Spring, MRSA and a Blanket Fort

We sure travel a lot this tri!! We went back to Colorado for Easter break. Maia and I flew out from Chicago the weekend before Easter, and J drove out later that week once school had wound down for the extended weekend. Karly had the week off from school so she also came out to visit! It was great to spend time with all my siblings, may quite possibly be the last time we are all together until after Scotts mission!

By the way my little brother DID FINALLY get his call!!! He will be serving in the Sydney, Australia mission Mandarin speaking. How awesome for him, I’m so excited for him and this opportunity he has. We’ve always wanted to visit Australia, so now we think we will save up to go see him when he is ready to come home! Especially since it’s perfect timing, we will be all graduated!

So most of our time in Colorado we go to just hang out, which was nice! I had lots of extra hands to help with Maia, which was perfect because I also had pneumonia! Yes that annoying cough I’ve had for like a month that I just kept brushing off? Turns out it actually was something! Good thing my mom caught it cuz I probably wouldn’t have done anything about it for a while to be perfectly honest. Coincidentally Mandy also had pneumonia at the same time, so we were nebulizer buddies.

Being spring and all we of course celebrated Easter. Maia LOVED visiting the Easter Bunny at the mall, in fact we had to tear her away from him! She was very sad to go. She had a blast finding Easter eggs too!

Of course Easter is not all about the Bunny and the Eggs! We were able to spend time with Grandma and Grandpa Brown as well as the LB’s! Well half the LB’s. We were able to take some time and reflect on the real celebration behind Easter, the crucifixion and resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for the atonement, so that it’s ok if I am not perfect at everything all of the time. So that I can live with my family again when this life is over, and thanks to the blessings of the temple I am sealed to them forever. I have such a wonderful life and am so truly unbelievably blessed to have such wonderful family and friends, and to be taken care of in so many ways.

 

Along with spring also came a new calling! I am not the Primary Secretary! There is lots to do, but I Love it! I am so excited about it! I have never been a super organized type of person but this is my chance to gain strength in those aspects of my life. I get to keep track of nearly 100 people, their contact info, names and faces and BIRTHDAYS!! I’m good at birthdays! If I’ve met you at least twice and you’ve told me your birthday chances are likely I remember it. At least the month if nothing else! I know I am not perfect in this aspect either, but I know birthdays. I guess I just want people to know that someone remembers them on their birthday!

 

So that is super fun! We have also had some less fun moments! Beginning with a little zit on Maia’s leg.

 

I noticed it that morning, and later in the day it looked more red, so I took a photo so I could compare, mostly because I thought I was being paranoid. Then the nect day it turned into this:

Okay that must be more than irritation from her diaper…maybe she got bit by a spider or something?

then another one showed up on the other leg! I only started to panic on the inside…and call and talk to all my family that is medically trained (i.e. Dr Bob and Nurse Mom).

A little hard to see because my flash is retarded! But it is the size of a dime and began to drain puss. It was hard like she had a little marble under her skin, she started walking funny so I know it was hurting her! So to set our minds at ease we went to the Urgent Care, because of course it was a weekend that this little bugger got worse during.

(Wednesday 3 days after treatment began, still hard spot but so much improvement!)

Doc didn’t know what to say, he told us it could be MRSA but wasn’t sure so took a culture and said help it keep draining by putting warm wet washcloth on it, and gave us some antibiotics. They said we’d have the results in two days, Tuesday (which would have been my birthday which I will post about later). Come Wednesday night I still hadn’t heard from them, so right as I figure no news is good news the lab calls me and basically says they forgot to call me Tuesday morning, by the way she’s positive for MRSA, so just make sure she takes all the antibiotics we gave you and call your doctor if it gets worse. That was it…so do yourselves a favor and don’t Google image search MRSA..it’s terrifying! I’ve done it multiple times now. My mom is MRSA positive, which is probably where Maia got it from in the first place, and when she first got it I wanted to know what it was and it scared the crap out of me. I have now learned once you get MRSA you always have it, kinda like the cold sore virus, so we just gotta keep our eyes open and hope she doesn’t get it again for a while!

 

To make this post even longer lets end on a more fun note! Maia and J love to play hide and seek! It’s adorable. And her favorite places to hide are under the kitchen table and in our bedroom closet. Because she likes to hide in the kitchen we thought it would be fun to make her a blanket fort!

she enjoyed it

She may be wearing a tutu but she’s her daddy’s girl and loves to have her sword in hand, especially when guarding her toys in her fort!

Special way to get into the fort, you gotta walk in backwards!

and then stop and smile for mommy taking photos!

 

We are so excited that Spring is here, and look forward to more adventures outside whenever the weather decides to cooperate!

Sunday Dinner

Sunday dinner I usually try to do something awesome! And today I made a roast and potatoes and indeed it was awesome, and SUPER easy! What would I do without my Crock Pot?! I’ll tell you I’d cook a little less  

Anyway carrots, potatoes, celery and onion chopped in large pieces in bottom of croc pot place roast on top, cover with powdered onion soup mix add 2 cups of water cook on high for 4-5 hours or low 6-7 hours. It was lovely. As we were finishing up J said “know what would be awesome to end with?…Cherry Pie” I will never turn down cherry pie! However I didn’t have enough filling to throw a quick pie together so rather than break the Sabbath and go buy one I got creative.

A few months ago I bought this silicone tart pan at Tuesday Morning; mostly because it was $4 but also because I wanted to try and make tarts. I put it away and never got around to them until today! I had some frozen pre made pie crust (a true staple I know) and one can of pie filling. So I cut out circles of the pie crust to line the tart cups and filled with pie filling baked at 375 for 20-25 minutes. But I still had a second pie crust and it had thawed so I couldn’t let it go to waste, so I proceeded to make mini pies.

 

I only had filling enough for 3 more little treats and I didn’t get a perfect seal around the edges; but nonetheless I am proud of these cute little pies! And yes I WILL be making them again in the future! Preferably when we have some friends over or something it’s a lot of temptation to have mini pies lying around because they’re so small. It’s like pie vitamins, don’t wanna stop eating them! Maybe I’ll throw a baby shower for one of my many pregnant friends and make little pies, I bet I could make them even minier!

Don’t you wish you came over for dinner tonight!

but as Pies go, that’s pretty small!

In other news around our house Maia has a new game she likes to play. Well it’s not new per say but she plays in a new way; Hide and Seek. She now likes to put a blanket over her head and wait until you ‘can’t see her’ then she will peek out and giggle. It’s darling. Tonight we were playing this game:

what does this remind you of?

Correct Answer? “E.T. Phone Home”

She’s a silly baby and we love her more and more everyday.

Another Observation

So we live in an apartment, we have neighbors above and on one side. Its not too bad most of the time but I've decided it's ok that I don't know my upstairs neighbors. In fact it's probably better that I don't; I'm sure I would feel incredibly awkward meeting them by the things I've heard coming from their home. I know there is at least a her and a him that live there. I've heard her phone conversations (maybe she's a loud talker?), I've heard someone pace the front room, nearly everytime I'm in the shower I hear that someone up stairs ALSO is in the shower (which is kinda really weird...). But the most awkward 'I don't want to look you in the face on purpose' factor is the noises that go Bump, Bump, Bump in the night. Great for them and their relationship but come on 3am every Sunday (well I should say Monday I guess) is that really the best time to make all the noise? Bumps and hollers and sometimes even screams, because of the fact at 3 am  and that we live in Davenport I'm pretty sure alcohol is often involved at the early morn encounters, but if I hear all sorts of noises at all times of the day and night wonder what my neighbors think of me? Even walking through the hallway you can hear peoples conversations from inside their apartments; maybe we just have very thin walls. Maybe my neighbors complain about how my baby at 1 still doesn't sleep through the night, or when she slams the doors? I don't know but I don't think I'll really be finding out on purpose.

Another thing to look at as we are looking for a new place to live, hopefully the sale of our condo goes through soon so that we can be free of that debt and have the financial freedom to pay for a place a little bit nicer. Maybe even one with a basement! I would just love a washer and dryer, or even hook ups for them seeing as we have the machines they are just in utah at the moment. So we're on the lookout but if we can't find anything, it will be interesting to see if we do get to know our neighbors; and any awkwardness that might ensue.

Our turn in Jimmermania

We are HUGE cougar fans right?! So this year when our team has been doing Amazingly! We sat around on Selection Sunday waiting to hear where our boys were gonna play! And wouldn’t you know they were selected to play in Denver the weekend of Boards!! Since Jesse is in 4th tri he didn’t yet have to take the tests meaning we had the weekend off, free to go watch the game of course! Once in a lifetime opportunity, how often in our lives is everything going to line up so perfectly for us to be there, right down to good weather! So we bought our tickets and headed out thursday after school (well after SOME school.. ).

We got a new car seat just for the trip its got more of a reclined position compared to the last forward facing one we purchased and thus was easier for Maia to nap in on the road. So majority of the time she was a happy baby. Since BYU played thursday night and our tickets were for saturday (yes we assumed they’d make it to saturday…and they did DUH) we wanted to be able to watch the game so we stayed over night in Lincoln Nebraska. The Holiday Inn there in downtown is quite nice! And we were on the 14th floor which in itself was pretty cool to us! Great view :)

and some great pizza from Old Chicago that was right next door! (heavenly!)

SO Friday we drove the remaining 7 hours to get to my parents home in Highlands Ranch. It was so sunny and warm! Nearly every time we make a trip to Denver it snows, or in the summer last year it rained and there was a tornado (while we were circling the city in an airplane!!!) so to have great weather the entire time was WONDERFUL!!! I love how sunny it is in Colorado, LOVE IT.
My family has a new dog; a poodle named Melvin. We met him at Christmas but he has not had a haircut since we last saw him so this time around he looked more like a sheep!
 
He has been great with Maia! Poodles don’t exactly have the best reputation with small children but he has been very tolerant of her and likes to play with her. She loved patting his fluffy hair and throwing the ball for him and putting things in his mouth. I’m pretty sure his favorite part about her was that she likes to drop food off of her highchair tray. Especially when she figured out that if she dropped food he would eat it.

Saturday soon came and we worked on our Jimmer shirts and signs for the game!
 
we are definitely a Cougar Fan Family!
Maia stayed home with Grandma, Grandpa, Auntie Mandy and Uncle Totty (Scott) while Jesse and I went to the game.
  Pepsi Center-its HUGE and unfortunately no one watching on TV was able to see our awesome sign we were just to high up.
But our Cougars won and it was a great time! We were sitting amongst fans from the first game that decided they were all rooting for Ganzaga mostly because they’d been trailing most of the game! So all the more fun to be loud and cheering “Jimmer, Jimmer!” as well as Heartsock, Emery and Abouo of course!
Then we had a pretty quiet Sunday with my folks before we headed for home monday morning. Sunday Maia liked playing in the backyard with Grandpa Garry and Mandy doing pull ups on the gazebo and watching the fish in the pond (searching for the turtle too!)
  Then she took some time to play piano with mommy ( who hasn’t played for a long time…) But she really enjoys the piano, I hope she keeps that up I didn’t have the patience with myself to keep it up; but Maia loves music so much already. And it would be wonderful to have a piano player in our family.
Monday morning we began the trek home to Iowa, and since it is such a long drive we made the decision to stay in Council Bluffs for the night. While there we were able to have dinner with our friends Sarah and Sean who we know from Provo. It’s fun having friends dotted all over the country. This summer we hope to get to visit with more of them as we are planning quite a long cross country trip to visit family and friends for our break. SO our friends and Fam in CO, UT and ID and Canada and everywhere in between lookout here we come!

Observations

I am the kind that observes situations before jumping in... Lately I seem to be observing the funniest things when in the Walmart check out line. 


First off you know  the conveyer belts that bring your food to the cashier? Continually moving, just like the moving side walk at the airport, Human conveyor belt..or toddler treadmill (see video on my facespace page). So you have your stuff on there and the little divider at the end so some one can go next. Ever notice how people will fill up that tiny little 6 inches of conveyer belt you leave them like there's no tomorrow? The conveyer belt suddenly broke and they gotta fit their whole cart on that tiny little spot or they wont get to check out at all? When you're in front of them it's easier to be like "geez calm down buddy its gonna move again in like 30 seconds" but being behind them you're more likely to look back and forth at his cart and the small space to see if maybe YOU could squeeze some more of their stuff on, like its gonna move the line any faster. I do it but at least I'm not alone in the endeavor. And to be honest since observing this I am working to break the habit and be patient with the conveyor belt.


Do any of you use the recyclable bags? When I bring them to the store; I hand them my 4 bags, the cashier is usually annoyed. How dare I bring my own bags! But come on they don't break as easily and are easy to carry, oh and Eco friendly, okay i'll bring my own bags, when i remember. But as the cashier is going it becomes a mission to fit all of your groceries into one bag! I sit there watching them bag my groceries thinking, you know there's more than one bag there...you dont have to fit it all into one... so then i end up leaving with one bag I can barely lift and 3 other bags each with a loaf of bread, box of cereal and the milk (cuz it needs its own bag..?). Unless of  course the cashier is a man and I'm purchasing feminine hygiene products then those will be put in their own separate bag as if they never had to touch them. On more than one occasion I have found myself getting to the car and reorganizing the bags so that when I get home I will be able to lift them and my toddler inside in as few trips as possible.
The only time I've noticed it not being this way, so far that is, was in Maui where you're option is to bring your own bag or don't have one. Some places provide paper bags but there is a new law that prohibits plastic bags being used for things like bagging your groceries (unless you bring them in yourself). 


So is it just me?

Hawaii 2011

Yes we went to Hawaii!! And it was wonderful, what else would you expect? We had the opportunity to visit our family in Maui. My sister in law, and her husband and 2 boys, live upcountry in Maui and we haven’t seen them in a very long time! Since before little boy number 2 in fact! Griffin is their newest he is about 7 weeks old now and growing like a weed! He is SO long! Well he’s just a big little baby :) Yes he has red hair too ( yes he is Native American) He is so precious! I was very curious to see how Maia interacted with Lincoln who is now 3 and then on the opposite end little Griffster. She did great! She tried to do whatever Link did, and he was really good about sharing his toys with her and helping her as she tried to be big like him! And Griff she didn’t care much at first until Jesse and I began to hold him, then she started paying more attention to him. She tried to take his soother when she thought we weren’t looking and would sit in his calming vibrations chair when he wasn’t in it. But she warmed up to him and by the end we could hold him without her trying to climb on top of him and she even kissed him on the head a few times.

LOVED the pool!!

On our first day there we walked around the hotel area to get the feel for where we were and such. We walked passed the pool and Maia ran right up to the edge! We caught her in time so she did no jump in but we let her dip her feet in the water (it was still to early to swim). After that anytime we she was outside she ran for the pool so after breakfast that day we suited up and lathered up the SPF and went for a swim! And just as we suspected she adored every single moment! She even made some friends with some other kids that were playing catch, she was watching them so intently they shared their water football with her. She may not be able to throw very far but she sure tried!

And what kid doesn’t like being thrown up and drop down into the water with daddy!? Cuz mine wanted to do it all day!! The beach was a little more intimidating to her but we got it down eventually.

This was her first reaction to the softer sand! She would not have anything to do with it.

but she didn’t mind walking closer to the water, as long as she had mommy’s hand! With all the different and new surfaces she walked on like cement to grass and grass to sand she was holding our hand a lot to make sure she was safe. It’s a great feeling to know you mean that much to someone, she wouldn’t do it without me. But that was only at first cuz once she got the hang of it much harder to stop her!

Here was her first encounter with Baby Griffin looked at him…then looked at me…looked back at him…then went back to playing blocks and trains with Linky.

           

But she also got a kick out of their screen door. She played with it for at least 30 minutes totally content by herself. Such a big Girl!

 

So we had lots of fun with family we also got to go to the beach, of course it IS Hawaii!!

Our footprints all in a row baby, mommy, daddy

Daddy and Maia swimmin in the ocean

  family at the beach

 

We got some nice sun and played in the water and even built a sand castle. It lasted only a little while but was fun.

 

  The beach sure is tiring!

It was pretty rough adjusting to the time change for her, good thing for melatonin! We all used it a couple times there and then once when we got home. Helped a lot! 4 hours time difference is a big deal when you’re little! Okay its kinda rough when you’re not little too :)

We were out there to visit family so it was so so so great to get to spend time with them! The weather was beautiful most of the time too we had like 2 days of rain which did mean our whale watching trip was cancelled due to bad water. Which is ok the ocean is scary enough don’t want to be on it when a storm is coming! We were able to see some whales from the beach and off the side of the road to Lahaina. I didn’t get super great photos though we were pretty far away :) But one day I’ll get a great whale photo you can count on it!

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We spent some time up at the Lavender fields some beautiful scenery and lavender everything in the gift shop! We tried lavender scones and both lavender lemonade and herbal tea. I almost got a lavender and dark chocolate bar but I was all lavendered out by then. There were these cool black flowers there too, I’ve never ever seen black flowers outside of the craft isle so that was really exciting to me!

Also our friends the Wongs happened to be in Maui the same time! It was great to catch up with them again!

Their daughter Cassidy is adorable :) She and Lincoln were like best friends! And she got along with Maia too! They are expecting a little boy this summer, we’re so excited for them!!

Well it was a great trip filled with family friends and great weather! Can’t wait to plan our next visit to the Islands, mostly because it will probably be when we’re all graduated from Palmer!

Road Trip

This was the weekend we were gonna be super busy! We planned our trip out to Dave’s wedding like this:

• Drive down through Kentucky and visit Nyree
• stay and play for a day celebrate Ny’s birthday
• Leave friday for DC Maia staying with the girls
• Saturday wedding + reception then turn around and 12hr drive back to KY!

We overall were preparing for about 40 hours in the car, but we were prepared with our books on CD and an emergency kit in the trunk. So we began our journey Wednesday after Jesse’s exam. We got on the road around 11am so we made it in time for dinner to Nyree’s. We haven’t seen them in over 2 years, before Jesse and I were engaged in fact. And it was our first time meeting Sayaka, she is only 6 months older than Maia they are about the same height have the same wispy brown curls and the same squishy cheeks!

  Uncle Jesse and his girls!

from left to right : Chie 10, Naomi 4, Maia 13 months, Saya 19 months, Senae 7

On thursday we had the whole day to hang out with the girlies because it was a snow day! There was a whole Inch and a half of snow on the ground! Gotta love Kentucky winter weather (we sure did!!). We played Just Dance on the Wii, Uncle Jesse is the dance master. I did alright its quite a workout all that dancing; it was super fun though! Then we had story time, which nearly lasted the entire weekend, Jesse as many of you know is a big fan of the Wheel of Time. It’s a great series I am nearly finished with it, it is currently 14 books long 1 more to go! We recommend to all our friends to read it! Anyway Jesse gradually told the girls the story of the first two books, Eye of the World and The Great Hunt. At every loll in action the girls would badger Jesse about hearing more of the story, they will probably end up reading it soon themselves. Jesse was even able to get some flashcard making in (he had an exam monday morning). That night we went to a Hibachi Grill/Sushi Bar/ Buffet for dinner it was fantastic! When we got home we got all the girls in bed and got our stuff together to prepare for our trip to DC starting the next day.

 

Come Friday morning the two big girls left for school (they only had a half day, but 2 snow days before that!) and when we got up to get ready it was just the two babies and Naomi to play with. We couldn’t help notice that something was different, the energy in the air felt almost colder as we got ready to go. I was telling Nyree about Maia’s routines and writing down both our cell numbers and emergency numbers just in case. During this time Maia was unbelievably clingy to both of us. Neither of us could leave her sight without a total melt down, which is really odd for her. We had things all ready to go and decided we should have a prayer before we left, especially because the forecast predicted some more snow on the east coast atop the frozen tundra they’d already received that week. As we knelt in prayer with Nyree I began to cry, and it wasn’t the usual warmth of the spirit that I felt, I felt unbelievably sad; as the prayer ended I could see the others felt something similar. So we began to chat about it; Nyree mentioned to us that’d she’d had a dream of calling my mom and talking to her about how she could get a flight to Nashville to come pick up Maia, because in her dream something had happened to us. That on top of the feelings we’d just felt and Maia acting so out of character we decided to think about this trip a little more thoroughly. Jesse and I excused ourselves to our room to discuss it, Maia cried the entire time, we looked up a weather map and called Dave about what the weather was actually looking like. A line from my Patriarchal Blessing came to my mind about how my very life may be protected as I follow the promptings of the spirit, as I shared this with my husband we decided in faith that we should not make the drive out to DC.Once we decided to stay put and have some more family time the whole spirit of the home returned to a warm happy one. We are so grateful for the blessing of personal revelation. You can read more about our belief in revelation here.  That Friday also happened to be Nyree’s birthday so we planned to help celebrate it. When her mom called to sing happy birthday she also inquired about whether we had left to DC, she shared the experience we’d all had and her dream and that we’d decided to stay. Mom Fox was beyond relieved, she had also had a bad feeling about our making the trip, along with several others in our family. I am so very very grateful that the Lord watches over me so carefully; That just in case I didn’t catch on to the promptings he’d sent to me, members of my family had also received them in order to keep us safe. I am truly blessed to be a member of the Fox family, not only do I have a Marvelous, Amazing, Wonderful husband but I have more parents and siblings that care for me and my family. I love them all!!!!

So Nyree’s birthday! We had a fun surprise to the girls when they got home from school and realized we had stayed! So we had them help us make their moms birthday special. They still had some lessons and homework to work on, so we helped get that rolling and Jesse was able to study too. Naomi did not want to do her reading so she was asked to run around the couch until she could smile and do her reading. What started out as punishment soon became a game even the babies wanted to play!

  began with Naomi, then Chie then the rest of the girls!

We made dinner and a birthday cake! Those girls were great in the kitchen! Dennis was on call that evening but we promised to babysit the next evening so they could go on a date. For birthday dinner we made Cheddar Stuffed Chicken with mashed potatoes, corn and a salad, then dark chocolate cake with chocolate icing and vanilla ice cream for dessert!

We had a great time and after dinner we did some skpe-ing with Auntie Julie and Grandma Fox

Hopefully we helped in making it a great birthday for her!! (those are princess stickers on the girls foreheads from valentines from Naomi)

We had a saturday to play with the girls that we weren’t planning on so we had some fun and some story time that morning and then decided to do something touristy and Jesse Maia and I went down to Nashville to visit the Parthenon.

  It was such a nice break from the cold! we didn’t even need our coats! There were people running outside in shorts etc Gorgeous day!

Next time we are in town we hope to visit the temple, and my friend Rachel from Massage school! Then we went back home to watch the girls so their mom and dad could go on a date!

Although we are still bummed we couldn’t make it to Dave/Uncle Teeny’s wedding we are glad we were able to spend time with family. We know Teeny understands about our not being able to make it too, his wedding WAS scheduled in the middle of winter on the east coast. Sunday we were able to make the drive back to Davenport safely. Now that we know the drive and that its only about 7 and a half hours we will probably be seeing more of those fun Fujii’s!