All in the Last Week!

As many of you know Abigail is crazy. She is very tiring and out of control. I try to teach her how we should act and the things that are and aren't appropriate. I sure hope some day it finally sinks in. I don't know how many times I have told her we don't go out front. Last Wednesday she went out into the garage and was playing like she normally does. I was all around the house gathering laundry and getting out stains and such, when I got the feeling to check the garage and see how Abby was doing. When I opened the door to my horror and surprise the garage door was open about 3 feet or so. I was like, "Oh crap!" I immediately run outside in my pajamas and barefoot. I go over to the neighbor's front yard, she likes to go over there and play. No, Abby. So I decide to go over to "the rock park" as Sawyer calls our retention basin. Nope, no Abby. About this time I begin to panic a little bit wondering how long she was out and where she was. As I am running down the street I see Abigail outside of our neighborhood, outside the gate! I was like no way. She was down by the gate, I think trying to get in, maybe she just went out, but to me it looked like she was trying to come in. I got her and yes then I spanked her, I know terrible mom. I wanted her to know that, that was NOT okay. I am not sure but she loves the garbage man and he was coming around, so I think she went outside to watch and then I think she followed him out one gate, and when I found her she was trying to get back in. Who knows?

Then on Tuesday while I was at therapy with Matthew, Abby escaped out the front door of my parents home. My mom came downstairs to find the front door open and Abby no where to be found. She had wandered out and a neighbor had found her and took her down to another neighbor's thinking it was their daughter, but no she belongs unfortunately to the Evans'.

Friday at my parents, she got out again when she was thought to be in the backyard. Once again she was nowhere to be found in the house, so Sawyer ran around trying to find her. She found her in the backyard of the same neighbor's home as the previous time. When Sawyer got my dad and got back Abby was gone. So they went around to the front and the neighbor was just coming out to bring her back home. She went out the front and their gate to the back must have been open so she went all the way back and then when she was done, she helped herself into their house! Aside from tying her up I don't know what to do. Knowing her she'd figure out how to get herself out of that one anyway. Any advice? Anyway, later that night she was at my mother-in-laws being watched. She was taking a bath and must have brought some toilet paper into the water. Well, we all know what happens when toilet paper gets wet. She must have realized this isn't good, so she threw one roll into the toilet and flushed it. Well, the toilet didn't like that very much and so it overflowed. I really hope we grow out of this stage and we become a person that I can take out in public. Right now that is tough and I would like to go places or would like to not feel tied down with a crazy 2 year old. If only she could give some of her energy and strength to Matthew. Too bad! I am sure she will survive to see her 3rd birthday!

So Cute!

Matthew just started laughing about a month ago. He rarely smiles and laughs for me, but just the other day he finally was really smiley, and laughing with me. I thought I've got to get this on camera. Well, of course the camera comes out and he stops. Also, it was very hard to tape and try to make him laugh. Yesterday Brendon was trying to get him laughing so I could get it on video. We finally got him laughing. He usually laughs with his dad and his grandma's, little stinker. I will continue to work on getting a better video of him laughing, but had to get this posted. It isn't much but considering about 2 months ago he was barely smiling and not laughing at all this is precious to me.

School is Finally Out!

I am a little happy about school being out, but at the same time now my schedule is all messed up and I have to think of things to keep us all busy and from going insane. We don't have a whole lot planned for this summer, mostly going up north and swimming to escape the heat. Thanks again to Felicia Kriloff, I have some pictures of Sawyer from the last day of school. She was sad for school to end. Hopefully, she will be like that the rest of her life. I know, I'm dreaming. She had a good year, learned a lot, and did really well in school.

Sawyer with her teacher Mrs. Bornowski and her little baby Morgan.

Taking a picture with some of her friends, Maddi and Lilly.

Playing a game at the end of the year party. This is Sawyer on her first day of school.

And here she is on her last day of school.

Sawyer is Awesome!

We got a call about a week ago saying that Sawyer had won a place in the poetry recitation contest at her school. We had to wait until the Arts and Letters Night at her school to find out her placement. When they began calling out the winners I thought they would call her for 3rd place, they didn't. Then I expected to hear her name for 2nd place, nope. To my amazement she placed 1st. I am so proud of her. She was so excited because she got a medal. She has been wanting one for awhile for something. She was so excited. She was able to then recite her poem for everyone. She recited Georgie Porgie. She has done well all year with her poems, and I am glad she isn't too afraid to get up infront of people, that will help her out in life. Way to go Sawyer!Sawyer with the 2nd and 3rd place students.

I wanted to get a better picture since it was dark but she got into the shower before I could get it so I got her the next day.

Way to go. By the way she also lost her front top tooth. She pulled it out herself. She was also very pleased that she did it all by herself. I am sad though because she is losing her cute baby teeth. Oh well, it had to happen someday.

My Poor Little Guy

Well finally after 6 months Matty was healthy enough and strong enough to get circumcised. After our fun with the MRI, I made sure to let everyone know that he could not be put under. They let me know that he wouldn't be given a narcotic that would really put him to sleep. He would be given gas though a mask and then an epidural. He did really well and was not happy when I went back into recovery. He was hungry, and as soon as I was given the clear I was able to feed him and he was all good. He was numb for the next 6 hours or so. It was sad about the time everything wore completely off he woke up and was a little whinny and I could tell he was in some pain. All in all he is doing well and I am so glad to have that part or his life over with. I am so happy though, I feel like he is moving right along and getting closer to normal, whatever that is? I guess just one more check off the list, yeah! I didn't have my camera so I took some pics with my phone. Seriously, how did people survive with out cell phones.

Matthew was waving his arm so fast, that is why it looks invisible.

Way to go buddy!

The Month of April

So I thought I was behind before. I guess I just like to get so behind it's overwhelming. Be ready because this may be a long one to get myself caught up. Starting at the beginning of the month. Abby has been working on potty training. I am kind of letting her do it herself, mostly because that is the type of girl she is. She WILL do the opposite of what I want, just because she can. I have just been giving her incentives to go. Anyway, she went all by herself and put her panties on again all by herself. She did pretty good but had a few problems. She now almost a month later is pretty much all the way potty trained. We are still not 100% but almost there. Thankfully enough that the diaper bill is much less, thank heavens! That doesn't look very comfortable, I guess it doesn't bother her. Not only did she not get her bum covered but she got them on insideout. I guess at least she got the legs in right and they weren't on backwards either.

Matthew

Got to go to his first baseball game on April 7th. Even though they lost it was fun to be there. We had really good seats. We were on the second row from the wall. I got to stare at Connor Jackson's bum!

Doesn't he looked thrilled.Amazingly I got Matthew to sleep even though everytime there was a noise he would startle which was quite often.I actually have no idea what this is from. I am assuming Brendon took it. I just thought it was cute, both girls falling asleep in their bean bags while watching a movie. This is when you just love being a parent.

Easter

We had such a fun Easter. We started it off on Saturday. The Evans cousins got together and played games, ate, had an Easter egg hunt, and visited. It was so fun to visit with my cousins and see all the ones visiting from Utah. We were going to go to Usury Pass but it was raining so we moved it to a Ward building.

Playing Missionary Tag.

One of our family favorites. The Easter egg hunt has begun. Abby finding eggs also Kristen with the twins Seth and Spencer. Uncle Scott with Brody; Brad, Meghan, and Tyson Miner; Spencer and SWBy; Karen and Patyon Abby and Payton finding more eggs.

Sawyer getting in on the action.

Abby stops to eat some of her candy. She was so funny she would find an egg, pick it up, and shake it to make sure there was candy in it before she would put it in her bucket.
Sawyer and Ruth looking for more.
Sawyer and Abby showing off their haul of eggs.

Later that night we met at my mom's for our Easter celebration. We ate the traditional dinner of ham, potatoes, green bean casserol, etc. We had our annual egg bash competition, and of course and easter egg hunt.

Sawyer coloring her egg for the bash.

Abby having fun with the colors. So much fun she was done after this picture because she spilt color all over the table.All the children showing off their eggs before the Egg Bash.Brendon battling Ruthie. He lost. Abby battles Uncle Reddin. She lost. Our whole family got out on the first round. Next year Neus' the egg trophy will be ours. Stephanie has won it the past 2 years. Since she wasn't here this year to do a three peat, Karen was the winner!
Here was Matthew during our Easter festivities. He chilled while we ate, dyed eggs, had our bash, and while we did the Easter egg hunt. Again it was raining and dark so we did the hunt inside. Here's Sawyer looking for more eggs. Abigail cleaning off the piano.The grandchildren checking out their spoils. My mom had over 100 eggs for 6 grandchildren, it was ridiculous. With our hunt the next day with our family the girls had quite the candy stash. On Sunday night we went to Brian and Lainie's for dinner and visiting. Thank goodness there was no easter egg hunt. It was a very busy but fun weekend with family.

Side note: I have to write this down. Easter Sunday we get home from church and we are walking through the garage into the house. Sawyer passes the garbage and says, "Hey you are the Easter Bunny." I asked her, "Why did she think that." She said, "Because all of the trash from our candy is in the garbage." I said, "Well, maybe I buy the candy and leave it for the Easter Bunny." She said, "Oh yeah, okay." So, I saved it this year but she is too smart and will catch on very quickly.

Trials, Haven't I Had Enough?

I am going to answer my own question and say no. They won't stop, but I'd like a break please? Anyway, for those of you who don't know Matthew had an MRI scheduled on April 15th. We went in and they had to put him under anesthetic because that's what they do to make sure babies lie still. Anyway, when they put him under with the gas mask he was fine but when they gave him the shot of stuff to make him go way under he stopped breathing. They tried a few different things to see if he would start on his own. They had a decision to make stop the MRI and reschedule with a chance this will happen again or intubate him and continue. They decided to intubate and continue. When they told me this he was in the process of getting his MRI, so I was freaking out for a bit until I saw him. I was also worried because we had his MBS test (x-ray of his swallow) scheduled for the next day and he had this tube down his throat. I was worried that it would make him not at his best when it came out, so we cancelled that which was annoying. I couldn't get the feeding tube out of his nose without that. Thankfully when he came out of the anesthetic he was breathing on his own. When I finally got to go back to the recovery room he was crying and hungry. Because of this though we got to stay in the hospital that night. It was not a good night. His machines kept beeping and I was worried they would make him stay longer. That morning at like 5:30 I get a call from my brother saying my dad had had a heart attack. I was like are you kidding me. I am sitting here with my son in the hospital and my dad is now in the hospital, could today get any worse. Well, it could. To make a long story short my dad had multiple heart attacks, he is lucky to be alive and with us. Luckily he had his first one in the hospital. He had CPR done a number of times and he was shocked a total of 38 times throughout the course of his morning/heart attacks. He ended up having a Triple By-pass surgery done. He looked so fragile and scary when he first came out. At that time we didn't know the brain damage, if he had any. Thankfully, it seems he is fine and in time will make a full recovery. He was having breathing issues and couldn't get out of the ICU, hmm... who does that remind me of. Anyway, he is doing well and I am so thankful to my Father in Heaven for blessing my family and keeping us all here. I almost lost my son and now I have almost lost my father. How grateful I am to have them here with me and hopefully for awhile longer. I am grateful for my Savior and that he was there through these trials. I am also grateful to know no matter what the outcome we are sealed and can be together as a family forever. I am so grateful for those blessings in my life. By the way Matthew is doing great and hasn't had any problems since the MRI. Now I know that he can't go under anesthetic, which is a good thing to know.

Orbital Family Picnic

Brendon's company has an annual family picnic. It was so fun for the girls. Right when we got there Abby saw the bouncers and jumped out of the stroller and headed off. Thankfully Sawyer stayed with her. They had face painting, balloon makers, bouncers, a rock wall, lots of food, and much more. We had a good time, here are a few pictures.

Abby is climbing up the huge slide. She also went down this way feet first on her tummy. This was one of her favorite things. They had three different bouncers. Abigail eating her icee while waiting to go rock climbing.I started to help her, but I'm not that tall so...
dad helped her get higher. She did really good. She kept wanting to go on this. I thought she was too small until my brother said she wasn't. She didn't quite get the concept, she kept hanging onto the rope. She loved coming down though.

Sawyer had fun doing the wall too. She also did really good. She didn't get that high though because her hands kept slipping.

Marcus works at Orbital too so we got to hang out with our cousins too. Matthew had a nice relaxing time riding in the stroller. Of course he has a hold of his tube!

Kayda having fun with Matthew

The weekend after my dad's heart attack my family spent about 3 days hanging out at my house since my house was about a 1/2 mile from the hospital. It was fun to be with my family and to have Travis fly from New York to be with us. We ate, visited, played Wii, and took turns watching each other's children so we could go visit my dad. We were on the babysitting shift and Kayda was playing with Matty trying to get his socks off.Hey little Matty!

Cute Kayda, I will get his sock.
One down, one more to go!
Hopefully one day Matthew will be crawling around playing with Kayda too. This is really their first interaction, hopefully more to come.

Sawyer's Spring Concert

Sawyer had her spring concert. She has been looking forward to singing for us in her concert. She did such a good job and looked so beautiful.My beautiful Sawyer. The Kindergarten classes, well part of them. Sorry the picture didn't turn out too well.

My Sweet Baby Boy

Matthew turned 6 months on April 28th. That day he finally was able to do his MBS (Modified Barium Swallow), the x-ray of his swallow. He did so good, he passed. He was able to swallow honey thick and nectar thick liquids without any problems, that means no aspirating. He also was able to swallow half nectar thick but the therapist said he had some underlaying around his epiglotis and didn't like that so she said we will do nectar thick for a few weeks and then go down to half nectar. He also tried regular milk consistency but after about 8 swallows aspirated. Which considering, I think, is pretty good. I think he isn't far from having normal non thickened milk. The wonderful thing is that he met the goal I set for him...

of getting his tube out by the time he was 6 months. He was able to get the tube out because not only could he drink from a bottle without aspirating but he was also able to get all his fluid needs from the bottle. He is doing well and gets pretty fussy around time to eat. Yeah, a normal, well almost, baby. It only took about 6 months. We still have a long way to go developementally. He hopefully will make the next goal I set out for him which is crawling by 12 months, we'll see!

I think now I am officially caught up on the month of April. It only took what 5 or so posts. Yeah, hopefully I can keep up on it. I always say that and then here I am posting a whole months worth at once. This last month ended up being kind of crazy, so hopefully I can keep up on it.