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.

Finding joy in motherhood

I have always found a lot of joy in mothering my two young boys. Even when Noah was a newborn and Brock was just 16 months - I found my "monotonous" days of diapers, naps, feeding and book reading full of fun and fulfillment.

About 2 months ago I lost a lot of that joy I had been feeling. I am sure it was based mostly on circumstances and our situation. We were looking for a house, living with my parents, and doing about a million other things. I was stressed about how I was stressed. I was being impatient with my boys and my level of frustration was only heightened by knowing that soon I would have a third. I KNEW I had to find a way to fix my attitude.


We are in our house now and life has totally slowed down, that has fixed a lot of it. I am finding joy in the little things and have gotten back to my normal routine. But I have found my one and only saving grace: scripture reading. For full disclosure - I have not been great at it since Noah was born. I will go a few weeks on and then a few weeks off - but even during my "on" weeks it was something I forced and didn't really enjoy. I had to remind myself to do it - it was never a habit and never something I "feasted" on, until now.

About 3 weeks ago I realized it was the one thing missing in my life, and the only thing that would bring the spirit into my life, and improve my relationship with my Saviour, and in turn help me feel joy. I was half way through the Book of Mormon at the time but I felt prompted to start another book. I decided on the New Testament, it had been about 2 years since I had read it, and I knew it would be great to just study Jesus' teachings, since I was really trying to invite Him into my daitly life. When I was in Matthew Chapter 3 I had the idea to relate EVERY reading to my life, specifically my life as a mother. I feel as though I have found the key to a locked treasure, my whole life has changed. I yearn for those 5 minutes in the morning when I get to pray and read - I haven't felt that in years, it is so refreshing. Those moments are sacred to me and I am learning so much - and the best part is - my whole day is effected. I can tell a drastic difference when I read. The joy just flows into my heart when I would normally be frustrated or bored. I don't stress about how much I read or for how long, I am not marking or journaling, I wish I were and hope to add that in soon, but I just don't want to make it too overwhelming. I just read what I can read and try to gleen somesort of insight. This has worked well for me.

Another thing that has made a difference is reading with my boys. Every morning during breakfast we read a few versus from the Book of Mormon, I don't try to make it too intense, I just read until they want me to stop. (Tip: I have found that they are more interested if I say "Jesus" for every reference to Him - they recognize His name and get really excited.) When both of these readings take place, our day just seems to go better.

I wish I posted everyday

I write a blog post in my head everyday and plan on writing it once the kids go to bed... but I never do and am always sad that my life is not documented the way I would like. When I do have time to post I am torn between "catching-up" on our outings and "new-happenings" and a journal-type entry.

The main reason I haven't posted lately is because I want to to a GRAND post about our latest news. But have not gotten around to taking a picture. So I am just going to do the post - with out a picture.

We bought and are living in our house!! I had planned on documenting every process, thoughts and emotions that come along with this wonderful event - but as with my previous paragraph - I failed. It turns out when you move you don't have a lot of free time - and you don't have access to the Internet.

We are so excited about the house - it is wonderful - we are so happy. I am a little stressed with my "to-do" list. It also turns out that it is not easy to move, unpack, clean, and get ready for your third child (a girl this time) while being 8 months pregnant. I start each day with a million things I need to do to get things cleaned, unpacked, or organized and find that all my energy goes towards just keeping the house clean and then I am just too tired or too sore to touch the boxes. I told Jason that if I just weren't pregnant for 12 hours I could get my to-do list done, but it is probably going to take me all 6 weeks to get ready for our little girl. I have a ten-step plan. I pray she doesn't come early.

Step one - unpack everything
step two - clean and wash everything
step three - organize everything
step four - unpack, organize and buy clothes for the boys for spring
step five - buy, borrow, and find everything I need for a girl
step six - wash and organize all girl stuff
step seven - have baby
step eight - adjust to new baby and and three childrn
(coincide with step seven and eight Jason will be working on the yard)
step nine - decorate house with the the things I have
step ten - buy new things the house needs
I plan on reaching step ten by the end of the summer.

I promise as soon as I unpack our camera I will take a picture and do a "proper" post about our home.

Coming with an empty cup

I feel like dry desert ground just waiting - crying out - for rain to fall so I can drink up - soak up - every last bit.

I have found myself actually day dreaming about General Conference and counting down the days until it is here. I find myself wondering things like: What will the topics be? What will be the theme of the conference? What will Elder Holland speak about? (He has picked some powerful topics the last 3 or 4 conferences) I have never anticipated conference so much. I am just waiting for the down-pour and hope I am spiritually prepared to receive what I need.

Just a fun photo

Last weekend at my cousin's wedding.

It may be the closest thing to a belly shot your gonna get.

Our first snowman

Yes, I feel incredibly guilty that Brock has been obsessed with Frosty the Snowman for 2 winters now and this was our first snowman, I could give you a list of excuses as to why we haven't made one before, but let's be honest... it was laziness. Brock went and "checked" on his snowman about every 10 minutes for 2 days, then he melted. Brock actually thought it was more cool than sad that he melted.

"My Noah"

I have long referred to Noah as "My Noah". While Brock was my first and I was/am completely in love with him, from the moment he was born he had a special connection with his dad that I could just not compete with. But with Noah, I felt like he was mine. This feeling, however, has not helped me know how to parent him. It has been a struggle.

I don't mean to give Noah a bad rap - he is a good baby - still pretty mild mannered and he could be FAR worse, and it is not fair to him, but compared to Brock... any child would seem more difficult. Despite this little attitude of rebellion in his eye and a tint of craziness in his behavior, it is not the "misbehavior" that exhausts me - I actually find it endearing. I get frustrated because I honestly don't know what this kid wants or needs. I feel like we have been "at odds" since he was about 15 months old. I was constantly just trying to keep him happy, rather than teaching him to be patient, obedient, or calm (which was always my first priority with Brock), and anytime I would stop trying to "pacify" him and try to teach him, it was just more frustrating than rewarding. I felt like a complete failure with him.

A few weeks ago I had an epiphany, I was not allowing Noah to grow up the way he wanted to. I was still treating him like a baby. I believe the more independence you give your child and the more you trust them, the better they will behave. I was not treating Noah like a capable child that was able to obey. The epiphany came when I was thinking about Brock at Noah's age.

When Brock was 14 months old I went on bed rest with Noah's pregnancy, despite a 1 week stay at my mom's house I was alone with him all day. A 14 month old boy, in the middle of summer, in a third story apartment - we still had to get out everyday. He had to be very independent and very obedient. I taught him to walk up and down our 3 story cement steps by himself, climb in and out of his high chair and car seat, and run and get his own balls after he had hit/kicked/thrown them. When he was 16 months Noah was born and he took on a lot more responsibility with his own independence and helping out with Noah. By the time he was 18 months, I could trust him to do most things by himself.

Because Noah did not have a younger sibling, I had not taken the time to give him the independence that he so desperately wanted. I would just pick him up and take him where I wanted him to go, or take something from him I did not want him to have. Speed and cleanliness were more important to me than teaching. I changed my attitude and started to treat him like he was his own man who got to make his own decisions - and what a difference it has made!! Some days I forget, and still treat him like a baby, and we have hard days. But when I remember to stop, and let HIM figure it out and let HIM decide to obey or let HIM learn the consequences, our days our good.

I love Noah so much and he brings so much joy to my life, he makes me work harder as a parent and for that I am grateful. I have always felt like I have had these children to teach ME how to be a parent rather than me teaching THEM. He really is "my Noah".