Is It Naptime Yet

This weekend we did a very short trip to Ely to visit Andrea and Brien and to see Zarina blessed.

We left late on Saturday around 1 o’clock. (Jon was topping off fluids and accidentally put the pink windshield wiper fluid in the pink coolant fluid. It might have been OK, but since we were going on a long trip with very few towns and a lot of nothing in between we thought it would be better to have the engine flushed to be on the safe side. He was there for 3 hours. Ugh.)

We got on the road and the girls and I got excited when we we saw that there was snow on the mountains outside of Alamo.

Just in the car having fun.

Snow on the mountains!

Pretty cloud on mountain.

Are you sure you want to go this way?

We went the long way, or scenic drive to Ely through Caliente.

The Union Pacific train station in Caliente. Jon said he rode though Caliente several times as a kid on the train. (His father worked for UP.)

We stopped and played in some snow on the roadside.

I will say I thought it was pretty until Jon decided to throw snowballs, which he did immediately after getting out of the car.

The girls weren’t in the snow clothes I brought and I didn’t want them getting wet from the snow sticking to them.
OK I also didn’t want them getting dirty.

They loved it and wanted to make a snow angel like Daddy had, but I was wanting to get back into the warm car and onto the road again.

Jon mentioned how driving in the snow made him feel like he was on a different planet.
I’d have to agree.
Neither of us grew up in snow, Jon did go on a mission to New York, but that has been over 10 years ago.
Snow is just foreign to us Las Vegans.

I just noticed this guys headlights weren’t on.

It was pretty. The scenic drive wasn’t very scenic with the snow storm, but it was still pretty.

Uh, where’s the scenery?

We’ll have to visit Mount Charleston for some snow. The girls just loved it and maybe next time I’ll let them get dirty and wet.

We got to Ely around dinner time and headed over to Andrea and Brien’s for a short visit.

Eden loved Zarina and wanted to hold her.

The next day while getting ready for church Eden began to smell. So I gave her a bath and Jon inspected her dress.
A poopy diaper that she had that morning had leaked on the dress, so it smelled. We decided we’d better dress her in her pants rather then have her be stinky and in a dress.

The sacrament meeting was nice and we headed over to Andrea and Brien’s for a delicious meal of pulled pork sandwiches.
It was all of Brien’s family and then us, and his one neighbor.
(My parents wanted to wait till the crowd died down since they had my aunt who has cerebral palsy with them.)

Zarina after church.

We got some pictures and then took off home.

The Parks.

The Parks with Lilah and Eden. (This is what Eden wore to church.)

Proud aunt with Zarina.

It was a very long drive and the girls started being roosters right as we got near the city and they continued for about the 20 minute drive in. And that is Eden at the end talking, for those who think she doesn’t talk, she does talk and a lot at times.

We’ve got our camera back from Cannon.
Finally!
Actually we got a camera of equal or greater value that has been refurbished, I can say it’s nicer than ours was, since they didn’t have the parts or whatever.
This makes it nice for me cause I was wanting a new one,  but couldn’t justify why since  ours still worked, or was getting fixed for free.
(I was kinda glad it stopped working thinking I could get  a new one, but Jon researched that they fix them if it was a defect. Anyways.)

I sewed my first hooded towel this week. We got tons of towels from our wedding. This was the only ivory towel, hand towel and wash cloth so I thought I’d make a hooded towel for the girls and then I thought I’d give it has a gift. I like it a lot and almost want to keep it.

So I spent money on ribbon and thread and that was it. I’m giving it has a baby shower gift for a baby shower I won’t be able to attend.
Too bad all our other towels don’t have hand towels to make hoods or they are not colors I’d use for kids.
But I really liked how it turned out and I plan on making hooded towels  as Christmas gifts for the girls that I wanted to make back in April for Easter. :)  My mom never embroidered their names on them, so I may just add ribbons.

When I was doing a little research on how to do it I came across many sites. One site had that they’re easy and if she needs a baby shower gift in a pinch she uses towels they have.
I thought that was yucky.
Used towels as a gift, just sewn together. Gross.

Also Here’s also a picture of the shelf I bought and put together almost completely on my own.

It’s nice because it gives us more shelf space for books in the living room.
I do worry because Eden at first was just pulling all the books of the shelf, or really wasn’t even letting Lilah put them on the shelf, but I think she’s got the hang of getting one book down and putting it way before getting another one down. Though she still grabs 3-4, but I’d rather 3 or 4 than a pile.

We went on a date Friday night.
I love the ward we’re in. We have great people with great daughters who are willing to watch our girls for free and what parent doesn’t like free babysitting, unless the person is a total weirdo? (The Jewitt’s daughter, Shelby, is 14 and is the ‘technical’ babysitter when they have the girls, but my girls also love Hannah, who is 10, and is their playmate. I love the Jewitt’s. They are an awesome family, and not just because they give us free babysitting. 😉 )
Anyways, we traveled the 16 miles and saw the Elizabeth movie. I used a free pass and one we bought from Costco. The theater we went to charges $10.25 per person for a movie. Yeah, that’s why we’re picky and I buy discount tickets at Costco. ( It’s just hard to pay $20 for 2 hours of entertainment unless it’s really good.)
It was a good movie and we headed over to Coldstone afterwards for some yummy ice cream dessert since it’s only like 60 something degrees in the evenings still.
We got the girls to bed late, but we had a fun night.

Saturday we did various things round the house. I inside and Jon outside.
He found a lizard while cleaning outside and the girls had fun looking at it and touching it.

Our side-yard bug eater.

Don’t hurt the lizard.

Later that night we bit the bullet and cut Eden’s hair yet again.
She loves to play with her hair and lately she wakes with big honking knots in her hair. And she complains about me taking them out.
So Jon cut her hair and I helped towards the end.
It’s very short.
It gives me confidence that we can cut our boys hair, if we ever have one.

An example of the knot I face after she sleeps. I mean both nighttime and nap time I’ve had to deal with taking one of these out.

Her hair is pretty ruined at the tips where her knots have been.

The last picture with her having longer hair.

The first cut.

After…She might be destined for short hair throughout childhood.

Even though it’s so short it kinda fits her personality.
She’s still so cute but I’m gonna miss putting her hair in pigtails.

She didn’t enjoy the haircut. She was crying a little by the end when we were trying to make sure everything was okay. She has crooked bangs, but I think that’s standard on little kids.

We also visited Jon’s parents today after church and the girl’s naps. It’s been forever because someones been sick or we’ve had other engagements with my family.
We finally made it today. Jon also set up a machine that helps send information to Dad’s doctor from his pacemaker each night.
Dad was very slow getting around tonight and it was a slight reality check to see how bad he’s gotten, though it might also be that we just haven’t seen him for so long and have forgotten how slow he was before.

We also had a family from our old ward, as in the ward we were in for the first three years of marriage until we moved two years ago, move into our ward boundaries.
It’s ironic because Jon has a lot of respect for the father and he is probably the one person he didn’t want to know, or have to tell, about his change of heart. (His wife knows because we share a close mutual friend, so I’m sure he knows also.)
It’s still nice to have a family move into our ward because it seems like everyone is moving out.

 I gave the girls an early bath and put Lilah’s hair in curlers to start off our Halloween.
Then in the morning we carved our pumpkin.

  (I bought it for it’s cute stem and beautiful orange color, never mind it was lopsided and had a scar on it. )

 

Lilah enjoyed taking out the “guts” of the pumpkin.

Lilah sketched a face for  me to carve.

 

 Eden just scribbled so I carved an E for her.

 

I did my own pumpkin face also. ( I love Eden’s “smile” I think that’s what it’s suppose to be.)

Jon came home early, a very nice surprise,  so I left early to go to my parents house. I met my sister Kristi there with her kids and my sister Carolyn. (Jon was left with candy duty. I love to take the girls out trick out treating.)

We started trick or treating shortly after dark and the girls looked beautiful.

Glinda and Dorothy.

 

Dorothy

 

Glinda

We just went up and down my parents short block, then we stopped by “Grandma’s store”, aka JoAnn’s, to see my mom as she had to work last night.

We got to our neighborhood and went up and  down our little block. There was actually 8 houses including ours this year giving out candy opposed to the 5 or 6 from the previous 2 years.

Then we visited one of Eden’s nursery leaders, because they love her so much and I love to show the girls off. Then the Jewitt’s since they’re in the same neighborhood and the girls were more excited to go see the Jewitts than the nursery leader. (They love the Jewitt’s cats, toys and daughters who watch/play with them.)

Funny story: When we pulled up to the Jewitt’s, Sis. Jewitt, or Beth, was walking her oldest daughter and her boyfriend to the daughter’s car. As we walked up I said they couldn’t leave without seeing their cutest trick or treaters. So they said how cute the girls were and then Beth said to the other two that they needed to go into the house so the girls could knock and say trick or treat. So she ran the other two into the house with her.

After a short visit at the Jewitt’s we stopped by the store for milk and cereal. I heard a  a lot of how cutes. (Have I said how much I love to show my kids off, though we went to the store because we were completely out of milk and it’s on the way home from the Jewitt’s.)
We came home and had a little fun with the glow sticks Britta gave the girls.

 Then the girls had fun in their candy.

Mmmm, candy.

 MMMM, candy!

 

MMMMM, CANDY!!

They got to bed about 10 pm. Only an hour past their bedtime, though it’s been more like 9:30 lately anyways.

We had a great Halloween and Lilah has decided to be Dorothy, a mean witch, and Tinkerbell for Halloween next year.
Our pumkins with the candle. (I forgot to take any pictures before the girls went to bed so you get just the pumpkin.)

 

 Lilah’s pumpkin face.

The holes from my carving’s eyes give an interesting affect, in which Lilah actually had a circle within her larger circles, so this is more true to her drawing.

Now I know why you only carve one side of the pumpkin.

My carving illuminated.

So I’ve finally been able to get the picture files opened.
Here’s our family pictures from earlier this month.
Ones we ordered:

Some of these I like so I’m sad we didn’t get them.(Jon didn’t like the fake or forced smile, because Lilah doesn’t smile like that on her own.) But to reorder would defeat the purpose of using a $3.99 a sheet coupon because it would be like $15 a sheet plus a fee for reordering.

Ones we didn’t order:

The ones the send you online are fuzzy so a person isn’t tempted to print them, though you can but they’re just not high quality.

 How the girls have grown from a year ago.

It’s Nevada Day observed. Nevada Day is the 31st, but a couple years a go they passed a law to make the last Friday of the month Nevada Day observed instead of giving us Nevada Day or Halloween off, totally bites. I loved having Halloween off as a kid. So Jon has today off and we’ve been busy.

Jon’s going through all his books. Yes we’re actually getting rid of some books! If you’ve never seen our house we have two six foot tall book cases, then four three foot tall book cases. All full. With books. Overflowing.
We have duplicate books, like two of each Teachings of the Presidents, and lots of doctrine gospel study manuals.
We have about 5 sets of Scriptures that we’re keeping. (our first sets, our seminary sets etc.)
Our books haven’t been organized since we moved here 2 years ago, so even though it’s not a immediate ‘wow, look I organized the books’, like ‘wow I cleaned the kitchen’, I’m still very happy it’s getting done. Especially the getting rid of some books. I can’t tell you how happy that makes me.

I’ve also done slightly needless things today but it makes me feel good to get things done. Like I organized my sewing stuff so I could neatly pack it away. Though I still need to make drapes. 🙂
We’re also doing tons of laundry and two loads of dishes, and I’m planning on cleaning our bathrooms today.

I wish I could take a picture of the book chaos, but our camera broke. We do get to ship it free to Cannon and they’ll fix the sensor, but it won’t be fixed for about 2 weeks. So you only get this picture of the girls in their costumes from yesterdays party. It broke when I went to take a second one.

Lilah as Glinda the Good Witch and Eden as Dorothy.

Yes, I made both costumes. I did Lilah’s Monday and Tuesday, with hand sewing Wednesday. I hate costume satin. It frays like nothing. Despite difficult fabric I think Lilah’s dress turned out nice and shiny.

Anyways, if anyone has a digital camera I can borrow for Halloween, give me a holler, otherwise we’ll be recreating the event. 🙂

So I’ve finally gotten pictures of baby Zarina!
Brien sent them to a Lacy instead of Lacey on Wednesday night, so once I called today we got it figured out and I just received pictures.

In Brien’s e-mail he said:
She has Andrea’s eyes, nose and checks and my hair color, lips and ears.
we love her a whole lot.

While talking to Andrea she said how easy the birth was. She was a 5-6 going into the hospital so they gave her the epidural right away and then pitocin when her labor was not progressing.
(I can’t complain too much, my labor with Eden went pretty much the same way. I guess Harvey girls are just naturals at this child birthing thing.)

She is very cute, and not an ugly newborn. (Yes, some newborns are ugly, something every expecting parent should talk about. 🙂 )
Andrea said how she had cute chubby thighs, which you can kinda see in the photo’s, but when she lost her newborn weight it was in her thighs.

Congratulations Andrea and Brien! She is adorable and I can’t wait to met her this Thanksgiving!
(I’m kinda jealous of Carolyn being able to have you at her house, but just a little because she will have a newborn at her house. 🙂 )

New Mom with baby Zarina.

Andrea said how she keeps calling her baby girl because it’s weird to call her Zarina, since she was named after a friend, the friend who introduced Brien and Andrea.

After her first bath.

Under the heating lamp.

Daddy’s arm.

Lilah asked who’s arm that was. Was it Brien’s or Andrea’s? I hope it’s not Andrea’s with all that hair. 🙂

Baby Zarina Marie Park!

Today we went on a field trip to a local fire station.
The girls had tons of fun and Lilah had her ears plugged most of the time, in which Eden also decided she should plug her ears. It’s becoming my children’s signature.

Plug your ears, everything is loud.
So here goes.

Most of the group.

Jon said at least she puts her fingers in her ears and not her nose and Eden just does what Lilah does.

Our tour guide fire fighter put on his gear for us.

He crawled towards the kids, telling them this is what they would see if they were ever trapped and a fire man needed to get them out.
Most were not hot on the idea of seeing him crawl towards them in his gear.

They turned the trucks lights on.

They showed the kids some of the tools they use .

Sitting in the fire engine.

We went through the whole station.

The tv room was a hit. The kids were fascinated with all the recliners.

The other fire truck came back so went to look at the hoses.

The fireman asked if I wanted to try on the gear, but I’m not too hot on putting on sweaty things. I also didn’t have socks and would have had to put my bare feet in the boots.
One mom had long pants and socks so she was volunteered by her SIL.

Our group.

Are we done taking pictures yet?

The kids had tons of fun and when we came home Lilah played a fire fighter game on the computer.

It was lots of fun and the fire fighters were very nice and spent lots of time with us.

Fun fact: Eden says fighter fighter instead of fire fighter. It’s just cute.

On Wednesday we took an adventure with Julie, Naia, and her step-son Reagan.
We went to the beautiful Mt. Charleston, or cold mountain as Lilah liked to call it.
It really wasn’t that cold. Who knew 62 degrees could be so warm.
I don’t think we made it to Mt. Charleston, more like Lee Canyon.
We just went to some camping grounds to try to eat our food and enjoy some hiking and exploring.

We picked up some Kentucky Fried Chicken and headed towards the mountain.
We tried to eat outside in the beautiful weather but some bee’s or wasps liked our chicken and pretty much swarmed us.
( A swarm consists of more than 4 bees being around our site at once.)
Poor Reagan was totally freaked out by them, as was Julie, and they were both having a hard time, though Julie was trying to not act scared.
My girls were mostly OK unless the bee/ wasp flew around their face.
I suggested we eat in our cars so Julie agreed and we headed back to our original picnic spot. (We went to three different spots before we gave up because of the bees/wasp.)

Eating in the car.

Take a picture of me eating chicken mom!

Eden has proven to be my adventurous child. She would wander off without anyone near her. She did stay in eye range, but only because I kept reminding her to not go to far.

Take a picture of me holding the rock!

Eden, come back here!

We took a hike in the woods. Lilah loved the woods.

Wait, where’d Eden go?

We found a large tree that had been cut down.

This was the best out of the 2 pictures I took.

After being in the woods we decided to take a walk along the road.

They wanted to hold onto the stroller, at first.

Eden and Lilah both wanted to wander into the woods later so we distracted them by making them run to places.

Do these pants make my diaper look big?

Lilah’s hives came out a little with the running so we made her walk with us as Reagan and Eden ran ahead.

We had a fun day.

Eden slept for the 45 minutes home and decided that was enough nap for the day. Lilah never took a nap. In fact I think she’s going on nap strike.

Nine days after starting Lilah on amoxicillin she is now having a reaction of hives. We had only one day left of the medicine, or two doses.

Damn allergic reaction.

Jon woke me up at 5:53 am to tell me Lilah had hives and I of course called my mom to see what I should do and he went to the Mayo Clinic family health book. She’s not wheezing and they’re just getting a worse, now looking better since I put some anti-itch cream on her, but no wheezing which would make it more of an emergency.

I’m just waiting for it to be 8 am so I can call the doctor and see if I need to take her in.
Poor baby, I hate hives.
………..

Well, I called at 8 am on the dot. The nurse said there was no way to tell what the rash is from unless they see it, though she thought it would probably be form the amoxicillin, so I brought her into see the nurse practitioner.
It was an allergic reaction and I’m to give her Benedryl. If it looks as though it’s not clearing up I have a steroid prescription to get filled that should help.
I feel like they are getting worse, but I’ll wait a little bit to see if they affect Lilah. She’s been pretty much her regular Lilah self, just spotted.

I have some pictures so you can feel some sympathy for my poor little girl.

She’s a dalmatian.

her back.

Lilah’s leg after lunch. The others were before lunch.

I think the hives started being more defined in their borders.

I had Judy watch Eden for me so she could have some fun while Lilah got taken care of and I picked Naia up from Julie’s work after the appointment, since it’s right by my doctor’s office and I wasn’t positive that Lilah didn’t have something contagious.
Before I picked Naia up we stopped at Smith’s to get the Benedryl and I got us a couple doughnuts as a treat. The baker there thought Lilah was cute and she felt bad that she had some sort of allergic reaction. We got a couple of free bite sized cookies, though she was just giving them out.
Lilah’s become shy around everyone, grandparents included. I think she may be doing it for attention. ‘If I act like a baby I’ll get more attention’, though Jon will say she’s just shy. There are times she acts shy and doesn’t speak and then there are times she acts shy and doesn’t speak, but she makes baby type motions or sounds. I don’t know what to do with her.

So my worry about my girls having the same allergy as me has manifested itself in Lilah. I guess time will tell if Eden has it also.

We were going to have family pictures taken today, but I forgot about Lilah’s gymnastics’s class that goes from 5:30-6:00 pm. So I rescheduled it for next Wednesday.

It’s not like we can do gymnastics or pictures tonight though. Even if she’s not contagious I don’t want the other parents worrying about her or the other kids shunning her, since it would be the first class and we know no one in it. I also don’t want to worry the teacher with a new student that has a full body rash.

I hope she gets better soon.