church in Lewiston. We decided that we didn't want to take her to the ward with so many possibly sick people so we did it after church in the Relief Society room. We also decided to keep it just close family, so only siblings and grandmas. We asked my dad to bless her and because I have a big pet peeve at blessings when there are so many people in the circle that they can barely touch the baby we decided to just have it be the two Grandpa's and the bishop. Well, Bishop Baldwin couldn't make it, but his counselor Ted King (my dad's cousin) was there so he was in the circle. It was a great day. It was funny because my dad was blessing her and said "Kamry Lundgreen".... that may not sound funny, but it is because he forgot her middle name! He should have said "Kamry Ann Lundgreen". Anyway, so after the prayer was over we kind of looked at each other and I told him that he forgot her middle name and he felt so bad. It was a simple fix though... so we had another short blessing to complete her name. Then we had dinner and just chatted. It was a lot of fun and a nice quiet blessing instead of an insane asylum party with 1000 people. That's exactly how I wanted it.

Well, Nate and I decided that selling our house on our own just wasn't working, so we decided to sign with a Realtor. We had met with a couple of Realtors that we really liked, and then we met with the lady (Nancy) that sold Nate's grandparents house. She was wonderful and we really liked her, so we decided to go with her. Because we have a baby and a dog, it's difficult for us to keep our house in "showing" order and constantly perfect. So we decided that because our plan once our house sold was to move in with Nate's parents for a while (lots of mounting medical bills from Kamry), that we would move in with them now and just stage our house so it's always "show ready". So we moved in with Nate's parents and got our house ready. I only had to commute to Richmond with Kamry for 2 weeks before we moved, so it wasn't totally crazy. Kamry was a ballerina for halloween. My friend Megan had made her an adorable tutu and Marie had bought her a sleeper that said "My 1st Halloween" that was pink and had little bats, ghosts and pumpkins on it. So I turned her into a very tiny ballerina. She was really cute and although she didn't realize it, she had a fabulous 1st Halloween. I decided to quit pumping breast milk shortly after I went back to work (and quit anyway :) ) but because I was done pumping I decided to take on the HCG diet and see if I could lose a little more weight. I was 20 lbs. lighter than I was when I got pregnant at that point, so I only had 30 lbs to lose to get to my goal weight of 160. Well, that diet is stinking hard! It's very effective and if you stick with it you can totally do it but because I'm a loser and have absolutely no will power, I only lost 10 lbs. But I've been off the diet for a month now and I have maintained my weight. So here I sit at 180 and I'm very happy with it. I lost about 9 inches overall too so that's fabulous! I can pull all of my pants off without undoing the button! It's been really good living with the in-laws. They are great, and we really have our own space because of the basement. But it's nice to come home and have someone to talk to when Nate is working late and when Kamry has needed attention but I've needed to do homework Marie has been great to help out. Don't get me wrong, she's not a built in baby sitter by any means. I still do everything for Kamry, and I cook a meal here and there too so I'm not getting a free pass either. I've probably cooked more here than I did when we were living at our house. That's pretty pathetic. Once our house sells, we are looking at buying some land so we can build a house. Hopefully we'll get it sold and be able to build next Summer. That would be nice. Thanksgiving was fun. We ate this year with the Lundgreens. Sharon's family joined us too so it was a madhouse with 18 of us (19 counting Kamry) but it was a lot of fun. I thoroughly enjoyed my lemon pie after stuffing myself extremely full too. The semester is pretty much over (classes end this week) and I don't have any final exams so once classes are over, I'm done. It's crazy to think that only one more semester and I will be a college graduate. I love that thought. I've started revamping my resume and hopefully I'll be able to get a good job as a social worker. Thoughts of a masters degree have ran through my head a little, but I need a break before I undertake that. I hope to get my masters someday, but right now I need to take it easy. 6 years of school (including summers) is way too much for my brain. Kamry had her 6 month shots the week before Thanksgiving. They gave her a flu shot too so she had a total of 4. The girls that give the shots are way fast and do a good job but of course she still screams. When she got her 4 month shots she did the screaming so hard that she held her breath for a short period of time. So I was kind of expecting that this time, but what happened I definitely did not expect. They hurried and gave her the shots and the girl was like "okay you can pick her up" so I did and I was trying to love her better when I noticed she wasn't moving. Well.... SHE PASSED OUT! I looked at her and her whole body was limp. I started freaking out and crying and the girl was like "blow in her face" so i did and she was pinching her cheeks and playing with her hands and she finally took a big deep breath and started screaming again. I couldn't believe it. She held her breath so long that she passed out. I was so freaked out. The girl was like "wow. lets hope she doesn't make a habit out of that" and i was like "are you freaking kidding me?" anyway... that was scary and I hope she never does that again. On December 4, we went to the Festival of Trees at the South Towne Expo Center in Sandy, and then to see the lights on Temple Square. It was a lot of fun. Kamry slept pretty much the whole day, but we had her all snuggled in her car seat with beanie and gloves on so she kept warm. I hadn't ever been to the Festival of Tree's before. For those of you who don't know what that it, it's a big thing where Families decorate Christmas Tree's in honor of a loved one and then they are available for purchase and all proceeds from the ticket sales and the tree sales are donated to Primary Children's Hospital. It's a great cause. I guess usually they have a little paper by each tree telling about the tree and who it's decorated for, but for some reason they didn't have that this year. It was still fun to see all the trees, because they are all so amazing, but it would have been nice to understand the trees a little more. Some people had pictures of the loved one next to the tree, so that was nice to see... except for a lot of them were children. That was really sad.

That morning (before leaving for the Festival of Trees), Marie and I went to Kmart as volunteers to wrap presents for the "Shop with a Cop" event that they have every year. It's where cops take under privileged kids shopping for the families for Christmas and they get to ride in the cop car and go to breakfast and everything. That's a really good event too. Well, right after we arrived at Kmart, Nate called and said Kamry had a huge lump on her neck. Well, Marie and I headed straight home and then Nate and I took Kamry to the doctor before we left for the festival of trees. The doctos said she had an infection and that he lymph nodes were infected and that's what the lump was. Well, he put her on antibiotics and told me to come back Monday. Well, today was Monday and when I woke up, Kamry's neck was even bigger so I called the Dr. and changed her appointment from 3:30pm to 10am so I could get her looked at sooner. I went there, and he decided it was best to get a second opinion and sent me to see Dr. Bennion, an Ear Nose and Throat specialist. He gave her 2 shots (so sad) - one was an antibiotic and one was a steroid. He said that I needed to watch it really closely. If it changes at all to call him. He was concerned because she's so little and I guess it's not very common to see this kind of infection in a small baby like her. He said there is about a 50/50 chance that they will have to do surgery on it (lance it) and release the infection. It's possible that the steroid will just make it go away on it's own. Well, I had to take her back each day to see how it was going. She got the shot on Monday, another one on Tuesday and Wednesday when I took her back things were looking great. The bump was getting smaller so he decided not to give her another shot and just put her back on the augmentin antibiotic. Well, Thursday things were looking great and it was a tiny bump. I went to my internship at Sunshine Terrace and when I was headed home, my babysitter Sharon called me and said that Kamry had been good all day and then woke up SCREAMING from her nap and the bump was back and it was huge. Her appointment was at 4pm that day so I was already on my way to pick her up to take her there. Dr. Bennion was disappointed but not completely shocked to see that it had come back. He was worried about that. We decided the best option (really the only option) at that point was to do the surgery to lance it. We scheduled it for 7:30am the next day (Friday Dec. 10). Dr. Bennion was leaving town for some work things, so Dr. Wood was the one we scheduled the surgery with. He's really nice and was great to work with. There we were again, watching an anesthesiologist walk away with our baby. It was so sad. Her poor neck was massive by that time and you could tell that it just hurt her so bad to move her head. Everything went well in the surgery and Dr. Wood said that there was A LOT of puss in there and that they irrigated a whole gallon of saline through the wound. Her cut is about an inch long on her neck (just a little below her ear). They had packed it with gauze that has antibiotic ointment on it. I have to take her back in each day to have a little bit of gauze pulled out and then once it's all gone, they will repack it and do it again. Dr. Wood said that it's very important to let the wound heal from the inside out or the abscess would come back. Kamry has been so brave through the whole thing. You could tell after the surgery that she was really hurting, but once we got her on a pain med schedule she was pretty happy and kind of returned to her usual self. This poor girl just can't catch a break. I sure hope that it's smooth sailing from here on out for her.

Well, If you actually made it thru that whole saga of the last 5 months I'm amazed. Here are a lot of pictures with captions of what's been happening too.

These first ones are pictures my friend Megan Bair took when Kamry was 5 months old. I love these pics! They're absolutely fabulous and there were so many adorable ones I couldn't choose. I printed so many of them!

I absolutely love her blessing dress. It was perfect!

Does this one say that she is my daughter or what?

Her random sleeping styles were so cute!

Nate was worried she would get cold when she was in the swing, so this was his solution.

This is the hernia on her belly button (umbilical hernia) prior to surgery

Kam in her little tiny surgery gown

Kam in her GIANT crib after surgery

Post umbilical hernia surgery. I didn't take pics of the scars on her pubic bone, but they're both about 3/4 of an inch long on each side.

Kam's blessing day

This is her "post blessing" dress

On Halloween, Marie and I went with Cori, Cooper and Kilee to Lee's to do the trick or treat thing and Marie had these so we put them on Kamry. CREEPY!

My beautiful Ballerina

First time eating cereal

Guess who found her tongue?!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING! Her bib says "Everyone is Thankful for Me" and that is SO true!

She kinda looks like a boy in this one cause I don't have a bow on her head yet. She's still cute though.

This is when we went to see the lights on Temple Square. She was wearing mittens to match too!

This is right before surgery. If you look at her neck you can see the huge lump. That was the abscess.

At the hopspital in her little gown (that was way too big for her) before they took her to drain the abscess in her neck.

Laying in the crib that fits her a little better now after the surgery. Her poor neck was wrapped up like a wounded soldier.

Again with the oxygen.... at least we didn't have to take it home this time.

Well that was all the pictures of the past few months. Christmas will be here all too soon and I'll post again.

Welcome Home Kamry!

2010-07-14T16:31:00.009-06:00

WOW! A lot has happened since I last posted and the biggest one of all is that our little girl is finally home! She is so strong and healthy! I can't believe she got to come home 2 weeks earlier than her due date. We have been so blessed through this whole ordeal and I can't thank anyone enough for their thoughts and prayers. It has been a roller coaster ride, but we have made it and now the real adventure begins. Here is what has been happening since my last post. (I'll try and mention everything in date order so you can see her progression). - - -When Kamry was born, part of our "Welcome Packet" into the NICU included a calendar with lots of stickers to document important moments during her stay there and as I went, if there wasn't a sticker for something I wrote it in so it may look a little weird that I am saying dates along with these things- but because of the calendar, I actually remember when things happened.

On June 21 she weighed 3 lbs. 8 1/2 oz. and on June 22 she did her first breast feeding where she actually took milk from me. The nurse that night (Raini) saw me doing non-nutritive with her and said that it was time to make her actually eat. So I went back later that night at the 11pm cares and she breast fed. She ate for about 4 minutes! They told me that it takes roughly 10 minutes of active sucking to get a full feed so when she was done and tuckered out at 4 min. we fed the rest (estimated the amount) through her feeding tube. She did so awesome on her first breast feeding and from that point on I was not to do non-nutritive with her anymore and always be giving her milk. I use this thing called a "nipple shield". It's a plastic thing that just sits right over my nipple and makes it more like a binkie nipple to help her get the idea better. She took to it really well, and it also helps control the flow just a touch more too.

June 25: My mom and Grandma King came to visit and I decided that it was time for Great Grandma to be able to hold her so Great Grandma held Kamry and loved on her for 10 or 15 minutes. This was a seriously exciting day because Nate got off work early and came while my Grandma was holding her AND at that moment, we switched her into a "big girl bed" and out of her isolette. She has been maintaining her body temperature really well and even getting a little hot in the isolette so it was time to move her out. She has done awesome ever since and we've never had to question putting her back because her temperature is really stable.

June 28: KAMRY WEIGHED 4 LBS TODAY! She DOUBLED her weight from her lowest point! A huge feat and she did it so quickly and so well. June 29: Kamry took her first bottle from nurse Lisa and she ate her FULL feeding amount. Nate got to feed her a bottle first on July 2 and then the next day I bottle fed her. (I hadn't been bottle feeding her those days in between because we kept doing breast feeding because, well.... it should be obvious that I'm the one with the milk filled boobs! :) She lost a about 3 oz. and went back down to 3 lbs. 13 oz. and I started to wonder if maybe she wasn't getting as much as we thought she was when she was breast feeding. The past few days she had been taking full feeds from me about once every 12 hours so at those times we didn't "tube" any of her food. So me and Nate talked about it and we decided that until she is bigger and we know she can eat well enough by breast feeding, we are going to bottle feed her my milk. That way we know exactly how much she is getting and there won't be any question on it. Even though I really want to breast feed, I feel it's the best thing for Kamry and honestly, it's saving me time. She can't eat all the milk I produce so after I was feeding her I was still having to pump off everything else, so really it was taking twice as long.

July 8 was a very sad day for me. I had seen Kamry get a shot a couple days before and so when they told me that she was going to be doing her 2 month immunizations that day I ran away and couldn't watch. Some moms can do it, but she had cried so hard when they gave her the shot earlier it almost made me cry. Her little face went so red and she quit breathing ( you know how you can't breathe when you're crying really hard) and then she SCREAMED louder than I've ever heard before! It was awful! My friend Skye came to see Kamry that day, so we went to lunch and I just stayed away until the unit opened back up at 4 and her shots were done. That night she even fussed a little through her bath because her little thighs were still tender. So sad!

July 9 wasn't a great day either. Kamry has an umbilical hernia (very very common in babies) and usually they fix themselves. Well this particular day, nurse Lisa had heard about a baby that spent quite a bit of time in the NICU and how she is going down to Primary Children's Hospital now to have a hernia fixed on her pubic bone (just to the inside of her left hip). So Lisa got thinking that it's common for little babies to develop hernia's so as she did Kamry's assessment, she found a little bump. And you'll never guess where it was.... on her pubic bone just on the inside of her left hip! It was just little, but when she pushed on it Kamry got really fussy and cried. So they ordered for an ultrasound and indeed, she has a hernia there too. They started consulting with a doctor (Dr. Doug Barnhart) down there at Primary's to see if she needed to be transferred to have it taken care of. After much evaluation of her ultrasound pics, they decided to have it watched for the weekend (to be sure it wasn't getting bigger or changing colors on her skin) and do another ultrasound on Monday. The next few days were a WHIRLWIND of events. On Sunday July 11 we came in and the feeding tube was removed! She had been eating all of her meals for the previous 48 hours so the feeding tube could officially be taken out of her nose. Instead of feeding her every 3 hours now, she is ad-lib. When she is hungry, we feed her but she can't go more than 4 hours. Well, as we were getting excited about that, they told us that she could potentially come home on Tuesday because she was having her eye's checked one more time and then would be good for 6 months if everything went well. So when I came down on Monday, they told me to bring my car seat for the official "car seat check" and we would begin preparations for her to come home.

July 12: We put her in the car seat to see if she is big enough for it, and made a few adjustments to the straps. We had to give her "Princess Laya" rolls to hold her head from bobbing from side to side and she was required to sit in it for an hour without having breathing problems. Well, once we got her in there (she was slightly fussy as we messed with the straps - which by the way were really easy to adjust) she fell right to sleep. She is SO tiny in the HUGE car seat! She sat there for almost an hour and then all of a sudden the hearing test people came and instead of waking her up and moving her around (because they need the baby to be calm for the testing to work properly) they took her in her car seat. About 30 minutes later they came back and said everything checked out with her hearing. It had been almost 4 hours since her last feeding so we took her out and she ate like a champ. They did the other ultrasound on her hernia, and it had definitely grown bigger. You could feel it when you touched it. At first it was like the size of a pea, but now it was more like an olive. So they scheduled an appt. with the doctor at Primary's for Wednesday morning. When we bathed her and did her assessments she weighed 4 lbs. 9 oz. and was 17 inches long!

Tuesday July 13- THE BIG DAY: Nate took work off because we needed to be there for oxygen training and CPR training. We went down and it was a crazy few hours of constant learning about all the things we needed to know to take her home. We signed a million discharge papers, and talked to I have no idea how many different people. Kamry had her eyes checked and she is in "outer zone 3" which apparently is great, so she doesn't have to be seen for 6 months now. Me and Nate chose Praxair to supply Kam's oxygen (we pretty much chose them because they have an office in Logan so it's easy access and quicker service) so the girl came and did training with us. She has a monitor that is attached to her to make sure she doesn't de-sat or quit breathing. We put the little leads on her chest and this machine kept making the LOUDEST BEEPING I'VE EVER HEARD! Her leads just weren't reading rights, so we defaulted to what the girl called the "mommy saving belt". It's a piece of material that fastens around the baby's chest to hold a better set of leads. I have no idea why we didn't do that in the first place. Once we got that put on there, the machine quit beeping. I have to say that if she quits breathing in the night we will know IMMEDIATELY because that thing is so loud. We'll probably both have heart attacks in the process. I am happy to say at this moment, over 24 hours after we put it on it has not beeped once! Then after learning about the oxygen, Nate and I had to do CPR training. We didn't get certified because we didn't take a written test, but we now officially know how to administer infant CPR and how to stop her from choking. Of course, they have the little doll that you practice on and when it was Nate's turn to do it, he BROKE THE BABY! There is a little spring on the inside that makes the chest go up and down when you do compressions, and he broke the spring! I laughed so hard. The lady was like "that has never happened before!" He wasn't pushing too hard or anything but instead of being on the floor like we would be if it was a real baby, we just put it in our laps. Well, he is a boy and of course didn't put his knees together so when he pushed on the baby, it's head and legs were on his knees and the body was pushed down into nothing, so it broke. HAHA! I do feel better knowing that we both know how to do CPR on her if it's needed. Finally at 1:00pm we we finished. We loaded her up and were on our way home. I sat in the back with her since it was her first car ride, to be sure she was okay. She slept the entire ride home! As of right now, she doesn't mind her car seat so that is a really good sign. She is such a mellow and relaxed baby that it really takes a lot to upset her or make her mad. Nate's parents and my parents were able to come over and see her and my sister Melanie brought her old bassinet from my mom's house to us so she got to hold Kamry for the first time ever. Of course I was nervous for the first night with my baby, but Kamry did awesome. Just in case she didn't wake up to eat, I set an alarm for 3 hrs. and 45 min. after her last feeding so that I would for sure wake up so she didn't go hungry at all. She was still snoozing when I woke up to my alarm. I don't know how long she would've slept if I had let her. I got her bottle warmed up, changed her bum and she ate so good! When I put her back in the bassinet, she kind of made little noises for a few minutes and then was fast asleep again. She is an amazing baby.

We had a 9am appointment at Primary Childrens with Dr. Barnhart to have him look at her hernia and schedule a surgery. He assessed it, and of course he had to push hard on it to see if it would go back in, and she did not like that at all. She fussed and screamed because it hurt. Me and Nate felt so bad for her. It was heart breaking to see her in pain like that. The doctor was really nice and explained how they are going to fix it. Basically, the hernia was caused by small opening in her abdomen wall, and things can get pushed through the hole creating the hernia. In extreme cases, bowel can get sucked through there and it can cause a lot of damage and problems. He said to fix it, they will make a small incision on her pubic bone, go in, push back the protruding hernia (which he said is most likely her ovary sticking through the hole in her abdomen wall) and sew up the hole. They are also going to check the right side to be sure nothing is going on there. He said that even though the hernia just appeared, she was born with it so checking the right side will ensure that another hernia doesn't pop up later. They are also going to fix her umbilical hernia while they're doing it. So we got the surgery scheduled for August 10. It's considered an out-patient surgery, but because she is less than 8 months old, the anesthesia can sometimes (in rare cases) cause them to stop breathing, so the hospital requires them to stay 1 night for observation until all the anesthetic is out of their system. That way if anything does happen, they can intervene quickly. Me and Nate are completely fine with her staying the night. I don't want to her stop breathing at home with us. It's sad to think my little girl is going to have surgery, but it's going to fix the problem and then everything will be fine. I was so surprised because Kamry did awesome the whole ride down to Salt Lake and the whole ride home. She started getting fussy in the doctors office, so we fed her, changed her and she was a happy camper again.

On Friday (7/16) Kamry had her first appointment with the pediatrician in Logan - Dr. Brown. I really like him. He seems so nice, and my cousin Rachel takes her kids to him and she just loves him, so I think I've picked a good doc for my little girl. She weighed 4 lbs. 13 oz. at her appointment. Almost 5 lbs! It has been an insane few days but some of the most amazing of my life. The past 9 weeks have been so tiring and exciting and crazy that I don't know if our life will ever settle back down. But having her home is a great way to start it. Kamry officially spent 65 days in the McKay Dee NICU. WOW!

This was her at the hospital when we did her car seat check. It actually fits her good, but to keep her head from bobbing from side to side we improvised with these blankets. The car seat specialist (yes, they really do have a specialist) said that doing this with blankets is totally fine because if we were in an accident, they would just fall out and not go behind her head. Anything that sits behind the babies head is at risk for keeping their head pinned to their chest and making it harder for them to breathe. She really discouraged any after market car seat things that don't come with your car seat. I was mentioning those little things that you can buy to go around their head (from ear to ear) and she said no because they can fall behind her head. Scary. I never thought about those things before. We will only have to do these rolls for Kamry a couple more days because she is getting bigger and more stable in the car seat now. (The lady said to do it for about a week after she came home).

I snapped this one when Kamry was sleeping in the bassinet one morning. Too cute!

We were still holding onto the bottle, but I thought it was so cute how she was holding it to her mouth.

Kam's first bath at home. (This is a yawn, not a scream). She loves bath time and it's so fun.

After her first bath at home. Sheena gave her this little hippo towel. too cute!

One of her adorable outfits. I love when they have stuff on the feet!

Cute little socks. She has these in pink too.

This is the table runner and center piece that Kallie is using for her wedding on the tables. Nate thought Kamry's outfit matched so good he wanted pictures. They turned out really cute.

This is about as close as Tommy has been to Kam since we brought her home. I think he still finds it strange that there is someone else in the house. He has been really good with her though. She started crying the other day and he ran to her and stayed there until we came. I think he's going to be protective of her once he gets used to her.

Could Nate be more comfortable?

Most Recent

2010-06-19T20:49:00.011-06:00

Well, there has been a lot going on. I was hoping to keep up on this blog a little better, but I don't always have access to a computer unless I come home, and even then it's still hard to find time.

Things are going great. Little Kamry is a trooper. She currently (as of today 6/19) weighs 3 lbs. 5 oz. and is filling out nicely. She is kind of getting little chubby cheeks on her and I love it! According to my last post she was on a CPAP. Well, she was on that for a few days and then went onto an Oxygen Nasal Cannula. She did really well for about a week and then did go back on the ventilator for a very short time and then was off and just on oxygen again. She is currently just on the oxygen and is doing great with it. They have weened her down from 4.5 Liters to 2 Liters in just this short time and she is usually between 28-32% oxygen so she is handling things really well. Usually when we hold her, they have to turn down the % of oxygen she gets because her saturation's will go too high. She loves being held and of course we love holding her.

She got to start wearing clothes too! I love seeing her in clothes. I cried the day that we came into the NICU and she was dressed. It makes her look so adorable, but it also makes this more real. Knowing that she is doing good enough to wear clothes makes me so happy. She had to have all of her IV lines removed to be able to wear clothes, so that is a great sign on her part. The clothes are all so tiny and they are still huge on her! Whoever designs preemie clothes needs to be hit in the head. They think a 5 lb. baby is a preemie! What about the 2 lb babies like mine? They just have to drowned in the fabric? I guess so! Even though the clothes are big, they are ADORABLE on her. I love it.

This was the very first outfit she ever wore. It was one they had at the hospital but I do have to say that it is really cute!

My friend Brittany Anderson gave her this one. You can see what I mean by people not knowing how big a real preemie baby is! Look how huge it is!

Grandma Lundgreen gave her this little outfit. I thought it was SO cute and she looks so adorable in it. This is the pic I got that shows the most of the outfit. Doesn't she look comfy?

Just this week I began "non-nutrient" breast feeding with her. That is where I pump and remove all the milk from me, and then we try to get her to latch on. Tuesday was the first day we did this, and she latched on right away - only for just a second, but she knew what she was doing. Then on Wednesday she did awesome! She latched on and off for about a half an hour sucking really well. We did it again Thursday and she is doing great. This past Thursday she "turned" 34 weeks. ( I don't really know how to phrase that. Oh well). The lactation specialist told me this is a great time to start trying to get her to latch because we will then take her up a little each time and soon she will be able to try nursing. Not full nursing, because we don't want her to choke, but they said that I'll pump out a lot of my milk, and then she can try nursing some. But that way she won't get a rush of milk into her mouth and end up choking. Gradually we will work her up to full nursing and see if she'll take bottles too. It's interesting to experience this all, but I'm grateful that I have specialists there to tell me if I'm doing something wrong. I mean, lets face it - I am a breast feeding "virgin"! :)

Last week we were able to have the grandparents hold her for the first time. They were all absolutely thrilled and it was so sweet to see all of their faces as they held her.

Grandma King

Grandpa King

Grandma Lundgreen

Grandpa Lundgreen

I still don't know when we can bring her home, but she has to be able to eat and breathe on her own and maintain her own body temperature. Her due date was July 29, which is roughly 7 weeks from now. I'm thinking she will come home between 4 and 6 weeks from now. We'll just have to wait and see. I'm also completing her room too so when it's done, I'll take pictures and post those as well.

Kamry also got to start taking baths in a little pink tub instead of having sponge baths. She absolutely loves them! I couldn't believe her reaction! We wrapped her up in a little towel to help keep her warm, but she didn't fuss at all the first time. She just sat there wide eyed enjoying every second of her warm bath. I wasn't able to get pictures of video the first time, but Nate was there for the second "tub bath" she got and video'd the whole thing. It was awesome! I tried to figure out how to upload the video from my video camera, but of course I am technologically retarded so some day, when I have figured it out (or found someone smarter to figure it out) I will upload the video so you can see it.
This is the little tub we bath her in. She's almost getting too big for it now, but it has worked great the first couple times.

First Kiss from daddy!

Nate of course had to have a pictures of this outfit. It's very very true too! She is definitely going to be a daddy's girl. You can tell he is such a proud dad and he is going to be a great dad too.

Kamry Update

2010-05-25T15:45:00.010-06:00

Baby Kamry is doing really well. She was taken off the ventilator last week and put on a cpap. I hated seeing her like that. They had to put this little beanie on her head and had to strap it on so they didn't move. Me and Nate decided we hated the cpap more than the ventilator because it looked so sad. The pics below show it really good. Her whole face was taken up by that. They had to put this little beanie on her to be able to attach the hoses to it so they didn't move too much. It was SO SAD! After about 2 days on the cpap, they took it off and put her on just a nasal canula with oxygen. We were so relieved to see that! Here are a couple of pictures to show you just how sad it was.

Here she is squeezing Aunt Deanna's finger

She has been gaining weight pretty good. They told us it could take up to 2 weeks for her to get back to her birth weight. She went from 2 lbs. 3 oz. at birth to 2 lbs. even. She has gained and lost a little but she is still above her birth weight. The nurse was telling me that it's really common for premies to gain and lose a little before they start gaining continuously. She is still so tiny, but seeing her put weight on is great.

Last Saturday (May 22) I got to hold her skin to skin. The nurses were saying it's great for mom & baby because it helps them bond and also helps baby feel closer to mom. I can seriously say that it really does. When I was holding her against my chest she was so relaxed and they had to keep turning her oxygen down. She went from like 45% oxygen to 25% oxygen while I was holding her. She slept on me and was so comfortable. Her little arms were outstretched onto my chest. We were concerned that she might get cold (even though we had a warm blanket over her) and the nurse told us that it's been shown (by research i guess) that when the baby is being held by mom, if she gets cold or hot, moms body will change temperature to make the baby comfortable. Apparently dad's body doesn't do that so they have to pay more attention to if the baby is comfortable. Mom's are so amazing. The things our bodies can do to create children, bring them into the world and then care for them. It's just amazing! Women rule! These are skin to skin pictures from 2 different times I've held her like that.

She almost always has a hand on her face when she sleeps. The nurses were telling me that it means that she is content. It's so cute when she does that!

Our little girl is so amazing. Even though she is so small she is so strong! Compared to some of the other infants in the NICU she is so low-maintenance which is such a good thing! Every time I go in the nurse tells me that there really isn't anything to report. She just uses her oxygen and occasionally has a breathing treatment. They haven't been worried about anything else really since her heart PDA closed up. I know that we're not out of the woods yet, there are still a lot of opportunities for things to happen, but she is so strong and healthy that I cant help but be so greatful that she is so amazing and strong.

Hospital Latest

2010-05-14T22:43:00.007-06:00

May 13: I officially became a "Boarder" at the hospital. I moved rooms, and am now staying at the hospital as a boarder and not as a patient. What that means is that I get to stay in a hospital room, still get 3 meals a day and be close to Kamry without having to pay for it. It's a service they offer for nursing mothers to be able to keep us close to our babies. The staff does not check on me anymore, and I can come and go from my room as I wish. The other nice thing is that I don't have to pee in that stupid hat anymore. Because I was so swollen and had retained so much water they had to monitor my intake and output to be sure I was releasing the water that I was holding. Well, they told me that it could take a week or two to lose all the water, but in a 24 hours period I pee'd out 4 LITERS! The nurses about died when they told me that and you can only imagine my reaction.

Nate went home for the first time to get a good nights sleep on an actual bed. He said our bed has never been more comfortable. The recliner they had for him in my room did not look comfortable at all! He came back this morning and brought me a few more necessities, you know... clothes, underwear etc... When I got up and showered and actually put clothes on today I felt SO GOOD! I can't believe how nice it is just to be able to get dressed and wear normal clothes. No more hospital gowns! YAY!

May 14: Today was pretty relaxing. Brian and Kelli came to see us and we left the hospital and went to lunch. It was so nice to leave the hospital because I haven't been outside since last Saturday. Well, I guess if you count being loaded into and out of an ambulance as being outside, then it was Sunday. But Nate drove his truck today so I did have the challenge of getting into his huge truck. Luckily he is a thinker and pulled a step ladder out of the back of it and I climbed the ladder to get into his truck. A picture below will depict the humor. If you can't laugh at this, you're dead. I even had to use it to get out of the truck too. I just can't lift myself or stretch my body that much yet since the surgery.

After Brian and Kelli came, my old roomie from ISU Lindi and her mom came to see me too. I haven't seen Lindi for months so it was so nice to see her and be able to take her in to see Kamry. She was just in awe at how tiny she is. The pictures really don't make her look as small as she really is. You definitely get a better picture when you see someone hand or something next to her. Its funny to see people's reactions that have never seen a premie her size. They're just in shock. After Lindi and her mom were here, Brittany Anderson and her husband Jon came. It was funny to see the shock on Brittany's face too. I love the reaction. And it amazes me how everyone just is so drawn to her. Kamry is so sweet, and so tiny that it's impossible not to fall immediately in love with her. It was really nice to see friends today. I've had a lot of visitors this week, and every day it's fun to see people. Tomorrow is going to be much slower so we'll see how the day goes.

We got to go hold Kamry again today (5/14). Here she is peeking at her daddy with one eye open. She loves being held by her daddy. I told Nate that I'm pretty sure she is going to be held way too much when we get her home and he said that if she is sleeping, and he is home, she will be sleeping on his chest. Just the thought of our little girl sleeping on her daddy's chest makes me want to cry. It's such a beautiful image.

First Kiss from Mommy!

The Terror Continues...

2010-05-11T08:31:00.008-06:00

Sunday May 9, 2010

On this morning, I woke up, obviously still in the hospital, but feeling just fine. Dr. Strebble (the on -call doc that was watching over me all weekend) was planning to review my latest labs as soon as they were back and then we would discuss the best plans for me. I decided that I wanted to take a jacuzzi bath to relax but decided to wait until I talked to the doctor. I knew as soon as I got in the tub he would come and want to talk.

In the mean time, Nate's parents arrived to visit and then Nate came up shortly thereafter. Because my labs had been so steady, he decided to sleep at home and get a full nights rest. Well, after just a little bit, Dr. Strebble came in and discussed my labs with me. He felt that the best plan was to transport me to Ogden to McKay Dee Hospital and have them monitor me because my toxemia was not getting any better and my blood platelets were still low. (Normal platelet level is over 200 and I was in the 90's). He wanted to speak with the specialist in Salt Lake City, then also with Dr. Ahlstrom who would be my physician in Ogden. He left momentarily, then came back saying that they had ordered for an ambulance ride to Ogden and I would be on my way within the next few minutes. Me and Nate both had a look of fright in our eyes, but we knew everything would be okay. I knew that if they were tranferring me to Ogden, it was the best thing for me and for Kamry so I had to trust their judgement and know that the doctors know what is best. At this point though, I decided that I'm glad I'm a social work student because it came in handy trying to keep myself calm and not freak out. All the lessons my teachers have taught me over the years really paid off.

When the ambulance guys got there, they were great. Making jokes and keeping a smile on my face. We had a nice ride down (even though you feel like you're riding in the back of a dump truck). Me and the one guy (I think his name was John but I can't remember exactly) sat and chit chatted about my work and the differnt things that I do up at school. He seemed very impressed with my career goals, and the fact that even though I was most likely going to be having a premature baby within the next few days I was keeping very calm. He was relaxing to talk to and it made the trip down really comfortable. All I can say is that I truly appreciate the men and women that are willing to do those jobs because they can really make or break the sitaution and this guy totally made mine.

When I got to Ogden, the nurses that were working were very surprised because apparently they had heard that a 28 week pregnant girl was coming in and they were expecting the worst. They had the NICU team ready to go and were prepared to take me straight into surgery. Much to their surprise, I was smiling and talking to them as if nothing was wrong. About 20 minutes after I got to the hospital, Nate arrived. He drove down seperate so he would have a vehicle, and could stop by the house to get some items for us.

After having even more labs drawn, I asked Dr. Ahlstrom if I could take a shower. He said that would be okay if it was kind of a quick one. That was fine with me, a shower just sounded really good. Nate left to run down to the car to get my shower stuff, and forgot the keys. So he came back in, grabbed the keys and left again. Right after Nate left to go get my shower stuff out of the car, Dr. Ahlstrom came back in and said that they were going to take the baby and to begin preparations for it. I wanted to cry. I asked him if I could still take a shower because I wasn't going to get one for a few days. He said that was okay, but still to make it quick. While waiting for Nate, I got in the shower and began to wash. He came in and helped me with my hair and helped me dry off. We said a quick prayer to ask for strength and for me and the baby to be safe. Then I was loaded onto a bed and began to prep for surgery.

The nurses and sugical tech's were great. They gave me some pills and a "shot" of some grape crap drink to help with nausea from the anesthesia. I've never gotten sick before, but this was a new experience because I've never had an epidural before. As they wheeled me back into the operating room, I suddenly got very hot and just knew I was going to throw up. Luckily I said something fast enough and the speedy tech got me a puke bag. I threw up in it and of course, threw up the nausea medication they had just given me.

I was moved onto the operating table, and was told to lean forward as far as I could while they placed the epidural. Nate sat there with me and held my hand. The first needle just took me off guard because I wasnt expecting him to stick me right then, but as he was preparing the epidural, all the little "local anesthetic" shots is what really started to hurt. Needles normally don't bother me, but this time I was squeezing Nate's hand. He said I wasn't putting any pressure, but I felt like I was squeezing as tight as I possibly could so apparently I was very weak from this whole experience.

They laid me back and put the curtain up so I couldn't see. Nate was seated right by my head and told that they would say "Baby Time" when he could snap a quick picture before they whisked her away. He didn't watch any of the surgery, but we both laughed at the doctors. They had such great humor. One of the nurses had her IPOD in her purse, so they hooked it up and let me choose the genre (country of course). I laughed because when I was getting stuck with the needle for my epidural, the song "Some Beach" by Joe Nichols came on and it was just too ironic.

During the surgery, I felt a lot of pressure right under my chest bone, and the anesthesiologist said that is normal because that is where the epidural begins. But of course, instead of just answering, he told me "oh, the doctor is just taking a break and is leaning on your chest bone for support". They teased about "who brought the 12 pack?" and "i think I'll take a smoke break now and finish this later". It helped keep the mood light and kept me smiling. I think truly talentd doctors know how to make their patients comfortable, and these guys did great.

Directly after surgery right when they were about to wheel me out to recovery, I threw up again. This hurt so unbelieveably bad. The muscles that had just been cut into now felt like they were shredding apart in my belly. Even though I had an epidural and was still numb I couldn't believe how bad it hurt.

Once in recovery, they let my family come see me. I didn't realize that almost my entire family came down when they heard I was being transferred to Ogden. My parents, Brent, Deanna, and Melanie came. Nate's parents, Ben, Cori, Kade and Kallie all came too. So 2 at a time they shipped them back to see me, and then of course the grandparents got to see Kamry. After I was finished in recovery (about an hour later I think) they wheeled me in to see Kam before they took me to my room. I got to see her for a minute, and of course, what happened. I threw up again. This time it hurt even worse! The nurse had told me that I should take a pillow and push down as hard as I could. I didn't have the strength, but luckily my dad came to my rescue and pushed on my belly with a pillow for me. It really did help too so I'm glad he was willing to do it.

All in all this experience is one that of course I will never forget, but I am grateful for at the same time. You love this child so much before they're even born and then once they get here you can't believe how much you love them. Well when they're so fragile and small it seems like your love grows 1000 times more for this child. If you're not a parent yet, you will totally understand when you are, but it is the most amazing feeling in the world and nothing could replace it.

Here are some pictures from her first few minutes of life:

Sunday May 9, 2010

7:26pm

Kamry Ann Lundgreen

2 lbs. 3 oz. 14 1/2" long

Welcome to the world little one!

Proud daddy

28 Week Terror

2010-05-09T07:34:00.004-06:00

On Friday May 7, I went to the doctor for my 28 week appointment. I was all prepared, I drank my glucose orange drink for diabetic testing perfectly, I arrive the 15 minutes early to my appointment like I was supposed to and then I got called back into the office. Everything was going smooth. I had planned to talk to my doctor about swelling because my feet and ankles had been swelling pretty bad, and the past week had been a lot worse than before. So I get weighed, and I gained 11 lbs. from last month!

Let me give you a quick picture, and I'm going to give the actual numbers here so please no judgements. I know I need to lose weight, but at this moment... I don't care. So when I got pregnant, I weighed 212. Then because I was sick in the beginning, I dropped 5 lbs. down to 207. I held steady there for about 3 months. Well, then at my first weight gain appointment in April I put on 7 lbs, so technically now I'm only 2 lbs over my pre-prenancy weight at 214. Well at this appointment, I get weighed and I'm at 225.

So to continue the story... my urine sample came back with higher protein than they like to see, and with the swelling my doctor then proceeded to tell me that she is concerned with toxemia and/or preeclampsia. (here is a good website to learn more about that: http://www.preeclampsia.org/symptoms.asp). So she told me that they would run my labs and if anything was abnormal she would call me. Well, I get up to work and just about an hour later she called and told me that she wanted me t0 go check into the hospital for 24 hour surveillance.

Of course I immediately called Nate. He was headed home from work (this is about 11:30am) for his dad's surprise birthday party we were throwing up at the University (his dad turned 50 on saturday). So I told him the story and just said instead of going to the party, he needed to go the hospital instead. I drove to the hospital and checked myself into labor and delivery. About an hour later, Nate got here and we just got to sit around because they have put me on bed rest. I can get up to go to the bathroom, and shower and thats pretty much it. They are keeping my blood pressure monitored every hour. It was every 15 minutes, then every 30, but now we're down to every hour (which is nice) and they do blood draws every 12 hours, and monitor the baby's heart beat and whether or not I'm having contractions about every 3 hours. Lets just say its a lot of poking, prodding and noisy machinery. I tell you there is nothing better than hearing Kamry's steady heart beat on that monitor though. My favorite is when she kicks it trying to move it off of her (that's what I'm assuming she's doing at least). The little monitor just sits on my belly, and after a couple of minutes of it being there she starts kicking it, then she finally gives up. It's pretty funny. I'm glad my little girl is tough - she gets that from her daddy I think.

On Saturday: When the doctor talked to me on Saturday morning, he has decided that I am officially here in the Logan hospital until Monday, but possibly (most likely) further than that. It all depends on my labs and how my body responds to the bed rest. I'll definitely stay on bed rest until the baby is born, even if I get to go home. They have also officially diagnosed me with toxemia, and they're still monitoring preeclampsia. I asked if there is anything we can do to help with the swelling (like water pills or something) but he said when it's toxemia, the only solution is to deliver the baby - which we obviously don't want to do yet. They're hoping that we can hold off on delivering her until atleast 32 weeks (4 weeks from now), but preferably 34+ weeks. It will all depend on my body and how I respond. I'm really pushing for at least 32 weeks so she is further developed and weighs more. When they did my ultrasound on Friday when I got here, they estimate she currently weighs about 2 lbs. 4 oz. so she is very small. Average for 28 weeks, but still too small to feel good about delivering.

Nate got permission for me to go for a wheelchair ride and the doctor said it was okay for me to go outside. I just couldn't be gone for very long. We were only out for about 10 minutes, but it was a beautiful day and that 10 minutes was fabulous! Nate spent the whole day with me and we napped, watched tv and chatted. It's scary for both of us, but its so nice to have him here with me. Even when we're just sitting doing nothing, it means the world to me that he is here. He stayed through the night on Friday night, but last night we decided he could go home and get a better nights sleep since my labs had stayed pretty consistent.

I'm allowed to have visitors, but I have to keep them limited and I have to keep calm. My blood pressure spikes if there is too much going on, or even when I'm laughing too much so it's pretty solomn in here... but we make it work.

Well that is my current 28 week terror story. I'm trying very hard not to dwell on the thoughts of all the possibilities because I don't want to stress my body into having this baby, but it definitely puts your life in perspective and makes you really think about things. My dad gave me a beautiful blessing on Friday evening, and that made me feel a lot better.

I'm taking a few pictures here and there and will post those soon with updates of what is happening. Pray for the best, and lets just hope that this little girl can come into the world in a few weeks when she is stronger.

Me at 22 Weeks

2010-04-14T18:33:00.003-06:00

Here is me from the side. Don't make fun of the relief society arms, and no my fingers aren't swollen... they really are just that fat! :)

It's a GIRL!

2010-03-12T17:41:00.004-07:00

March 11 - the day we had been waiting for. It was a great day for us in two ways because March 11 is Nate's Birthday, so he turned the big 25, and we were waiting impatiently because we found out what we're having and yes, due to the title of this post you know that IT'S A GIRL!

We had our appointment at 11am. We get there and wait with butterflies in our stomachs to go back and get the ultrasound. My name gets called and we walk quickly but not quick enough to draw attention to the door. The ultrasound guy takes us back and we begin. He is really nice and as he goes through the babies body, starting with the head begins telling me that everything looks great. The baby is healthy, a good size and all the organs look good. WHEW! I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief. Well, as he gets lower he goes "WHOA! Yeah, that's a girl! NO little boy parts there!" this is image that we saw:

Umm... yeah... pretty sure that's a girl!

I almost started to cry and Nate looked so cute. I had this kind of surprised look, but like a proud father look too. You can tell he's already wrapped around her little finger. She's definitely going to be a daddy's girl.

The guy was trying to get pictures of her face and she had it turned away from us. So he kept like jiggling my belly to try and get her to move. When she finally turned to face us she had her whole arm over her face (sleeping like her daddy already). We finally got her to move her arm enough to get a profile shot of her.

After the appointment, we went to lunch to celebrate (for both the baby girl and for Nate's birthday). We went to the Coppermill and there was these 3 girls there having lunch. Well one of them had like an 18 month old little girl (SO CUTE!) and me and Nate couldn't help but keep looking at her. She threw her sippy over by us and I gave it back and told the mom I was sorry we were staring, but that we just found out we're having a girl. She totally understood.

After that we both went back to work and finished out our day. It was definitely hard to focus and concentrate because of everything that went on, but we survived. Then we went to El Toro for Nate's birthday. Thank heaven the salsa didn't give me heart burn. That would have been a horrible end to a wonderful day. :)

Here are a few more ultrasound pics. It's so weird how alien looking they are at this stage, but these 3D ultrasound pics are AWESOME! I love how defined they are!

I think this one is my favorite because she's got her cute hand up by her face and you can see baby fingers. LOVE IT!

Well that's our beautiful little girl and yes, we have picked a name.... Kamry Ann Lundgreen

Pregnant on Christmas 2009

2010-01-03T12:25:00.009-07:00

Christmas this year was really fun. First off - we found out on November 20 that we are pregnant. It was SO exciting. To start the story, we didn't tell anyone that we have been going to Salt Lake and working with the U of U Reproductive Medicine office because we wanted to wait until we found out any more information and see if we can even have kids. After 3 1/2 years of trying to have a kid you get really sick of questions all the time. Especially living here in Utah where people think we are nuts for being married 5 years and not have any kids yet. So the less questioning, the better.

Anyway, when we started going there in October and they ran a few tests on me and on Nate and decided they wanted us to try shots. (For those of you who don't know the history of our trying to get pregnant - long story short I have been on pills - first Chlomid and then Femara, for more than a year. We had done 3 Artificial Insemination's and none of them worked. Finally in a fit of fury I got off the pills earlier this year and decided we would just try on our own for a while. Anyway, so these shots I got on I had to give myself in the stomach every day for a little while and in the process I had to continuously go down to SLC and have ultrasounds done. So I traveled to SLC 2-3 times a week for almost 3 weeks. Finally when my follicles looked good, they gave me an HCG shot and I had to take that 2 days before my insemination. This HCG shot was what would force my eggs to release. The previous shots helped them grow and become ready. So then 2 days later we went down and did another artificial insemination. So then I just had to wait and see if I skipped my period. I know that I was supposed to start on November 20, and the doctor told me if I hadn't started that I HAD to take a pregnancy test that day.

So I had been spotting a little, but hadn't started bleeding so that morning I got up and took a pregnancy test. When 2 lines showed up I just stared. I had to re-read the instructions to be sure that 2 lines meant pregnant. (Even though I have read those instructions 1000 times before). So then I went into the bedroom and said "um... honey I need to talk to you" and he started to wake up and was like "what?" so i just said "I think I'm pregnant!" and he sat right up and went "WHAT?" After freaking out for a minute, we decided that I needed to go get a blood test at the hospital just to be extra sure. Man, that was the longest 3 hour wait of my life! But when I finally called and they confirmed that I was pregnant I was exstatic! I called Nate to confirm that I was indeed pregnant. We both freaked out a little again and then I had to call the Doc in SLC to let them know the news. It was such an exciting time! We have waited SO long for this and the feeling is indescribable.

After discussing it, we decided we didn't want to tell any family until Christmas. I had always had this little fantasy in my head about how I would tell them. I've always wanted to give them a picture frame with the ultra sound in it and have it say something cute. Well after trolling the internet for some ideas, this is what I came up with:

(I took this picture with my phone so it's not a great one). But it says "Under Construction" and has tools and stuff. I got a picture of each of the parents when we told them.

Anyway - for Christmas Nate got me a new guitar which was awesome because I've been using my brother Brent's for the last year and it was too big for me. So now I have one that fits me. I got Nate a nice 8 drawer tool chest on wheels for the garage.

Me after I realized my gift was a guitar:

Nate checking out his new tool box:

After presents we went to my Aunt Janice's for breakfast. Uncle Rudy makes a really good Mexican breakfast every Christmas with burritos and homemade salsa and stuff. So we went there and decided to tell my parents that morning that we're pregnant.

You can't see my dad because I'm sitting right next to him. But my mom instantly went " Oh my gosh- really?" and my dad stared at the picture and said "what is it?" he had no idea it was an ultrasound. So my mom told him it was an ultrasound picture and then he started to cry. My sister Deanna was pissed that I hadn't told her. I had gone to lunch with like 3 times since I found out and she was mad that I hadn't spilled. HAHA! I'm just a good secret keeper! I have to admit that it was SO freaking hard not to tell.

You can't hardly see Marie because she put her hands over her face and fell back into the couch. As you can see, Nate's dad was pretty excited. Marie and Kallie both started crying and were really excited, of course. Then Marie asked how far along I was and I said 9 weeks. She got mad and told me that it was mean to keep it a secret so long. HAHA! Again, good secret keeper!

It turned out to be a great Christmas and of course, everyone is very excited for us that we having a baby. I can't believe it's finally here. I'm due July 29th. Luckily it's during the Summer so that I don't have to take time off during the semester. My senior year in college is going to be busy as hell with my practicum, school, work and a new baby - but it's totally going to be worth it!

Here are just a few other pictures from Christmas:

Cooper and Kilee opening their gift from me and Nate

Allen with his new 9mm gun from Marie

Peytynne opening Christmas and Birthday gifts all in one (her birthday is Dec. 20 and she was with her mom, so we did them all on Christmas day)

My dad thinking he is so sneaky. He had my sister go to the dollar store, buy $30 worth of gifts and wrap them individually. He made my mom open them each up before she could open the envelope in her stocking. She opened the envelope and it was the description of the trip to Hawaii he bought her. This will be their 4th time going to Hawaii. They absolutely love it over there. This time they're going to the Big Island of Kona. My mom was definitely surprised and very irritated after opening $30 worth of dollar store stuff. (At least most of it was useful like dish soap and crackers and stuff.)

My mom on the phone next to dad's Globe. He has always wanted one and this year my mom found this and was able to give it to him for Christmas. He was definitely excited about it.

All in all Christmas was great this year and next year will be even better because we will have our new baby to share it with.

Halloween at Hawns

2009-11-05T19:25:00.006-07:00

Halloween this year was definitely the best one ever! Simple as Suicide was playing at Hawns in Hyrum so a bunch of us went out and watched them. Afterwards, me, Nate, Becky and her husband Nate (fondly known as Nate and 5/8), Enis and Dallas came back to my house. It's amazing the things that happen after you go to bed. When I woke up the next morning - there were 5 people in my King Size bed (THANK HEAVEN I HAVE A KING SIZE!). And I guess a couple of the guys thought it would be funny to shave Dallas' eyebrows off and put steps in one side of his beard. HE WAS PISSED! It was definitely the highlight of my day though- waking up to that. I have pictures on my phone- so if I figure out how to send them to my email I will post them. But here are a few pictures from the evening at Hawns. I hope you all had a good time and really enjoyed your Halloween too!

Look at Nate's beard! He shaved off his Go-T. I actually kinda like it (even thought it looks a little white trash!)

Me and Megan

Bart and Jed (Bart is lead singer for Simple as Suicide and Jed plays the guitar)

Homer - he plays bass

My georgous friend Skye (she is married to Homer)

Oh Enis - only so many people can pull of this costume... and he is definitely one of them :)

This is the bed I woke up to (except I was in the very middle)

Oh Dougie and his mustache

Twiggy and Meg (we decided that twig was a Mafia guy and if you read Megan's name tag it says "Major Trouble" haha:) )

Cute Becky and Nate and 5/8. We love them!

As you can see - it was quite the event with great friends. I seriously have the most amazing friends and I wouldn't trade them for anything! LOVE ALL YOUR FACES!

Happy 5th Anniversary to Us!

2009-10-24T13:23:00.004-06:00

Well, yesterday, October 23 was our 5th Wedding Anniversary! We celebrated the day by going to work and Nate sent me a beautiful bouquet of roses to work too. They were pink and yellow roses. They were ABSOLUTELY beautiful! Once the work day was finally was over, we went to dinner at the new Elements restaurant here in town. There was a "Dine Around" special that I got from work so they were offering a 3 course dinner for 2 for $40. The food was great! I don't know if we'll go back any time soon (mainly d/t the price) but it was a very nice restaurant and just the ambiance inside made it very romantic. We enjoyed just spending our evening together. If we had our way, we would be going on a nice vacation (probably in December after finals) but because we can't afford it we are going to Wendover next month to see a show and gamble (with a very small limit of money mind you).

I find it a little ironic that it poured rain on our wedding day (and pretty much the whole month of October that year) and today I wake up, and it's raining. Interesting. And the one thing I find a little depressing is that 5 years ago today I was in sunny Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. I am so glad we took such a good honeymoon. We had so much fun and I was glad that I got to experience that with Nate. When we got married he had never been on a plane, been to Mexico or seen the Ocean. I showed him a lot very quickly and he loved it! My love for vacationing has worn off on him. He can't wait for our next adventure (and neither can I).

Anyway... I can't believe it's been 5 years already - but it's an amazing feeling. Nate and I have had some great times (and some not so great times) through out but he is an amazing husband. He is my best friend and I honestly don't know what I would do without him. He pushes me to be a better person and I can't thank him enough for it. LOVE YOU HONEY!

Tuacahn

2009-09-20T12:32:00.004-06:00

My sister Deanna called me in August and said that the play AIDA (eye-ee-duh) was playing this summer at the Tuacahn Amphitheater in St. George. I've never seen the show so I was like "hell yeah lets go!". So we decided to get tickets for Labor Day weekend. We got 6th row, center stage tickets for $49! That's freaking cheap! I knew Nate would be going dirt biking so this was the perfect opportunity to spend some time with my sister.

AIDA takes place in Egypt and it's the story of the Nubian Princess (Aida) and she gets captured and is made a slave for the Princess of Egypt. Nobody knows she is a Princess because that would mean immediate death, so she keeps her identity a secret. Anyway, I'm not going to give away the whole story, but she ends up falling in love with the Egyptian Princess' betrothed named Radames (rah-dah-mays). If you want to know the rest of the story, you have to see it for yourself. It's a good one!

We left Friday and drove down. We stayed the night at the Best Western Abbey Inn in St. George. The reason I say the name is because it was a really nice hotel, with a HOT breakfast in the morning, and it was only like $89 bucks a night! So if you're going to St. George I would highly recommend this hotel. Here are a few pics of the outside. It just had a "homey" feel to it.

Anyway, so Saturday we went and walked around the Temple and kinda bummed around. Then we went to dinner and the show. The dinner was catered by Golden Corral - it was really good. You had the option to eat inside or out, but the weather was so nice we decided to eat outside. Well, little did we know that there were going to be like 1000 bees swarming everywhere. It was ridiculous! Luckily neither of us got stung, so that's good.

You're not allowed to take pictures during the show, but I snapped a few before hand of the set. If you've never been to Tuacahn, it's amazing! Because it's an outdoor amphitheater they can do crazy stuff. For example, there is a scene during the show where they're having dinner with the Pharaoh and all of a sudden, a camel walks onto the stage carrying a belly dancer. How many times do you see a camel walk onto the stage during a play? Um... NEVER! They can shoot off fireworks, and they even have the option to flood the stage. They can control the waterfall and stream behind the set to flood the stage. It was awesome!

Right at the entrance to the parking lot

This is the boardwalk to the theatre

from the amphitheater

the set of AIDA

Anyway - the weekend with my sister was awesome and it was great to just spend time with her. We are planning to go back next year because they are doing CATS, Crazy for You and Tarzan!
You should check out their website, if you haven't seen it already. it's http://www.tuacahn.org and if you get a chance to go down, I would say it's totally worth the drive!

Growing Puppies & Wedding Fun

2009-09-02T20:51:00.006-06:00

Kristin Elizabeth Peterson Smith.... wow that is a long name! My good friend and front desk comrade at work Kristin got married on August 15, 2009. She looked SO FREAKING PRETTY! Kristin is from Tennessee and her husband Aaron is from Ogden. Because they met at USU they got married in the Logan Temple and then had their reception at the Ogden Country Club. Then two weeks later they had another reception in Tennessee.

I went to their lunch at Hamiltons (YUM!) it was amazing! She had the biggest selection of food and then at her reception there was another very big selection of food. Her decorations were gorgeous too! See, when normal people get married it take roughly 3 months (if not more) to plan a wedding. Well for Kristin.... it took 3 days. Her mom flew out from Tennessee and they had 3 days to get all the big stuff done. It was the BUSIEST 3 days I think ANYONE has ever been. It was hilarious how tired she was, but then 90% of her wedding stress was done, over, finished. She's a genius. If I ever get married again (ha ha) she is going to plan my wedding. (She doesn't know that yet.. probably because getting re-married are not any plans I currently have for my future). Anyway - here are a few pics from her wedding.

Beautiful! I was kind of slouching down because I had on 3 inch heals and I was WAY taller than she was. I didn't want to "tower" over the bride.

I think my favorite part about this picture is that all the boys were standing down (behind Aaron) to catch it and when he lifted her dress she was like "AH! You boys have to turn around!" it was just so funny.

This is the view from the country club patio. Talk about a perfect day. It was actually raining in the morning when they were at the temple, but it cleared up very nicely by the afternoon.

Oops... I caught the guys decorating her car. They were smart and locked her car and nobody had a spare key so luckily the inside of her car was saved.

Growing Puppies:

Nate and I went to see our puppies again the other night. They are getting SO big! And they're adorable. There is this one that looks JUST like tommy when he was a pup. SO CUTE! I want to keep one so bad - mainly just so Tommy can have someone to play with, but I really don't think I could handle potty training another dog. Not right now at least. Anyway, here are lots of cute pictures so enjoy!

This is the one that looks just like tommy. Doesn't he look like he's done something wrong? i love how his paws are curled. SO CUTE!

This one was just chasin his tail! he was NOT going to give up until he had it and by dang he caught it eventually.

These two would not stop wrestling. As you can see, they are at the "biting" stage with each other. The one on bottom has the face of "oh crap. you got me"

All of the babies with Mama Maggie. She is such a good mommy.

He was nibbling on me and it was so cute i had to take a picture. I would wiggle my fingers and she would paw at me trying to get me to hold still.

The puppies are going to be ready to go to new homes around the 21st of September. It's so sad to think they will be gone but at the same time I'm so excited that these little pups will make people really happy. Tommy has seriously been the best money I've ever spent! He is such a devoted dog. Anybody who's reading this that owns a dog, knows what I'm talking about.

Puppies and Family

2009-08-12T18:18:00.007-06:00

PUPPIES! I am proud to say that on July 31 my baby boy Tommy became a proud parent of FIVE little shih tzu puppies! Mama Maggie and all the babies are doing great and we are just so excited to watch them grow! (well at least until we sell them all - but these 6 weeks are going to be fun!)

They look a little bit like gerbils. They still haven't opened their eyes yet. In a little bit maybe.

My cute hubby with a teeny tiny puppy

You can't really tell... but the one closest to Maggie is the runt. If you look close you can compare him to the fat one next to him. Sad... but he's a cutie though :)

FAMILY! Well, Nate's Aunt Kathy passed away a couple months ago. He hadn't seen her daughter Sharon since he was like 8 or 9 so last week Sharon came up with her 5 daughters (she has 1 son but he stayed home and didn't come on this trip.) They live in Grand View Idaho. I've never been there but rumor has it that its in BFE so it was nice for them to come to a real town with humans instead of animals. The oldest daughter Megan told me her graduating class had like 18 i think. TINY!!! We had a family gathering at Uncle Jacks house in Willard. He has a classic car museum so we went down there. I got some fun pictures. This car museum is way cool. It's open to the public too for tours, so if you wanna go and see some crazy old cars this would be a good place to go. Here are a few pics.

Coolest little BMW

Amanda on the inside. You should have seen her climbing in this thing. HILARIOUS!

Marissa leaning on the freaking awesome car!

This is one of those "boat" cars. They can drive on the road and then you can drive them right into a lake and they will float. They have propellers on the back and the exhaust is re-routed so its safe to drive in water. Jack said the engine hood is sealed so water can't get in and they came with one ore when you bought the car. There aren't very many left in the world and i think his sign said that in 2006 one of these cars was bought in Scottsdale Arizona for $145,000. AMAZING!

Anybody in the mood for a coke?

Jacks museum is really cool and he has so much stuff in there that its really a blast from the past (and for a lot of us, a blast from farther than our past). HA HA.

On Sunday they called us as said the girls wanted to go skeet shooting, so we went up to Richmond with the guns and had a hell of a time shooting skeet and playing with the guns. (safely playing of course). I didn't get pictures of the whole family because my battery was being stupid and dying. There was Sharon (the mom), Megan, Jessica, Amanda, Joey and Marissa. They remind me so much of Marie. You can totally tell that they are related. It's hilarious! They really want to move up here and we're all hoping they do because it would be freaking awesome!

Nate took Marissa on a ride. He took Amanda too but the battery died in my camera so I didn't get a picture of that. Sad :(

Sharon and Marie sporting their guns and sexy outfits. (Apparently the girls had all showered and taken the hot water so neither of them got to shower and get ready on Sunday... yeah right... its just an excuse! j/k)

Amanda walking back after kicking some serious butt shooting skeet. She hardly missed any!

Marissa shooting Nates 22 pistol. Pretty sweet.

Well this weekend was way fun and it's exciting to meet family that I never knew existed! And it was so nice to see the families reunited again after a very long time. These are definitely sweet memories.

Girls Day

2009-07-11T09:35:00.002-06:00

Well, Me, Kelsey and the Brittany's have been talking about having a girls day for a really long time. We finally were able to pick a day and go. After consideration about what we wanted to do, we decided to go to the Massage Therapy school in SLC and get massages. BEST IDEA EVER!!!!! I got us appointments at the Healing Mountain Massage School in SLC and after reviewing the many many choices of what we could do, we all decided we wanted the Hot Stone Swedish Massage. Now when you hear that title, you thing BIG BUCKS, BUT.... because we're smart and went to the school clinic and not a spa we got a 70 minute massage for $35 bucks!!!!! They told me when I made the appointments that there were 3 girls on staff and 1 boy, so I put the boy with me because I figured I was the only one that would be comfortable with that.

So Friday (yesterday) finally came and we headed down to Salt Lake. We stopped in Layton and ate at MiMi's Cafe. I hadn't eaten there before and it was way good. I got this turkey croissant sandwich that had almonst slivers and slices of apple. It was way good.

So we get to the massage appointment and they have you fill out a paper saying how much pressure you want, and then they have you X the areas of your body you want worked on and color in the areas you want them to avoid. So I colored in my my boobs to my butt and X'd everything else.

The guy came in (who by the way looked like he was 15) and started the massage. It was freaking awesome! He was new at clinic cuz he hadn't been there more than a week, but he was skilled. I could tell he was nervous because when he would switch out the stones he kept one hand on my back and it was shaking. Poor kid. When he worked on my legs and feet, he sat a stone on my foot and wrapped it up while he did the other leg. Then he left both feet wrapped while he did my neck. It felt so freaking good!

After he had me turn onto my back, he was massaging my neck and the top part of my chest just below my neck and then he took the stones up behind my ears and rubbed there. It was so relaxing. He worked on my legs again (on the top this time) - I was getting so relaxed that my leg twitched. I didn't say anything, but when we was working on the other leg it twitched so bad it came off the table. It startled him and he thought he had hurt me, so I told him it was just my muscles and he didn't hurt me. I felt bad cause he kinda freaked out a bit but oh well. He calmed down pretty quickly after I told him it wasn't his fault. The lady at the front desk told me that when your muscles are relaxing like that it's almost their way of giving in, so they spasm before they relax.

Anyway, we ended the day with Custard Shakes and headed home. It was such a relaxing day and we decided that we want to go down and get the wraps and heat soak bath things next time. It was a confirmed agreement that we are definitely going back.

It was really nice to just spend time together and chit chat because we really don't get to do that at all and this just put the icing on the cake. We can't afford to do this every month, so we are going to have to go every 2-3 months, but that works for me! Oh, if you want to know what school we went to, it was Healing Mountain Massage Therapy School. Their website is healingmountain.org/slc -- if you click on the "clinic" link - it takes you to their "menu" if you will. Definitely worth the drive.

Nate Finally Home

2009-06-14T11:46:00.002-06:00

As soon as Nate was moved to the rehab facility (he hates it when I call it the "nursing home" so I started calling it the rehab facility - it made him feel like he wasn't 100.) Thursday May 28 was when he moved into the rehab. The minute he got in, he wanted to get out. The Physical Therapist came and worked with him every day. Saturday and Sunday I got to bring him home just during the day because I was going to be here to help him. But he had to sleep at the rehab at night so our insurance would keep paying for it. The first couple days I went in and helped him shower so the CNA's didn't have to. But the following days when I was at work he had to be showered by young girls. Talk about awkward. But starting Tuesday he went in and showered himself. The Physical Therapist gave him a sponge on a long stick (kind of like a back scrubber) and one of those grabber things. Even though it took him a long time, he did it himself and got himself dressed. When he walked out of the shower room the aids were like "did you just shower yourself?" and he very proudly said "yes, and I'm ready to go home now". That sounds so much like Nate.

So after talking with the Physical Therapist and getting "permission" from the doctor Nate was ready to come home on Wednesday. I went in and we signed all the discharge papers we loaded him into the car and were off. We had to go by the pharmacy to pick up his pills and that was a treat. First I get there and the stupid doctor (who will remain anonymous and by the way was not our usual physician because you're assigned a new doctor when you're a patient in the nursing home... he oversee's all of the patients there) hadn't called in the prescriptions. So they call his office and luckily he was still in. (I was not about to take nate home without pain pills). So they told the pharmacist the prescriptions over the phone.... but lo and behold you can't call or fax in a prescription for Oxycodone because it's a narcotic. You have to have an original signature. STUPID! So then I had to run to the doctors office, get a prescription with an original signature and then go back. But when I was leaving the office, i got looking at the prescription and noticed it was wrong. Nate had been taking 2-3 pills (10-15mg) every 3 hours when he was in the hospital and in the rehab. This prescription was for 1 pill (5 mg) every 4 hours. Um... what? This doctor hadn't even assessed Nate's pain to see if he was okay to have his meds reduced! So I go back into the office and talk to the lady at the front. She went and talked to the doc and came back in. She goes "he feels like Nathan's pain is controlled enough to reduce his pain meds." and i go "what? he hasnt even seen Nate so how can he say his pain is being properly controlled?" and she goes "well, the doctor believe that it's time to start reducing his pain med intake before we have problems." and i go "well, without a consultation I don't feel it's appropriate to reduce the pain meds and with a fracture like he's got he is in A LOT of pain! Every movement hurts, and..." she cuts me off and goes "well, what did he do?" SHE DIDN'T EVEN KNOW WHAT WAS WRONG WITH HIM! I about flipped my lid and then I said, "he has a freaking fractured pelvis. That's whats wrong with him." she goes "oh... I didn't know that." Anyway, after I about jumped over the counter and clobbered this woman she finally got the doc to change the prescription... but when it came back the only thing that was different was it now said "1 pill (5 mg) ever 3-4 hrs"- WOW, big change. Every 3-4 hrs instead of every 4. So i clarified that now that we were out of the rehab, we were back in the care of our regular physician and I would never have to talk to this doctor again, and she confirmed that was the case. THANK HEAVEN!

So I get back to the pharmacy and get the pills. He was on the oxy's for pain, a muscle relaxer and a stool softener. But then the pharmacist gives me the shots he'd been given in the hospital that thin out the blood to help reduce blood clots. Nate had bruises all over his stomach from these shots. They're really good when you're immobile, but when your blood is circulating and you're moving around they're not really necessary. And after my insurance covered the cost I still was going to have to pay $80 but 8 shots! (Without my insurance they would have been $280 for 8 freaking shots!!!). I asked the pharmacist if I had to buy them and he said I was allowed to refuse any medications.... so i didn't buy them. I just got the other 3 and left. So instead of spending over $100 on meds, I spent $30. I felt good about that. (don't worry... I called his regular doc the next day to be sure it was ok that he wasn't getting the shot anymore... he said it was fine).

After a long process of forms, pharmacys and stupid doctors, 3 hrs later I finally got Nate home. So on June 3 Nate finally came home for good. He has been working himself each day and is improving really well. He can't get around the house without any assistance from me. so that's great. At this point, all i have to do is help him out of bed. He can do it himself, but it takes about 5 minutes, so I help to make in an easier process.

I'm glad that my work has been so flexible. They have let me come and go as I've needed to to be able to care for Nate and help him with things. It's been really nice to have such flexibility. It's going to be a long process of healing, but it's happening rather quickly if you ask me.

Last Monday Nate finally got his temporary cast removed and a new one put on. He picked camo for his color. Typical boy. We then scheduled an appointment for 2 weeks and they will be doing more x-rays on his wrist to see how long he'll have to have the cast (they estimate 6 weeks) and this doc is going to take over the care of his pelvis, so they'll be getting more x-rays at our next appointment for that. He won't be able to go back to work for probably 3-4 more weeks (if we're lucky) so i guess we'll see about that. He is getting really stir crazy but at least he's being productive around the house. I mean, the other day he dusted above all my door frames! He is definitely bored if he's willing to do that. But it's nice to have him home and I'm just thankful he's alive and doing well.

Memorial Weekend: the continuing story...

2009-06-11T19:03:00.008-06:00

I left off on Monday morning after Nate's accident. I slept on the floor all night (well, if you count 3 hours being all night) so I was sore and of course we both smelled awful because we'd been camping since Friday without showering. So after we spoke with the nurses, I decided to go to my sister Deanna's house and shower. I left Nate sleeping, flat on his back in the bed. He had to lay flat on his back because the doctor hadn't evaluated his head, neck and back x-rays so they didn't want to move him without knowing he was ok and nothing important (besides his pelvis) was broken.

After driving to my sisters house and taking a lengthy shower we decided to get some breakfast. We drove to this little home town restaurant for breakfast (reminded me a lot of LD's in Richmond) we ate, and then I went back to the hospital. It felt so good to be clean. My clothes from that I had on the day before were caked in mud (mostly because I fell when I was running to the truck).

When I got back to the hospital, I sat with Nate and just read my book that I had in the truck because he slept most the day. He was in a lot of pain and he was starving. They wouldn't let him eat just in case he needed surgery, so he hadn't eaten in over 24 hours. At about 5pm the nurse and the doctor came in saying his back and neck were fine so they could take off his neck brace and let him sit up. FINALLY! He had been flat on his back for 26 hours!!

Before the brace came off....

During...

After

After they had his neck brace off, he asked to have his hair washed. It was so greasy and dirty from camping! The aid came in with a shower cap that has a leave in shampoo/conditioner thing in it. They put the cap on him and she massaged his head. Here is the before and after shot of that. I'd heard of those caps, but I hadn't seen one before. Pretty cool.

Enos, Dallas, Doug, Twig and Sperm came up on Tuesday to see Nate. They stayed for a few hours and then left, but not without Enos leaving Nate quite the collection of DVD's to choose from. He brought his whole case and left Nate about 15 movies. Definitely better than watching daytime television! It was so nice of them to come down and see Nate. They are all so supportive and very reassuring. Doug was still wearing his arm sling from his accident a couple weeks before. (He had wrecked a dirt bike of High Creek Canyon and did lots of damage... so he knows how Nate feels).

Dallas and Doug

Twig

Gradually as time went on Nate began sitting up, and a little while later, they finally stood him up for the first time. He didn't take any steps that first time, but he stood with the walker.

The next day he was determined to walk. He took a few steps forward, and a few back. And it just got better from there.

Nate really liked the strawberry/vanilla swirl Ice Cream from the Primary Childrens cafeteria. (Deanna informed me that Primary's has way better food than U of U so I took the 2 minute walk and went there for meals.) We always brought ice cream back for Nate's room mate Perry too. I didn't get any pictures of him... but he was a funny guy. He was in his 50's i think. Him and Nate got along really well. He was in a four wheeling accident and broke all sorts of bones.

Perry got discharged a few hours before Nate and while Nate was sleeping, he created this. On the side it says "Call Perry" and had his phone number. They already started planning a camping trip together. I'm sure we'll see him again someday.

I went home Monday night and drove back Tuesday morning. Then I had to work 1/2 day on Wednesday, and came down again. Nate's parents came down on Wednesday and spent the day with him, and they stayed the night at Nate's Aunt Ann's house so they could be with him Thursday. I had to work all day Thursday because it was my Summer Citizen Orientation. When I was working, Nate texted me and told me they were transfering him to Logan Nursing and Rehab that afternoon. Luckily his parents were there and they were able to bring him to Logan so he didn't have to be transported by van. I went to see him as soon as I was off work. It was so nice to be able to just drive to the rehab and not have to leave Logan anymore. It was nice having him close to home. Not quite as good as having him home, but better.

Memorial Weekend turned Disaster

2009-06-03T20:10:00.010-06:00

Many of you know that Nate and I are really big into camping and having a good time riding four wheelers and dirt bikes. Well, this memorial weekend wasn't any different. We decided it would be fun to go with (almost) all of our friends (sorry doug) and head out to Mountain View, Wyoming to go riding at the "Badlands". (They have been rightfully named). Since we sold my four wheeler last year Nate decided that I needed something to ride so he went down to Motorsports Unleashed and talked with his old buddy Todd Barlow and rented me a Suzuki 400. Nate wanted to leave around 3 on Friday, but it ended up being more like 5:30. So by the time we drove the 3+ hrs to the badlands it was dark. We didn't get to do any riding on Friday night, but we still had a good time visiting with our friends. And in the mean time, we got to meet a few new friends, Georgia (his real name is Thomas - but we like Georgia better) and Jake.

Saturday we got up, ate some breakfast and decided to go for a ride. We rode hard and had a lot of fun. I had forgotten how much arm work it takes to handle a four wheeler. It's been almost 2 years since I rode, but man, I was feeling it after a few hours. We crossed over this fence (random that they have a fence in the middle of freaking no where) but anyway, we get across it because Dallas and Enos were telling us about this really cool cave we needed to go see. So we finally get to this area and we have to get off our bikes and hike.

It literally was one foot in front of the other because there wasn't any more space than that.

Out of the group, only me, Nate, Dallas, Enos, Skogs and Georgia hiked to the cave. I guess I impressed Enos and Dallas because, well #1- I was the only girl willing to hike it and #2 - i was ahead of Skogs, Nate and Georgia. They kept saying that I was a "bad ass" because I hiked it. It was also cool cause they kept telling Nate how lucky he is to have a wife that will get dirty with the guys. GO ME! We get up to the opening - and OH MY GOSH!

This is Dallas crawling thru it.

I was scared, but I didn't hike all that way to punk out, so I "thought skinny" and went on thru. Here are just a few more pictures of the cave and the guys. These guys are freaking awesome! They are accomodating because I'm a girl, but they don't baby me either. I love these guys.

ENOS

GEORGIA

We hiked out of the cave (it wasn't very big) and took a few pics.

There were these really cool "rifs" from water and erosion. love it!

This is one of the holes that you can look out of in the cave.

We hiked up and over to see this area that had been carved out by water and sat there for a good hour or so just chattin it up and eatin sunflower seeds.

L-R Dallas, Enos, Nate, Skogs and Georgia

DALLAS

Me and Enos (Nate said we look like a couple. We thought that was pretty funny.... and accurate by looking at the picture)

Good ol Skogs and Georgia (believe it or not, but Georgia is 37! - He is also called "Old Man" but only by Enos)

That night the girls decided we needed a "girls ride" so we went and had a BLAST! Here are a few pictures from that:

ME

Me climbing! (Just a note: I was the only girl to make it around that loop!)

Me, Cari and Cadi

Skye, Cari and Cadi

On Sunday, we woke up and kind of bummed around camp for a bit. Well, then we decided to go for a ride. Spanky had showed up (Dallas and Enos' step brother) and he was riding like a bat out of hell. He rides hard and fast all the time.

So a bunch of us head out for a ride. Homer, Skye and I were behind everybody else by a little ways. The ride was really fun, and then we come up on this hell. Jake had turned around and was motioning for me to stop. I stopped and he says the words that I never EVER want to hear again. "Nate's hurt, I'm going back for my truck." Of course he didn't go into detail because he was hurrying, and of course I'm about ready to fall off my four wheeler because I didn't know how hurt he really was. I carefully went over this hill, and there he was. Laying on the ground. I hurried and stopped. Jumped off my wheeler and ran to his side.

He was talking and moving his head around so I knew that his neck was okay. It wasn't broken. (THANK HEAVEN). So Skogs is doing his fire fighter/emt check on Nate to see if he can move his legs and feet. He tried moving and then screamed! He knew that something was wrong with his hip because he couldn't hardly move his right leg. Spanky had some IB's and a muscle relaxer so he gave those to him. We were trying to talk to him to keep him calm and keep him from going into shock. It started raining, so everyone started taking off their sweatshirts and covering him. Spanky pulled a head sock and a thermal out from his bag and wrapped his face up. You could smell them from 10 miles away they stunk so bad, but it was keeping him warm, so we dealt with the smell.

The tail pipe of his bike was completely full of dirt. His bike was about 30 feet away from him when it was all said and done. And micraculous, the bike has NO DAMAGE! (stupid thing).

Jake came back with Enos (who initially wasn't with us on the ride) and they brought a dirt bike ramp, and the couch cushions that Enos' sleeps on. They got it ready and tried very carefully to lift Nate onto this make shift backboard. I've never heard someone scream so loud in pain. Once he was on the backboard, they put tie-downs around him to keep him steady, and then loaded him into the back of Jake's truck.

Spanky rode back with me, guiding the way, and Jake very very very carefully drove the truck with Enos in the back trying to keep Nate still, and shielding Nate with his body from the rain.

I hurried back to camp and started to get the truck. Spanky thought that the truck would be too rough for Nate. Luckily Alaska and his wife Danielle were there in their 4-runner. So we hurried and pulled all their sleeping stuff out, and folded down the backseat. We were prepared to get Nate there. Then we just had to sit and wait for Jake to come in his truck. When he finally arrived we very carefully shifted Nate into the 4-runner and pulled the ramp out from under him. (This again was VERY painful for him). When we finally had him loaded we pulled away from camp and headed toward the Evanston hospital. (Evanston is about 45 minutes away from Mt. View - but first we had to drive very slowly to the main road.) Alaska had to stop and get gas because there wasn't enough to get us to the hospital, and Nate needed to pee. Well, obviously he couldn't get up and go. I tried to talk him into holding it, but he was bound and determined he was going to go so they didn't have to give him a catheter at the hospital. So what did I do being the wonderful wife I am? I bought him a gatorade bottle and helped him pee in it. FUNNY SITE let me tell you!

After finally getting to the hospital, the doctor and nurses (all female by the way) got nate out of the 4-runner (not very carefully it seemed) and into the ER. They got some morphine running thru his veins and took him for x-rays. He came out with a broken left wrist, and 3 fractures in his pelvis. HIS WHAT? Yeah, his pelvis. One of the WORST fractures a person can have. They expressed their concern about internal bleeding, and told me they were life flighting him to U of U hospital. When they began prepping him for flight, I left to get the truck so I could head out and go to the hospital with him. Right when we left, I gathered my thoughts and made the dreaded call to Nate's mom. When she got on the phone, she didn't even say hi. All she said was "whats wrong". They weren't expecting to hear from us until Monday afternoon when we got back, but this was only sunday. Mothers intuition I guess. She said they would head down quickly so they could be there with him while I was enroute. The guys were awesome and got our stuff loaded into the cab of the truck and had Tommy (our dog) all ready to go. I got there, had a momentary freak out, the guys calmed me down and I drove all the way to U of U hospital from Evanston in about 3 hrs. Nate wrecked about 3pm, we got him to Evanston around 5:30pm and they flew him out at about 7:30pm. It was a 25 minute flight from Evanston to SLC.

About midnight they finally moved Nate from the ER to his room. His dad, my dad, and Ben gave him a blessing and then they all left while I stayed with him for the night. The nurse tried to tell me that it was policy that people couldn't stay the night, but he didn't have a roommate so I insisted that I stay. After about 3 hrs of sleep between the both of us, it was finally morning. Out of all of this, all I can say is that I am so grateful that we have such amazing friends. I have never seen so many people band together and literally take the shirts off their backs to help their friends. We are so blessed to have such amazing friends, and I am so proud to say they are my friends. I would do anything for these guys, and it's good to know they would do the same. I honestly tried to think of how many friends I've had in my life that would do anything for me. I can count them on 1 hand. Now that I have these guys in my life, I can't count them all. So if you guys are reading this, thank you and we love you.

To be continued........

One of the "Honey Do's" On My List

2009-05-02T12:26:00.005-06:00

I know I suck at posting and some of my posts are not very exciting. But this one was very exciting to me. When we bought our house our bathroom had carpet. Who ever the idiot was that said carpet in the bathroom was good idea should be shot! If anyone reading this has carpet in their bathroom, I just have to say that I'm not going to apologize for any statements that I make that could offend you. :-) Anyway... when we bought the house we were spending quite a bit painting and putting up new light fixtures so we decided we could handle the carpet in the bathroom for a while. Well, 2 1/2 years later we finally put in a tile floor. I wasn't able to be home in the beginning of the process so I had Nate take some pictures.

He caught Tommy in this picture. It looks like he had started to rip up the carpet and then remembered to take pictures for me.

This is right next to the tub where water sometimes gets out when you're showering. GROSS!

And the worst- right by my toilet where we had leaking issues right after we moved in. We put in a new toilet (because I couldn't stand the idea of using someone elses toilet in my own house), and for some reason it was leaking, and it completely soaked my carpet. (hence... the other reason why carpet in the bathroom is DISCUSTING!)

You know... my friend Kelsey will vouch for me that the bathroom is the first thing i clean and it's always clean. Can you imagine my discust when Nate pulled up the carpet around the toilet and the entire floor was rotting! We had to put down new plywood around the toilet and tub too. SICK!

But.... here is the finished product....

Playing Mommy

2009-03-17T19:10:00.007-06:00

My brother Brian and his wife Kelli went to St. George and Vegas for 5 days and 4 nights. Well, there wasn't anyone to watch Brycen or the dog. So when Kelli called me to see if I could watch Brycen while they were gone, I thought for a second, but decided to accept. It's good practice... but mostly Brycen is a VERY happy child, so i figured it wouldn't be too bad. The other reason I decided to watch him was because i was on my "mandatory 5 day furlough" that the University required during spring break week. I didn't have any plans anyway so it was something to fill up my week!

This is my ADORABLE NEPHEW!

Brycen is definitely a binkie boy. Can you tell? When he did that I thought it was so cute so I had to take a picture. (little does he know that mom and dad are slowly weening him off of the binky. so sad...)

Brycen decided that because he found my Skip-Bo cards he would play 1000 card pick up! (Have you ever seen the size of those skip-bo decks? THEY'RE HUGE!) But in the end he didn't pick up a single one. Hmmm... that didn't work out the way I thought it would.

Jeneil and her girls, Taylor and Makenna came over on Thursday to play. And then friday we got together with Kelsey and her niece Brynly and Brittany and her little boy Jacob. Play dates are very fun! Saturday Brycen had his first experience getting in the hot tub with me, my friend Becky and her two kids, Owen (who is 4 days younger than brycen) and Kya. Brycen loved it. He just chilled on my lap and enjoyed the warm water. (Just an FYI- it wasn't turned up all the way so it wasn't too hot for the kids).

Brycen is definitely a night owl. This is the last night that I had him, right after he fell asleep at MIDNIGHT! My sister in law is very lucky and is able to stay home with him, so going to bed late isnt an issue. I'm usually in bed by 9 so this kid really wore me out!

As I mentioned before I had one extra dog. Well, I didn't mention that Kelli's parents went on this trip too. They also have a dog. So I became a mom and a kennel club all in one day! Tuffy (brian and kelli's dog) is the dark one, the one in the middle is Bandit (LuAnn and Sheridans dog) and the farthest one is Tommy (my baby). As you can see they were VERY tuckered out after wrestling and playing for hours on end.

I thought these sleeping pictures of the pups were cute. I was tripping over them every moment of every day.. but brycen had a blast with them and they really enjoyed each others company.
Tuffy

Tommy

Bandit (he sleeps and sits with his legs out funny. it's cute)

Well... you can't imagine having 3 dogs in the house and no battle scars on the child. On Sunday, the very last day I had brycen he bent down to pick up his binky cause the dogs were rolling all over it when they were wrestling and he got a FOOT in the EYE! You can see his battle wound right in the corner of his eye. He cried for a second and then got over it. He did say "NO" to the dogs. But he very quickly forgave them. And you can see the smile on his face behind the bink.

I learned a lot playing mom for a few days. Going from no child to a 19 month old was a definite experience in itself. He is a really good kid and he was so much fun. I haven't laughed and giggled so hard in my life. I have seen a lifetime worth of Handy Manny (but I must say is MUCH better than baby einsteins). I think brycen was very good preparation for parenthood. When I do have a child... I'll let you know the comparison. LOVE YOU BRYCEN!

Coopers 3rd Birthday

2009-03-17T19:00:00.003-06:00

Cooper Jon Lundgreen turned 3 on March 8. He is getting so big! It's amazing how fast they grow up and how much they know at the age of 3. He surprises me every time I see him. He's so smart! Here are a few pictures of his birthday. YEAH! HAPPY BIRTHDAY COOPER!

This is the best smile I could get cooper to give me. Usually he CHEESES it!

This is the really cool wooden train set Kade and Kallie gave to Cooper. He had so much fun pushing the trains along and making fun track designs.

Cars is the DEFINITE choice of cake for cooper. A few of the cars had been taken off by the time I got over there to take a picture, but you get the general idea of what it looked like. WAY CUTE!
Cooper blowing out the candles. THE BIG 3!!!

NEW CAR!!! (FINALLY)

2009-02-20T18:10:00.003-07:00

Well, I finally was able to get my new car! For those of you who didn't know, I drive a 1994 Geo Prizm with NO A/C. It's a really good car and gets great gas mileage, but it's was freaking hot in the summer time!

Anyway, so I have been researching for a long time and been keeping my eyes open for a new car and a good deal. Well, I finally picked out his adorable Nissan Altima. It was a REALLY nice car. So I finally get a day when Nate can go with me, and guess what.... he hates it. He thought the body was ugly, he didn't like the way it drove yada yada yada.... and i kept saying "but it's so practical!" So we being walking around the car lot, and he notices this really cute Pontiac G6 and is like "see, you can have a practical car AND a good looking one!" So we drove it, and let me tell you.... it was freaking love immediately! So i just wanted to post and say my husband is really sweet, and this was my valentines present. (I actually got it like a week before valentines... but that's ok) This is my new car! I LOVE IT!!!

Merry Christmas

2008-12-31T17:16:00.003-07:00

Well.... I am awful and completely forgot to take any pictures on Christmas this year.... and I really suck because it's New Years Eve and I'm finally talking about Christmas. Forgive me... it has been a VERY LAZY break for me! (YEAH FOR NO WORK OR SCHOOL!!!!)

Well, for Christmas this year, it was pretty basic. Nate and I just got clothes (which I picked out every piece by myself) and as we were opening gifts, I was pretty dang sure that I didn't get anything from Nate... until he handed me this little gift and said it was for me. He bought me a way cute bumbles watch. His mom saw me "eying" them at Novemberfest so she called Nate to see what he had gotten me. When he said nothing... she insisted he got me one of the watches. She looked at a bunch of them, took pictures with her cell phone and sent them to him. He picked the one he liked the best. I think he did pretty good.... don't you? ( NO making fun of my disgustingly white skin)

Well, we have all learned that when Nate sets his mind to something... he is going to get it. So this is what he came home with a few days after Christmas. Little did I know he had been stashing cash away and saving it for his new snowmobile. It's paid for, so I guess I can't complain too much.

BLACK FRIDAY SHOPPING!!!

2008-12-06T09:56:00.003-07:00

Yes yes, me, Marie and Kallie got up and went to Al's Sporting Goods at 5:00AM! We were the smart shoppers. We sat in the car until they opened the doors and while the hundreds of people were filing in through one set of doors, we snuck in the other set. And we didn't even have to stand out in the cold!

My main reason for wanting to go to Al's was for new snowboarding pants. I found this pair that I tried on and ABSOLUTELY LOVED! They were only 25% off so I was like... well - lets see how much they are. Yeah... originally $359!!!! I said, umm... NO and put them right back where I found them. But I did end up getting a really cute creamy colored pair and these were 70% off so it only ended up being $50, and Kallie was buying them for me for Christmas, so I only had to pay $20 out of pocket for them. Pretty sweet!

This is a picture of me and Kallie when we were waiting in line.

The only problem we had was when this lady starting fighting me for the pants. We got in a bit of a tug of war but I WON so it's all good. Marie was just lucky enough to snap a shot of the fight.

Okay, okay, this was staged. But she was a good sport.

Happy Thanksgiving

2008-12-06T09:15:00.005-07:00

I know I'm a little behind on posting, but i have finally broke away from studying for finals to do this. So here goes...

This year for Thanksgiving we spent it with Nates family. We find it easier just to rotate years and then we don't have to worry about spending equal time with each family. Luckily for us Nate's mom started doing Thanksgivin dinner for just the immediate family so we get a very good home cooked meal and we don't have to deal with the aunts and uncles. YEAH!!!

Well Thanksgiving wouldn't be Thanksgiving without something happening to a food item. (Because when I am around, food is NEVER perfect). So this year Marie put me in charge of stuffing, and a lemon pie. Me and Marie are really the only ones that wanted the lemon pie, but its my favorite so I made it. Well, it was beautiful. I did however make the mistake of getting out of the truck at Bens to hug Cooper and Kilee and well, Tommy (my sweet little dog) doesn't like it when I get out of the truck and leave him in there. But I wasn't sure how Ben's dogs would be so I left him in there. Well, I saw him run to the back seat of the truck and didn't think anything of it, until I remembered that my pie was in the back seat. Well I ran to the truck and yeah, Tommy's FOOT had stepped RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF IT! So here is a picture of my pie, and of my adorable dog. Oh... and in case you're wondering... me and Marie still at the pie, but we just ate the outside edges of it. :)

Kade had to work at Lee's until 2:30 so in the morning time we went skeet shooting. It was way fun. I actually started hitting the clay pigeons after a few practice shots. First off I shot Nate's old single shot rifle. IT SUCKED!!! I don't know why I let him talk me into that. I knew it was going to kick. I held it really tight against my shoulder and pulled the trigger, but it still almost knocked me on my butt. Nates mom laughed at me thinking that I was being a baby, but when she shot his gun she realized that it really does kick and it hurts! His dads gun wasn't as bad, but Ben's automatic rifle was the best one. It holds 6 shells so you can shoot a lot without having to reload and because it's an automatic you don't have to cock it.

Here are some pictures from our day at the gun range...

Nate was doings so aweomse! I think we counted 8 skeet in a row that he shot down. I'm pretty sure he was using ben's gun right now. He shot 6 in a row and then he was out of shells, so he reloaded and shot 2 more in a row without missing. To be honest... it was a definite turn on. :)

This is me shooting Ben's gun. I was using the rock as leverage.I think it helped because thats when I started hitting them. I had a lovely bruise on my shoulder the next morning though.

Cooper was wearing ear protectors. It was so cute! He was collecting the empty shells that were fallig on the ground. (After we threw them out of the way of course). He was really good to stay behind the guns that were shooting and stay close to his mom. I think he had a lot of fun though.

We couldn't get Kilee to wear the ear protectors, so we just held her and tried to keep them covered with our hands when the guns went off. She wasn't scared though. She seemed to enjoy what was happening. I love this pink coat. It looks so cute on her!

Well this is Marie (my mother-in-law) and she was "pulling" while the guys were shooting. She's a lot stronger than me, but for some reason she couldn't pull the thing back to get the skeet in place. It was pretty funny. I ended up helping her the first couple of times and then we just switched places and I pulled. So this picture is her struggling to pull back the thing. (I have NO IDEA what the "thing" is called, so hopefully you get what i'm talking about)

Kallie was having fun shooting Nates little hand gun. It is really old school, but still is new enough that it holds a clip. That is a fun gun to shoot.

This one is one of my favorites. This is Bens pointer and even though she is bred to be a hunting dog... ha ha ha, she is terrified of guns. Ben brought her up there in hopes that she would get used to the shots being fired so she would quit being such a chicken. She is a sweetie though.

Happy Halloween

2008-10-31T16:43:00.006-06:00

Today at work we had our annual Halloween Party. It was actually really fun. Mike, our lead event assistant put together all of the decorations and by the time the party was over i had sucked the helium out of about 15 balloons. I'm still a little high. HA HA! It was fun though! We were singing Christmas Carols like chipmunks. It was great.

I couldn't decide what I wanted to be for Halloween so yesterday I got on google and typed in "easy halloween cotumes from home" and one of the options that came up was a Rubik's Cube. So that is what I was. Cute huh?

My friend Hollie ironically got on the same website at home and decided to be the stop light. She was gonna be the rubik's cube too but then decided not to. (This picture is definitely not the most flattering and I didn't even know they were taking the picture so I'm looking at Varuna who had dressed up like the Joker from the new batman). The cute little girl that is a lady bug is Hollie's little girl Brylie. She's freaking cute! This video is us singing like chipmunks. It's pretty funny. There was a couple of people singing with me so you can't exactly hear me, but you definitely get to hear me cough at the end. (PS - I have NO idea why I'm waving a flat balloon around while we're doing this.) ENJOY!

The pink shirt is for PINK IN THE RINK. USU's Hockey Team is supporting Breast Cancer Awareness. They were selling these shirts for $8 a piece and all of the proceeds go to Breast Cancer Awareness. And the players all got pink jersey's to wear. Their game is tomorrow night (Nov. 1) at 7pm at the Eccles Ice Rink. If you wanna come it's only $5 admission and $1 off if you wear a pink shirt. Come Enjoy that Game! It's gonna be AWESOME!

This was different

2008-10-29T20:54:00.003-06:00

I pulled this from Natty's blog. It's different than any of the other ones I had seens so here goes...

Your real name:LeeAnn King Lundgreen

Gangsta name (first three or four letters of your first name, plus izzle, favorite type of icecream, favorite type of shoe): LeeAizzlechocolatechipcookiedoughflipflops

Native American name (favorite color, favorite animal):pinkpuppy

NASCAR name (first names of grandfathers): Milo Norman

Stripper name (favorite perfume/scent, favorite candy): Nollie Reeses Peanut Butter Cup

Soap opera name (middle name, street you live on):No middle name.... um.... King Country Manor Drive

Star Wars name (first three letters of last name, first two letters of first name):LunLee

weather/anchor name (first grade teacher's last name, major city that starts with same letter):Brough Brooklyn

Spy name (favorite season, favorite flower): Fall Gerber Daisy.

Cartoon name (favorite fruit, article of clothing you are wearing now): Apple Sweats

Hippie name (what you ate for breakfast, favorite tree):Cereal Evergreen

Super hero name (second favorite color, favorite drink): Red Diet Dr. Pepper

Goth name (black, name of one of your pets):Black Tommy (or Black "Thomas" when he's in trouble)

Movie star name (first pet's name, first street name): Stubs Center St.

Iraqi name (second letter of first name, third letter of mom's maiden name, third letter of dad's name, first letter of a siblings name, last letter of mom's name):EPUDP

Rockstar name (first pet, current car): Cat Geo

Happy 4th Anniversary

2008-10-23T17:33:00.003-06:00

Well, another year has gone by and here we are at our anniversary once again. We're keeping it simple this year and just going to dinner. Spending the evening together is all we want to do anyway. These four years have flown by so fast. We've definitely seen our share of trials, but through it all we've become so much closer together and it's amazing how your love continues to grow for someone, even when you think you love them with all your heart right now. So, Nate I love you and thank you for being such a wonderful husband to me.
I don't have any pictures on disc (another thing that I need to do and haven't yet) so I had to take pictures of the pictures. (Which doesn't always work out the best - as you can see, they're a little fuzzy.) But, these are my favorite pictures from my wedding. (Thanks to Kelsey for making my hair beautiful!)

Karaoke at my house!

2008-10-17T15:26:00.004-06:00

Well, I'm just sitting here at work being bored so I thought I would post about the Karaoke night we had at my house a month or so ago. One night everyone decided to come to my house for some reason (which I love that because when the night is over, I can just go to bed and don't have to drive home). Anyway - the night was going great and then all of a sudden nate comes out to the garage with my karaoke machine. I didn't think anyone would be into it, but EVERYONE was. It was AWESOME! i saw a whole new side of some of my friends. Check it out...

Twig singing his heart out to Gary Allan

I think Doug was a little curious at what twig was about to do.

Skye being adorable! She was flying solo that night because Homer was in Ogden playing a gig with his band (Bands name: Simple as Suicide aka SAS)

Dallas using a box as a hot
pad because his hot dog was a little too warm for him to hold with bare hands. The innovative things boys do.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

2008-10-16T21:35:00.007-06:00

Well, yesterday was my birthday (October 15) and I am officially 24 years old. YEAH! Not that there is anything really that exciting about being 24 instead of 23. No new privileges or anything. Anyway - I woke up the day of my birthday and went to work out with my good friend Becky (whom I also like to call my "bosom buddy"). She met me at Curves with these beautiful flowers.

I thought that was so sweet. It just made my morning and made me so happy that I had gotten my fat butt out of bed on my birthday.

So anyway, I come home and am getting ready for work. Nate gets up, and heads off to work. Um... HELLO!!! DID YOU FORGET SOMETHING??? YEAH- he completely forgot to wish me a happy birthday. PITIFUL BOYS. AND the sad thing, is that we had been talking on Tuesday night about where we were going to dinner for my birthday. It's not like he didn't have a reminder!!!

On with the day, we had an open house at work (YEAH! NOT!) So I spent the whole day in heels on my feet just wanting to die. And on top of it I'm on the verge of a sore throat so I wasn't feeling great anyway. But... Tonya, a lady I work with came upstairs and got me. She acted like there was some emergency and I needed to come downstairs and help. So I did.... and this is what I found....

I honestly think these are the prettiest roses I have EVER seen in my life. They're such perfect fall colors.

And my card just said "Happy Birthday Babe! I Love You!" Needless to say, I wasn't mad anymore about him forgetting my birthday.

Labor Day Yellowstone Trip

2008-09-03T10:34:00.006-06:00

Well we went to Yellowstone with Nate's family for Labor Day weekend. It was fun, but very interesting. I think it was just strange to see the different ways people vacation. My family and Nates family definitely do things differently when on vacation. But that's ok - that is what makes us unique I guess.

I really liked this shot i got of the watrefall coming between the trees.

This buffalo was just taking his time walking down the middle of the highway. He was so close we could have reached out and touched him. He was a big boy though - not so sure touching him would have been a great idea.

Cooper got up on Nate's shoulders and when we told him to hold on tight he grabbed Nates ears. It was so cute we just HAD to take a picture.

We went to the Grizzley and Wolf Discovery Center. It was really cool. They took the bears out of their 'area' and then they let the little kids put food out for the bears. They were hiding it under rocks and stuff. It was cute.

For some reason Nate liked this picture of me (even though the wind was blowing my hair EVERYWHERE) so I thought I would put this one on here.

Brycen's Birthday

2008-08-27T16:18:00.006-06:00

HAPPY ONE YEAR BRYCEN! Brycen is my brother Brian's baby - for those of you who didn't know
This is his really cute Sesame Street 'Grow With Me Sprinkler'

This adorable gift is his "cow bowling". He was loving that the ball made noises when you move it!

First time in the swing!

First time falling out of the swing! (Don't worry, Grandma LuAnn was behind him the whole time) He held on for dear life, it was so cute! He's a tough little guy!

Kilee's Birthday

2008-08-26T10:11:00.009-06:00

ONE YEAR OLD! Kilee and Cooper are getting SO big! Ben (Nate's brother) and his wife Cori had a little birthday party for Kilee. Cooper was helping her open her presents, and when he found something he wanted he would say "that's for me!" It was cute.

This is one of those presents that Cooper said "thats for me!" It's the Pick Me Up Elmo that Uncle Nate and I gave Kilee. It sings and dances. It's actually really cute!

Kilee thoroughly enjoying her birthday cake!

Cooper decided to help himself to Kilee's cake!

Uncle Nate was helping Cooper to "jump" the four wheeler! WEEEE!

Memories

2008-08-15T18:35:00.004-06:00

I saw this on Natty's blog and I agree with her and think it's really fun so;

Here are the rules

1. As a comment on my blog, leave a memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you know me a little or a lot, anything you remember! If we're only blogging friends or if you're a blog hopper who happens upon my blog regularly...leave me a comment. There must be reason you keep stopping by! Say something! If you don't have a blog or don't know how to sign in, sign up for an account! You won't regret it!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog (if you have one) and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty fun to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll be sure to write one about you... either on your blog, in my comment box, or I will email you back!

3. If the memory happens to involve my husband, please include him!This is your chance to let meknow you're checking my blog!Give me a shout out!

Going Away Party

2008-08-11T18:42:00.007-06:00

My good friend Chelsea Nelson quit working for USU and moved to Washington! I miss her so much! She was freaking awesome! It seems like you just start to get to know someone really well, and then they leave. It's cool, you've gotta live your life - but it's sad to see people move on. Chels - if you read this - I LOVE YOU AND I HOPE THAT SEATTLE ROCKS!!!!!

Cami and Chels
Chelsea and Walker

Chelsea, Brittney and Brandon

After dinner at Cafe Sabor we went to the Celebration Centre. I had only been there before for work so I hadn't ever been on the rides - they are AWESOME! Stan Checketts (who invented Bungee Jumping) owns this place in Logan and he has just a few rides there. It has the tallest free fall drop ride in the world! (I DID NOT go on that one though! I just watched.)
This is the swing that we all went on. Because there were five of us we broke it up into groups. I was SO surprised with how fast this thing gets you going - i mean, how quickly you're clear up in the air! It's INSANE! lets just say that Walker was freaking out like a little girl and when we got off the ride, the guy running it asked him to "watch his language" or we would have to leave. I couldn't hear it from the other side so I'm not even sure what he was saying.

Chelsea and Erica getting ready to ride the swing :)

St. Augustine, FL

2008-06-10T18:05:00.010-06:00

St. Augustine is the oldest city in the United States. It was established in the 1500's. This lighthouse was absolutely beautiful. We hiked to the top and I've never been so out of breath but the view from the top was AWESOME!

These are the stairs we had to climb. Can you imagine being the light keeper at this light house and having to haul buckets of lantern oil to the top? They let you lift one at the bottom so you could feel how heavy and then half way up they have another one so we could lift it and feel how much heavier it felt because we had been climbing. OUCH!

We went to this old fort and was used to hold prisoners during wars. It was almost like a castle

because you could see where the mote went. It's dried up now, but it was cool to see. And they reinacted what it was like to shoot a cannon at the enemy coming. My ears were ringing for about an hour after that. My favorite part of the fort though was this lady. Her fingernails were FREAKING GROSS!

Florida!

2008-06-10T17:56:00.006-06:00

When we went to Florida after NY we had SO much fun! We started in Jacksonville (our friends live there), then we went down to Ft. Lauderdale where we stayed in a hotel for two nights and then left on our CRUISE to the BAHAMAS! It was a short cruise, but it was really fun. I think it's smart to start off with a short cruise just so you can see if you get sick or not. I was sick the morning we came back into port and it was NOT pretty!

This picture is the firs tnight on the cruise. I love the sun and the water in the background!

This picture was taken at the Atlantis Resort in Nassau, Bahamas. There is a huge indoor/outdoor aquarium. There are only certain areas of the resort we could go into because we weren't guests there, but it was still amazing. The cheapest room is about $700 a night and the most expensive room is $25,000 a night (did I mention that one has a FOUR night MINIMUM!!!) That's INSANE!

New York

2008-05-25T18:59:00.011-06:00

New York was definitely amazing. We had a blast seeing all the very large buildings - and getting lost on the Subway. I tell you, it really does take a genius to be able to decipher those stupid maps. Luckily for us, Sheena was just a phone call away and she is very familiar with the subway system. Our first hotel was very scary. I just have a word of advice for anyone wanting to visit New York City - DO NOT GO CHEAP ON HOTELS! No matter how expensive you think $200+ a night is, it's totally worth it. I booked us a hotel for $130 a night and when we got there - we were in the middle of the FREAKING ghetto in QUEENS of all places! We stayed one night and then booked a better hotel right in Manhatten. We were on 49th and 10th. Five blocks away from 5th avenue (where everything is). It definitely got better once we got to a better hotel.

We met up with Sheena one of the nights and walked across the

Brooklyn Bridge and had real Brooklyn Style Pizza. It was kind of

getting dark when we walked there, and it was dark when we came back. You definitely get a different perspective on the city when you see it all lit up and from a distance. It really is beautiful.

See... I told you the city was beautiful!

I hadn't seen Sheena since they moved to New York like 2 years ago. It was so nice to be able to spend the evening with her and catch up. Thank you and Love ya!

We went on "Top of the Rock" (Top of Rockefeller Center) and got a GREAT view of the city. We walked passed Tiffany and Co. and I had to keep myself from going inside - that could have spelled disaster for my checking account. The building behind Nate in this picture is the Empire State Building. And, a little bit of New York Trivia (thanks Sheena) - did you know that the top of the Chrysler building is made of old car parts?

Central Park was beautiful and SO peaceful. When you're relaxing in the sunshine, it's almost like you can't hear the city anymore - everything just fades out. I see why people like to hang out there a lot and have picnics. I would if I lived there.

We got tickets to David Letterman. The only guest I knew was Ashton Kutcher. (He's always a pleasure to look at). The show was really funny and it was interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes. To get tickets to Letterman you enter online, they call you with a trivia question, and if you answer correctly - you get the tickets. We never watch Letterman, so I was completely amazed that I got the answer right. The answer was "Where does Rufus work?" (I think the name was Rufus) anyway - if you don't know it, he works at the Deli down the street. I was STOKED when I got that answer right, and for never watching the show I was pretty pleased with myself. I really wanted tickets to Conan O'Brien but he wasn't currently giving out tickets because they are booked for like 2 months.

We took a helicopter ride over the city. It was only about 12 minutes long, but it was amazing. Yet another way to get a different perspective of the city. Here is a shot of the Statue of Liberty from the chopper. It's beautiful, but it's not as big as I had imagined it would be.

Anyway - this part of the trip was amazing. I definitely think that if I ever go back to New York it will probably be with my sisters and will more than likely be a pure Broadway trip. I think we would go for 4 days and see a different show every night. That would be awesome! I wanted to get tickets to Wicked but Nate isn't into that stuff, and the price of $140 per person choked me a little. But they currently had Wicked, Mary Poppins, The Little Mermaid and The Lion King playing (among others).

Washington DC

2008-05-25T18:30:00.008-06:00

I am finally getting to my blog after being home for a week. It's been interesting playing catch up with work and school and my yard. Our trip was amazing and worth every penny (and believe me, that's a lot of pennies). We had some very interesting experiences, but believe it or not, Nate and I got along the ENTIRE time without killing each other. We had a lot of fun together and were able to spend good quality time with just us. It was awesome! We went to Washington DC first. Flying into Baltimore, MD I came extremely close to throwing up on the plane, but I held it back. I have never gotten sick before on flights, but this one almost did me in. Then getting from the airport in Maryland to our hotel by the Pentagon in Washington DC was interesting and um... adventurous I guess you could say. I felt bad because the one thing Nate really wanted to see was the Declaration of Independence. Well, just our luck- the building was under construction and not open to the public so we couldn't see it. Here are a few pictures from Washington DC though.

Arlington National Cemetary - notice the sentinels are in perfect rows. Only the best for those who give their best.

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier- If you ever get a minute, google some information on the requirements it takes to be a Guard at the Tomb. It's amazing the qualifications these boys have to have.

The Capitol Building. Washington DC completely dies down at night. Nothing is exciting or happening there at night. Everywhere we went, the cops were eyeing us down to be sure we weren't doing anything wrong. It was really creepy. Definitely not a night life city.

The Lincoln Memorial

There are a whole bunch of these statues of soldiers. It's very peaceful and almost sacred to be in the presence of these. It definitely makes you very proud to be an American.

Iwo Jima Memorial

The White House