New Year Reflections

Here is a timeline of a few of the things that happened in crazy '09. I am really excited to start a new year, and hopeful things may settle down?!?

-Jan/Feb: Tyler gets into U of M and BYU. We have to decide where we're going. We also are acclimating to having our dog, Milo.
-March: We decide on U of M, despite ever enticing offers from BYU
-April: Tyler leaves his job to focus on his side business, we move out of our house, and move in with his parents
-May to August: We rent out our house, visit my mom in PA, one of my best friends Heather gets married, and try to save as much money as possible.
-August to September: Move in to Ann Arbor and enjoy football games, adjust to a new ward.
-September to October: I see Tyler less and less as he fills his time with homework, clubs, group assignments, class, business plan competitions, company presentations, social commitments and business activities.
-October: I find out that we are pregnant while Tyler is in SF and tell him over the phone. Disbelief. Shock. Excitement! I get called to teach the CTR 7 class at church.
-November: Spend Thanksgiving in Vermont. Really really nauseous. Tyler incredibly busy.
-December: Christmas, family, love, joy. It's really been a great Christmas.

Here are a few things I am looking forward to next year:
-Teaching Ava all her upper and lower case letters. Maybe get started on reading
-Teaching Violet to write her name
-Having a little baby to snuggle with
-Nesting
-Finishing Violet's 1st year scrapbook
-Tyler getting an internship and *prayerfully* *maybe* a job offer from it
-Being outside, traveling, discovering new books and new hobbies

Things I am not looking forward to:
-Having Tyler gone a lot
-The cold
-Losing baby weight
-Cleaning up after a family of 5

Happy New Year!

Winter 09 Pictures

Our Christmas card picture.


Another fun picture. My hair looks much better in this one.

Christmas Holidays 2009

This is how our Christmas began. I worked very hard this year to be organized and well planned. In fact, aside from online shopping, I only had to go out to stores three times. Each Christmas celebration we went to got a garbage bag full of presents that filled our car to the brim.

Here is my Grandma Lucas. Still going strong at 92! Thanks for having us over Grandma :)


The girls actually knew what was going on this year. Especially Ava. This adds a whole new dimension of stress and expectations that I wasn't prepared for. Picking the perfect presents, balancing Santa presents with Mom and Dad presents. Budgeting, being secretive, and figuring out what we wanted to tell her about Santa. Yes, I did pull the "I'm going to call Santa if you don't behave."

Here's Audrey in her zebra print Snuggie the night before Christmas.

My dad cutting the ham.. We ate a lot of ham.

The night before Christmas we did a Nativity where we all got dressed up. This year we included 3 Nephi 1, and the story of the star appearing to the Nephites in the New World and the righteous people believing that Christ had been born. Here is our Nephite, Uncle Jared.

My brother Bryce and his wife Stephanie.

My Grandma Culver in front of a beautiful spread she put together.

Some of our home made gifts. Here is the food Tyler made.


Stenciled shirts I made.

One of Ava's favorite presents: a doll she can do hair with.

Uncle KC and I as Mary and Joseph.

Aunt Audrey and our little lambie Violet.

Uncle Riley and our Ava as Angels.

The three wise "people" to be politically correct. Those graduation gowns do come in handy for something!

Some home made name signs I put together with Jenny before she moved. Sad. I totally ripped the idea off etsy.

Ava opening presents.

Violet in her bumble bee dress with Granda Mclean.

Daddy and his girls

Violet's crazy hair braids.

We've literally been gone for the past two weeks straight it seems like. But I am feeling much better!!

News :)

I feel guilty when I read everyone's blogs and I don't post a thing. But I promise, I've had a good excuse! We have been blessed to find out we are expecting #3 June 27, 2010! I've been feeling sick, so it's hard to get motivated to do much of anything. It seems I will have one good day, and then one bad day. This weekend I will be 11 weeks, so hopefully it will end soon. I've actually puked twice, which didn't happen with the girls. I will probably deliver in Michigan at the same hospital where I had Violet.

I really had completely not been thinking it was possible we would get pregnant on our own. I thought we would have to go through fertility treatments (although I did early this year with no success) and/or adopt our next baby. We had been praying for a baby for a long time, and I had recently told the girls that only Jesus could give us a baby, so pray really hard. My faith can never be like that of a child, so I decided to have the girls pray. Ava asked sadly one night, "Why is Jesus not giving us a baby?" SO sad. But we kept with it, and hopefully the girls will learn from this experience.

I had been feeling a little "off" so while Tyler was on a trip to CA before Halloween I took a pregnancy test. I hadn't taken one in almost a year, because I had essentially put it completely out of my mind not wanting to face disappointment. Lo and behold it was positive. I kept it a secret for a whole day, and then had to tell Tyler. Even though he wasn't here, and it doesn't get much worse than telling your husband the big news over the phone, I had to tell him.

I had some bleeding, so we waited a couple weeks, then took another test to make sure it was still positive. It was. So I waited another week or so and couldn't stand it. We went to a very nice clinic where everything was free and they gave us another test, and an ultrasound to find out how far along I was. Ava was literally jumping up and down and shaking her water bottle when she saw the baby. Here is our sweet little baby. So big at 8 weeks! The uterus is the black circle. The round part is the head, and the parallellogram looking part is the body. If you squint and look really hard at the belly/glare part you can see the umbilical cord.

For Thanksgiving my Step brother and his wife and daughter let us come to Vermont and stay at their house with my Mom and Mike. It was BEAUTIFUL and so relaxing. I got a cold, but it was still amazing.

Here is Tyler with this creepy electronic cat.




Daddy and Violet

Ava, Alisa (ava's cousin), and Tori (step cousin?) Tori's dad (my step brother) is going to Afghanistan in February.

I hardly knew Ava was around her and Alisa played the whole time.


Some beautiful scenery on the way home. Notice the plowed snow on the sides of the road.


Ava had some sort of issue on the way home so she decided to do this with her shirt.

Happy Thanksgiving! We are thankful for miracles. Because each of our children are miracles in the most literal sense.

Happy Halloween

Love,
Snow White and Ariel