Random Things

Kitt and Matthew's Final weekend with us was April 13th. They came that morning and us adults got to hangout with each other. I fed babies and talked to Kitt and Matthew (bless his heart) helped Gaupo install a new storm door. The girls were at a birthday party, so we just got to adults for a bit. However, we did try to party it up. We had good food-burgers for lunch and Teriyaki chicken for dinner. We went to the Rec Center and went swimming, which Matthew pointed out was the first thing we ever did with him--kind of cool. We also had a piggy painting party with Aunt Kitt. We enjoy simple pleasures these days and this day was totally fun.

 

Matthew held both babies at once! This is a big deal for him because at the beginning of  his internship he was a little nervous about babies and what to do, but now he knows a lot and is so good with them.

Kylee, Aunt Kitt, and Tia picking out colors for their piggies.

Here is a layout pic of Kade and Abby in bows. To me Kade is so boy, so much so he doesn't even look good in a bow.

The weather has been so nice lately and so Tia and I have been going to parks more. Tia is quite the mommy and I must make it look pretty cool because she always wants to have her own stroller and babies.

Walking to the park with our two strollers.

At the park.

This is how you 'push' 5 kids at once. Warning the middle kid needs to be a pretty good steerer and pusher themselves. It was a fun little trick for a bit.

In other baby new. Kade is getting close sometimes to rolling back to front and Abby can go from front to back once she get her hands in the right place. I have to be careful how I place her for tummy time or before I know she has rolled over. Also Kade got moved to a bottle last week. I didn't know what else to do. I had tried supplementing, acid refulx medicine, and just toughing it out, but nothing worked and he was always screaming during feedings. It just got to the point where it wasn't worth it anymore. I needed to have more of me for the other people in this family, so we switched and are both SOOOOO much happier. We still have our moments, and I personally find bottles, so messy, but I love that I can enjoy my babies and kids so much more. Abby is still a great nurser and enjoys having lots of milk. They are kind of in a routine and that is nice. I definately have moments where I kind of want to quit, well quit isnt quite right more like press pause take a timeout and then go back. Sometimes, I cry and get frustrated because things can be hard at times. However, there are other times I get to laugh with my kids, jump on the tramp with them, make cookies and dinner. There are time I get to blog, and have quiet. There are so many good times. Life wasn't meant to be easy and a party all the time, so I feel like I have a pretty good mix and I feel so grateful for my life and all the good and bad it entails. I am a blessed woman.

Easter 2019

I am pretty proud of myself this Easter because I actually feel like I didn't sluff the spiritual part of it. We were reading the Children's Friend on the Sunday before Easter and I stumbled upon a portion where it had a little blurb, scripture, and song for everyday leading up to Easter. So,  that is what we did for family scripture study all week. Tia has never wanted to be at scriptures more. I know for a fact it was because there was a video involved. I looked up a music video with the song for each day. But, it was so fun to have her there and involved. She even helped read the scripture sometimes. Kylee loved the video but she loved reading the scriptures more. Her job was to read the scripture and Tia's was to push play on the video. It was so great to daily remember Christ. I also took time to read the final week of Jesus's life in Matthew. I really wish I had the brain power right now to really study, but for now reading will have to do and I am glad that I had the opportunity to read that story and remember.

It reminded me of my testimony. My testimony that Christ lived, died, and lived again. He suffered in Gethsemane. He rose the 3rd day. Because Christ did those things I can live with my family again. There is life after death and it can be a joyous reward. I can repent. There is always someone who knows exactly what I am going through and what it feels like and He knows how to help me. I know that because of Him, I have help to do things that would normally be impossible. Christ loved ME, so He came to the earth lived, died, and then lived again, so that I would not have to be alone forever. I am so very very grateful for that.

Easter morning, the Easter Bunny did come and he did an Easter egg hunt as always. I really wanted to watch it, so while I fed the twins I had the girls watch the Easter video's put out by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It really just about killed them and I think it is one of the few times that TV didn't satisfy them. However, they hung in there and we got the twins fed and then we went downstairs and they enjoyed the hunt. The eggs left were filled with M&M's, White Chocolate Cadbury Eggs, and Reese's Pieces Eggs. After the hunt, Gaupo made pancakes for breakfast and then we quickly got ready for church, so that we could walk. It was a beautiful morning to walk. We had a great church meeting. Our ward choir sang a beautiful musical number and there were good talks. I was highly distracted during Sunday school, so sadly I didn't get much from it. After church we had lunch, and naps. Then the rest of day was just talking and being a family. We got a little rain in the afternoon and that was nice. We had some cheesy potatoes and ham for dinner and a nice quiet evening.

Easter was pretty low key, but I still think we hit all the needed and good parts. I feel like my children knew and realized why we were celebrating Easter and we had some good discussions during the week and we were also able to have fun with coloring eggs and having an Easter egg hunt. For me it was the best of both worlds.

Tia coloring eggs.

Gaupo coloring eggs.

Kylee coloring on her egg.

Tia, Gaupo, and Kylee.

Me, Tia, Gaupo, and Kylee.

Kylee and Tia on the hunt.

Abby holding a little egg.

Tia with some eggs.

Kade and the little egg.

Me on Easter Morning.

Emptying Eggs.

Life Since Twins

Our twins were born, and now this is the first time I have had to blog about anything and everything since they have been born. They are now three months old and I have them going to bed early, so hopefully I can get in the habit of blogging again, because I really did miss writing, but it was so crazy. I think the craziest thing about 2 is that the moment when you have just a smidge of time is so much smaller because you have to get two babies to sleep or content and that doesn't happen often and when it does there is usually someone else who needs something. However, it is wonderful, but I wont lie I love being able to put them down around 7:00. Yes, it means I have to get up in the night, but I love having some time where it is just me or just me and Gaupo.

So, what has happened since they were born. Well, we have held babies, and held babies. We have tried to do cooking, and cleaning. We have gone to school. Although, this is the first time since the babies that I have taken my kids to school, so still getting back into everything. But, beside all those little things we have fed babies, gone to Arizona for a wedding, had Kylee's Birthday, finished the basement, and had a baby blessing plus company.

Feeding Babies. I know it sounds like it should go with all the 'little' things, but I really feel like I need to document how it actually is or how it seems. It seems huge because I am trying to nurse two babies. Which I can do. I have the milk or at least seem to. I can do both at the same time, which everyone think is amazing, but that isn't whats hard. What was hard is that all the time with the babies sucking on me caused some nipple damage that took about 7 weeks to heal up. It took a good 4 before it stopped hurting every time they latched. I have also since had blisters, but that wasn't too bad. Kade is really fast at nursing but kind of lazy, so if it isn't fast he gets frustrated and wont. Also after having him fuss and almost deny eating while we were in Arizona I decided to go off chocolate to see if that helped. It did, so now I don't get chocolate. Good thing for Reese's Pieces! However, not even that stopped all the problems. Kade is still kind of a fussy eater and sometimes is so impatient. Sometimes I worry that I don't have the milk because even Abby will get fussy. It takes time and it is really hard to do not at home. I haven't figured out how to cover up, so when we are out and about I either just have to do it or wait till we get home. When we had company I went to my room to do it, so every 2.5 to 3 hours I was checking out of what was going on in my home. Sometimes it is really rough and I want to give up. I have seriously contemplated it and still do. However, I love that we don't have to buy formula and do bottles. It helps our bills a lot. I am not a super good cuddler, so I love a reason to have these two cuddled next to me when no one else can have them. I love when they get full and are content. I love holding and looking at them and not feeling the slighest bit guilty because I am feeding them. I usually like doing it, so I feel very blessed to have done it this long and to be able to do it.

Klaire's Wedding. We went down to Arizona on Presidents day weekend to watch Klaire and Curtis get married. We left at 2:30 in the morning and didn't get to Pima until 7:00PM that night. It was a long day. However, I am so glad we went. It was fun to be with family and to have a vacation and tons of help with the babies. I am so glad we didn't miss the wedding because it was fun to be there with them and celebrate that special day. We loved soaking up the family time. My girls loved playing with their cousins and I loved being around my siblings, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandpas. I really didn't want to come but we of course did. We did the journey in two days. We stayed in Alamosa, Colorado at a hotel. We enjoyed the nice hotel (courtesy of a the Richard's family), breakfast, and the indoor pool.

Kylee's Birthday. Kylee turned 7! I can't believe I have a seven year-old. We had a great birthday celebration. We took the whole weekend to celebrate. We had Sam's Club for dinner on Friday and watched Gummi Bears and had a sleepover in the basement. Saturday Kitt and Matthew came and we had greasy tacos and pumpkin pie for dinner. Then Sunday we had presents and breakfast for dinner and more pie. Kylee is quite the girl. She is a great big sister and really loves her siblings. She loves holding Kade and Abby. She loves playing with Tia and recently discovered she likes following directions for building Legos. She doesn't really like school, but I do think she is starting to like it more and more. Her best friend besides Tia is still Tori Jacobson although she plays a lot with a girl named Harper at school. She is learning and growing a lot and we are so glad we have had her be a blessing in our lives for the last  7 years.

Kade, Gaupo, Kylee, Me, Abby, and Tia.

Kylee and Her cake.

Love these two sisters.

Basement Project COMPLETE! We have finished the basement and love it. The girls play down there a lot. They love playing in the playroom, bedroom, and bathroom. They have loved having their new slide too. I love that they have a space to play that isn't were the babies are. I love that many of their toys went back downstairs. I love having a space for guests and that the space is inviting. I love that we no longer have wear shoes to go get food from the storage room. I love that it is done and we can do other things on the weekend. It was a good experience and project but I am glad to be done.

Movie night the first night with carpet

The slide!

Baby Blessing and Company. We blessed Kade and Abby on March 10. Grandma and Grandpa came out the Thursday before. We played games, read books, held babies, and played. Grandma and Grandpa even went to school and had lunch with Kylee. She LOVED it! We loved having them come and visit us. After the blessing Jack and Lindsay and their family stayed till the following Friday morning. We got two snow days while they were here, so I didn't have to take Kylee out of school like I was planning. We didn't do anything real special with them except play and let the kids make friendships. The kids played super well together. They did have a rough day towards the end but hey after 5 days non-stop together its bound to happen and it wasn't really too bad. I loved having the extra help with the twins. I was super bummed when they left and I had to care for all of my kids all by myself again. I love family time, so I am so glad we got to have visitors. Kade and Abby's blessing was great. We had both grandparents, Kitt and Matthew, and Jack and Linsday and their family here to help us celebrate. Gaupo blessed his babies and I sat on the stand and held the one that wasn't being blessed, so that was kind of cool. We had good food--nachos and lazagna. Plus sams club muffins for breakfast. Yum! We just spent after church visiting and enjoying each others company. We had a good time and are glad we could have the special celebration together.

Grandma holding babies.

Kylee, Tia, and Grandpa playing Sorry.

The group at the baby blessing.

Our family of 6!

The Grandparents and us.

Kade and Abby's circle. Matthew, Papa, Gaupo, Grandpa, and Jack.

Sisters. Lindsay, Me, and Kitt.

Kade.

Abby.

Abby and Kade.

I feel like so much and yet nothing happens with us right now, but I sure feel busy. I think caring for a family of six takes a lot of time but I wouldn't trade it. I love my family and my kids. I feel so blessed to be doing and have done the things we do. I know that Heavenly Father is blessing this family because he works miracles in my life on a daily basis. I wish I could document more and hopefully will be, but this is all the last 3 months are going to get.

We Had Twins

This was written a couple months ago, but just barely getting around to getting it up and completed with pictures.

Having Twins

Written1/12/19

I don’t want to post this to my blog yet, because it is easier to print the blog if I keep things in chronological order, but I am forgetting details really fast, and it is a major event, so I want to document it before it all slips away.

Gaupo and I went into the hospital on New Year’s Eve to start the induction process. Before we left we had dinner, a little FHE lesson, and toasted in the New Year. We arrived at the hospital at 8pm. It was so weird to go and not be in labor. It was even weirder to climb into the labor bed and just wait for things to get checked out and happen. Anyway, once I got all checked in the doctor came and checked my cervix to see how much I had dilated and the answer was none. I couldn’t believe it. I was 38 weeks with twins and for the first time ever my body was not ready to let the babies go. Anyway, they decided to start me on medicine that would just kind of get things started but not throw me into hard labor right away. I got the medicine I think around 9:30 or 10:00pm and it worked well, but they never redosed me. The doctor never really came to give me more, which now that it is all said and done I would probably have pushed more for it if I knew that I would take so long.

Anyway, at around 1:30 I asked for an epidural because the contractions and cramping were making it hard to sleep and relax which I know you’re not really suppose to do in labor, but I figured if I was there I might as well get it. So, I got it and went well. Or at least I thought it did. I mean it worked great for awhile and I loved it because I could still move, but not feel the pain that was awesome. However, as labor crept into the next morning maybe even early afternoon I started to feel everything again. The nurse finally agreed that something wasn’t right and when I asked her to help me turn we found that what wasn’t right is that the epidural came disconnected. So, we called the anesthesiologist again and he came and said that he could reconnect it, but the chance of infection was too great and he would recommend redoing it. So, I got another epidural. After that things went well. I guess. They still seemed to go really slow and take forever. Eventually things started moving and I know because one half of my body started to feel everything. Yes, that is right the second epidural for some reason stopped working on half my body. It was awful. At first I just thought I was being kind of whimpy, but it got really bad. It got so bad, that I told Gaupo I needed a blessing because something needed to happen I couldn’t do it anymore. Either the twins needed to come or the pain needed to reduce or something I couldn’t fight it anymore. So, Gaupo gave me a blessing and the nurse called the anesthesiologist again. He came and essentially gave me a huge boost of medicine. It started working and I crashed out. I honestly don’t even remember him leaving the room. After I had slept for a bit, I woke up and the nurse checked me and I was dilated and ready to go. The only problem now was I wasn’t sure I could push the babies out because I was so numb. So, we were going to wait for the epidural to wear off a little, but then baby girl’s (Abby) started to not come back as well after contractions, so it was time to have babies.

We got all ready to go and headed back to the Operating Room. That is where they do twin deliveries just in case they need to do something fast. Anyway, we get back there and they do another ultrasound to make sure that the babies are in the correct position. Kade was head down ready to go… no surprise there, but Abby was transverse across the top. AGHHHH!! So, they said okay you might need a c-section, so do you want to just have one and not try to have them vaginally. Well after 26 hours of labor I couldn’t believe I wasn’t going to have these babies vaginally. While Gaupo and I were discussing what we thought we should do the doctors were discussing too. They said that even if I had a c-section with a horizontal cut they still might not be able to get to Abby because she was so high up. So, now we really didn’t know what to do. Finally I look at the doctors and I say what do you recommend, because really I wanted my babies here safe and sound. If that meant c-section than that is what I needed to do. Well, the doctor thought for a moment and then said, I really think I can get her turned the right way once Kade is out. I said okay, lets do it. So, I pushed Kade out in about 2 rounds of 3 pushes each and then that doctor grabbed Abby though my belly and turned her and shoved her down. Luckily, the cervix re-opened and I started pushing for Abby. We did about 3 sets of 3 and then they told me  I need to have a baby, so I pushed a couple more time really hard and out she came. I was blessed with a beautiful baby boy and girl. I couldn’t believe it. Kade was born at 10:39 and Abby was born 12 minutes later at 10:51pm. It was a long hard delivery, but these babies are amazing.

They almost went to the NICU, but they decided they would monitor them with us and they never ended up having to leave. The twins have been fabulous ever since. They nurse well, although I about die when they latch on because I somehow got some pretty torn areas, but they are healing and I really think it will be okay. I have been blessed that they knew how to nurse and that we can do it tandem meaning I can do both babies at once. Apparently, that is not that common it actually usually take a mom that has had babies before and full-term twins to make it happen, so I feel very fortunate there. Also, Kade was tounge tied when he was born which is why I think my nipples are damaged kind of bad. We got his tongue clipped this past Monday and I think he loves it. I was kind of on the fence about it, but then the doctor’s office called me, so I went and had it checked out and I am so glad I did.

Having twins is kind of crazy, but honestly I already love it. I am sure we will have really hard days. Naptime is already hard because I want sleep so bad and sometimes the twins don’t want to give it to me, but luckily my mom and Gaupo could bail me out this week, but this coming week I won’t be so lucky. 4 kids I think might be crazier than twins. Trying to balance all of their different needs and to make time for everyone is tricky and it will be even trickier this week as we venture into it without Oma to help us out.

I just want to document the miracles that have happened amidst the trials. My mom was able to come and be with us for a month. She was able to stay to help me with Kylee and Tia’s first week back at school. Labor was long but I made it and was able to deliver vaginally. I had a doctor who had confidence in themselves and was able to help make that possible. We had good labor and delivery nurses. The twins are full term, good eaters, and good sleepers so far. Kade was able to get his tongue loosened before it because big ordeal to do. My big girls have remained excited and in love with their brother and sister.

Life is going to get crazy, but I am excited for this new adventure with our family of SIX!! Here are just a few pictures. We honestly have way to many to choose from.

Kade and Abby when they were born.

Tia holding Abby.

Kylee with Kade.

Family pic.

Home finally!!