Thursday, 17 November, 2005

Yesterday was a great day.  I finally found Misha’s glasses.  I realized last week that even though I saw the glass case, it didn’t mean the glasses were actually in the case.  I have been searching high and low for those darn glasses for the past week.  On Monday, I had Misha go and pray in her bedroom and explained that she needed to wait after praying and listen to where Heavenly Father told her to look.  She said that they were in the office but nothing more, and she was unwilling to look.  She lost tv privileges all day long.  I was praying myself and looking under beds, out in the sandbox, in heat vents–anywhere.  She doesn’t really think too much about taking those glasses off and leaving them wherever.  Finally yesterday I was straightening books from the book case in the office and noticed something shiny on top of the books.  I thought it was something else and was just going to leave it.  What a relief when I finally pulled out her glasses.  I yelled, “I found them.  I found them!”, and Chris came running downstairs to see what the excitement was all about.

Kristen drank from a bottle twice yesterday.  I have been trying for awhile now to get her do that, but she hasn’t been the least bit interested.  Yesterday I gave her undiluted apple juice and that was a whole lot better tasting than the diluted stuff and she began to drink.  Wahoo.  Later in the afternoon, I tried a bottle with formula in it, and she drank that as well.  I’ll keep working with her so that at some point I can leave her with a babysitter and have a little freedom.  I would especially like to go to the temple.

Yesterday afternoon I walked downstairs and down the hall toward my office.  Misha came walking out of the office with my broom in her hands and said, “I tried to give Amy a blessing but she didn’t want one.”  I explained to her that only those holding the priesthood like Daddy were able to give blessings.  At the same time I hear Amy complaining loudly in the office and went in to investigate.  “Misha whapped me on the head with the broom.”  Which Misha replies to, “No, I didn’t.  The whapping on the head part was the blessing.”  I had to write everything they said down quickly because I thought it was so funny.

Thursday, 3 November, 2005

Yesterday I was walking down the stairs in front of Misha, and she wanted me to wait for her.  All of a sudden I hear, “Stop right there, old lady.”  I could hardly believe my ears.  The little stinker.  Chris asked me if I gave her soap for saying it but I guess I laughed a little too much to be able to pull that off.

Wednesday, 2 November, 2005

Kristen is learning and growing constantly.  She is able to roll over from her front to her back without any difficulty...though she started doing that at five weeks.  I never encouraged her until she was about five months old.  She doesn’t want to roll back to her stomach yet, but I am sure that will come.  At her six-month well child check up, Kristen weighed in at just under 18 pounds (about the 75th percentile).  She is around 28 inches in length which is off the chart.  Her hair continues to grow as well, I would say about a ½ an inch every month.  It is well over four inches long on top.  She rubbed a lot of it off in the back so that has some catching up to do, but I don’t imagine it will take long.  I can put in pony tails on the top or two little pig tails which are pretty darling. 

Still she will have nothing to do with drinking out of a bottle.  We have tried numerous times, but she just chews on the nipple.  A bit of liquid dribbles in to her mouth from that, but she doesn’t seem to care for the taste of formula all that much.  Fortunately, she has been eating baby foods for the past month.  Her favorites, of course, are the fruits, but she does like squash and sweet potatoes a lot.  Beans and peas are pretty low on her popularity list.  She usually will eat rice cereal in the morning mixed with yogurt and then a vegetable and fruit in the evening.

I took all three girls with me to the doctor’s office when I went for Kristen’s check up.  After the visit, I was feeding Kristen in the car while the other two played on the grass.  Misha and Amy ran over to me saying that Misha’s ear was bleeding.  The day previous, Amy was playing doctor or something with her and poked a Q-tip into her ear causing quite a lot of pain for Misha.  Misha didn’t complain about it much that night so I didn’t think much more of it.  So I finished feeding Kristen and marched us all back into the doctor’s office.  They submitted a request for us to see the doctor on short-notice.  We had to wait for some time before we were able to get back in, AND I got to pay another $20 copay. 

When Dr. Moffatt looked in Misha’s ear, the one ear that was bleeding was pretty red and inflamed indicating that Misha had an ear infection also. Aaaaghh what are the odds?  She checked the other two girls just to be sure.  She should have checked me as well, because I got sick a couple of days later.  Misha got on antibiotics (more money), but she didn’t get sick.  Lucky me!

Kristen has been sick since Sunday, so her schedule is quite off.  I feel so badly for her.  Misha had the same thing a week ago and had a really sore throat.  She was rather froggy for about four days and had a fever and body aches.  You know Misha doesn’t feel well when you can’t find her and you go into her room and find her fast asleep on her bed.  With Misha being sick though, she could tell me what was wrong, so I know from that that Kristen must not be feeling great at all.

My brother, Brad, came for a visit last Saturday and stayed until Tuesday afternoon.  When I realized on Sunday that Kristen was getting sick as well, I asked Chris and Brad if they would give both Misha and Kristen blessings.  I always hope that my babies will wake up healthy in the morning, which they don’t usually, and wonder if it is some lack of faith on my part.  Amy even asked me today why Kristen didn’t get better since daddy gave her a blessing.  I didn’t have an answer.

Great Grandma Andrews came to visit three weeks ago.  Grandpa Kline also came for a short visit.  The girls love to have Grandma Andrews come.  Their favorite memory now, which is also something Chris did with her when he was a little boy, is making chocolate-covered bananas.  They think it is wonderful and love to eat them as well.  Grandma Andrews flew in on Thursday afternoon with Larry coming in around the same time from Phoenix.  Chris took Amy and Misha to go pick them up and even took them into the airport with him.  They thought that was great fun.  I guess traffic wasn’t so great because they didn’t get home until after 7 pm.  Shortly after that, Chris had to head off to the church for a planning meeting with the bishop and other auxiliary leaders.

Amy had school Friday morning, but once she was finished, we headed into Longmont for lunch.  Larry had to be back at the shuttle at 2ish so we weren’t able to spend much time in town, but Grandma did buy Misha a cowboy hat at Target and Amy a skirt and sweater.  We dropped Grandpa Kline off at the shuttle pick up and ran a bunch of errands out in Firestone.  We decided to get pizza from Papa Murphy’s and stay in and watch movies.  Grandma was fine with that.  She’s not up for much activity these days, especially since she is almost 82. 

Saturday morning, I headed off to the church for Super Saturday.  It is the first one that I have ever attended and there were some fun crafts that I was able to make.  Chris stayed home with the girls and even came to pick up Kristen since she was fussing so much.  He did pick up a wheel chair for grandma, so once I got home, we grabbed a quick lunch and then headed over to Flat Iron Crossing for an afternoon of shopping.  Grandma bought a red hat for the lady’s group she belongs to and some wall art for her living room.

We were going to go to Olive Garden for dinner, but the wait was too long and we were all hungry.  We ended up going down the street a ways to On The Border.  I love this restaurant, but the food does not sit well with Kristen, and she is usually upset from it for two to three days after.  I even ordered something different than normal, but it still upset her tummy.  Oh well, I’ll have to wait awhile before I can go back there again.

Grandma’s flight was Sunday morning around 11:45.  Chris stayed for about a half hour of church and then headed home to take her to the airport.  The girls, of course, were sad to see her go.

Amy is still loving and doing well at school.  Chris and I went to Parent Teacher Conference last week.  Mrs. Stephen says that Amy is a great student.  She doesn’t talk a lot, she does what she is asked, and she gets her work done.  Her challenge will be to let others answer questions because she always knows the answers and to not be an overachiever.  She is doing well in all areas.  I am so proud that she is such a great student.

My paperwork for receiving my green card is still in process.  We had to submit some new information because the INS office seems to have lost it (what a surprise!), but I received a letter last month saying that everything is in process however they can’t give any kind of time line for when I should receive my card.  On the other hand, I applied for citizenship in July.  I have my interview on November 21st.  I am not sure if I will be sworn in then or at another time, but I was surprised that my application would be processed so quickly.  I’ll be a citizen before I ever get my green card, but by then it won’t really matter.

We pulled a nasty surprise on the girls.  Kaiser Permanente was having a flu shot clinic last Saturday.  We didn’t tell them that they were going to get a shot until we actually walked into the room full of nurses.  When I told Amy, she started to cry right away and Misha was none too happy either.  They both clung to me and I had to push them ahead of me as we walked over to the nurses who worked with pediatrics.  I hope that it will help us stay healthier this winter season.  Sadly, Misha was already sick with a sore and froggy throat and fever.  She was sad to miss trunk or treat at the church on Saturday night, but not so sad about missing church.

Brad gladly stayed home with Misha and many people asked where Misha was since both Chris and I were at church.  Kristen was pretty docile during church-she even slept twice.  Once I got home, I realized that she too was getting what Misha had. 

Last week the girls were driving me crazy.  Amy was teasing Misha and Misha was whining and whining and whining.  Finally I got so tired of listening to them, I made them write lines.  Amy had to write ten times, “I will not tease Misha.”  She was pretty methodical about it.  She wrote ten I’s then the next word ten times down the page until she completed the task.  That was around two or three in the afternoon.  Misha still hadn’t finished her lines of “I will not whine” by eight pm.  She complained and whined and did some more.  Chris added extra lines but that didn’t inspire her to finish even when she was threatened with even more lines.  Chris told her she would have to go to bed at 7:30 and Misha jumped at the chance.  I told him that she had to stay up and finish what she was given because going to bed was simply another way to get out of the task.  She finally finished at 9 pm with Chris’ supervision.  Such different personalities.

Tuesday, 1 November, 2005

The girls loved Halloween this year.  Amy chose to be a bride, and even though she is almost six, she wore the dress I wore at my baptism when I was eight.  Misha was a spirited little cowgirl.  The weather was cold for trick or treating so I made the girls wear winter jackets and gloves.  They stayed warm but weren't too happy about having to cover up their costumes.

Thursday, 27 October, 2005

The girls’ prayers have taken on a new dimension and you can tell 1) that they really listen to what we are saying, and 2) they are giving more thought to what they are saying.  So many times they finish off a prayer and both Chris and I say, “That was a beautiful prayer.”  I thought it was pretty cute, then, when Amy finished praying one day and Misha said to her, “That was wonderful.”  I remember one night when Amy was saying an especially fervent prayer, she said something to the effect, “I know that you can heal my rash because you (Heavenly Father) are the only one with the power.”  A child’s faith is amazing.

Tuesday, 4 October, 2005

Time sure does go by quickly.  Some of the highlights from the past month include Kristen’s 4 month check up and Misha’s 4 year old check up.  Fortunately for Misha her check up did not included any shots, unfortunately for Kristen, I think she got three.  Poor thing.  Kristen tipped the scales just under 16 pounds.  She is healthy and growing well.  It is sad for me when I put away clothes that she has grown out of knowing that no other baby in our family will be wearing them again.

I was at the library with the girls about a month ago and a little boy was being quite a stinker to my girls and sticking out his tongue at them.  As he continued to do it as we were leaving, even while I was right there, I looked back at Amy and asked, “Are you sticking your tongue out at him?”  She responded, “No.  That wouldn’t be following Jesus and keeping the commandments.”

We went camping at the end of August, leaving on a Friday afternoon after Amy came home from school.  The weather was perfect for camping this year during our annual “Camping with the Hansens” up in the Rocky Mountain National Park.  We were the first to arrive at the site and had our pick of the camp sites.  We got everything set up and a few others started to arrive.  Chris wanted to go for a hike around a lake at Moraine Park, so we left to do that before it got too late.  Many more people had arrived by the time we returned and were starting to get their dinners ready.  Last Christmas, my parents gave me a Dutch oven, at my request, so I thought that now was as good a time as any to use it.  Not quite as easy as the KFC some people brought, but it was a good learning experience.  I decided to make pizza and the peach cobbler.  The first pizza was burnt and crispy, though it wasn’t too bad to eat the filling of cheese and pepperoni.  The second pizza turned out a lot better and by the time we tried the cobbler, it was great.  Everyone was happy to help us eat it.

School is going great for Amy and right now she doesn't mind having to wear a uniform.  She is an excellent student and much of it comes easily and quickly for her.  Many of the students struggle, but I must say that we do a lot to help Amy learn.  We read stories at bedtime where she can often pick out words.  We quiz her and Misha on addition and subtraction at meals and are so impressed by their intelligence.  Misha has an amazing memory for a four-year old.  The other day I was upstairs tidying Kristen’s room and said to Misha, “I need to put masking tape on my list”.  When I got downstairs later and was trying to remember what it was I wanted to put on my list, I asked Misha and she immediately answered, “Masking tape.”

I volunteered at Amy’s school last Friday.  She was excited to have her mom there.  They began the day talking about the date, day of the week, weather, etc.  Amy was often the first to offer an answer.  While every other student in the class had work to finish or redo, Amy was able to go and play because not only had she already finished it, she had done it right the first time.  I was impressed.  There were kids in her class that didn’t know their letters or numbers.  The time we spend with her sure does make a difference.

We are carpooling with a new friend and family that has recently moved into our ward.  Wendy Langston picks up Amy on the way to school before 8 am, and I go to pick up Amy and Madison and drop Madison off at her house at 11 am.  It is nice to not make quite so many trips back and forth.  While I went to the school with Amy last Friday, Kristen stayed with Wendy.  It was her first time with a babysitter and since she doesn’t really take a bottle, I was hoping that everything would go ok.  When I went to pick her up, all I could hear as I walked to the front door, was Kristen crying quite loudly.  She ate her cereal fine, which probably tided her over for awhile, but would not take a bottle for anything.

Misha had a field trip for her preschool class last Tuesday.  The weather was perfect for a morning outside on a hay ride.  We got to travel around the farm, stopping at different fields to pick vegetables.  Misha loved it, and we came home with loads of potatoes, corn, carrots, peas, onions and tomatoes.  I froze corn that night as well as a lot of the tomatoes.  The rest of the tomatoes I saved for chili that I made on Sunday–it turned out quite well I thought.  Kristen came along with us to the farm.  It probably wasn’t all that pleasant for her though.  She had a dirty diaper when we got there and we were in such a rush that I didn’t even get a chance to change her until we got back to the main farm area at lunch time.  Fortunately it wasn't too bad.  Other moms were kind enough to hold her while I got vegetables after they had already gotten theirs.

Misha goes to visit Miss Robyn on Thursday for orientation and then classes officially begin next Tuesday.  She has been looking forward to it for some time.  The classes are late starting because Robyn has been finishing up her radiation treatment from having breast cancer in March.  I hope that everything goes well.

Amy has had a rash on her body that was spreading all over so we took her into the doctor last Monday.  We also combined the visit with her yearly physical and kindergarten vaccines.  Poor thing.  When she found out that she was going to have to get shots, her afternoon was ruined.  When the nurse finally came in to give the shots, Amy had been already dreading them for a bout 15 minutes, and she broke into tears.  Chris and I held her hands throughout.  Fortunately she won’t need anymore until she is 12 or 13.  Chris also had his yearly physical.  I took the girls outside to play and to feed Kristen during his exam.  Nice to get that over with and to know that Amy is caught up on her immunizations.  Sadly, I will probably have us all get flu shots this year, but I won’t mention that for awhile.

Saturday, September 17, 2005

We got tickets from the library for Elitch's in Denver.  The girls have seen the roller coaster and other amazing rides from the freeway as we have driven past and always wanted to go.  We asked our friends Jamie and Jeremy if they wanted to come with us.  Jeremy jumped at the chance.

I rode one of the roller coasters that was just plain crazy and wondered what kind of craziness had gotten in to me.  I was happy to finally walk off of it in one piece.

Thursday, 8 September, 2005

Amy learned how to ride a bike!!!  She was thrilled when she finally "got it" and was soon zipping around the neighborhood.

Thursday, 25 August, 2005

Amy loved her second day of school.  When I asked her how it went she said, “Perfect.”  Good to know that it is living up to all of her long-held expectations.  Misha isn’t quite as happy about school.  She asks repeatedly how long before we pick Amy up or tells me that she thinks Amy is ready to come home.  Most of the time she just says, “I miss Amy.”  The nice thing about it though is that there is rarely any whining, fighting, or arguing in the morning.

Kristen has a stuffy nose.  Poor thing!  But she is still smiling and happy.  She woke up around 2:30 am and then again at 3 am because she couldn’t breathe.  I picked her to rock her and hold her upright to let her nose drain, but she instantly thought it was time to eat and would have nothing to do with just plain old rocking.  Once she was finished eating she was raring to go, mind you, that’s at 3:30 in the morning.  I held her close until she began to close her eyes and finally she fell back to sleep and slept past 8 am.  I put her to sleep on her “Boppy” pillow which kept her head and upper body elevated and she was able to sleep so much better.  Nice because that gave me time to get Amy ready for and to drop her off at school.  Misha was very compliant when I told her that she needed to be dressed and have breakfast if she was to come with me.  Yesterday she didn’t get to come because she wasn’t ready, and Chris said she was rather upset with me.

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Amy officially started school today.  She was so excited.  I think it was as exciting as Christmas morning for her.  I was exercising in the basement when I looked over at the stairs and saw her peaking her head around the corner.  I suggested that she go back to sleep because it was only 6 am, but she was too wound up already for sleeping.  She has been looking forward to this day for years and it has finally arrived.

Her clothes were already laid out for her last night and she was raring to put on her uniform.  I had her eat breakfast first so that she wouldn’t get her clothes dirty and Amy agreed that that was a good idea.  She understands that she will be going to school Monday through Friday and will have the weekends off.  I thought this morning as I was cleaning up breakfast that she would need to get used to that because it isn’t going to change much for many many years to come.

We arrived at the school which is a brand new charter school–Carbon Valley Academy-that was only conceived as an idea last summer at this time.  Amazing to see how much has been accomplished in such a short amount of time.  Cars were lining the side of the road (the school is located in what was an empty warehouse in the business district of Frederick) and we had to walk about a block to get to the school.  All of the students, teachers and parents were lined up according to class and at 8:15 were able to file into the school through the makeshift gymnasium/lunch room.

The kindergarten students and parents filed into the room and distributed school supplies into boxes.  Amy found her desk and name tag and met her four table mates.  I took a couple of pictures and was happy to see how excited she was.  She gave me a hug and a kiss (and I thought that’ll only last a couple of years before it will embarrass her) and I along with the rest of the parents headed back to the gym for a meeting with the principal.  He could have said everything in a couple of minutes, but seems to like to talk.  Nice man though.  I was back home by 9 am to find Misha and Kristen watching “Finding Nemo”.  Kristen was ready for a nap and Misha got to make her bed.  She was quite upset that I didn’t take her with me this morning, but one, she wasn’t ready, and two, she seems to be getting a cold.  I hope it doesn’t pass through the family.

Thursday, 18 August, 2005

I have gone far too long without writing and catching up is not going to be fun.  We left on Thursday August 4 for a 10-day vacation to Utah.  It started raining as we left Colorado and continued to increase in intensity throughout the day, sometimes with whiteout type conditions as we drove through the mountains.


We drove to Glenwood Springs where we met up with some friends of Chris’ from the Philippines who now live in Colorado.  We picked up Shawn in Glenwood Springs and then drove about 30 to 40 minutes to Aspen to meet his sister, Sheila, and see some of the tourist sites around there.  The rain started again as we headed into the mountains to Maroon Bells-the name of the mountains.  The lake there is supposedly very beautiful, but it poured as we arrived .  I stayed in the van with Kristen while the others got out to check out the lake, and by the time they came back they were soaked.  Kind of a waste for the $10 we had to pay as an admission fee into the mountains.

We decided to drive back toward Glenwood Springs for dinner and stopped in a town between the springs and Aspen (can’t remember the name though).  We chose a small pizza shop when the Mexican food place was packed and parking was nowhere to be had.  It was certainly not superb, but passable.

After leaving Shawn and Sheila, we continued on to Grand Junction where Chris had booked a hotel for the evening.  Nothing fancy but they did have a continental breakfast in the morning which was nice.  Kristen was a dear and slept throughout the night and continued to do so for the rest of the trip.  We are sure blessed to have such a sweet baby.  Amy and Misha too were great about going to bed and fell asleep quickly after long and busy days.

We left for Provo the next morning and arrived around 2:30 or 3 pm.  We stopped at a park where the girls could play, and I could nurse Kristen.  We figured since we were in Provo that we would stop at Susan’s and let the kids play with their cousins.  That’s what they had been looking forward to for the past couple of weeks as they anticipated their trip to Utah.  We had hoped to meet up with Mom and Dad later that night but after being cut off on the cell phone a number of times as we drove through the mountains, they decided to run down to Salt Lake to pick up something for Dallin.

Instead, Chris called his Novell friends and arranged to get together with them for dinner in Spanish Fork.  We met at The Pizza Factory.  I was tired and Kristen was beginning to be more and more frazzled so it wasn’t so much fun for me, but there were kids for the girls to play with and we headed over to Brett and Deni’s after dinner to see their new house.

Brad had also closed on his new home earlier in the day, so we didn’t stay long so that we could arrive at Brad’s house before 10 pm.  He graciously allowed us to stay the night even though he was going back to Maureen’s for the night.  He had been staying at her place for a couple of days between moving out of his condo and closing on his new home.  The view was incredible from his living room and was one of the big draws for him.  He now has a two bedroom home with a basement framed and ready to be finished.  He lives on the Utah County side of the Point of the Mountain across the freeway from Thanksgiving Point.  He lives in a new development called Traverse Mountain.

We arrived at his house late just as Mom and Dad and Dallin and Donna were leaving to go back to Dallin and Donna’s house.  The girls were sleeping so we made up beds for them and they were back to sleep for the night.

Brad dropped by briefly on Saturday morning to bring food that he had been storing in Maureen’s refrigerator.  He was having the carpets cleaned and asked if we would stick around until the cleaners came to let them in.  We drove over to Dallin’s and dropped Amy and Misha off for a little bit to play with Angie and Wade.  Isaac had been throwing up, but they figured it was from the four hot dogs he had wolfed the previous night.

We waited at Brad’s for 45 minutes for the carpet cleaner guy to show up.  He was supposed to be there by 11:00 am but was quite late.  We finally left there, went to pick up the girls and headed towards The Practice for Brad to check Misha and Kristen’s eyes.  Chris was worried that her eyes weren’t tracking like they should.  Turns out she is doing great, no worries yet, and Misha’s eyes have improved in the last year.  Wahooo.  I hope that they will continue to do so.

We picked up a few groceries on the way home and then went to help Brad unload.  Once we arrived, Kristen chose this moment to have a break down.  I think she was simply so out of sync with her routine and schedule and so overtired from not getting a good nap.  She cried for quite some time, slept a short while and then was up again.  The good news is that she slept until after 8 am Saturday and Sunday morning.  In fact, we had to wake her up on Sunday in order to get her ready for church on time.

Sadly, when Brad checked to see if his utilities were still working, the hot water that he felt was the last little bit in the tank.  He didn’t realize that the gas had been shut off and was not able to have someone out to turn it on until Monday morning.  So we didn’t bathe or shower on Saturday or Sunday and finally I boiled water on the stove for a bath for me and the girls Monday morning.

We attended Brad’s church with him at 9 am along with Mom and Dad.  The ward was huge and reminded us of our ward in Colorado.  Even the church was new and finished in the same colors.  Brad’s ward however is growing so much faster than ours.  We thought our growth was crazy.  They are getting ready to be split soon.  There were four looooooong baby blessings in Sacrament meeting.  Our girls don’t usually get to have paper and pen until after the sacrament is finished so it was especially long and boring for them as the testimony portion of the meeting did not even begin until 9:55.

We went back to Brad’s after church and just vegged until 5:30 pm.  Dallin and Donna had a dinner at their house for the entire family and the girls were excited to play more with their cousins.  Amy and Angie get along a lot better now, but Dallin’s boys were pretty rough and punching Misha; wasn’t too happy with that.  Her tender little whiney heart caused her to cry a couple of times.  Kristen was loved by all.

Monday morning at 10 am we were scheduled to be at the Sears in South Provo for family pictures with the Ball family.  After the fun adventure of heating water and bathing, we arrived right on time.  It was nice to see more cousins, many that we had never met before.  The pictures went on for quite some time, especially since each family did photos as well.  When they were finally ready and they showed us ours, I was not impressed whatsoever.  They agreed to redo ours, but the photographer was definitely not pleased.  Finally that was done, we had picked all the shots we wanted, and we headed to the food court. 

Chris, Amy, and Misha were going to Seven Peaks with some of his family, and Kristen and me were hanging with Brad, Mom, and Dad to pick out a couch and carpet for his house.  (What he finally settled on he has since changed his mind about and will continue looking).  He did find a lawnmower though.

After a long afternoon, and too many stints of feeding Kristen in the bathroom on a hard chair, I headed back to Brad’s with Mom and Dad while he went back to Maureen’s to pick up his bike.  The traffic was quite congested, and I knew we would be cutting it close to get to Kristen’s baby blessing on time.  Chris and girls pulled in about 20 minutes after I did.  I was finishing up feeding Kristen, and we had to then hurriedly change and pack up all of our stuff.

The blessing was scheduled for 6 pm, but so many people were late with the bad traffic.  Chris’ mission president and one of his companions and family (Jeff and Jo Isom) were able to attend along with everyone from both sides of our family.  It was especially poignant for Chris, and I could tell that he struggled to keep his emotions in check during the blessing.  After Kristen’s blessing, Kyle blessed Dylan as well.  Nice because Kyle’s parents and sister were able to attend as they live in Springville.

Karra King, my niece, took notes during the blessing and these were some of the things Kristen was blessed with:

“Heavenly Father, in the name of Jesus Christ and with the power of the holy Melchizedek Preisthood, we come before thee with this infant in our arms to give her a name and a blessing.  The name that she will be known as is Kristen Nicole Kline.  Kristen you are born into a special time and are a special and chosen spirit of Heavenly Father.  I bless you to have extraordinary strength...You will have the opportunity to marry in the temple.

You have parents who love you.  I bless you to have a free mind to learn everything that our Father in Heaven would have you learn.  I bless you to have a spirit of peace and to be a peacemaker in your home.  You have a strong intellect....Be safe....Seek to know things from the will of Heavenly Father.  I bless you to have the spirit.  In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”

After the blessings were finished, there were many pictures taken but we finally were able to get everyone out of the church and headed toward Chuck-o-Rama in Draper where we had reserved a room and had dinner.  It was a great evening that we all enjoyed (that is, except for Dallin and Donna as Isaac was throwing up again).

After saying our goodbyes, we headed north toward Ogden and Wolf Creek.  It was about 15 minutes to get through Ogden to the mouth of the canyon and then about another 20 minutes to travel to and find Wolf Creek.  All of the girls had been sleeping in the car, but Amy was wide awake once we arrived at the resort.  Linda had booked two condos next to each other.  Ours had two bedrooms that slept our family and Becky and Kyle slept in a loft upstairs that also had beds for their kids and a separate bathroom.

Fortunately the unit had a toilet plunger because our bathroom’s toilet was plugged and Chris had to spend time plunging it once we arrived.  He was very vocal to Becky at how disgusting it was.  Since they were the only ones staying in the condo, it was likely someone in their family that plugged it, but she didn’t think it could have been her family.  Go figure.

Tuesday morning arrived bright but not too early.  Linda and Candace planned to go to Costco to purchase food for the week and since Chris was strongly encouraging me to get a swimming suit, Kristen and I went along.  We bought sooooooo much food, more than we could have eaten in two weeks probably. 

We went swimming in the afternoon.  Misha said that she wasn’t feeling too great and threw up as we were walking to the pool.  She didn’t want to be left behind while everyone else was swimming though.  There was a small wading pool there that was quite warm and Kristen loved it.  I sat with her while the girls swam and played.  They had a great time.  Once we were back at the condo though, Misha started to throw up more.  Fortunately, the first time, Chris got her mostly to the tile floor before she puked.  She threw up in the garbage can next, poor thing.  She fell asleep early.  Chris started feeling nauseous and there began my very fun evening.  He had the chills so I kept warming up towels and covering him up.  Once it cooled off, I had another towel ready to go on him.  He finally threw up, but never really felt better until the next day.

Amy spent the evening over at Grandma’s condo eating and watching tv.  I went over for awhile to eat after Chris threw up and was feeling better, but didn’t stay very long.  I tried to have Amy come back with me because I knew that she would be falling asleep soon.  She was laying on the floor watching Star Wars.  She wanted to stay, so I let her.  Becky said that she would bring her home.  Not long after I left, Amy was asleep on the floor while cousins played around her.

I heard Misha moan during the night and quickly got up to see what was wrong.  Good thing because she was starting to barf by the time I got into her room and could hold the garbage can under her chin.  She is frustrating when I do that though because she keeps trying to push the garbage can away.  She must have felt better after that because she fell asleep for the rest of the night and seemed to be better in the morning.

Wednesday morning was full of relaxing.  Linda had thought she wanted to go go go all week long, but she starting enjoying doing nothing and so the rest of us were happy that we weren’t compelled to go or do anything.  Chris wasn’t feeling quite up to par and took the opportunity to sleep while I took the girls swimming.  Kristen actually slept in the stroller while I watched the girls swim and play with cousins and Grandma and Grandpa.  Chris came over about 45 minutes later and swam for a bit.

Since it was our responsibility to fix dinner on Wednesday evening, we didn’t stay too long at the pool.  We BBQ’d hamburgers and hotdogs.  I thought that the kids would mostly eat the hotdogs, but lots of the parents did too.  It was an easy fix without an overabundance of clean up.

On Thursday Becky and Kevin and their families and us decided to go to Temple Square.  Linda and Larry drove to Provo to help Lori and Jenni move and clean their apartment.  Yes, they are needy.  The rest of us arrived in Salt Lake around noon and found a park close to the capitol building to have lunch at.  The kids ate some, played, ate some more, played more... you get the idea.  I think we got a little food in them.

After lunch we headed to Temple Square and the church office buildings.  Chris wanted to have us go to the top to see the view, which we did, and after we came back down, I looked back to see Drew, Becky’s little boy, throwing up on the floor.  What I missed seeing however was how he had already thrown up all over his dad.   The rest of us went outside while they cleaned up.  Becky and Kyle decided that they had already had enough and headed back to Wolf Creek to rest and do some laundry. 

The rest of us stayed a while longer, took some pictures, went to the visitor’s center, saw the Christus, etc.  We headed over to the mall to get something cool to drink.  Kevin and Candace then decided that they were tired (Candace is 4 ½ months pregnant) and were going back to Wolf Creek.  Chris had told the girls that they could ride the light rail, so I stayed with Kristen at Mervyn’s while they went for a ride.  There wasn’t much at Mervyn’s to catch my eye, so we headed over to the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and sat in the lobby listening to beautiful piano music.  Kristen slept while I enjoyed the music and watched people.  Before leaving Salt Lake, we made one more stop at the Distribution Center to get new garments.  Traffic was awful on the way back.  We weren’t thinking and left Salt Lake right at rush hour.  Fortunately the girls slept.

Becky cooked a spaghetti casserole for dinner which was quite good.  Misha didn’t care for the look of it even and literally made herself sick over one bite.  As we sat at the table, she finally threw up after gagging on the one and only bite in her mouth.  Good thing she is a slow eater as most of the family had already left the table.  Chris put her to bed after that, and she was one starving hombre come morning time.

Since we were gone most of the day, Amy finally got her daddy to take her swimming after dinner.  It’s vacation after all.  Chris didn’t even get in, but she had fun nevertheless.

Friday morning we all headed up to Snow Basin ski area.  Most of us were going to take the tram up to the top of the mountain.  Kevin, Chris and Kyle had a little more adventure in mind.  They rented mountain bikes and spent the day riding down the mountain.  Chris and Kevin stayed together and Kyle and his friend rode together.  Chris was exhilarated by the experience.  He absolutely loved it.  It is something that he has always wanted to do so I am glad that he was able to get the chance.

The rest of us came down the mountain about an hour later and headed back to Wolf Creek.  Lucky me got to make dinner for everyone else.  Lazy bunch of people.  The girls played for the afternoon and when Chris got home around 4 pm we all went swimming.

By the time Saturday morning rolled around.  I had had enough “vacation”.  Sharing a condo began to get old and wear on my nerves at that point.  Kristen hadn’t had a really good nap all week long due to noisy kids and having a room right by the front door.  We started getting things packed up in the morning and headed back down to Brad’s place around 11 am.  Larry and Linda, along with Candace, Jeremy, and Jonathan were also leaving on Saturday but they had so much stuff to pack, they were lucky I think to finally get out of there before 3 pm.

Candace and her boys were riding back with Larry and Linda to spend the week with her family and then attend Lori’s wedding on the following Saturday.  Speaking of Lori, I think I saw her Monday morning at the pictures in Provo and then Tuesday night for a short time.  She never even bothered to introduce us to Sam.  Anyway, Candace would stay with her family, Kevin was flying home to work and then flying back again to Vancouver the following weekend for the wedding.

We spent a little time with Dallin and Donna and family, but by that time, we were so familied out that we just got some pizza and went to Brad’s for the evening.  We were planning to leave Sunday morning to drive home.  Our trip home was uneventful and all the girls were pretty good in the car.  I was just glad to finally be back in my own bed.  I think Kristen was too.  She looked around the house and settled in quickly.

We were home for a couple of days and then Chris was off again to Vancouver for the wedding on Thursday the 18th.  We probably all would have gone to the wedding if Linda hadn’t been so adamant that she wanted us at the family reunion instead.  Seems to me that an event such as a wedding should pull rank, but whatever...  Sadly for Chris, he was the only one without his family there.  Thus he became the “royal run all the errands” guy.  Lucky him huh. 

Amy and I along with other two girls got to go visit her teacher, Mrs. Stephen at the school on Thursday the 18th as well.  We got to see where her classroom would be and take a tour of the rest of the school.  Impressive I say.  Amy was so excited for school to start.