Thoughts from Montana

Montana is quite the little talker. I have no idea where she gets it... :) Lately she's been repeating the cutest little phrases like, "I'm sorry...I not mean to." How can you not forgive that sweetness? And also lately when I ask her to not do something I will end it with, "Say, okay, I promise, Mommy." She says, "I promise." It's adorable.

Anyway, today in the car we were singing songs and of course we got around to singing her Ariel song. While we were singing she stopped and said, "Mommy...Flounder scared...the shark!" I thought it was the most adorable thing ever...until what she said next. She found her little purse in the backseat next to her carseat and she said, "My purse! My collections complete!" (This will make most sense to you and be even cuter if you remember that The Little Mermaid's song, "Part of Your World" has a line in it that says "Wouldn't ya think my collections complete?") I said to her laughing, "You're collections complete?" She said, "Yeah Mommy....I promise!"

Michele's Birthday

My mother in law's birthday was Friday. The woman hardly ever does anything for herself and so I was very happy to hear that her daughters were planning a night out for all of us to go with her on her birthday. Just the girls. We met for dinner at BJ's where we all gave Michele our gifts to her. We all had the same thought...without talking to each other. We all got her a book. Luckily none of them were repeats, and she hadn't read any of them. She will be a busy reader for the next few weeks. Yes, I said weeks...she is a fast reader. :)

Dinner was fabulous...we all enjoyed it. Michele being the healthy eater she is decided to forego the free Pizookie. But after all of our meals, we all were pretty full.

Then we went out to the movies to see "Nights in Rodanthe". It's a movie based on Nicholas Sparks' novel. I actually had just read the novel that week and finished the night before. I had bawled my eyes out reading and then bawled my eyes out in the theater. I felt kind of ridiculous, but I really wanted to sob out loud. I'm glad I didn't, I think Mo would have laughed at me! :) haha, right Mo??

I had a blast. I'd love if we did this more often. It's hard with all our busy lives and schedules but its so nice to get together and just be "girlfriends"! Happy Birthday Michele! We love you!

P.S. Missed ya Meg.

Proof She is Our Child

Not that any of you were wondering whether or not she was really ours...but there really is nothing more exciting than seeing characteristics develop in your growing child that are reflections of you and your spouse. There's no really way to explain it, its just very cool. So, the other morning after Montana ate breakfast (hence her only wearing a diaper...I know many of you have to be wondering if the child runs around in diaper all day...not the case. She just is a very messy eater and I like to not have her ruin all her clothes...just after breakfast I don't always get her dressed right away) anyway, after breakfast the other morning she went in and was playing the piano and singing. She loves to do this! And it's totally not forced, I promise you. The child LOVES music...I know I've posted about it before...but it never gets old to me. It's like that saying, "A girl after her mothers heart". It truly gives me so much joy to see her enjoying music like I do. With the lungs of that girl (you should hear her scream) I estimate she will one day out sing me for sure! And I will love every minute of it! This is the video I caught of her singing, "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star". You'll notice when I tried to play her a song to dance to, that she is a one woman show and wants the stage to herself. Diva for sure!

And now this, my friends, is proof she is her daddy's little girl. If you know Marc, you know that he is very organized and clean. He likes things to be a certain way and it's something I've grown to really love about him. I enjoy that we try to keep a clean home together and I am very fortunate to have a husband who enjoys cleaning. Aside from all of the athleticism Montana has shown (we'll have to post a video from the park. That girl can climb and hang like you wouldn't believe) which would definitely be traits from Marc as he is the more athletic side of this couple, she also has shown traits of his need for things to be neat, tidy and perfect. Yesterday Montana found some snow man wrapping paper and was dancing on it, so I decided to teach her the snow man song. You can't see it in the video, but she had to stand on the wrapping paper for the song and throughout the song continues to try to put a corner of the paper down that is folded up and won't go back down. She can't seem to concentrate on the song until this is done. Definitely her daddy's girl!

What a lucky gift we have as parents to watch these little people bud and grow and become branches of who we are. I hope that Montana develops all our good traits...and not the ones where she'll grow up and say, "Ahhh...I'm just like my parents!"

"It's Not Juice..."

***Note to self...get ready BEFORE your child wakes up. Makes life a lot easier.***

So yesterday morning, I was getting ready for the day. I had already showered and dried my hair, it was just the touching up process of doing something with my hair and face. I have a nice little set up where I set Montana in a chair at the end of our bed and she watches her Disney movies. Her favorite of the moment is Mary Poppins. (You should hear her sing, "Chim Chiminey Chim Chim Chiroo"...it defines adorable.) Anyway, I'm in my bathroom and occasionally Pumpkin Buns comes in and checks on me..."Hi Mom." "Hi Tana Belle...where's Mary Poppins and Jane and Michael?" "Um...", she says, and she runs back in to find them. It's normal for her to come in and out as I get ready...going in and out of my closet wearing all my different pairs of shoes. Sometimes getting into my drawers and pulling things out. Nail polish..."Oh, no, no....give that to Mommy." Listerine, "Danger, danger...no, no, no!" Mommy's Tiffany's necklace, "Oh here, that's Mommy's special pretty. Let me find you a different pretty." I'm getting a little tired of the game, and am nearing the end of getting ready for the day...and she pulls my cold cream out of the drawer. She says, "Mommy, juice." And pretends she's drinking from the lid. I said, "No, not juice. Are you pretending its a cup?" And she says, "Yeah!" So I checked the jar, made sure the lid was on tight and said, "Whatever....but its not juice, okay?" "Okay mom." Five minutes later, I give up on getting ready in peace, making do with what I'd turned out in the ten minutes of chaos and walk back into the bedroom to find this...

"MONTANA!" I shreik. Noticing its on her face and around her mouth I say, "Did you eat it??" And she says, "It's not juice." Luckily, if she did taste it, she didn't get much of it. Even a two year old knows you don't eat something that doesn't taste as good as juice.

Even though we were running a little late to my cousins to help her pack...I again forced myself to make this a cute memory...and decided to take a video. I think you can sense my mood in my voice. Now that we're all cleaned up, I think I'm at a point that I can laugh at the situation. I wasn't quite there during the process of filming.

Because we were running late, I cleaned her up best I could without a bath and combed her GREASY hair into a pony tail. All you women know how greasy cold cream is...yeah...she looked like a grease ball for the rest of the day. Finally, at the end of the day, it was scrub time.

P.S. Sorry for all the red eye in the pictures. I didn't take the time to edit them. Although I must say, the red in her eyes in the first set of pictures depicts quite well her sneakyness! I love my little mischevious girl! Greasy messes and all.

Heartbroken and Humbled

A few weeks ago I found a link from a friend’s blog, to the blog of another woman. This woman had become quite the popular blogger, with her joyous outlook on her life as a wife and mother, and had become an inspiration to many mothers just like her out in the world. I have found some wonderful strength and cute ideas from her blog—The Nie Nie Dialogues.

Very unfortunately, in August she and her husband were in a private plane crash. Her husband had just received his pilots license…from what I’ve read its unclear who was flying the plane, because there was also another pilot instructor in the plane with them. Sadly, the instructor died in the crash. Stephanie and Christian were both severely burned; Stephanie over 80% of her body and Christian I believe 25-30%. They have four young children and live in Arizona. Luckily, they have a lot of family and support. Two of Stephanie’s sisters are tending her children, and through news stories and her blog, there has been an outpouring of love, support and fundraising for their family. Their conditions seem to improve daily…from what I’ve read lately, Christian is awake and recovering quite well. Stephanie, I believe is still comatose, but has had skin grafting surgeries and there seems to be a lot of hope for recovery. Her sister, Courtney, keeps up a blog on their updates and successes at CJaneRun. Her writing is amazing, heartfelt and so completely moving, I’m in tears every day as I read her words.

Courtney’s blog also led me to another family that is dealing with tragedy, in which she asked her blog followers to pray for and support as they have been her sister. This family is the Decker’s. Click here to go to their blog. Carol was pregnant with their second daughter. I’m going to take a blurb from their blog to explain the synopsis of her situation. “The doctor's did an emergency C-section around 4:45 pm or so because Carol and the baby's blood pressure dropped very rapidly. Carol stayed in surgery until after 7 pm because the doctors could not get her blood pressure stable. That night she had a CAT scan to see what is would show. It ruled out a perforated colon.

The following day, Carol's temperature spiked at 106.9 F so the doctors wrapped her in ice blankets to help bring her temperature down. Later that evening, it had come down to around 100 F. She started showing signs of DIC. That is when the body trys to fight the infection by sending clots to places that don't need clots. Eventually there is no blod flow to those places so the skin necroses (or dies) and begins to slough off. This also means that when she does bleed (i.e. scratch from inserting a feed tube) she doesn't have the clotting factors to stop the bleeding, so she bleeds a lot.

Carol started dialysis yesterday (6/13/08) because her kidneys are now starting to fail. They started to fail due to low blood pressure or flow. It is also why she is so edematous or swollen. The dialysis is helping with Carol's excretment and diminishing water retention. There is a 20-30% chance Carol will need ongoing dialysis after this is over from permanent damage to her kidneys.

The doctors have not given an estimated time to expect Carol in the hospital. It could be from weeks to months. So prayers and positive thoughts for Scott and the many doctors and nurses that work with her are always welcome.
Since all this Carol has had both her leg's below the knees amputated, her left arm below the elbow amputated, her right ring finger amputated; and is now blind. All of that is due to ischemia from vasopressive drugs used to keep her blood pressure high enought to survive.”

My heart has been so heavy since reading of both situations and following them. I write about this because I have felt so incredibly humbled by these family’s battles. Here I sit, day after day, dealing with every day stresses of life as if they are earth shattering. I wonder if I will have enough time to finish all of the laundry and dishes and get a decent meal on the table. I spend too much time thinking about my looks and clothes and make up and hair. I take for granted precious moments I get to spend with my loved ones; most importantly my husband and child. Stephanie and Carol’s stories spoke to me as mothers who lived their lives, and gave of themselves for their children to have everything in this world. I am sure they are not laying in their recovery beds worrying about whether or not their laundry was folded. They are not counting how many loaves of homemade bread they baked or worrying about whether or not they had plucked their eyebrows. They are not concerned with whether or not they had ever run a marathon or what size jeans they wear. I can only imagine, but I’m sure the faces that they dream and see in their minds every day are those of their husbands and sweet babies.

What these two amazing women have taught me, is to cherish the life of a mother and wife. To understand the immense blessing it is to be able to have that opportunity and to savor every moment of it, every day. It is never going to be easy, and as these women have found, much of it is going to require endless sacrifice on our part. But no matter the sacrifice, we will give for the love of our family. I don’t want to waste another minute taking for granted the roles I hold and the opportunity I have to experience them every day. Because in one sweeping moment, it could be gone. And in a few short moments…they will inevitably grow older and no longer be our babies.

I don’t know why I am blessed so in my life. When I really sit back, look at it all and take it all in, I feel very undeserving. Nevertheless, the Lord has given me these opportunities and blessings and I cannot take them for granted another day in my life. I cannot forget what a blessing it is every day to wake up and see the smile on my child’s face or wipe away her tears. For these blessings, I am eternally grateful.

Please keep these two families in your prayers.

It's Autumn Time, It's Autumn Time

Well, it's kind of starting to be at least. It's not exactly fall weather yet, but I thought I'd get the kids into the spirit of Fall today with a little leaf coloring. I know the idea is to wait until the leaves have fallen...but instead we picked some off of the trees and bushes in the backyard.
We taped the leaves to the back of their paper and they had fun coloring the other side to see the shape of their leaves appear.

Then, I tried to teach them a song about falling leaves...soon realizing I didn't really know how it went. I think I figured it out, I may be wrong. Don't mind my sillyness.

Fall is one of my favorite times...I love that its pants weather again, (I'm not a big fan of shorts). I love the colors...it reminds me of my birthday, Halloween, Montana's birthday and Thanksgiving. And of course, it leads into the feeling of Christmas which really is the most wonderful time of the year. Before we know it, it will be here!


I'm always looking for fun crafts and projects to do with the kids. Being two year olds, I have to find quick projects since their attention span doesn't last too long. Any fun ideas??

Sacramento State vs. Weber State

Saturday afternoon, Marc and I went to the Sac State vs. Weber State game. We met up with Mike and Brooke and kids there (we knew Montana would have more fun playing at Aunt Courtney's house then sitting in a stadium). It was also fun to run into our friend Trent, who attends Sac State. It was a pretty good game, but unfortunately in the end, Sac State lost.

Sitting in the sun...




Blakers...he gave me a killer shoulder massage! Thanks kiddo! :)

Hornets and Wildcats

Maryn and her daddy

Brooke, Blake and I enjoying the game

Thanks guys for the tickets. We had a lot of fun! :)

“When I die, bury me on the golf course so my husband will visit”

Haha! I don't really feel this way, but I found this quote online and thought it was funny! I am glad that Marc has golf in his life. It attempts to fill the football void and gives him an opportunity to de-stress from the work week. It's also great bonding time with his dad and is something I know is very special to Marc. Here are some pictures from their most recent trip to Bartley Cavanaugh...

And just so ya'll know, I get "me time" too. I had a girls night Friday night with my cousin/friend Brittany who is in my new ward up here, and our friend Shawna from the ward. I only got one picture to show for my "Girls Night Out"...which has only half of Brittany in it. Sorry Britt. :)

We went and saw "The Women" which was pretty good and then went and ate to our hearts desires at Chili's. I don't remember ever feeling more full in my life. It was lots of fun just talking, laughing, relaxing and being a girl! :) Thanks girls!

Date Night

Marc took me on a much needed date on Saturday night. We went out to a great restaurant called Bistro 33. We had a fabulous chorizo and queso dip with lime chips appetizer. That was the splurge. Then Marc ordered an Au Jous Roast Beef dip, and I ordered their spinach salad and a cup of the chefs specialty onion soup. It was literally TO DIE FOR. It wasn't a brothy onion soup, more like a creamy onion soup. I wish I had more than just a cup, but all the cream was probably not great for my diet! :) It was a fabulous meal and it was so nice to just relax. Plus with appetizer, two meals and water to drink (plus tip), we left only spending $38!!!

Then we just walked around towncenter. We were going to go to a movie, but decided there weren't any we hadn't seen worth spending 20 bucks on. So we walked to Hollywood Video and rented a movie instead. At this point, our dinner had settled a bit and so we got Yogaberry and sat by the water to enjoy it. To top the night off, we drove over to the Mercedes dealership, looking at cars for Marc (one day) and dreaming! :)

We picked up our baby, went home, put her down for the night and relaxed while watching a teen horror movie (haha). Thanks Courtney for watching Montana! It was definitely a night out that we needed!!!

Saturday Soccer

My little sister Whitney plays rec soccer. She happened to have a game up in our area on Saturday and so we were able to go.

Ryan liked the fresh air...He's always so happy!

Thank heavens for Nicole and Tiffany. They play with Montana and Andalyn and keep them occupied. So grateful.

Playing Ring Around the Rosie

Relaxing in the shade.

Grandma and her baby boy.

She's gonna be a socca playa.

Tired of watching the game, they wanted to play on the nearby playground.

The only shots I could get of Whitney playing. She's awesome...however, they lost.

The star player...

Friday Night Lights

Many of you know, that for the last three years, our fall nights have been spent out at a high school football stadium, me sitting in the stands, while Marc coaches. The first season I was a newlywed, second season pregnant, third season with a one year old and the help of family and friends in the stand. This season, Marc has decided not to coach. He is focusing more on his career and spends his free time playing golf at his leisure. Football had a lot of restraining time commitments. However, he does miss it. I can tell. He said on Friday he could "smell football in the air". At first I thought it was silly, but then it made sense, since you can smell the fall season and feel the more brisk air, and for him, Fall reaks of football. Makes complete sense.

Well, this last Friday night, Galt High School, where Marc coached alongside his buddy Warren for two years, was playing McNair High School, where Marc's dad teaches and was the head coach two years ago. So, we decided to go out to support the teams. Anngela, my friend whose husband Warren is the head coach of Galts Varsity team, is the ultimate coaches wife. She teaches at the school, but has more Warrior Pride than the students. Her two little boys were all dressed up in their Galt attire, and she had a red and black (Galt colors) two man tent set up on the side of the stadium with toys and dvd's, etc., so that she could support her husband. I know...amazing. I don't know that I could ever fill the "coaches wife" shoes quite as well, and so its probably a good thing Marc isn't coaching anymore. In fact, Montana and I left at half time. But, the time that we were there was fun. And I have to say, in my defense, I have actually been way more supportive in watching football this season so far. I sat and watched part of the BYU game on Saturday (amazing game! Shut out!), and then the 49er game on Sunday (even more amazing game! Horrible first half, amazing second half where they tied, went into overtime, and won by a field goal!) And I watched part of the Cowboys vs. Eagles game yesterday, which was a nail biter til the end as well. I'm gettin' the hang of this sports fan thing! It's actually really fun!

Anyway, at the game Marc sat in the stands with his dad and brother while I tried to keep Montana occupied down at "Camp Schroeder"! :)

She got to wear her princess sweatshirt from Disneyland that she loves! Also, notice she has her hand over her heart during the national anthem. We are teachig her to be proud to be an American.

Playing with Mikey

Getting a little tired, she and Timmy pulled out their pacifiers and blankets and relaxed in the little red wagon.

Sitting still for five seconds with Mommy while she played with one of those doo-hickee things from Disneyland. That thing kept her occupied for like ten minutes. See Marc, I told you it would be worth the purchase at Disneyland. Next time.



Future Cheerleader

Me and Anng...she was all dressed up in her Galt High best as well.

Me and my man right before I bailed out for the night...