Dailey gets her cast off..

This cute little girl has started Kindergarten with a broken foot followed by a broken leg. She has hobbled to and from school for the last 2 1/2 months and has really done pretty well with it all.
She even fell down Grandma and Grandpa's stairs with the cast on when she lost her footing at the top of the stairs. She now has the dang thing off and was hobbling around as if it was still on for a week after. Now it has been two weeks so we took her to tumbling and the last five minutes she hurt the bottom of her foot and now is back to not walking on it!
Oh boy! Has it been a crazy few months!

Early Trick or Treating...

We did a little trick or treating a week early! We have some neighbors in our ward who have a four year old little boy who is in Dailey's primary class who has had cancer since he was 18 months old. The doctors gave him a few days left to live and so the family planned a week of holidays for him to experience and have before he passed away. Since we lived so close he came to our house. We carved pumpkins and had them lit when he came to our house. Our kids were excited to give him a teat along with some hot wheels cars! Than we were able to join in and walk with him!

This sweet little boy passed away the following week after his holiday festivities. Our kids have been praying for him and his family since he got sick and it has been a neat experience to witness the families faith and love through it all. They had so many long days in the hospital and so many when they were home just filled with all the things they had to do to keep up with medication and everything for their boy and through it all I watched as they never wavered in their testimony and fulfilled their church callings. She was out delivering visiting teaching assignments the day she had to drive to Seattle for another treatment. They have been such examples to me and my family and I am so grateful to have been able to know this little boy and their family!

Fall Break...

We went up the canyon during Fall Break. Cole had a rock collection he needed to get rocks for so we went up to Snowbird and gathered rocks and walked around and played at the playground that was up there!
We did Chick Fa La and came back down and hung out watching the BYU game at Grandma and Grandpa Dearden's house!

Random Day to Day things...

 Tayson got his haircut and we couldn't believe he didn't move a muscle. It was the craziest thing to see a 2 year old just sit so still for a haircut!

                       I helped in Cole's class and than Dailey and I stayed for lunch with Cole!

          Playing the wii together! Tayson thinking he is playing and he was so focused!

                                                                        Outside fun!

                          Cole and Dailey both drew pictures for their Reflections at school.

 Tayson in time out. We have some biting and hitting issues along with shouting and talking back.

                                   Cole and a few buddies playing football in our backyard.

Tayson's 2nd Birthday...

This little guy turned TWO! We are so happy to have him in our family! As I type this he is on my lap helping type and staring at the pics saying "choo choo".
We celebrated the morning by playing with his trains!
We went to the park with cousins and had a great time!
He is such a fun little boy! He is a sweet little boy with a lot of attitude at the same time! He absolutely adores his older brother and calls him "hole" and asks for him about a hundred times a day while he is at school. When its time to pick Cole up he is the first to the car!
He is sleeping terrible right now and keeps Cole up but we sure love this little guy!

Family Home Evening...

Cole came home from church really excited about a lesson he wanted to give as a family home evening.  We had to postpone it one Monday due to the school carnival that kevin wanted to take the kids too and than we did another FHE with our ward where we went and decorated a little boys yard with hearts, when he came home from the hospital. He has cancer and the kids pray for him faithfully every night, so we thought it was important to go!

Anyway he finally got to do his lesson this week. It was on telling lies and if you tell one lie it is easy to repent and be forgiven. He wrapped string around the girls and had them get out and than if they told too many how much harder it was. He bore his testimony at the end and it was really simple and so sweet! I love that our church has us do this. Even though ours last maybe 5-10 minutes I know that it helps us out and brings us closer to Christ and each other as a family!

Lucy Lu and her Tonsil Surgery too...

Before Surgery!

We have been planning to get Lucy's Tonsils out for awhile. When she was two she had surgery on her cyst on her chin and also had a broken leg that year. We felt like she had been through enough that year and couldn't stand to do another thing. So this year with our new baby Whitley coming we decided to do the surgery since we will already be meeting our deductible. 

We took her for another consult with Dr. Tagge. He took one glance at her tonsils and said they were the largest he had seen. He told us we really needed to do this surgery so that she could get the sleep she needed at night to help her brain development.

He told us we would see great results!!!

We were planning on November but they called on a wednesday with a cancellation at Riverton Primary Children's for surgery on Friday. It was quick and we decided to do it! We are glad we did it at that facility. They were so great with her and us. It wasn't as crowded as the Primary's downtown.

After Surgery the doctor came and talked to us and he said that was the most satisfying surgery for him since her tonsils were so Big. He kept telling us how big they were and that we were going to see so many great benefits of having them removed. They did a tonsillectomy and androids too.

When they came to get us to go see her I couldn't wait to get back! She was freaking out. She was screaming and trying to pull out the IV. It took a long time to get her calmed down. It took a little longer to get her to drink the root beer slushy they gave her.

Now we are Four days post surgery and it has been a rough go. She has lost more than 5 pounds and we have a hard time getting medicine down her. When we give her the medicine she says in the saddest voice that she hates us! It is really heartbreaking.  I think we are almost through the toughest days. The nights have been pretty bad too. We had one good night and the others haven't been so great. She wakes up the other kids and than its a whole family affair of crying. Cole and Dailey will go back to bed but Tayson won't so it keeps Kevin and I both up. One with each kid. I am really complaining here but sometimes I sugar coat things and I want to remember going through this little challenge. I know it will be so worth it! And come tomorrow she may be much better! This bottom pic is what I took the night before surgery in effort to try and see what her throat looked like before. Really she had barely any room in her mouth. No wonder she never sleeps good and only wants to drink milk all the time instead of eating!
I can't wait to see the benefits from this surgery on our sweet and tough little girl!

Another side note-her brother Tayson bit her cheek the day before and that is why it is all red. The next day it was all bruised over. That little Tayson can be a stinker!