Night at the canyons

Not much happened this week for us. I am still loving the bootcamp. I didn't lose any weight this week, but I did lose 4% of body fat. I guess week 2 people usually don't lose much weight. I played volleyball twice this week for four hours. On Friday night I had a girls night out with my friend. I took Aubrey and Jennifer and my friend brought her girl Aubrey's age. We went out to dinner and went shopping after. Jennifer did pretty good. Aubrey was so excited that Eric got to stay home.

Eric and his friend Madison go to school together. I guess on Friday they had a hard day. My friend dropped off the kids at school, and Madison and Eric were arguing over who got to close the van door. So they both closed it. Madison pushed Eric and called him a "Mean boy". Eric walked away about five steps, then turned around and RAN at her and pushed her down. It was with such force that she rolled three times. She got up and started yelling at him. By the time school ended, they were friends again. We had a talk with Eric about not pushing, especially not girls. The whole time though, Zac was trying so hard not to laugh. We even had to leave the room during the "talk".

On Saturday we took the kids up to Provo Canyon to my favorite park, South Fork. We roasted hot dogs and marshmellows for smores over the fire. The kids had so much fun! They are still asking us to go back up. All of the leaves were changing color up in the canyon, it was so pretty. The kids loved making smores. After awhile though, Aubrey would just grab the chocolate and eat it without the other fixings. That is a girl of my heart. Jennifer did wonderful in the canyon. There is just something about being outside. She layed on the blanket for most of the time just being content.

Bootcamp

So I am hooked. I absolutely love the bootcamp! I felt like I had bruises over my entire body last week, but I loved it. Today we are working the arms again, so I need to psych myself up for it. The arms are my biggest weakness. I have lucked out and have had the trainer almost all to myself every day. I guess the other classes there have been 25-30 people in them. I have gotten more intense workouts since he is right there pushing me that much harder. I weighed in on Friday and have already lost 10 pounds! Alright, I know that most of that is water weight, but I'm still pretty happy about it. I only have 5 more pounds to go to get to my pre-pregnancy weight. But I still have a ways to go to get completely toned. :) The bootcamp focuses on a different area of your body every day, either core/abs - arms - glutes/legs. Then on Friday's we do a circuit of everything. So last week I was lucky enough to have the core twice, and this week it will be the arms twice. It has been great having my dietician be my friend/neighbor. I have gotten a little special treatment, and I have been able to use all the programs before the group to help her troubleshoot any problems with the program. Zac has been great and has been very willing to watch all three kids every night while I go work out. During the morning I run 5 miles on the treadmill, but Jennifer is usually sleeping the entire time for me. I have been modifying my diet to have more whole-grains in it, so I made pizza on Saturday and made the dough with ALL wheat flour. It was really GOOD. I usually put 1 cup of wheat and 3 cups of white flour, but I think that from now on I will use all wheat. Zac liked it too, and you really couldn't tell that much of a difference. I am going to miss not having a garden in the winter. I was able to use my tomatoes, green peppers and onions for the pizza. So nice just to be able to walk outside to get your produce.

Jennifer is still a little congested, but gradually getting better every day. Aubrey had a fever all weekend, but is also getting better. Not much more has happened, nothing real exciting. I did play volleyball for 3 hours on Thursday night, which is always fun. :)

Long night

So last night I was up the ENTIRE night with Jennifer. She had a lot of mucus in her throat, not her nose, so she would choke every time we would lay her down. It was a little scary because she would choke so bad she couldn't breathe. So I stayed up with her holding her upright the entire night. We got into the doctor's first thing in the morning, and they said that it hadn't gotten into her lungs thankfully! I just have to keep on doing the saline drips, bulb syringe her nose even though nothing is in there, and put her next to the humidifier. (Which is everything we were doing last night) but that I probably have 2-3 more nights like last night. I am exhausted, and I start my boot camp today. My arms feel like dead weight from holding her all night. She is now almost 11 pounds. I'm hoping they are going to focus on the legs or abs today, not the arms. I wish Mountain Dew wouldn't affect my milk, but it does, and she would be up all night because of the caffeine. But I would sure love some right now!

Yesterday Zac blessed Jennifer. He did a really good job and is glad it's done. I'm glad she didn't scream throughout the blessing. She was having a pretty good fit before church. I asked Dad to take a picture of us at the church, and Eric kept on doing his "guitar pose"...so that is what he is doing in the picture. I learned the Michael Jackson dance "Thriller" this week. A group of us are doing it for the Stake talent show. Aubrey is really cute and tries to dance it with us. She has her monster claws perfected. :) We all went to D.I. and got some great dresses to ruin for our costumes.

This is a picture of Eric's first day of school. My friend/neighbor took this picture for us and gave it to me finally. :)

Oops!

So I finally got the battery recharged in my camera, went to take a picture and the camera slipped out and dropped on the kitchen floor. I completely broke it! Zac took it to work to try to fix it, but apparently when it fell, it stripped some gears out of it, and it won't turn on...oh no! I am having a hard time with this! I have already missed some monumental moments with Jennifer rolling over, Eric's first day of school, etc.

This past week I made salsa. I wasn't planning on canning at all this summer because of Jennifer. Dad told me that he had some tomatoes, I said I would take some home. I asked Zac to put them in the car. When we got home, I had Zac bring them into the house and he brings in four big bags of tomatoes. I couldn't believe it, then Zac goes, "I'm not done." He comes back into the house with two more bags! I had no idea that I was getting that many tomatoes! I hated to see them go to waste, so I decided to make some more salsa. I have a lot of onions and jalapenos in my garden, so we put them to use. I ended up making 40 pints of salsa. However, for SOME REASON while I was doing the water bath, I had FIVE jars burst on me! I have no idea why! When I put the salsa into the pints, the salsa was boiling, (like it's suppose to), and I put them straight into the boiling water bath, so I didn't really have a variation of temperature...I am really baffled as to why five of them broke.

So my neighbor/friend is a registered dietician and works with personal trainers. They are having a contest right now for the "biggest loser" to win $10,000, so I signed up. Since I just had a baby, I'm hoping I have a pretty good shot. It's not just based on weight, but fat percentage as well. Even if I don't win, it's a great excuse to have a personal trainer and get back in shape! I was in the best shape this pregnancy. I was doing four miles every day up until 5 days before I had Jennifer. So I'm not really too out of shape, but with this being my third baby, I'm just not losing the weight as fast as my first two kids. So I will meet with my personal trainer doing a "body bootcamp" 5 days a week for an hour a day, then I will do my own personal cardio for an hour a day as well. My friend is giving every participant diets according to the individual person, etc. I am really excited about it. I'm mainly excited to learn new exercises to help reach my goals. This contest starts next Monday, and will go through December. When I go back to work, they have the option of meeting at night as well to workout, so I can still keep it up.

Again, I'm disappointed about the camera, I really need to take some pictures of Jennifer. Maybe I will borrow Dad's camera occasionally. :)

Rolling over

Jennifer rolled over FOUR times yesterday! WHAT? She is only 2 1/2 weeks old! My other kids were months old before they rolled over. And of course, the battery on our camera is dead and we haven't been able to find the recharger. We were trying to get some good quality tummy time in with her, and she just refused to stay on her stomach. Zac started yelling for me, and I ran in the room just in time to see her roll over for the first time. Then she did it again, and again, and again. What a strong little girl!

Eric had his first day of school yesterday, and again, no battery for the camera. We think Eric hid the recharger, he tends to hide anything that has a plug. My neighbor took a picture of him at school, when she e-mails it I will post it. He had an amazing first day. He absolutely loved it. The next part is for journal reasons...Sunday night Zac gave Eric a father's blessing for the school year. In the blessing he blessed that the kids would be nice to Eric, etc. When I went and picked him up from school the first thing he said to me was, "Mom! It worked! Dad's blessing worked! Everyone was SO NICE!" He seemed to grow up over those hours while at kindergarten. When we were going to kindergarten he held my hand the entire way there. When I picked him up, he almost ran the entire way home, extremely excited to do his homework, and ready for the next day.

2 week fiasco

We had Jennifer's 2 week check-up. She is weighing in at 8 lb 3 oz and 21 inches long. She is in the 75% for her length and 50% for her weight. With both Eric and Aubrey I had their pictures taken when they were 2 weeks old. So I decided to carry on the tradition and have Jennifer's picture taken. Wow. It was quite the ordeal to get this pictures taken! We had to wait at Kiddie Kandids for 3 1/2 hours! I'm glad I did the pictures with the kids first since Jennifer was still asleep, but she was NOT having it for her picture! The picture that we got was literally in between crys! I could not get her to calm down. She refused to nurse, refused to take the binky, refused everything! During the pictures Aubrey goes, "Uh-oh, pee is starting to come out!" So I had to hurry and RUN her to the bathroom with Jennifer and Eric, but Aubrey wanted help to get ON the toilet (which was disgusting), but I couldn't help her because I had screaming Jennifer in my arms. She climbed on, went to the bathroom, got her hands VERY clean, then ran back to finish taking pictures. THEN Eric had to go to the bathroom! Are you kidding me? Apparently he didn't think about it when we were IN the bathroom with Aubrey. So we ran back to the bathroom, etc. Finally, I just told the lady taking Jennifer's picture that we were lucky we got the pic that we did, I just needed to get home. At one point in this, I had ALL three kids crying. Oh my. A little discouraging! Things would have been fine if we didn't have the long wait to even take the picture in the first place. I felt like everyone was staring at me as I was leaving the mall. I had Jennifer screaming in her car seat in one hand, Aubrey crying in the other hand while holding Eric's hand who was also crying. It may be awhile before I venture out on my own again. However, I did do a successful grocery shopping trip Monday night with all three kids by myself and it went smooth. Today they just weren't having it.

One week old

I can't believe she is already 1 1/2 weeks old! It has been a busy week! Jennifer has had jaundice, so I have had to go to the hospital every day for the past week to get her levels rechecked. Her points are now starting to go down, but luckily we never had to admit her in the hospital, although the doctor threatened it every day. I have been sick as well. I got a sinus infection right when I got out of the hospital, but didn't get the antibiotics until Wednesday. Then yesterday, I got mastitis. My fever was at 104.5 pretty much all day yesterday, with really bad chills. BUT, because I was already on antibiotics for my sinus infection, I already had a head start on getting better. Today I have a low grade fever, but I am feeling a lot better. It's hard to get better without any rest! :) The hard part about yesterday was that Zac had rented a drill for the cement from Home Depot, and my fever and chills didn't kick in until he was gone. So I called him because I was shaking so bad, I was afraid to hold Jennifer to change her diaper. He came back, but because we already paid for the rental, he had to get the holes drilled which took HOURS, so I was really sick and had to take care of the 3 kids. Miserable day. Days like this make me wish I had my mom to help me. It's hard to not have her here when pretty much everyone who has a new baby has their mom's to help them out. I know Steph can relate to this.

On Thursday Eric had his open house for kindergarten. We got to meet his new teacher, and find out where his locker is, coat hanger, bathrooms, etc. He is so excited. They already had homework for him too. We go take an assessment on Thursday to see where he stands education wise. We had to take some pictures for his homework so I have included some of those pics (the one of the family and himself).

I absolutely cannot STAND cat hair. So Zac and Barb got creative shaving Buster, with a mohawk and chops and all. Zac wanted me to post a picture of their creative work. AND Aubrey felt left out, so I have included a pic of her as well. She keeps on picking flowers everywhere she goes, and today, my Dad's yard was her pick. So she wanted her picture taken with the rose that she picked. She hasn't been pricked by a thorn yet, so hopefully it happens soon so she will stop picking flowers!

Day one and Smiling

Introducing...

Jennifer Kristine Nielson! She arrived last night at 9:01 p.m., and was 7 lbs 11 oz, 18 1/2 inches. I was suppose to start my induction at 8am yesterday, but they could not get me in until 10 am. They started the pitocin immediately, and I started to have contractions 2 minutes apart right away. The doctor couldn't come in to break my water until 12:45, and by this point, I was still only dialated to 2 cm. After he broke my water, the contractions started hitting really hard every 30 seconds. I lasted for 2 hours with the hard contractions, then finally called in the anethesiologist for my epidural. They checked me again at 6 pm, and I was only at 2 1/2 cm! How frustrating! I had a new nurse come in around 8:30 p.m. and she said I was finally at 4 1/2 cm. I guess the nurse that put my catheter in put it in the way of the babies head, so she couldn't come down. So this nurse moved it to the right spot, and I immediately felt major pressure. After 15 minutes I couldn't handle it and had Zac page the nurse and I was ready to go! The doctor ran over and I only had to push once and she came! This time around I didn't need any stitches or anything, and already recovery has been so much better! She is nursing beautifully, and so far doesn't even really cry. (I know that by this point she has only been here for 13 hours, but, I am VERY hopeful!) We are just excited to have our new little girl finally here! Aubrey and Eric were so cute when they saw her. Aubrey couldn't stop laughing she was so excited! A big thank you to Dad for letting the kids spend the night TWICE even though we had only planned on ONCE! The kids had a wonderful time!

Derby night

Zac and I got called as the ward activities chair people. So we had to get an activity together really quick. We ended up doing a potato derby on Friday (which was also my birthday). We had to have the activity quick since our new arrival is coming on Thursday. Zac has won the derby every year that he has participated. But not this year. He spent well over an hour on his potato car, and Aubrey kept on asking for one. He slapped one together in two minutes and handed it to her. Aubrey took FIRST PLACE! She was so excited! Zac had even made a trophy for the winner, so Aubrey got to take home the trophy. Eric wasn't so happy. He REALLY wanted to win bad! As we were getting in the car to go home, I told Aubrey to sit next to Eric. He goes, "Come on Aubrey, come sit next to the LOSER." I have no idea when he became so competitive!

During the potato derby, I started having contractions every couple of minutes the entire night. I was pretty excited. After we cleaned up the cultural hall, we went home, I took a shower, and laid on the bed waiting for Zac to finish his shower. Almost immediately the contractions stopped. DANG IT! At least we didn't actually make it to the hospital...that would have been a little embarrassing. I'm a little jealous that Brett and Rachel on their FIRST baby went early! I keep on telling myself that Thursday is not very far away...I am just SO UNCOMFORTABLE! I would think that by my 3rd I wouldn't have to be induced. But there is an upside to this, I am able to plan up to the day. My last day of work is Wednesday, and the kids are way excited to sleep at my Dad's house that night. Eric is able to bring in treats to daycare to tell his friends goodbye; we can get Eric's kindergarten registration finished; I'm able to get all my ducks in a row at work with timecards, etc; and we can still work on picking a name for this girl!

Zac is under the impression that his two-week "paternity leave" is to get projects done around the house. So he decided he is going to build the deck during this time. We will see. I'm not too enthusiastic about his plans. That's about it for me...just the waiting game.

Back to work I go....

So I have been back at work now since Monday, and will stay that way until August 6th. Then I will leave for maternity leave. My doctor has changed my induction date to August 7th instead of the 8th because he will be out of town. I just came back from my appt. with him and last week he wanted to check to see if my body was starting to do "anything" yet. Since with Aubrey and Eric, my body never really did cooperate in preparing for the baby, I didn't want to be disappointed, so I told him I could wait another week. Today, he checked me and.......I am 75% effaced and 1 1/2 cm dialated. So far, that has been better than my other pregnancies. Finally my body is deciding that a baby will be here soon! These summer days are SO HOT! I am definitely ready for this little one to be out! He also said that I have about 2-3 liters of just water weight from the heat in my legs and feet! I will never have a baby again in the dead of summer. I don't know how my Mom did it having 3 in the summer! My feet are seriously an ENTIRE size larger at night!

The other night Zac and I were sitting on the couch, and he had just turned on the a/c. I was sitting under the vent trying to get cool and he starts moving his hands around trying to find a warm draft. He went over to the window to see if that was where the draft was coming from. Finally he comes by me and goes, "IT'S YOU! The warm draft is coming from YOU!" My body is just radiating the heat off into the room apparently.

We still don't have a name for baby girl...I think we will be "discussing" it up to the hospital! This little girl is so hard to name for some reason! That's about it for me...I will try to update more often, now that I have an internet connection again!

Emergency surgery

So I had a scary week this past week. On Monday, I was hanging out at Dad's house with Justin and Lisa and started to feel like I had a side ache. I went home thinking that it was just some indigestion and took some tums and went to bed. I didn't sleep very well that night, and when I woke up, my side still hurt. I didn't eat any breakfast, thinking that if it was indigestion, I wouldn't want anything in my stomach. So I popped some more tums and headed to work. Around lunchtime, I started to feel nauseated because I hadn't eaten anything, so I went and grabbed some lunch with some co-workers. Around 1:30ish, my side was still hurting, so I called my obgyn. The nurse thought it sounded like a bladder infection, so she wanted me to come in and take a sample sometime before 5:00. I felt like I really needed to get there now, so I went and talked to my boss and he let me leave early. I grabbed the kids from daycare and headed down to the obgyn.

When I got there, I gave them my sample, and it came back normal. The obgyn saw me and started pushing on my side where it hurt and decided I needed to get an ultrasound at the hospital. He called over there, and they stated that they just had an opening. So I ran across the street to the hospital (with the kids) and got some lab work done and waited for my ultrasound. Turns out my whiteblood cell count was high, so I had an infection somewhere. It took them 1 1/2 hours to get me into the ultrasound. In the meantime, I have called Zac and told him the kids were getting restless, but they could probably wait it out. I also called Dad just to let him know what was going on, again, thinking that I would be home later.

I get into the ultrasound and it takes the techinician 45 minutes to find my appendix. The baby is right on top of it. Apparently, the appendix is one of only organs that doesn't move when you are pregnant. When she finally found it, she got really excited and started having people come in. I had radiologists, students and doctors in the room. They told me I was a "case study" for the hospital. They hadn't had anyone this far along in their pregnancy with appendicitis in American Fork Hospital. WHAT? My obgyn tells me that I am going to have surgery that night, and the surgeon is currently in the operating room. I also find out that my kidneys had 50% blockage because of the infection. I had no idea. Again, I thought the back pain I was feeling was pregnancy related. So I start heading down to the same day surgery, and call Zac to have him come get the kids. He is on his way, but had just barely left. As soon as I turned the corner, the surgeon WAS in the operating room, waiting for ME! OH NO! The anethesiologist was there already too, along with a team of nurses. They rushed me into a hospital gown, and the nurses were giving the kids stickers trying to keep them occupied while Zac was on his way. Zac made it just in time for them to wheel me on the bed into the O.R. They were in such a hurry to get me there, that after they put my IV in, I said, "Wait! I still have my contacts in!" So they brought me solution. Then, I realized, it had been several hours since I used the bathroom, so they hooked up my IV to a walking post and I used the bathroom.

Because the baby was on the appendix, they had to blow my stomach up full of air and cut me four times to get it out. The incisions are pretty much all around my belly, not just one centralized location. When I woke up in ICU, I was asking about Zac, but everything happened so quickly, he hadn't gotten back yet. They took me up to labor and delivery to monitor me overnight. Almost immediately this little girl decided to be mean. She started kicking me right where my incisions were, and HARD. I have never felt so much pain in my life. Then the contractions started. Contractions are bad enough, but when you have incisions on your stomach, and it gets tight with the contractions, it gets bad. They pretty much doped me up with morphine, but it didn't do much. That night my contractions were about 3-4 minutes apart, and were in the 70's. My obgyn checked to make sure my cervix wasn't doing anything, and it wasn't. He stated that my uterus just went into shock from being moved in the surgery and I'm just going to have to bear the contractions for now.

Thank goodness for my obgyn! I have really liked him from the beginning. When they first took me to the O.R., the surgeon wanted to start me on a certain kind of antibiotics, but my doctor, said, "She can't have that!" Then they wanted to do a CT scan to make sure of the location of the appendix, again "I will NOT let you CT scan her." Then the painkillers that the surgeon wanted to give me were wrong. But my ob was there the entire time and I wasn't given anything that I wasn't suppose to have.

The next morning, they were suppose to discharge me from the hospital, but the painkillers kept on making me throw-up (again, PAIN). Then they started to tell me I would have to stay another night. NOOOOO! Being in labor and delivery was nice because they could monitor the baby, however, hearing women SCREAM all night long is not very nice sleep. Women, PLEASE GET AN EPIDURAL! I promise, it doesn't hurt that bad! Everytime I would hear the newborn cry I would think, thank goodness! Now for some peace and quiet! Then I would hear another woman scream. I was able to force a bread roll down, and begged the nurse an hour later if we could go. They finally agreed to let me go home.

When my doctor came and talked to me, he told me they got my appendix just in time. It looked like it was about to burst! Seriously! It only felt like a side ache that just wasn't going away. If I weren't pregnant, I think I would have toughed it out! He told me if it would have burst, that I almost positively would have lost my baby girl, if not myself! I had no idea the toxins that come out of your appendix when it bursts were that bad! Scary!

Zac has been great taking care of me this past week. He took off work and has been at my side every minute I've needed him. I always wondered how he would be if something bad were ever to happen. I watched how tender my Dad was with my Mom the entire time she was sick, and Zac has been just as tender with me. He would get me anything and everything I wanted, and would just lay next to me and watch t.v. while holding my hand when the pain would get bad. The contractions have pretty much stopped. I have maybe 5-7 a day now. Mostly when I stand up to use the bathroom or something, they almost immediately start coming. It's scary to think that just in an instant, our lives could have changed drastically. Since I didn't have time before the operation, and I just didn't think about it right after, later that night Dad came in and saw me in the hospital and gave me a father's blessing. I am just so grateful for the priesthood, and that my family has it in our lives. The young men came and brought me the sacrament today after church since I wasn't able to make it. Eric and Aubrey started to sing "I am a child of God', and I have not felt the spirit so strong as I did in that moment.

I have had a lot of support from my neighbors and co-workers. Because I am newly "federal" I do not have any sick or vacation leave accrued yet. My boss came and visited me at our house after I got back from the hospital, and found out that pretty much everyone at work was donating their leave to me so that I could get the adequate rest that I need. What a blessing! I have received cards and/or flowers from FBI, DEA, USMS, and from my work. The agents in IRS Criminal Investigation in Las Vegas even sent me a cookie basket. My neighbors all came together and have been bringing us meals and taking turns watching the kids. I don't even know if the relief society president even knew something happened until today when I didn't show up to play the piano. The Bishop has even brought food over. Zac's sister Barb has also been a huge help with the kids. Unfortunately, when all of this went down, it was her first day of school, so she wasn't around. Isn't that how it works? She has had so much free time for the past month, and when we have absolutely needed her, she is at school! But when she has been home, she has been helping out a lot with the kids so Zac could take care of me.

Dad was funny when he first came and saw me in the hospital. Tuesday nights are the night he works in the temple, and I called him on his way to the temple to let him know that they were going to do the ultrasound. When he showed up late that night, he said "DEAR! I would have come straight to the hospital if I had known you were having surgery! I wouldn't have gone to the temple!" I told him I didn't know until the second before!

I have my post-op appointments later this week on Wednesday and Friday morning. I'm not positive I'm making it to Lagoon this year....if we do, I will probably spend the entire time in the pavillion. :)

Eric's Birthday

So a happy belated birthday to Eric. The reasons for the delay will be on the next post. :) Eric had his 5th Birthday! I can't believe how fast time flies! He had some neighbor kids, cousins and my Dad and Grandpa Powell over for his birthday party. We started at our house with some cake and ice cream, then headed over to Jump on It for the rest of his party. The kids had tons of fun! Luckily, it was right before bed time so after jumping around for an hour, they were definitely ready for bed! Eric won the lottery with some water guns, he is ready for summer!

So, I haven't posted these pics of Eric playing coach pitch yet. He absolutley loved playing this year. His last game was this past Saturday, and already he is asking when we will sign him up again! But this time he wants to play of the "dirt field" like the grown-ups.

And last but not least, Zac wanted me to post a picture of the retaining wall that he is currently working on. He still needs to build two more rows of cinder block before it's done (which hopefully will be tomorrow.) After the cinder block is finished, he is going to put matching stone on top of the cinder block to coordinate with our house.

I know, I know...

I haven't blogged in a long time. Sorry. I have been so incredibly busy that the thought of blogging hasn't even come to my mind. But after five different people called asking if I was okay...I probably should start blogging. I don't even know where to begin...

Eric started coach pitch (a month ago) and LOVES it! He does really well hitting the ball and running around the bases. Zac has taken pictures, but I don't have the camera with me to load them. Next time. :) He only has 2 more games left in his "season".

Zac's sister Barb moved in with us about a month ago. Zac hasn't quite finished the basement yet. We passed our second inspection, and he has been hanging drywall most nights trying to get it done. In the meantime, we had to put Eric in Aubrey's room, and Barb is sleeping in Eric's room. The kids are FINALLY starting to go to sleep alright. Bedtime usually took me about 5 minutes, but since they are in the same room, it has been 1-2 HOURS. On the weekends, Zac and I try to work outside as much as possible to try to get our backyard in. Zac is currently working on another retaining wall out back. He is actually pouring the cement today. We have transplanted a big tree in our yard, and my garden is looking wonderful! I even have the yellow flowers on my tomato plants. I'm pretty excited about that. My neighbors all had their "view" of how well my garden would do this year, so I'm glad that my tomato plants have almost grown out of their wall o' waters, while theirs are only 2-3 inches high.

I went to South Carolina for a week for a seminar. This was the first time I was gone that I didn't have to find babysitters for the kids every night while Zac was in school. (on a side note, Zac got straight A's this semester.) While I was in SC, I ended up going kayaking again. It was wonderful! We were out on the river for about 4 hours, and at the end it was getting dusk, and the fireflies came out and were flying around us while we were kayaking. I had never seen them before. Everytime I am in South Carolina, I want to try their BBQ. So we took off to the "Best BBQ in South Carolina". I ordered my plate, and the food came and the BBQ sauce was yellow. Hmmm...I knew there was a mustard base BBQ sauce, but I thought it was just colored yellow, and still tasted like BBQ. No. It was the nastiest thing I have ever tasted. (i am not a fan of mustard) It was like they just poured French's Mustard all over my pulled pork. GROSS. I will not try South Carolina BBQ again. When I came home from SC, Barb told me that she never realized how much I do with the kids. I guess one of the nights the kids rooms stunk so bad because Zac hadn't given either of them a bath. In the morning, he just took some baby wipes and wiped down both of the kids and sent them to school/daycare. Are you kidding?

So Barb went to her friends ranch this past weekend. His family has a "buffalo farm" where people pay them money to hunt their buffalo and elk. Barb came back with a cooler full of buffalo meat. Hmmm. Zac was really excited about it. I decided I should try it. We made buffalo burgers last night, they actually were pretty good. (Although I made Zac chopped up an onion and put tons of seasoning salt on it before he made the pattys.) We have 14 more pounds of ground buffalo left, some steaks, and roasts. I'm actually pretty proud of myself for eating the entire burger, it just grossed me out to think about what I was eating. Mind over matter.

I am still trying to run 4 miles every day at lunch. It is getting difficult. I am starting to getting a little big...it is now more walking than running. My problem is I get charlie horses in my calves at night, so when I go out at lunch, the first half is uphill, and my calves are already rock hard and aching from the charlie horses the night before. I have definitely popped out now. 2 maybe 3 weeks ago, people still didn't really know I was pregnant. Now, the whole world can tell. :) I almost have to retire the "rubber band trick" on my jeans and just suck it up and start wearing maternity jeans. This little girl is completely in my ribs all the time. I honestly think my ribs are bruised. It really hurts when she kicks. So that is a big recap of the last month. :)

Las Vegas Week

I spent all of last week in Las Vegas for work. I didn't really do much while I was there besides go to work and out to dinner with some co-workers. I'm not much of a Vegas fan. I hate the smell of cigarette smoke. Wednesday night, my co-worker drove some of us out to Lake Mead and we ran 6 miles. It was a wonderful run! We were able to run through the old railroad tunnels that ran along Lake Mead. We went up to the Hoover Dam after and did a little tour, etc. It was great running in tunnels...who knew? The kids had Dad or Barb babysit them during the night while Zac was in school. When I came home Friday, I had put my luggage in my bedroom and headed back downstairs to go through some things. Aubrey was very quiet upstairs for about 20 minutes. Then she came to the top of the stairs with some of my makeup and Aubrey was asking me if she could open it. I came unglued. I thought that she had been playing in my expensive makeup, and she knew better. So I ran upstairs and she starts bawling. I went into my room and she had COMPLETELY unpacked me! She put everything away in the right spot. AMAZING. Between sobs she said, "Mommy, I really missed you, and I don't want you to go again, so I unpacked you!" I felt SO bad for jumping to conclusions about the makeup, etc. What a doll.

Sunday we went up to Zac's Aunt's house for conference. They had a lot of little dogs running around, and Aubrey got nipped on the hand by one of them. They had a great time playing. Monday night, my Grandpa Powell at his assisted living community were holding a "celebration" of sorts in honor of him. He really wanted all the grand kids and great grands kids to be there. we showed up and saw Dad, and he took Aubrey around with him. Little did we know, but we all had a part in the program. Dad had to give a biography of sorts of Grandpa, my Uncle ended up playing the harmonica, a cousin did a dance, and all the great grandkids sang 4 songs, led by myself. I had a hilarious 90 something year old sitting next to me who was feeding me one-liners throughout the entire program. At the end, the director was telling everyone how many comments she receives about how nice Grandpa is. The lady next to me (and not quietly) says to me, "Your Grandpa is really pleasant. The rest of the men in here are mean." Aubrey has lately become REALLY attached to my Dad lately. Everytime we leave she goes nuts! Last night, she again started bawling that we were leaving my Dad, and as we were driving, in between sobs she is YELLING "I want Grandpa, I love him SO MUCH." over and over and over.

Speaking of Dad, he came up to my house on Saturday and we planted my peas, carrots, beets, and tomatoes. (I already planted some onions). Hopefully the tomatoes won't freeze...I have some extras in the house just in case.

Pink or blue?

We had our ultrasound today and we are having another.......GIRL. I guess it's the season for girls! :) I am still being induced on August 8th, everything is looking great, and the baby is completely healthy. Aubrey was really excited, Eric is really disappointed. I knew only one of them would be happy. He will get used to the idea.

Just before they announced what gender the baby was, Eric was sitting quietly in his chair, watching the t.v. with the ultrasound, Aubrey was running around screaming wanting to go home. They said it was a girl, and Zac and I just looked at Eric and Aubrey and said, GREAT. Granted, when Eric was three, I'm sure he would have been running around screaming too. We are excited to finally know. My neighbor told me that she had a couple dreams that I was having a boy, and Zac felt like I was having a boy this entire time, so we were a little surprised.

I took Aubrey to Great Clips and had them cut off 4 inches off her hair. She has never had a haircut, and the ends were looking straggly. They cut some layers into her hair and it turned out great! It is still goes to the middle of her back. I would post pictures, but work has banned that, so I will have to wait until the weekend at Dad's house. ;)

Aubrey turns three!

For about six months now, all Aubrey has talked about is how she is going to get a Cinderella cake for her birthday. Luckily, Bobby's Mom is very talented, and created this wonderful Cinderella cake for Aubrey. She was absolutley thrilled! She took princess cupcakes to daycare/school in the morning, and when I went to pick her up, her teacher said, "Aubrey has been really excited it's her birthday today, and I REALLY hope you have a Cinderella cake, because that is all she has talked about." We just had her best friend Katelyn come over for some cake and ice cream...nothing fancy. Maybe next year I will actually do a party for her, they are just a lot of work.

I have been really excited to have my garden this year. Dad has been helping me get the right seeds and roto-tiller for the garden, and we went shopping around for some good top-soil. We found a great garden blend soil for an amazing price, so I went ahead and ordered 15 cubic yards of it. Zac, being the frugal guy that he is, found out the delivery price to Eagle Mountain, and decided he wanted to pick it up himself. The problem with this is that our truck only will hold 1 1/2 cubic yards per load, and Zac is going to have to shovel it out by himself. He took off the entire day to do this, I called him in the morning asking him what load he was on, and he said, "Um...they are going to deliver at 2:00" Thank goodness! They delivered the load right where I wanted the garden, and Zac was able to smooth it out for me before I got home. Dad came over and we rototilled in 10 bags of compost and some fertilizer. I am just waiting a week or two to let the soil settle a little before I plant. The garden ended up being ~20 ft x 15 ft. This picture does not do it justice for how big it looks. Dad came back and measured his garden, and mine is bigger...I hope it won't be too big. :) Dad has started my tomatoes and onions in his greenhouse shed, so hopefully my crop will be great this year. I'm not sure what kind of border I want around it yet, but I have some very "helpful" neighbors who let me know their opinion of what would look best.

The building permit finally came in for our basement yesterday, so Zac is busy again in the basement. He has finished the framing and electrical, and today he is working on the plumbing for the bathroom. We have to have the 4-way inspection, then we can put the installation in, have another inspection, and finally get the drywall up. Zac has already installed the pocket door from the bedroom to the bathroom and it looks great! He was able to get a great deal for a steel door for our cold storage. And good ole Zac, he "found" a roll of carpet pad on the freeway. So what does he do? He pulls over and shoves it in my car. It is enough for the bedroom. Does this really surprise anyone? I swear, just when I think Zac couldn't get any more frugal, he finds things on the side of the freeway. The only thing we've had to buy for this basement so far is the doors and the plumbing. He had all the wood, electrical, and can lights for the basement already from his "finds". He found a great deal on dry wall also. They are normally $7-8 a sheet, and he has been going around Lowes and Home Depot for weeks now, and they sell the sheets that have a corner damaged, etc for $2 a sheet, so he had picked up enough now for our entire basement. Our neighbors tease him saying that we could build something today, but if we wait a week or two, Zac will figure out a way to get it for free.

New Endeavor

So along with my new federal job, I got a call from EOUSA (Headquarters in Washington D.C.) asking me if I would join a working group. They told me that they consider me an expert in the field of asset forfeiture, and would like me to train around the nation. I would also being writing manuals and attending meetings twice a year with the other 5 members of this group. After getting more info from them, I decided that I couldn't pass up this opportunity. It is great experience and huge networking for my career and Zac's future career. I will be going to D.C. a lot to train and get to be in some important meetings. I hated to ask this, but I needed to know what the bare minimum I was required to do, since I am having a baby in August. The bare minimum is attending two meetings and train at least once in the year. So they are letting me do the bare minimum for this year (and hopefully next) before I really get into this. It is a HUGE compliment to me to only be doing asset forfeiture for three years, and have them consider me an expert. I talked to my office about it, and they were thrilled, especially my asset forfeiture attorney. Hopefully it will work out for the best. :)

So Aubrey had a little bladder infection a couple weeks ago, so I got her on some antibiotics. She broke out into a terrible rash, fever, etc. It was on a Saturday, so I took her down to an Instacare by our house, and 5 hours later discovered that she is allergic to her antibiotic. She is better now, but she sure did not feel good.

We signed Eric up for T-Ball starting in April. He is really excited, he tells pretty much everyone he sees that he is playing T-Ball in the Spring. I am definitely ready for Spring. I went with Dad to the garden nursery and bought all my seeds for my garden and a roto-tiller. I will have some top soil delivered to my house as soon as this darn snow melts and my ground is dry. Every day when I get home I get a little excited to see that the snow has melted some more. I started grow some herbs indoors, and the kids wanted in on the fun, so I let them start some watermelon and sunflowers indoors.

Zac is getting closer on the basement. We went to Lowes to grab the rest of the wood and a pocket door kit, and they had 80 lb bags of cement on sale. We need 100 bags for our retaining wall. So we inquired a little more, and come to find out, the bags that were outside were only 50 cents!!!! They were originally ten dollar bags. What a steal! Zac was able to load up the truck, but we had to do a couple loads to get the cement. The bags did have little rips on the top, etc., but we were able to stack thems to that nothing leaked out.