9 Months to Recover

Four days after my last post I had a cornea transplant.   All I have to say about that is if you can avoid having one. . .do it!  They are not high on my list of recommendations.

So now the question . . . how do you catch up on almost a year of posts?  The answer . . .LOTS of pictures and a very long post. 

Ellie has loved this bunny since she was three months old

 

The boys LOVED to feed Ellie.

The results

This is what I found when I went to check on Ellie during her nap one day.

Brayden turned four in Aug.

We had a beach party in our back yard.

 

Carson started school at APA (American Prepatory Academy).  A charter school in Draper.  A lot of work for me, but a huge blessing for Carson.  Her has really blossomed over the last year.

Ellie was Tinker Bell for Halloween.  My awsome friend Heidi made this incredible costume for her.  Ellie enjoyed picking the little balls off and eating them.

 

Carson was Peter Pan and Brayden was a lost boy. Yep I forced them to choose costumes based on what I wanted Ellie to wear.

Christmas morning.

 

Ellie thought we were insane for waking up so early

Even Carson thought it was a bit too early

Brayden was psyched out of his mind

That takes us to the end of 2009.

At the end of Jan 2010 we went with Ryan’s family on a cruise.  We spent two days in New Orleans were our cruise left from and than five days on the cruise boat.

The fam. at Jackson square.

 

Brayden LOVED Beignets.  Can you blame him.   They are scrumptious.

 

It was cold in New Orleans

It was not in Mexico

 

Ryan’s family was a lot of fun.

The boys had a BLAST.  At the end of the trip Carson could not decide if his favorite vacation was a cruise or a trip to Disney Land

Ryan’s Grandma Archuleta passed away shortly after we got back.

 

Ryan spoke at her funeral.   He’s had a lot of public speaking opportunities that pass year or two and did a fantastic job.

In Feb. Ellie turned one.

She share her birthday with my sister and my friend Becky (Becky could not make it to the party.)

She was NOT a fan of the candle on her cup cake or of every one staring at her and singing loudly.

 

It really hurt her feelings.

 

She did get over it eventually though.

 

Carson turned 7,  yes SEVEN in April.  I am not going to lie.  I cried my eyes out the day before his birthday.  I have every year.  I don’t with any of my other kids, but for some reason with Carson all I can see on his birthday is the miracle my 2 lb. 13 oz. baby has become.

We spoiled him and let him have a party at the children’s museum.

 

It was complete chaos. . .

. . .but, the children’s museum did an incredible job.  That IS something I would recommend.

And since I completely forgot to take pictures of Easter that brings it up to date.  So there you go Jamie, I kept my promise, lots of pictures of Ellie.

Crazy Busy

So I’m sure that I’m not the only one who’s month of July is absolutely INSANE.

So far this month we have. . . (sorry very limited on pictures) 

(Ryan and his brother Miles)

1. spent a week in Bear Lake with Ryan’s family. 

I know what you are thinking, a week in one cabin with all of my in-laws.  Ooooh the insanity, but is one of my favorite things we do all year.  I’ll have to get them from Ryan’s sister, but I have the best pictures of Carson riding the tube behind the boat.  That kid has become such a dare devil.  So not what we expected from him, but it has been a ton of fun.

Little Buddies, Owen and Brayden

2. Gone to Lagoon. . .TWICE

3. Taken two weeks of swim lessons

4. Celebrated the 4th watching fireworks at the Riverton Park

5.  Enjoyed Mile’s and Jessica’s beautiful blessing day for baby Isaac

6.  Spent time with our good friends Cathie and Dan Packer who visited  from Texas

7.  Ryan has gone to girls camp, cub scout camp and scout camp.

8.  Worked incredibly hard on some fun new projects for Simply Creative (more to come on that later!)

And still to come. . . My Cornea Transplant!  Some of you will remember last year that I posted about needing a transplant, but instead we decided to have a baby.  Well I’ve put it off long enough and it’s time.  Surgery is scheduled for this Fri.  If I think too much about it I start to become a wreck, but than I think hey, what’s the worst thing that could happen?  They could ruin my vision right?  Than I remember, oh that’s right I can’t see out of my right eye any way.

So, if you think about it I could use all of your good thoughts and prayers.  I can’t wait to have my depth perception back!

Oh, and I also get to have a root canal this week!  Yeah!

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Both boys love to play soccer and let me tell you game days are insane. Yesterday I was getting all three kids ready and out the door for Brayden’s game (by myself). I threw Brayden his soccer uniform, told him to put it on and rushed off to get myself ready, than hurried and came back to put on his shin guards and shoes, and than out the door. We were standing in the door way when I turned to tell Brayden to hurry and realized we had forgotten something

NO PANTS

If you know my sister April and my family you will find this next picture hilarious. If not you will probably just think I am cruel with a sick sense of humor. My brother took this picture in Disney Land.

The two side of April. The princess and the gorilla.

Baby Blessing

Last Sun we blessed Ellie. It was such a wonderful day. My Aunt Lenore made her dress, based on a picture I gave her. What an amazing talent. I love the dress. I wish these picture showed better detail.

This isn’t the best picture, but it shows the detail in the dress a little better.

If you are blessing a baby soon here are my top ten tips

1. Leave room in your fridge and time in your schedule for all of the last minute people that will drop by with food.

2. Let family and friends know in advance that you need to leave fifteen minutes early. (can you tell all the people showing up at the last minute to put food in my overstuff fridge made me late.)

3. Cook for the crowd. I played around with a couple of different menus and food items, and finally realized that the Archuleta’s are kind of a picky bunch and at the last minute decided to go with some family tried and true favorites. I think it went over pretty well.

4. The night before make sure you know were your car keys are (After all those people that made me late left, I realized I had no idea were my car keys were, luckily my brother showed up and drove me and the kids to the church. I didn’t find my keys until yesterday.)

5. Have a cute dress for baby to change into when you get home. Blessing dresses are kind of awkward for nursing and sleeping in.

6. One of the best things Ryan and I did is the couple of days before we talked a lot to the boys about their blessing days and things that happened. I think this helped ward of some jealousy and made them excited for the day.

7. Ask some one (like a sister or sister-in-law) ahead of time to write down the blessing for you as it is given (maybe some one with out kids, or older children so they can actually hear the blessing.)

8. Make sure all of your priesthood holders know they are invited. Than there’s none of the last minute awkward searching for everyone and trying to make eye contact to know they are suppose to up there.

9. Make sure every one has directions for the church.

10. Say a sincere heart felt prayer that morning as soon as you wake up that things will go smoothly and you will be able to relax and enjoy the day. (:

Whew blessings are a lot of work!

The Nursery

In preparation for the baby blessing I finally finished up some of the projects in Ellie’s room.

I decided to go with a green chair instead of a pink.  Pink walls and  a pink chair would have been a bit much.

I changed my mind on the bedding too.  It’s hard to see the detail in these pictures.

My friends Julie Williams in my ward took these beautiful pictures of Ellie. 

There wasn’t room for the rocking chair and the changing table in the room so we took the doors off of the closest and put the changing table in there.

Love this chandelier.

I’d still love to put up bead board and add some other little details, but for the most part the room is done.

This week and last in a nutshell

Ellie turned 3 months

She is such a different baby.  Her colic is gone and she is nothing but a smiley happy baby.     

She coos and talks to us all the time.  I’ve been surprised and love how expressive she is.

Brayden graduated from Joy school 

What a funny kid.  He loved Joy school and is sad it’s over.  Thanks to all the Mom’s and kids in our little Joy school class.  Both Brayden and I loved it

A funny story about Brayden, today he walked up to me and said, “Is it my birthday?”  I told him no, and he turned and skipped away saying, “Just checking’”.

You really have to wonder what is going through the little minds.

 

Who Says We Have to be Responsible Adults

So this is the car I drive (the Blue Moose). . .

 

And this is the car Ryan drives (scout) . . .

If we were responsible adults we would have taken our tax return and bought new cars, but instead. . .

 

WE WENT TO DISNEY LAND!!!

We fully took advantage of Disney’s 5 nights and 5 days for the price of three and spent all of last week playing!  My mom, my little brother Isaac and my sister April came with us.  It was a ton of fun, and boy do I have some good April stories. (Kacie I know you enjoy the April stories.)

Really the plan with the car is to drive the Ford Taurus into the ground.  Which we pretty much expect to happen any day and we fixed our Honda so Ryan now usually drives it now.

One of my favorite moments at Disney Land was riding the Tower of Terror with my Mom.  She thought it was a haunted house and how NO idea it dropped.  It was hysterical.

Every one thought Ellie was Isaac’s baby .  Really they do look a lot alike.  Man he’s handsome kid!

Isaac and Ryan were my hero’s they pushed my Mom and April around in wheelchairs every where we went for five days!