2010 Christmas Day

We woke up at 8:30 to open up our presents and had a really enjoyable time unwrapping our gifts.  The kids loved the toys they got and were entertained for the rest of the morning.  I made scrambled eggs, biscuits and country gravy, sausages, hash browns, and orange juice.  Then we headed over to Jenn's house to see her and the kids.  They made a delicious early dinner for all of us and the kids had fun playing with their cousins.  My niece, Emma, came home with us and on our way home we stopped at a couple different places to look at Christmas lights. First we stopped at Loop of Lights and Santa, Frosty, and the Grinch were there!  The Loop of Lights is set to their own radio station and the lights on the house flash and light to the music.  It's really neat to watch and fun to listen to music and watch the lights.  Then we headed over to see Christmas Land. We got out and toured through some Christmas lights.  Then we went home and watched Elf and drank hot cocoa.  "Buddy the Elf, what's your favorite color?"  haha, I love that movie.  Merry Christmas!

Temple Lights

Christian and I took the kids to go see the Arizona Train Lights and Temple Christmas Lights.  It was a fun outing until I discovered towards the very end that my purse had been stolen.  I set it down to have a picture of us taken in front of the Temple nativity.  We started to walk away when I remembered and went to get it.  It had been taken by then.  Someone stole my purse at the temple...what the heck!! Everything in my purse was pretty much replaceable.  The things I'm going to miss the most are the actual purse ( I really liked that purse) and the key fob that locked and unlocked my van doors.  It wasn't done at the most convenient of times either with Christmas only a few days away.

 

 

 

 

Santa Baby!

We came home from church today and Baylee was walking around looking so pretty in her dress.  Christian put a Santa hat on Baylee's head and she looked adorable.  She was so cute I had to run and get my camera.  These were some pictures we took of her.

APS - Light Parade

Christian works for APS and they sponsor a light parade every year.  The employees spent some time putting some floats together after they worked all day.  The kids and us got to participate this year, and we rode on the float in front of thousands of people.  It was a really fun experience.

2010 Halloween

Melody: Witch
Aaron: Ninja
Dane: Spider Man
Baylee: Batarina
Abby: Witch

We did two nights of Trunk or Treating on Friday and Saturday night.  Halloween night was on a Sunday and we stayed up as a family and watched movies and handed out candy.  Dane and daddy would race to the door whenever we heard the doorbell ring.  What a fun year it was for Halloween.

 

How I'm Doing

I've had some interesting experiences these past couple of months.  After many months of testing and trying to figure out why I haven't felt good, my doctor was able to diagnoise me with Papillary Thryoid Cancer.  It's been a positive thing though and I'm not worried in the least about it.  I'm actually very happy with the real possibility of feeling better again, now that we know what we're trying to cure.  It's been lots of doctors appointments this past year trying to figure me out.  At times I felt like I was making it all up and I just needed to eat better, and excerise and would mentally tell myself to get up and get going even if I was exhausted.  Everything I've felt seemed explainable too, like I'm exhausted because I have a wonderful calling and little babies at home.  Its been a couple of months of more blood work, ultrasounds, a nuclear scan uptake, and most likely a surgery in the next few weeks.  My doctor is very involved with doing medical research concerning thyroid nodules and has asked me to take part in some genetic testing since my sister and my mom are both experiencing the same things I am.  I told him I'd do it and then I found out he was going to pay me to take part in it...well of course I'm going to do it!  I was trying to keep all of this to myself because I didn't want any attention.  My mother-in-law has been to my house to help me with my kids so I can go to appointments, and friends like Brian and Karleen Sirrine never hesitate to help me with transporting my kids to and from school if I need them.  Friends are sending me emails, and leaving me phone messages which are always spirit boosting when I'm having a particularily emotional day or experiencing lots of fatigue.  Ward members always seem to be there when I need them most in taking care of my babies during Sacrament meeting, Sunday School, and Relief Society (thank you Roberta Bugbee, Barbie Richner, Mandy Bailey, Lynette Austin, Brianna Lee, Ginger Coleman, and Esther Hoffman for the help during the last few Sunday).  I think the most alarming symptom I'm experiencing right now is the loss of feeling in my arms so having sisters step in to hold babies has been such a relief.  Sometimes my arms feel like the strength goes right out of them and they tingle, shake and go completely numb.  I'm not really sure why that is but apparantly I could be feeling that in my legs as well and I'm not...so thank goodness for that.  My doctor thinks this has been going on for the past 2 years and maybe as far back as 5 years.  I had a sweet sister in my ward, that I don't know very well, send me a long email with the nicest things to say about me and about having faith, and then she knitted me an afghan which is beautiful and it made me feel very special because she felt I was deserving of such a beautful gift.  My friend Jolene calls me and checks on me to see how I'm doing and I feel like she's got the entire ward praying for me, and it's such a feeling to know that so many people want to see me feeling better.  I've got my friend Tiffany, and my sisters Laurel and Christi, who believed me all year long when I'd tell them I wasn't feeling well and they were my best cheerleaders in telling me to keep going to the doctors until something was found.  (haha, now I feel like I'm giving a speech)  I guess what I'd like you to know is that I'm okay, and I'm going to be feeling even better soon.  Mostly I want you all to know that I appreciate everything you've done for me.  At times I don't feel deserving.  Thanks Mom, Karleen, and Laurel for being available to answer my questions when I've wanted to know more about what I'm experiencing.  There's going to be some more interesting weeks ahead and I'll update my blog with how my appointments are going.  Christian has really stepped up these past few weeks in helping me with the kids and the house.  There are days where he finds me walking around in circles because I don't know what to take care of or because I can't remember what I was doing.  I feel very blessed right now and it's because of all of you.  Love ya,
Emily

Ohio - Part 5 (Indians vs. Twins)

Friday: We did some grocery shopping, made cinnamon rolls, watch Wuthering Heights (a depressing movie), and then got ready for the Indians Game.  Baseball between the Indians and the Twins.  It was the shortest baseball game I've ever been to.  It lasted about 2 hours and the Indians won!  After the game was a really cool fireworks show and they blasted the song Cleveland Rocks while lightening off fireworks so they exploded to the beat of the song.  Pretty cool...and Baylee thought it was very cool! 

Ohio - Part 4 (Farm Park)

Thursday: Today was our visit to the Farm Park.  I got to milk a cow today, pet some really big horses, and walk through a corn maze.  The corn maze had a bunch of different questions posted throughout and you had to answer correctly to know which way to turn.  We mostly had some really easy questions but there was one that Caleb had to answer for us.  He's really into dinosaurs and we came up to a question that asked us during which time period did the Tyrannosaurus Rex live A) Jurassic Period B) Crestatious Period  Caleb shouted out Crestatious when Eva and I were pretty sure it was Jurassic.  Sure enough, that little boy Caleb knows exactly what he's talking about when it comes to dinosaurs.  What a little smarty pants.  Baylee loved seeing the different types of animals on the farm, she liked the pigs the best but I think that's because there were cute piglets right up by the bars for her to touch.  She disliked the sheep the most but I think that's because they were bleating very loudly.  There were some little short ones that she sat in her seat and looked at but there was another pen where there were some very big and tall sheep that had very loud and very deep BAAA's...she wanted nothing to do with them.  I was holding her at that point and she was trying to crawl over my shoulder to get away from them.

Baylee wasn't to fond of the sheep.  They were loud and a bit nosey.

She really liked the little piglets.

MOOOO!

Baylee loved this cow.  She thought it was so neat and kept smiling at it.

YO.  Yeah, that's right.  I'm the one that ran LeBron James out of Cleveland.

This is Bella the cow.  Caleb and I got to try milking her before they hooked her up to the claw.  They milk her every morning and every evening and she gives about 4-5 gallons of milk at every milking.

Baylee smiling at the cows.

Getting lost in the Corn Maze

Here is one beautiful little baby. 

Here's me exposing my best side while getting a lesson on how to milk a cow.