Baby Claire

 Claire Reinette Laws was born on June 1st at 9:38am. Labor started Thursday night (her due date) around 9 pm. I was scheduled to be induced on the first because I had really high amniotic fluid. Surprisingly, this time around the doctor had to break my water for me while at the hospital, but happily she decided to come without needing to be induced. Brad and I walked the halls of labor and delivery all night long until I got my epidural around 5am. Ruth and Will stayed at home with Grandma Lents. We came home Saturday evening and we've been loving our little addition. We've already fallen into a great eating and sleeping pattern and I've recovered very quickly thanks to the fact that Brad has been able to stay home and take care of the "big" kids.

My mom was able to be here several days before Claire's birth which was a huge help. I was getting so run down and exhausted that it was wonderful to have help with Ruth and Will. We got to get a pedicure, take the kids to get happy meals and do lots of crafts with Ruth.

Ruth and Will love to spend time with me while I'm taking care of our little squeaker. And below she's wearing an outfit picked out by Ruth.

Anniversary Weekend Fun

 We spent a wonderful picnic eating, rock skipping, impromptu swim day out at Niagra Springs and Ritter Island with our friends the Anderson's. Happy 6 years of marriage to US!

I never got around to posting pics of our beautiful new kitchen. We still haven't done floors, but we got new counters, lighting and a backsplash!

And here are the BEAUTIFUL before pictures, from before we moved in...yes we agreed to pay for this house with the kitchen looking like this...be glad you can't smell what we smelled!

 That super ugly island is gone and is replaced with an awesome stainless steel table. And below is what the backsplash used to be, it was crappy grey formica that they extended from the counters up the wall, ugh.

Mother's Day

This was the best Mother's day yet. It was relaxing and I was spoiled with tons of great food. Brad made blueberry swirl French toast for breakfast, wow. Then after church we had Cornish game hens stuffed with wild rice, chorizo, and goat cheese stuffing, accompanied by garlic mashed potatoes and fried green beans. And he paired that with pomegranite blueberry juice. Seriously the best thing I can remember eating...and it was beautiful!

The day before Mother's day was also fabulous. In the morning we went to a kids fair, got burgers for lunch, we went to a color fest at the high school, and finished the day going out to dinner. We've been pretty spoiled around here.

Will's birthday

I can't believe it has been two years that this guy has been around. We just love him to pieces. We started his birthday with a balloon surprise.

He ate 3 eggs for breakfast, his favorite. Then the kids spent the rest of the day playing outside, watching Will's favorite shows and eating candy.

None of us are big cake lovers so I made Will a jello fish "cake" because he loves candy and jello. I just used Swedish fish, gummy sharks, green licorice, red rope candy, rock candy, and blue jello. I like that you can see the sharks under the "water" as well as on the top.

Brad's birthday

 

His birthday was pretty uneventful this year. He had to work on his actual birthday, so we celebrated the next day. It was fun to just hang out and go shopping on as a family. But I did make him an amazing dinner. Mac and cheese with bacon and a goat cheese crust, and creme brulee for dessert, it was delicious.

Unfortunately the best gift he got this year was not from me but his boss and co-workers, kuing aman  shipped overnight from SLC.

Recently

Some cute pics of the kids:

He loves getting his hair done by dad these days. He's so grown up.

Our little Ruthie Bear gave her first talk a few weeks ago. She did a fabulous job, even though we only had it prepared two days in advance. The topic was "Jesus Christ teaches me to choose the right." We found pictures of Jesus' life and then she would say, "Jesus teaches me to choose the right and to get baptised" or whatever the picture was of. She had it all memorized so I just had to show her the picture, to remind her what came next, before holding it up for the rest of the primary to see.

 ultrasound pic at 35 weeks, lovin' the cheeks!

I've been having tons of contractions in the evenings, for three days now. I remember that being the case with Ruth. I was madly timing contractions and always disappointed they only lasted 30 seconds. So far these are lasting up to about 10 and only a few minutes apart, but once I go to bed they slow down. Also, baby dropped the other night. It was the first time I had actually experienced the baby dropping...like I literally felt her working her way down and out of my ribs, it was super uncomfortable but cool. I'm feeling like there's no way I'm making it to our due date of May 31st, but we'll see.

Easter

So the Easter Bunny is real, in case anyone out there was wondering. Brad's been working tons so we were going to do our Easter on Tuesday, but Sunday morning we woke up to find eggs all over our front lawn! We were all super surprised. Will couldn't wait to dig in!

While I'm Thinking About it

I wanted to record personality traits about Ruth and Will while I was thinking about it.

At 3 1/2 Ruth is more outgoing than ever. She loves to talk to people at the grocery store, at the pool, ANYWHERE. She loves to dance and comes up with little routines and tricks. She has an amazing memory. She can tell us the name of songs that come on after like 2 seconds of it turning on. She is daring and loves to try new things especially physical tasks like monkey bars or touching animals at the zoo. She is very uninhibited in her personality and physicality. People are often telling me how well she speaks and how intelligent she seems. I too am often blown away by things she says, like the other day she said, "What if I don't want to grow up to be a mommy. It might be scary!" I just told her that some times it is scary and gave her a hug. Today Brad told her that she and Will had to eat their breakfast at the table instead of at the TV because Will makes a mess with cereal. She came back a few minutes later and said that Will agreed to not make a mess so they could eat their breakfast while watching shows!

At one month shy of 2 years old, Will has become a funny man. He loves to point out things that are: silly, funny, and wacky. He loves making jokes and often laughs at himself. He is very capable physically and likes to practice kicking, throwing and climbing, although he is more reserved than Ruth. He is very cautious in new situations and likes to stay very close to parents and observe what normal behavior is before jumping into new tasks. (examples are at the pool, petting zoo and hop-to-it, he is very upset for several minutes unless being held, then slowly acclimates to his surroundings.) Through all the mimicking of Ruth that he does, he has learned to count most of the way to 10 and is working on his colors. One of his new favorites is coloring. His love for rhythm has also increased to the point that he now is making drum sticks out of anything he can find.

I know we're not supposed to compare our kids, but I love that they are different. Ruth is free-flowing and care-free and Will loves the preciseness of drums and is cautious about his surroundings. I love my kids and can't wait to see what kind of a personality #3 has.

Las Vegas Trip

We went back to Las Vegas so Brad could go to the Wyndham Global Conference, thanks to his company for paying for the hotel room and gas! Brad had a great time at all his meetings, received a Chairman's Award, and got to meet all the big-wigs associated with Wyndham hotels. He came away really motivated and with lots of ideas to better himself and his hotel. And he got to meet Captain America and Thor.

The kids and I had a fun time swimming in the Luxor pool, visiting the zoo, eating their first Happy Meals, playing at a park, eating lots of frozen yogurt (there was a self serve place right outside the elevators we used in our hotel) and relaxing in our hotel room.

One of the funniest things that happened on this trip was Ruth's reaction to palm trees. The first one she encountered she ran right up to, turned around and started bouncing up and down trying to scratch her back. Then she stepped away and said, "Ow that hurts!" Can you tell she was watching Jungle Book on the way down to LV?

One of the kids' favorite things was riding on escalators, elevators and the monorail that goes between Mandalay Bay, Luxor and Excalibur. Tuesday was a bit of a grumpy day for the me and the kids. I took them to see the sharks at Mandalay Bay which they hated and the only thing that made them happy until dad showed up were the escalators and monorail. Later that day we went to Circus Circus and watched a fun circus show and played lots of kid games.

As a family we had fun eating at the Rain Forest Cafe (service sucked, food was ok...the refillable ICEES was exciting...decor was AMAZING and we got to sit right by the gorillas),

seeing the M&M movie, seeing Tournament of the Kings and generally seeing the sights and lights of LV. Tournament of Kings was the last thing we did Wednesday night and it was the perfect way to wrap up the trip. We got to watch a fun show with knights, horses, fire, dancing princesses and dragons, all the while eating chicken and roasted potatoes with our hands and making as much noise as possible...it was the perfect kid event that Brad and I loved too. Also a great b-day present for me!

The Last Week or So

We played at the park and this happened. No it's not jelly from a snack at the park. He went down the slide on his belly (feet first) and bashed his face on the end of the slide. Unfortunately we had walked so I had to carry him, keep the dog under control and walk as fast as I could while encouraging Ruth to do the same so we could get home and clean up the poor guy.

Last night ladies at church had a baby shower for me and two other gals. It was so nice to be surrounded by friends and talk and laugh. I was amazed how generous everyone was. Lots of cute clothes, diapers and 900 wipes! And enough money to get a small swing, high chair and nursing accessories. Now all baby girl needs is a name!

Joy

We watched the Anderson kids the other night. Ruth got to practice her big sister hold. Both of the kids LOVE Hazel.

We've truly been very happy recently. There has been lots of laughter and happiness. I think a lot of that has to do with being a lot better at living the gospel. We love doing family home evening, prayers have become very important when we're sad, and I don't know HOW I would have explained death to Ruth without the knowledge of the resurrection. (This was one of the most touching mommy moments I have had to date.)

The other day Ruth was very concerned about death. So I explained that we'll all get to live together again, and that we'll be resurrected which means your spirit will be reunited with your body. She was SO relieved to know she wouldn't have to leave mommy and daddy. And was thrilled to realize that we would ALL (yes, including Aunt Tia) live with Heavenly Father if we made good choices. I really don't know I went from being totally overwhelmed with her as a newborn to answering profound gospel questions, when did she grow up?

In lighter subjects, we had a blast at Hop-2-It this week. Will surprised me at how much he has developed since we went last time. He's a regular climber just like Ruth. His language also continues to explode, he's working on more and more 2 word sentences. I'm so proud!

We've been looking for a dog for over a month. We've been visiting the animal shelter several times every week looking for the perfect pooch. We ended up going to a breeder in Boise to get our beautiful La Fille au Cheveau du'La (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair...a Debussy song). She's a 3 month old Golden Retriever, who we call La Fille. She's ADORABLE. And I mostly get all the positives and none of the negatives of owning a puppy since she's Brad's! Brad takes her out to pee, feeds her, walks her, takes her to work, etc. She's the perfect puppy too. She lays around when we're relaxing and is excited to play when we go out back. The timing this time around is impeccable, we're all happy to have her around, and not stressed out like we were with the first dog two years ago.

Mostly Brad

I love my hubby so much. And I am so grateful for his amazing talents. He plays the piano wonderfully and is getting better everyday. It's wonderful to have our home filled with beautiful music, not to mention that the kids love dancing to it.

This week I am especially grateful for his Mr. Fix-it talents. When we were first married I was VERY skeptical of these skills. When he offered to fix his dad's truck the first summer we were married I almost scoffed. The repair was suppose to cost over $700. Brad did it with random stuff he found in his grandpa Nelson's shed (we lived in their house that summer while they were in Oregon on a mission). I was pretty impressed. But I digress. I am now usually unimpressed when Brad fixes things, because in the end I know that he'll be able to do it. (Which has come in extremely handy since buying our house.)

This week he fixed the suburban. The light that showed which gear you were switching into and showed your mileage went out...like more than a month ago. Everywhere Brad looked it was going to cost at least $200 to get that fixed. So what did Brad do? He pulled the console behind the steering wheel out, took it to a mechanic/doo-hicky store, found the pieces he needed to re-solder, and fixed our car for $1.25! It's pretty ridiculous how just being willing to try, along with a natural talent for fixing stuff and having the internet to do research, can save you TONS of money.

In other news we've decided that Ruth is going to be an artist and gymnast, Will is going to be a baseball pitcher and drummer, and #3 is going to be a Tae Bo instructor/Kung Fu master. I have been feeling very run-down/tired again. I had about 3 weeks of feeling energetic and good this pregnancy, but it has also been the most mild as far as other symptoms go so I try not to complain. Luckily it's getting warm-ish already and the kids play great, so I can just sit and avoid doing dishes when I need to! Oh, and heart-burn is back.

Mostly Me

I've entered the 3rd trimester! I can't believe how fast the second flew by. And with the 3rd trimester came my craving for sandwiches stuffed with tons of veggies. (With Will I couldn't get enough sprouts on a sandwich.) Tonight we had BLT's and the whole time I was eating mine I was thinking, "Why did I put bacon on this?" I've also been downing PB&J's like none other.

Speaking of sandwiches stuffed with veggies, yesterday I made homemade pitas to go with our gyro sandwiches. Oh yum. Fresh pockety bread stuffed with roasted red pepper hummus, tomato, lettuce, cucumber, grilled red onion and feta. Again while I was eating I was thinking, "Why did I put this gyro meat on here?" I just ate another pita as a pre-bedtime snack minus the meat, SO good.

And in other baking news I also made a strawberry rhubarb pie, all from scratch! Ha! I was nervous about the crust but it tasted good. Brad is a serious pie man, so it's fun to finally be comfortable enough in the baking world to make stuff he actually likes...because no, he doesn't like cookies or cake.

Sunday was GORGEOUS and 60 degrees so we went on a walk through the park. Picture thanks to Ruth:

While out there we saw two owls sitting in a tree, it was very cool.

And here are some of the crafts Ruth has been working on these days. She loves to get her craft on!

And in Will news: we've been looking at drawings of what baby sister looks like in the womb that shows the woman's belly too. So last night Will pointed to my belly and said "baby!" Then he lifted my shirt and was digging around trying to find baby, it was pretty funny.