Tenderhearted Celeste

"I found a shiny pebble in my fire pit. If it were magic I would bring the baby that died in my Mom's tummy to life."

I miscarried a baby just before Madylin's 2nd birthday. Celeste has heard the story and hasn't forgotten. She just brought this paper home from school. My sweet, sweet girl.

goth girl

Madylin has vampire teeth (literally) that she's been proud of for months now and they've just recently made her feel self conscious. I guess now that she's nearing 12, she's thinking more about her looks. So, the other day Maddie and I shared the following conversation:

Maddie: "This girl at school complimented my vampire teeth."
Me (with eyebrow raised): "Really?"
Maddie: "Yeah, but I'm not sure what to think of it because she's goth."

At the word "goth," I started laughing. A goth. How fitting.

Now the question is, what should concern me most?

1) A sixth grade girl is goth.
2) Maddie knows what "goth" is.
3) The goth girl complimented Maddie's fangs.

Celeste's Lesson

Tonight Celeste gave our Family Home Evening lesson. She always gives object lessons, using props from around the house. Sometimes we have to keep the other girls from snickering because her object lesson metaphors can be pretty far out there and difficult to follow. Tonight's lesson was very sweet and to the point. The photo below depicts our journey to Jesus Christ and the steps we need to take to reach Him. The framed picture is of her, as a baby. Each of the candles represents one of the steps. She included 1) having fun with your family, 2) baptism, 3) temple marriage, 4) taking care of your kids/being a parent, 5) faith in Jesus Christ.

A simple synopsis of our time here on Earth. :)

Mini Me

As the birth of the twins nears, I'm always thinking of ways to simplify my life once they've arrived. Sweet Heidi has hair that is kind of in-between straight and curly. She has the same hair texture that I had at her age: thick with straighter hair on the outside, curlier hair underneath, and lots of frizzy baby hairs growing in. This makes for some difficult mornings when her hair is especially unruly and she wants me to use a straight-iron on it just minutes before it's time to leave for school. And I can't count the many nights she's requested curlers in her hair. I've done this a few times, but it is tedious, time consuming, and oftentimes brings tears when I remove the curlers the next morning.

So, in an effort to simplify Heidi's hair challenges and make her more independent than she already is (and let me tell you, she is SUPER independent and my most dependable child), I let her get a perm! She looked like me before and Mark and I joke that we can find no part of him in her looks, but she REALLY looks like me now! She's my very own Mini Me!

Funny thing, in the first picture her straight hair looks neat and well cared for. Trust me, this isn't the norm!

Here's the play-by-play of the perm:
Excuse the bad photo formatting. I couldn't make them look any better.

Before













Curlers in










Rinsing out














Curlers out










A new curly Heidi!

On a personal note...and somewhat random

These last few weeks of my pregnancy are getting kinda hard. If I'm on my feet very long, I hurt. If I sit in a chair very long, I hurt. The only two comfortable positions are sitting with my legs inclined or lying on my side. Last week (30 wks) my midwife measured me and I was 36 cm- or nearly full-term size for a singleton. The biggest I've ever gotten is 39 cm and I'm almost there- probably will be by the time I see my midwife again next week. So, my body is feeling pretty done.

On a bright note, the twins are SO active! I love feeling them. Sometimes I can't believe two, tiny people can move around so much! The family can see my stomach shift and bulge from across the room. It's crazy! I am praying they'll keep growing healthy and be ready to come out by early August. I can't imagine having them stay until their due date of August 26. But, they might.

The girls had a track meet last Thursday and I told Mark it was my last one for the season. I just can't sit for that long. I was plenty cool in the shade, but the sitting exhausted me. Then, yesterday at church I had the same problem. After 2 & 1/2 hrs, I couldn't sit any more. I had to get up and find a new place to sit where I could stretch my legs out. When I got home I felt completely drained. So, I think I'm going to just do 2 hrs. of church till the babies come.

It seems ridiculous to get so exhausted from doing nothing. Sitting really shouldn't be such a difficult task for me, but it is.

The midwife has me drinking 1/2 my weight in ounces of water each day. I won't divulge my poundage, but suffice it to say that that is a LOT of water! I'm also consuming a min. of 2000 mg. of calcium, 80 gm of protein, and water with electrolytes. When I don't get enough of the calcium, I wake up with charlie horses in my calves. SO much goes into growing these babies. I never realized how vital nutrition really is for a healthy pregnancy.

The girls and I have had a fun summer thus far. I had so many plans for them, but as the summer progresses, I'm finding less and less energy for them. It makes me feel kind of sad. I always want their summers to be super exciting, but it's getting to be too hard for me. {sigh}

So, today I guess I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed. Nothing big, just the difficulties of trying to balance motherhood (of those in and outside the womb), homemaking (cooking, cleaning), and every day living. I have a really great life, I do. And I'll make it through these next few weeks, but I think I need to lower my expectations and figure out some indoor, recliner-friendly activities for me and the girls. Hmm. Maybe cards? Thumb wrestling? Movies and popcorn? Ahh, and reading. There's always reading. That's a good thing. :)

of Boys and Men

Poor Mark. He loves, loves, LOVES his girls, but I realized this weekend how much he'd enjoy having a son. My sister Kelly's oldest son, Eli (almost 10) stayed with us while she ran in the Ragnar Relay race. She was gone for 2 days. During that time, Mark really took to Eli. When Mark went downstairs to work out, he invited Eli to join him. He taught Eli how to do some pretty complicated push-ups from P90X and he taught him how to punch the punching bag. Mark invites the girls to join him when he works out, and sometimes they do for a few minutes, but Eli really liked doing this "man's work" with Mark. The girls usually fizzle out pretty quickly and have no interest in the punching bag. Eli stayed the whole time.

Mark also showed Eli his cool new knife he got for Father's Day. Mark picked it out himself- it's a knife Bear Grylls would be proud of and Mark is pretty stoked about it. Eli oohed and aaahed at all the right times. He was genuinely interested in it. Such a contrast from the girls' reactions: "Why'd you get that?" "Hmm. Nice." and "That could be dangerous."

I remember a couple years ago when I got home after a morning shopping garage sales and I happened to mention that one sale had a bunch of the Barbie-doll sized G.I. Joe figures for sale. He insisted we get in the car right then and go and buy them. I was shocked! He said he'd much rather see his girls' Barbie dolls date "real men", like the G.I. Joe guys rather than the effeminate Ken dolls he hated. And, secretly I think he just wanted an excuse to buy some boy toys.

So, Mark told me today that he really would enjoy having a son to share all of his guy things with. Girls just don't really care about guy things. I told him maybe we could adopt one, because I'm pretty sure my first ultra sound left no doubt that I'm carrying two more girls. But, I do have another ultra sound coming up, and I'll have to take another peek, just to make sure. It's more likely that Mark will have to make do with his daughters and one day hopefully their boyfriends and later, husbands will be interested in punching bags and knives. Until then, he'll be the lone man in a house FULL of women. :)

Mmmm Smoothies

My midwife wants me eating 80 grams of protein a day! She emphasized the importance of protein during this last trimester-- it is really one of the main building blocks for the twins. Well, 80 grams is a TON of protein. So, I've been trying to figure out creative ways to get more of it. And because of that, I've seriously perfected the protein smoothie. Here's my new and improved recipe:

8 oz milk (9 g protein)
1 scoop Syntha-6 vanilla ice cream protein powder (23 g protein)
1/8-1/4 cup lemonade concentrate
2 cups frozen fruit (strawberries or cherries are my favs!)

Blend until smooth.

The lemonade gives it a little zing and extra sweetness. It is sooooo good and I'm getting 31 grams of protein! Almost half of what I need! Plus, this is whey protein instead of soy. I get soy protein in my breakfast cereal (Kashi) and I really don't want to overdo on the soy.

My midwife has also encouraged me to drink water with electrolytes added because the electrolytes help with kidney function. Since I have two babies whose waste is filtering through my kidneys, it's important to keep my kidneys working well. So, I've been drinking Smart Water and now the water from the tap tastes BLECH to me! I LOOOOVVVEEE my Smart Water. It's not cheap, so I'm going to have to get back to drinking regular water once the twins arrive. :(

This has really been a different experience so far! I'm so happy we have two babies on the way!

Mother's Day 2011

From Celeste: Mini flower pot with a photo of her on the outside and a homemade card with $1 bill inside. The same $1 bill she received from the Tooth Fairy last week.

From Heidi: Handmade card, breakfast in bed: 3 strawberries and a piece of buttered bread.

From Maddie: Four handcrafted, braided bracelets she made at school.

From Mark: Beautiful vase of flowers, Breyer's Cookies and Cream icecream, a cookbook my sister helped pick out, and a leather rocker/recliner. We looked at new leather recliners and they're over $1000, so we were thrilled to pick out this used one together. And it was only $100!

I love my family. I am so grateful to be a mother and I love the memories so far and look forward to making many more.

Babies #4 and #5

I haven't blogged in so long and I've recorded nothing about my pregnancy.

I'm pregnant! 24 weeks! With twins! Both girls!

Mark and I thought our family was complete, but apparently we were wrong! Celeste will be 7 in just a couple of weeks and our lives are easy! Our girls are all independent and entertain themselves. We go on many family adventures: in the sun, rain, and snow! This is all going to change for a while...

So, last November I found out I was pregnant. Initially, I wasn't sure how I felt. I had just started snowboarding and was looking forward to a winter season of thrills. I cried when I found out. I cried because I was selfish and because I felt guilty for my selfishness. My emotions were all over the place. Some days I felt excited about the prospect of another baby and others I thought about all of the sacrifice that comes with an infant. So, I asked Mark for a blessing. I knew I needed to "get over myself" and feel grateful for my pregnancy. Well, the blessing was very humbling and completely changed my attitude for the better. He reminded me that it is a privilege to bear children. And he was right.

I began thinking more positively and looking forward to having another baby. I knew I wanted to birth this one naturally--Celeste was my only natural delivery and was so much better than my other two deliveries-- and Mark and I thought it would be neat to deliver this baby in the comforts of our own home. So, I set up an appointment with a highly recommended midwife and visited her when I was 10 weeks pregnant. She did an ultrasound and discovered there were 2 babies! I was speechless. I called Mark and he didn't believe me at first! So, the midwife talked to him and confirmed the truth: I was pregnant with twins.

I'd already been sicker than I'd been with my past pregnancies, so the higher HCG levels explained that. We were elated and shocked. We immediately gathered the girls together and told them the news. Their shrieks of delight were heard by our neighbors, I am sure.

I had to find a new midwife because in Utah, it is illegal for Certified Nurse Midwives to deliver twins. Twins are too risky. Whatever. Bogus government interference, if you ask me. My midwife recommended another midwife (who doesn't carry the certified title) and I switched to her. Ironically, she has more experience than my original midwife!

The first half of my pregnancy was fairly difficult. I was sick until about 19 weeks and the varicose veins I had with my last two pregnancies showed back up quite early. Then, things changed a few weeks ago and I feel like I've gotten a second wind. I feel great! I have more energy and I no longer feel sick. I'm sure it's the calm before the storm.

We had an ultrasound around 20 weeks and both babies are growing and developing perfectly. That is also when we discovered that they are both girls. Mark and I shared a good laugh about our having 5 girls and both feel extremely happy and blessed that these two are joining our family.

At this point I've gained about 30 lbs, + or - a few, depending on my water weight for the day. I've always gained about 50 lbs total, so I'm right on schedule!

Contrary to what most people will think, I am looking forward to being pregnant this summer. I will be taking the girls to many activities: tennis & swim lessons, and whatever else I can talk them into/afford. We have a very nice pool with water slides only a half mile from our home and I plan to go there most days and lounge in the water while the girls play. This will be the last time for several months/years that I'll be able to devote a lot of time to my oldest three, so I want us to live it up and enjoy each other. We're all looking forward to D-Day, sometime in August.

So, that's the story of the pregnancy of my 4th and 5th daughters thus far...

Mourning with Those that Mourn; Comforting Those that Stand in Need of Comfort

I heard something yesterday that I can't let go. Someone said, "When we hear about terrible things on the news, most of us say, 'Oh, how awful!' and then go back to eating our dinner."

It's true. I've done it. And it makes me wonder if I'm really doing enough for those around me who are mourning and suffering. The recent tornadoes in Alabama have affected me more than other world-wide tragedies. We lived in 'Bama for 5 years and loved it and its people. As I've heard story after story of the horrible loss of homes and loved ones, I feel helpless and sad. I live 2000 miles away. I'm 6 months pregnant. I can only give money and offer up prayers. But, I am so grateful to my family members and friends who are giving of their time and energy. Those who are performing back-breaking labor for strangers. That's what this life is about. Who cares which couple wins on Dancing with the Stars. Does it matter? Why was the Royal Wedding the #1 event talked about, when the tornadoes had destroyed hundreds of homes and broken up hundreds of families only days before? WHO ARE WE? Is this life some kind of big entertainment fest? Do we only care about ourselves and our comforts?

Thank you to the many who do look outside yourselves. Thank you for your service. Shame on you if you could be doing something, but are too addicted to World of Warcraft to leave your bedroom. Shame on you if most of your time is spent shopping for new clothes for yourself. Shame on you if you only "feel bad" but do nothing.

"This life is the time for men to prepare to meet God." Alma 34:32

I admit, I don't always do something. I do get distracted by the mundane. I don't always look outside my little world. But, I need to. I have to if I want to live with my Father in Heaven again one day. How will it be when I report back to Him if I can give synopses of all my favorite tv shows, but can't tell him how my neighbor is doing?

I want to be better. I must.