Feb 2013, huh? Well obviously we have fallen off of the grid. Time to beg forgiveness and gives sincere apology (aka update more often). To start with things are going great with the family. We bought a house in Springville. With a bunch of help from the family we refinished the basement, started an update on the yard, and learned what it mean to be homeowners. I will give a whole photo post on the remodel, the before and afters are fun.
David graduated from Culinary school. During the whole culinary school process his schedule was pretty crazy. He did leave the college and start working with Heirloom Restaurant Group at their Communal restaurant. To say he loved it is not even close to the mark. He learned so much on the job and from some amazing chefs along the way. Unfortunately for my sanity he was moved to the corporate cafeteria leg of the company after about a year. If you have not noticed I don't tend to handle sudden change very well. What I didn't realize is the corporate cafeteria world is where it's at! Suddenly he had more weekends and holidays free and depending on his schedule (it swapped a few times) we actually saw him in the evenings. He was promoted to a Sous position after a little while and began really learning management techniques. Once again though life took a shake as the company his team was working with changed cafeteria companies. So here we are with a 18 month old, we had just bought a house, and life was suddenly much more uncertain. Luckily, because he was a member of management Heirloom stood by him and found him a position at the Pizzaria 712 (my favorite restaurant!). While returning to restaurant hours was a transition, it was pretty exciting to stop by and visit, learn some of the fun behind the scene secrets, and he still had a job. After a couple of months things were not quite as rosy as they began and a few of David's friends had defected to the 'horrible' new corporate cafeteria company. As he talked with his friends and found out how well things were working out with the new company he decided to apply for an Executive Chef position. He did get an interview with the district manager but the position did not work out. Instead he ended up deciding to apply for a basic line cook position vs. being a Sous with Heirloom. This was a very hard decision as we had always wanted to stick with Heirloom for life but in the end it ended up being the right decision. He was able to get a dollar raise with less responsibility and has since worked his way up to Sous chef of the Lindon location, and after a few curve balls were thrown to them he has worked his way up to a Corporate Cafeteria Executive Chef for Bon Appetit. He has graduated from college, started work on a B.S. degree in Business Management, put that on hold, and taken his dream job which allows him to have nights, rotating weekends, and holidays with his girls.
My end of the spectrum basically stayed pretty much the same. I continued working to Utah Valley Universities Dining Services and took care of Lillie. Honestly I hated leaving her each day and constantly bugged David that I dreamed of seeing my daughter for more than five hours each day. Moving to Springville was a good thing. I have started trying to create those neighborhood relationships that we grew up with. We have a few friends in the ward, David has cousins that live down the street that stop by for FHE/gamenights every now and again. Brent and his new wife Sarah Ann (Annie) moved in with us and helped out a bit with the mortgage. We were able to build a strong relationship with them which was really fun. Brent and I were close when we were younger but then I moved out to collage and he grew up and we grew apart so it was nice to build that back up. Annie became a sister and friend that I could tell anything to. We joked that we were sister wive who just didn't share the husband. They moved into grandma/grandpas duplex apartment in June so we are officially on our own in the house which honestly is kinda weird. We still don't really do much in the basement as we are so used to just using the upstairs. After a while I started to get the 'itch' or baby hunger as we all know it. We decided it was about time to welcome a new little bug into the family. We were able to announce to our family last Christmas that we were 12 weeks along. This pregnancy was much more difficult than Lillie's. First of all the commute is longer, I had a two year old and her tantrums to deal with, once again I didn't really get morning sickness-instead it was sleeping sickness. Around out 20 week ultrasound I started to have heart problems and ended up having an EKG and 24 hour holster test to find out why my heart was racing and wanted to make sure that it didn't harm the baby. At the 20 week ultrasound we found out that the placenta had possibly attached to my scar from Lillie's c-section. This placenta accreta scared me, not gonna lie. I could hemorrhage and die. Yes, I know I am being a drama queen but it is scary. No worries in the long run though the placenta moved and we did not need to worry about this in the end. Eventually (after three separate attempts) we were able to find out we were expecting another girl!!! We had pretty much decided at this point to name her Emma and eventually decided on Colleen as a middle name. Emma after his grandmother (and my great grandmother/it was a runner up for my name) and Colleen after mine. Having already learned how much I hated leaving Lillie each day I knew leaving a second would be like cutting a second arm off each day. After many many discussions and a chance promotion for David we decided that I would be able to quit my job and stay home with the girls. The past two and a half months have been the best two months of my life. To help ends meet I have been babysitting my friend Kate's little girl Hailey and am going to be looking for a work from home job or a night job that I can help make ends meet. Not gonna lie, finances are pretty crazy and scare the begeebeeeeezz out of me.
Lillie is growing an changing every day. She started to walk at 17 months, has a mouthful of teeth (only missing the two year molars), talks like a child years older, and never ceases to keep us on our toes. We took the binky away at 18 month and at the same time she moved into a new room in the day care and around this same time we lost the blanket that she slept with each night. This seemed to be our recipe for disaster. Night terrors began to keep us up for hours each night and this continued for almost six months. Her first movie obsession was the Hunchback of Notredame....one mommy can only handle so many times. Next she moved onto all of the Land Before Time movies and had her Dinosaur birthday. She was introduced to her first real princess obsession in The Little Mermaid. As you can tell we let her watch way too much television, this is something that I am trying to change for all of the members of our family. She loves to read, color, paint, play with playdough, and especially LOVES to cook. At this point she recognizes many letters and is kind of grasping the concept of numbers but obviously we are working on that. This past week we have worked on potty training a bit more seriously and I am excited to say that she is basically there. We still average about one accident a day but that is usually #2 which all the other moms say is the hardest part.
Emma is a spot of sunshine on each of our days. Lillie has become the protective loving big sister and the only problem we have had is her being overly loving. She was born 7/11 at 8 a.m. at 7lbs 5 oz. 17.5 inches long. This birth was night and day different from Lillies. The planned c section went of without a hitch, spinal worked perfectly, and while I had a struggle recuperating immediately after the surgery I feel like the recovery was not bad at all. I still say that c-sections are the easy way out and have a huge respect for women who are able to give birth naturally. Just like Lillie, Emma lost weight in the hospital. She lost almost a full pound and I was worried they would not let her out of the hospital but we lucked out on that one. No problems with jaundice (unlike Lillie), problems with acid reflux (just like Lillie) and the sweetest personality. She loves to be cuddled, or just laid on the floor so she can kick and 'talk' to whoever she can see. We are blessing her in a couple of weeks and I am trying to hurry and get her dress finished in time. Yes, I am a genius and trying to make this important dress. My favorite feature about her is her smile. When she smiles her face lights ups and lights up those around her. David's definition is that she smiles with her whole face and not just her mouth.
