Lincoln’s Surgery

It’s over and he’s back and everything went great!  I knew he would be fine and I stayed pretty calm about the whole thing but it is a little scary and nerve racking to send your barely two year old into surgery.  But he did awesome.  I feel like I took the easy way out a little bit because I wasn’t even there.  I dropped Ryan and Lincoln off at 7:15 this morning, took Sawyer to the gym with me while I taught my class, came home and then picked them up at noon.  It was nice to be distracted.  I only thought about him one time during the hour I was teaching.  But as Ryan carried him into the hospital I couldn’t help tear up a little bit knowing what was ahead.  He looked so small and helpless.  I guess I should mention what the surgery was.  Ever since he was only a few months he’s had a hydrocele in his left scrotum.  They are fairly common in baby boys but often go away on there own.  Since it hadn’t and he’s two now they needed to remove it.  It’s been pretty funny actually.  Sometimes in the bath tub Lincoln will exam himself and say “Big Ball, Little Ball” because his left side is at least twice as big as his right.  We started prepping him for the surgery a couple weeks ago telling him he’d have “Two little balls.  No more big ball”.  This is captured in the video below.

On our way to the Hospital - You’ll notice Lincoln is holding an egg in most of the pictures.  It’s this weird obsession he’s had lately.  I often make him eggs and he always wants to hold one, and doesn’t want to give it back.  First thing in the morning now he asks to “hold egg?” We hard boiled one and the past few days he’s been carrying it around most the day with him.  His new nick name here is “Horton” from Dr. Seuss’s book “Horton Hatches the Egg”.  So random.  So funny.

Before the surgery.  We literally took him straight from his crib to the car, which is why he’s in pajamas. 

Waking up after the surgery.  He looks a bit groggy.  Ryan said he did so awesome when they put him under.  They let Ryan hold him as they used a gas mask to put him to sleep.  He said he was very calm and Ryan was asking him to spell different words (spelling calms him down – weird, I know).  Anyway, he asked him to spell “moon” and Lincoln said “M, O, O, O, O, O, O, N” slowing down with every O and then fell asleep.  I kind of wish I was there for that.

Apparently he was not so happy to be waking up after surgery.^{Leaving the Hospital.}

Then, a couple hours later, we went to the zoo. I threw this in because check out  the Sawyer’s finger pulling my lip down!  This is my life.He’s doing great!  Thanks goodness for awesome Doctors and modern medicine.

Party Time!

My sweet, dear friend Heather is pregnant!  After trying to get pregnant for over 3 years and being told they had fertility complications they decided to foster to adopt.  They were mid way through that process when Heather went in for an examination relating to fertility complications when she was told she was in fact pregnant!  It was a shock to say the least.  We are all so thrilled for her.  I had the honor of hosting her shower on Saturday.  It was so much fun! 

I wanted to keep the food semi light because only a few hours later we had a Relief Society Café Rio dinner, so we served salad, Chicken Pepper Broccoli Braid (my most favorite dish ever), home-made lemonade, and a few not so light desserts :)

We ate, planned games, opened presents and discussed all things baby. She will be such a great mom.  As a family therapist she has helped so many other families and children and I am so happy for her to soon have her own.

My sister gave me the genius idea to gift a children’s story book you love and have everyone sign the inside as guest sign in book.  When I found this book and read it I started crying in the store.  It was perfect.  Love you Heather!

Half Marathon

Well, I can check that off my bucket list.  The funny thing is it hasn’t actually ever been on my bucket list, and I’ve never really wanted to run one.  I mean, don’t get me wrong - If you know me you know I love to workout, but I’m more into the group fitness thing and not so much the running thing.  But then a couple months ago some of my girlfriends invited me to run this race with them and I thought, what the heck.  I’m not pregnant and have time to train and I have awesome girls to train with.  Thus, this is how I spent my morning.

     It was GREAT!  I was actually really surprised by how much I enjoyed it.  The weather was Perfection, the course was awesome, (down hill at the beginning and then mostly flat the rest of the way) and I had fabulous friends with me.  My only regret is that I wish I would have pushed myself a little harder the last 3 miles.  I really wanted to finish in under 2 hours and so when I had run 10 miles in 1 hour and 28 minutes I thought, “I have 32 minutes to run three miles” and so I slowed down a ton.  Stupid – I know.  According to my watch I finished at 1 hour 56 minutes and 30 something seconds.  I’m still waiting for my official chip time.  Here’s a wonderful picture of the girl who finished about 2 seconds before me.    Poor Ryan, he felt so bad he didn’t get me…I don’t really care.

They both started screaming there brains out when they saw me run through the finish.  They would only stop when I was holding them.  This is Jessica C, or as my sisters and mom know her, “Jessica Twins”.  I use that name to differentiate my two Jessica friends to them because no big deal this girl had twins not even a year ago.  She was my training partner and I had so much fun training with her and going on long runs and chatting the whole time.  I could NOT have done it without her.  We ended up not staying together during the race but we should have because our times only ended up being about 3 or 4 minutes apart.  I love her.  She started crying she was so happy to finish under two hours. Here’s the rest of the group.  Jessica, Amanda, Jessica, me.  I’m so proud of us.  The biggest bummer about the whole thing is that poor Amanda pulled her groin muscle half way through the race and was in tons of pain and had to walk a bunch – but amazingly she still managed to finish with a respectable time.Apparently I didn’t get the memo that we were all wearing our just past the knee workout pants.Ryan was super supportive every time I went on long runs and was a good motivator.  He was always giving me goals and tips.  Sometimes it was annoying but he’d just say, “I just want you to be all you can be”.  Why do I get the feeling he’s going to push our boys a lot physically.  Good thing I can be there to balance him out and remind them it’s just for fun and we’re proud of them no matter what.  Anyway, Ryan said he’d clean the whole house by himself multiple times if I finished in under two hours.  I don’t think he thought I could do it.  Looks like I have a break from house cleaning for a while!One other downfall…my second toes took a beating.  That’s not purple nail polish.But the rest of me feels great!  Had to take some muscle pics after feeling so invincible :)

More Birthday Fun

 

When Ryan got home from work we had cake and ice cream and opened a few gifts with a few friends. 

We have a smaller version of the magna doodle and Sawyer thinks it’s awesome.  He loves to scribble all over it.  I thought I’d get him a bigger more legit upgraded version.  That was about the only gift that I actually wrapped and didn’t end up bustin’ out before his actual Birthday.

Back tracking a bit before Sawyer’s Birthday, these next few pics were actually a couple weeks ago.  My friend Bethany’s little guy turned two and had a dinosaur party that was so fun.  You can check it out here.  Anyway, Here’s Lincoln with some of his best buds.

Okay, now we can fast forward back to this past weekend again. We decided to take a trip to the DC temple and visit my sister and her family.  It was great!  The boys got along much better than last time and slept through the nights all three nights.  What more can you ask for? We went to Great Falls on Sunday and just hung out and enjoyed the weekend.  We also had another little family party with Sawyer with more gifts and cake.  Bust Bud cousins.  That’s what they are.

Back to the Birthday boy.  I love him so much.  A few things to remember about Sawyer at one year old.  He is very independent and easy going.  He self entertains and does so many things by himself like getting on and off the fire truck, drinking from his sippy cup, and feeding himself.  He’s tough.  Lincoln sometimes pushes him around but he rarely cries when he falls down or gets hurt.   He’s a great, flexible sleeper.  He’s a great eater and by that I mean he’s not too picky – except when it comes to milk…he’s not a fan.  He loves to jump and climb on the bed and couch.  I love him to pieces and can’t imagine my life without him.