Brock's Birthday

I had a grand party for Brock planned. We were in our new house and could finally fit everyone (we have always had 2 parties, so we could accommodate everyone), he understood what a birthday was and was really excited (and had been counting down for 3 months), and I thought I would still be pregnant. Well... since I had Megan a week ago, it turns out all I could do was have my house kinda clean and make a cake (actually Jason's mom made it, I just decorated it). I used the wrong frosting tip on the black lines, it came out a lot thicker than I wanted it - but I had to accept it. Brock was thrilled and that is all that mattered. He kept saying, "mom, I love my basketball cake." That was all I was going for.

Opening presents

Brock was lucky to get his cousin Emma at his party. She is living in DC while James goes to dental school. Her and Brock are only 7 weeks apart. We miss them a lot. (She is the one with the pink flower in her hair)


Brock's favorite present came from his aunt Ashley and uncle Daniel. A soccer goal and soccer ball. He has not stopped playing since he got it... he wanted to take the ball to bed, in the tub, and to church. It is weird, we have a million balls (seriously), including a few soccer balls, but for some reason THIS one is so cool.






Somethings about Brock as a three year old:

• He loves to write letters. When he colors or does any kind of creative thing he usually just tries to make letters. His favorites are O, M, H, B, and A.


• He is the best big brother to Noah and now Megan. He is so protective of Noah and always tries to be a good example. If we don't want Brock to do something, if we just tell him to be a good example to Noah, he will stop. I can't imagine Brock's life without Noah, it has make him a more compassionate, more patient, a nd more understanding boy. He is so patient with him. It is wonderful.


• Brock is very obedient, he always has been. He stays right by me when we go somewhere, and will leave when I tell him it is time to leave. He goes to bed when it is bed time and never gets out of his bed.


• He is so logical, he gets this from his dad. If you just explain to him the reason why, he will be ok with it. He does not like being treated like a child. The more straight foreword you are with him, the better he acts.


• Brock is still a natural athlete. That is all I can say about that.


• He is a good eater. He will eat what ever you give him (usually), and most of his favorite foods are vegetables. He usually could take candy or leave it, it doesn't matter much to him - but he will cry if I don't give him a carrot.

Brock has changed our whole world. Looking back it is hard to see Jason and I as a family until Brock was born. He is molding Jason and I into the type of mother and father our Heavenly Father wants us to be, and for that I am so grateful. I feel like Brock has an old soul and has more to teach me than I could ever teach him.

I am giddy about...

This little girl and...

my blossoms.

I came home from the hospital to find that my pear tree had blossomed while I was gone. I have never been so excited about blossoms... knowing that they are my blossoms, on my tree, in my yard just makes me so happy. The boys and I have been singing "popcorn popping" several times a day.

Easter

We did celebrate Easter at our house this year - I just haven't posted it yet. It was fun this year because they were both so old.

Here we are dying eggs. We didn't get around to dying the eggs before Sunday, so we put a spin on the tradition. I boiled them Saturday night and then the Easter bunny came and hid the white eggs for the boys to find. Then once they found them we dyed them on Sunday afternoon. My boys thought is was great and didn't even know that it was because I was too lazy to do it earlier.

The Easter Bunny left a lot of eggs...

Brock waisted no time finding them.

Brock went around and picked up every egg and put it in his basket. Noah stood in one place and put each egg directly into his mouth. Not ONE egg ever made it into his basket.

Instead of Easter baskets this year the Easter Bunny left Easter Pails, all full of sand toys for the boy's new sand box.

It was a great Easter.

My mom's birthday

My mom turned 50 this year. Me and my sister's threw her a surprise birthday "get together". She assured us that she did NOT want a surprise party so we just had family and a few close friends. She was very surprised... she didn't want it... but she deserved it.

Right when she walked in and we yelled "surprise". (This is not my dad behind her, it is a good family friend). She tried to walk out as soon as she saw us, but he made her come in.

This is the "display table"

Me, my mom, my older sister Katie, and my younger sister Ashley

My Grandma and my great aunt Pat

My sister Ashley, Nancy, and Kim (both these women were my young women presidents in YW - they are both a big part of the woman I am today - I love them)

My aunt Jen and Aunt Leslie

My mom is so wonderful (see post), I am so glad that we were able to throw her this party despite mine and my sisters crazy lives right now.

How my boys say "I love you"

Megan is crying in the kitchen - I am pumping in the living room. Noah is concerned about Megan crying. Noah walks up to the kitchen to "check on Megan". I am just a few seconds behind him, and when I get there, this is what I found...

Obviously it didn't solve Megan's problem. If you haven't been following my blog for a while, you might not get the humor. Click here, here, and here

He obviously is learning to be a big brother from his big brother... that and my boys think that having a ball solves all your problems. Soon they will learn that women are much more complex than that.

Bringing her home

They boys have met her - and love her. Last night was a little dicey - mostly with Noah. I think it is hard to have your mom gone for 2 days and when you get her back she has a baby. Last night I went to bed worried that things were about to get really hard.

Then this morning Jason got up with the boys and I slept in. At about 9:00 Jason came in and asked if I was going to come down because, "Noah keeps asking for... baby sister!" When I finished that sentence in my head I assumed he would say, "Noah keeps asking for you." Then I heard Noah coming up the stairs saying, "baby sister, baby sister." Him and Brock walk into our bedroom, don't even LOOK at me, run right past me to Megan and start talking to her, "baby sister, baby sister, Megan, hi, I missed you, etc" This was probably the first time in Noah's life that he didn't run right to me as soon as he saw me. The rest of the day has been just as great. They love her (but are not all over her, thank heavens) and they still love me (of course) but are not possessive or sad when I have Megan.


Right when the boys saw her on Sunday night.

Brock wanted to hold her. He LOVES that he is her "big brother".

Noah thought he wanted to hold her, and then discovered he did not. He still has not wanted to hold her. But just loves to look. Perfect!

I desperately need to give a HUGE thanks to mine and Jason's family. Since Megan was early I hadn't figured out who was going to watch my kids, and didn't have anything written out or packed for them. My family was SO great. They just took care of everything and Jason was able to be at the hospital with us the whole time (which is exactly what I wanted). They came on Saturday and cleaned my whole house, did the laundry, and finished all of my "to-do's before the baby comes" - PLUS watch my boys. My dad fertilized our lawn and started killing our weeds. Jason's parents went shopping for me and finished getting all the things we needed for Megan and then came on Sunday and cooked us dinner and Debbie cleaned my "new" (from Craig's List) kitchen table - and I mean she CLEANED it. Thank you, thank you, thank you. All of you have made this transition so much easier. We have the best families!

Megan Jane Herbert

We welcomed Megan Jane into our family early Friday morning. That is right... I had our little girl. She was 6 weeks early and quite unexpected - but now that we have her we are thrilled she she was so excited to join our family and decided not to wait. We have been in heaven getting to know our new little girl. Although she was early, and is considered a preemie - she is perfect. Everything was fully developed, and she is eating and sleeping great. She never needed oxygen or any other "preemie" procedure. She is small 6 lbs 2 oz and 18 inches long - but other than that there is nothing preemie about her.

Our birth was perfect! Everything we have always wanted (except for 6 weeks early). We delivered at Alta View - which was wonderful! They were so supportive of our plan for natural childbirth and mother directed pushing. Here is a quick outline:

10:30 pm (Thursday night) - I started having contractions - not a big deal, have them a lot. Went upstairs to relax and try to get them to stop.

11:30 pm- Told Jason that these felt different and like they were actually "doing" something. We decided that she was too early and we had too much to do (I had quite a checklist of "to-do before baby comes), so I should try to relax or get distracted to make the contractions stop. I got in the bath to relax.

12:30 am - Contractions are more intense - I decide to go downstairs and watch TV to get distracted. Oprah is on and it was interesting - but the contractions are still intense. I am very tired, so now I am falling asleep in between contraction, but each contraction is waking me up, if sleeping and a good Oprah are not working, I decide these are for real.

1:30 am - I call Jason downstairs and we discuss our options. I told him that I felt as much pressure and tightening as I did right before I crowned with Noah - but with Noah I felt that way for 5 minutes - and this time I had been feeling that pressure for about an hour. So I wasn't sure what was going on. We decide to get to the hospital. We called my mom to come stay at the house with the boys.

2:40 am - We get to Alta View hospital and get settled in. They check me and I was 9 cm and 100% effaced. We realized I was going to have her, regardless of my checklist, so I stopped fighting my body and let her come.

3:15 am - I was just relaxing, doing my thing, and I felt the urge to push, so I did and felt the baby come down and blood. I announced that I needed to start pushing. My doctor had just gotten in the room. The doctor took a look and told me to push when I was ready. I was a little frazzled and wasn't sure what position I wanted to push in - Jason tells me I was a little disagreeable - but I think I was quite pleasant. After a few minutes I was as ready as I could be and I started to push.

3:20 am - Megan was born. Before hand they had told me since she was so early I wouldn't be able to hold her when she was born and they would have to take her right to the nursery. I was pretty upset by that. But as soon as she was born, she started to cry, so they said her lungs must be fine so I could hold her for a minute. They checked her while I held her and discovered that she was fully developed and fine - so she never even had to go to the nursery!

It was all so wonderful. Megan did so good, she knew what she was doing, despite my efforts to try and stop her. :) The staff at Alta View did so wonderful we were so impressed! Jason is such a wonderful birth companion, I could not have done it without him, he is so calm and supportive, he works just as hard as I do.

Right now it is Sunday afternoon and the boys (who have been at my mom's house) will be here soon. They haven't seen her yet, so pictures and stories will come soon. And I have about 4 or 5 posts I need to do to "catch-up" so those will be coming quick (hopefully) so I can just focus on our new little girl.

Our house

Finally - I took a picture of our house. We are so thrilled. We are in West Jordan and are having a lot of fun getting to know our neighbors and new neighborhood.

As many of you know we have been wanting to be in a house for almost 2 years now - but instead have been in our tiny, third story, Provo apartment. So, naturally, being in a house has LITERALLY changed my life. Here are some of the biggest perks.

1 - The BEST part for me right now is the garage. Getting those two little boys (plus my pregnant belly), diaper bag, and any groceries or toys up and down those 3 flights of stairs was so overwhelming. Not to mention we were going to my parents a lot to look for houses, so I was always taking a pack and play or a high chair or a million other things. It was getting so difficult. Now going places and coming home is not overwhelming - it is so wonderful to just go into the garage - NOT HAVE TO SCRAPE OFF MY CAR - and leave. Super easy! Sometimes in Provo I would just circle the block until I was "prepared" to make the journey up the stairs.

2 - A yard. I don't think I can really add to that statement. With 2 little boys - all they want to do is be outside. We have a fully fenced backyard - and I can be in the kitchen making dinner and they are out in the backyard playing. It is a dream come true.

3 - Space. This has been great for my children's sleeping habits. The bedrooms are all upstairs - away from the toys, yard, kitchen, etc - so no one is getting woken up. Noah is now sleeping from 1 to 4 everyday. The space has also encouraged my boys to play together more - rather than relying on me. When all three of us were within 10 feet of each other all day - it was always the three of us playing. And while I love playing with my boys, I always ended up being the referee, "give that back", "not so hard", "it's Brock's turn", "get off Noah", etc, which just ends up making whinny children who always expect you to solve their problems. But now I am not always in sight and they play together so well and don't always expect me to referee.
Disclaimer: This wasn't the case the first 2 weeks - The boys thought they lived in an amusement park - with all these new places to run and jump and climb - we had a lot of discipline issues and they were getting hurt a lot - but now they are used to it and it is great.

4 - The kitchen. Many of you probably know that I love to eat any sort of dessert all the time - and I also do not like my children to have these desserts (partly because I want them to eat healthy and partly (mostly) because I don't want to share). The boys can be playing and I can go into the kitchen and enjoy a cupcake or a cookie and they have no idea! It is so wonderful - I could never pull that off in the apartment.

Those are the main ones that I can think of right now. As I discover new ones I may add to the list. Thank you to all those who have prayed for us the last little while - with Jason's lay-off and the pregnancy and everything. It is amazing how your life can change, for better or for worse, so instantly. We are being very blessed right now and are so grateful for these blessings - we hope to always live worthy of them.


We have 2 apple trees and 2 pear trees in our backyard. And today Brock discovered he can climb them.


Our lawn needs A LOT of work. Our house was a foreclosure and has been vacant for almost a year. But this week I found these growing among weeds and dead bushes. They have made me very happy.

Discovery Gateway

We got a pass to Discovery Gateway (now that we are in the valley), and one to the Aquarium and hopefully one to the Zoo. I love watching my children play. They are both very focused and have great concentration. They have fun downstairs (especially with the balls - of coarse), but they love upstairs the most. Below are just some wonderful pictures of my kids playing.

This is Brock's airplane. He builds it everytime we go.

Noah's number one obsession right now is throwing balls down stairs. Good for him we just moved into a house with stairs. He throws all 4 thousand balls that we have down the stairs - then Brock throws them back up - then Noah throws them back down. This is repeated about 20 times a day.

Discovery Gateway is so expensive it is only really worth it if you get the pass. But once you do it is so worth it. It has been great for family outings - Jason loves to build things too, they are like three little boys playing together. And, once you have the pass it doesn't matter if you only go for 20 minutes - because it is free. I definitely recommend it.

Feeling refreshed

I definitely got the "fill" I was looking for. Holy cow - conference seemed to be directed at me (and every other parent!). I am grateful that Heavenly Father prepared me to receive those messages. My boys were GREAT during conference - I think I was able to listen more this year than in years past.