Where does the time go?

I heard, or maybe read, a good quote recently. It goes something like this, "time flies, but at least you are the pilot." How true. I am amazed though that it is already December 5th.
Our little family has been busy lately. I wish I could call my belly little, it stopped being little a while ago. I am now 34 weeks and I am ready to be done. The feeling of having a basketball under my shirt is easily ignored and forgotten, most of the time, except when I need to tie my shoes while I'm in the car, ouch. It makes a little shelf for Cassidy to prop on when we sit on the couch and she lays her head on my shoulder. Which is by far one of my favorite things that she does. The biggest pain, literally, is the pelvic joint pains. From what I hear, many second and subsequent pregnancies "attack" that region more than firsts. Night are horrible and mornings make me want to cry. I keep my fingers crossed for this little one to want to greet us EARLY!!! I asked my doctor about induction already, she said 39 weeks. Can I last that long?? We'll see. I really appreciate those pain free moments so much more now. I have much more understanding of how hard it much be to get old and lose the ease of a young, healthy body. But that being said, I would go through it all over again, 10 times worse, for the blessing of bringing another child into our family. I so love feeling the baby move around. I like to think s/he is doing pirouettes because of how it feels to me. The funniest part is that I only feel the baby on the right side, never on the left. Cassidy was the same. I "love" when s/he pushes against my pelvic bone and stretches long, weirdest feeling.
I can't believe that in 5 weeks we'll have another little one. That will be crazy, but so much fun. We've transitioned, partially, Cassidy to her new room. She still takes naps in her old room but sleeps at night in the new room with the new crib and mattress. I thought it might be easier if we did it this way for a week or so. So far so good. I am finishing up getting all of her stuff moved in and putting up the curtains today so that it is all set. We've had a lot of moving and reorganizing to do in the lose of our office but it is very much a great step forward.The nursery has less that needs to be done, just getting all the little baby clothes down from the garage and all the accessories that come with an infant, nursing pillows, bath tubs, etc. So much stuff!!! I do love being able to go through everything and get rid of stuff we don't use or need. Thank heavens for DI trailers that come around every three months or so.
Cassidy is growing up... She is such a little jaberwocky. She loves to talk talk talk. It is so cute. Her vocabulary is great. At her 15 month appointment I was asked if she can say 3-5 words besides momma and dadda, oh yeah, probably 15. Plus some that aren't words per se but we know what she means when she makes the sounds. Give her a cell phone or a remote and she'll hold it to her head and really start jabbering. So adorable. I think the cutest are "upee" "cheese" "co-kie" "ba-by" and down comes out "noun-ee".
She is now 31.5 inches tall and about 22 pounds, she wouldn't sit on the scale long enough to get a good measurement. So that puts her in the 80th percentile for height and 20-25th for weight. Her clothes range from 6-9 months (some pants) to 18 months (sleepers) because of the height/weight and cuts. I do love that we don't go through the clothes as quick and she gets lots of use out of them. She loves to walk around the house carrying baskets, purses, and now she likes to carry a blanket. Thankfully it doesn't matter which blanket it is, any will do. She didn't really get mobile with crawling till 12 months and waited till just after 14 to start walking. She does just what I thought she would do, wonder. She'll go from room to room and find something interesting and play with it or carry back to me. She loves being outside and really lets us know when she wants to "go" "out". She'll stand by the door to the garage, holding her blanket, telling us and if we don't "go" "out" she'll sit down and cry or get upset. So cute.
Joe is doing well. Work is work, busy and that is good. We have much to be thankful for in terms of his employment, especially right now.
Next week I'll post pictures.

Getting use out of wedding gifts

I think it really started in high school, my senior year I think. I volunteered to sew about 20 of the girls' costumes for our spirit week skit. Not too difficult, just red sating flapper dresses with a fringe hemline and sequence straps. They didn't turn out too bad.
When I put a sewing machine on my wedding registry I thought no one would buy it for us (me). Can I tell you how shocked, and pleased, and thankful, I was when it showed up at our front door. It has probably been used more than 95% of the gifts we received for our wedding. Even Joe has used it a number of times to patch, repatch, and patch some more a pair of jeans that we refuse to throw out. They make the perfect yard-work-pants.
I thought it would be fun to show (off) a few of the things that I've made.


This is a crib skirt I made for Cassidy's new crib. I had the fabric left over from a failed project and it became the perfect skirt.


Here are the curtains I made for Cassidy's new room. I must have bought and returned ready made curtains three times and couldn't find anything I really liked. I really like the colors and how they tie into the room color. Not really a baby style, but I like them.


I loved this fabric and had to make some pillows.


I made the roman shade, though it still needs to be hung right, as well as the valance.









One of the best baby gifts I received was a Hooter Hider (nursing cover). When I found out they cost about $40 I thought, for $7 worth of materials I could make one of those. So I do, as baby shower gifts.

Surprise!!

I always thought it would be fun to go through a pregnancy and not learn the sex until the moment the baby was born. Initially I was going to not find out but Joe wanted to know for this baby. But he has changed his mind and so we are both going to be surprised in the delivery room. We thought it would be fun to do a few polls. Just 'cuz it's fun to guess all the details knowing you have little control over any of them. Kind of like guessing the new bishopric. :) Have fun guessing and we might throw in a little, albeit cool, treat for someone who gets all three right.

Super great August

We're back!!!
What a great August it's been, I can't believe it's over, in three days. Here's a little run down on what we've been up to.

About mid-August Joe, Cassidy and baby & I went up to the cabin for a full 4 1/2 days. How nice it was to get out of town on a Thursday instead of hitting Friday traffic. We made it up in about 4 1/2 hours (we did hit traffic). Cassidy was great up until the last twenty minutes; she just wanted out of her torture contraption at that point. Once we got out of the car and set up and put her on the floor she was so much happier. We all loved being up there. Joe went fishing a few times, we all went for a few walks, and we took a stroll around the craft fair going on down town. We came home reluctantly but refreshed.

Most of the month I have been busy with the youth summer program, finding family names to take to the temple for baptisms. Being family history consultants (well, married to one) we have keys to our building's family history center so I scheduled hours a few times each week to help those who wanted it. I was ale to get a lot done for Joe and my families when there weren't youth there so it was a very productive month.

The last two Fridays our youth have taken their family names as well as names provided by other members of our ward to do the temple baptisms. In all I am guessing that we did between 420-440 family names!!! While there, I was in go-go-go-mood, always shuttling kids to the right place or taking names to be recorded, grabbing men to help out where needed. Exhausting but so worth every minute. It was amazing to be a part of that as well as having contributed about 80 of our own family names. Now we just have to do everything else.

This was my last time with my Laurels and the young women. I was released last week from the YW program. Our whole YW organization was redone. I think only 3 women still remain. I kind of thought it might happen but I'm still sad to move on to the next calling. Which is... co-teaching with Joe the 12-13 Sunday School class. This will be great, especially when the new one arrives in January. We are excited.

Cassidy turned 1 last week. So amazing that the year has already flown by. She is getting so much personality. She is getting her fourth tooth right now. She finally really picked up the idea of crawling on her knees about 3 weeks ago, no more army crawl. She's still too nervous to venture away from furniture unassisted but she's physically capable. She loves to converse with herself or her toys. I found her with a picture of my friend Marilee's little girl; she was saying 'baybay' (baby). So cute. She's a doll. We are so lucky to have her in our family. We are thankful for her everyday.

I hit 20 weeks this week. I can't believe that we are half way through this pregnancy. We can't wait for this little one to be with us. Yet we can enjoy the last four and a half months with Cassidy alone. I can enjoy the relative ease of shopping at whim just the two of us.

Yeah!!!!!

Let me be the first to say... HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't tell you how grateful I am to live in this country. Having served a mission in a less ___________ (you fill in the blank) country I have never since had a moment of ingratitude for the privilege I have to live here and raise my family in this imperfect yet AMAZING country. The freedom we enjoy to work hard and pursue my own dreams and ideals and (oh no, don't say it, don't say it) prosperity are too die for, literally. Many have and many more will. We live in a choice land and as long as we worship and serve the God of this land, Jesus Christ, we will be blessed. That is the key. There are many problems facing our country (when hasn't there?) and there are many nay sayers but the fact is that the more perfect the people become the better our country will become. The ONLY answer is serving Jesus Christ and becoming like Him. There is no other philosophy, political policy, or means by which we will enjoy the blessings we all desire. Thank you Father in Heaven for creating a land where we can enjoy the Gospel fullness and where we can learn and grow towards becoming like You.

Lots updates:
Cassidy came down with Rosseola this week. A baby with a 103 temperature is no fun. Add to that she got her first tooth on day 3 of the fever. Thankfully both are past us. Just remind me not to let her put my finger in her mouth. Little Miss Razorblade.
I'm almost out of the first trimester and on my goodness the difference a few weeks make. I feel so much better and have more energy.
Cassidy is officially a water baby. She loves to swim in grandma and grandpa's pool, especially when her cousins come to play.
Oh yeah. Cassidy went back to the doctor last week for her weight check. She gained 2 1/2 pounds!! Woohoo!! The doctor was thrilled. She asked what the secret was so that she could tell her other patients. Formula. I finally realized, learned, figured out that I was losing my milk and that Cassidy just wasn't getting enough calories from me. Though there are some aspects of nursing I kind of miss, can I say that a bottle, in some ways, is SO MUCH easier. Now Joe can feed her or we can go places when she gets up and just bring a bottle. The only reason for the switch was she wasn't gaining enough weight. So Cassidy went from the 3rd percentile to the 16th percentile. GO CASSIDY!!