October Fun!

October has been exciting for us! Somewhere mid month we went to Ben's sister's house for dinner and a halloween carnival at her kid's school. Hyrum was a dinasour this year (this was my little brother's costume when he was little). He loved the carnival and being with his 5 girly cousins! Above is Hyrum and Candace...the princess and the dinasour. Below is all the kids(except baby Paige). Kayla the nerd, Michelle was Jenny from Harry Potter, Candace the princess, Ashley the Cowgirl, and Hyrum the dinasour.
Tuesday October 26th we drove down to SLC and left for our trip to VA! Hyrum was so excited for the airplane ride! Thank goodness for portable dvd players or our airplane ride experience might have left us never wanting to travel again!

We did many fun things in VA-especially spending time with Grandma and Grandpa Butcher. Wednesday (not pictured) we went swimming at the rec center because it was raining all day. Thursday was beautiful and warm (I got sunburned) spent at cox farms. Cox farms is a not so little pumpkin patch with hay rides and farm animals and slides for the kids to play on. Hyrum was in heaven. Below is the crew getting ready for the hay ride. I had to stay behind and watch due to it being too bumpy for prego people.

Hyrum and the grandparents.

Hyrum behind the tractor picture.

They had goats that you could feed/pet which Hyrum loved. We opted out on spending the extra dollar to buy food for them which turned out to be a good idea because any kid that had food was being attacked by the goats! Hyrum wanted to touch all of them!

Hyrum chasing the goats.

The highlight of cox farms were the tractors you could sit on. We had a 2 year old melt down trying to pull him off. He was in heaven!

Family of 3 on tractors!

Hyrum on John Deer Tractor. Any tractor we passed he had to sit on and he still talks about the tractors from cox farms!

Ben took Hyrum down a rather large slide for a 2 year old and Hyrum loved it! He has no fear!

The one and only picture from Saturday...our day at the National Zoo in DC. This was probably my favorite day. We got to see all the animals and spend a beautiful day outside. No...we did not go to the Jon Stewart rally on the mall-but saw many rally-ers with signs walking downtown!

Back to Thursday...that evening we went to visit Ben's brother Rodney and his family. We went to Hyrum's only boy cousin's soccer game. Austin and Hyrum.

More of what Hyrum is used to...girls. Here is Jocelyn and Ella smothering Hyrum! He loved them and was sad to leave!

Friday we spent visiting our good friends the Freemans and their cute new additions (twins!). Cari was nice enough to take some family pics of us(will picture later). That night we ditched the kids and went downtown to a restaurant/miniature golf course in DC. I had to be carded to enter which was funny...Ben teased me that I wasn't old enough...j/k. It was fun!

Back to Saturday...we went to our old ward's trunk or treat and halloween dinner. Hyrum with our pumpkins from cox farms. So excited to get candy!

At the carnival he got a dinasour painted on his cheek. That is the most still I've ever seen him sit!

Hyrum loved trunk or treating and proceeded to say "love you bye bye" to everyone that gave him candy. He sure is a cutie! We are home now and happy to get back to normal...in come the holidays! Can't wait for the holidays and spending time with family! We leave for Portland in 3 weeks (unless a blizzard insues) for Thanksgiving. Time is flying by. We got a sneak peek of our baby but no revealing the sex yet...we'll have a 2nd confirmation on Monday and then let the buying begin!

Below is Hyrum singing itsy bitsy spider...twice. He has started trying to sing and it is so cute! Had to share!

Good News!

So we've only been waiting forever to finally share but here we go! We are pregnant and it's just one! Above is the two embryos we put in at 5 days old. Only one survivied which we are super okay with so we're 12 weeks now and due March 29, 2011! We are so grateful! Below is at yesterdays dr appt! So cute and less bean like!

I've been waiting to share all of what is going on due to my trying not to spill the beans although most people we talk to regularly already know. It's hard to keep a secret when you've done IVF. So, here is a catch up of August and some of September. My mom and brother Nate came out in August for a little over a week. We went to Island park while there and took some fun pictures.

We also did our traditional Redskin pics so here is Hyrum this year!

These pics are all out of order but we went to the zoo too in IF and it was fun. Pigeons and bunnies at a zoo are a little lame though...

Family Redskin Pic.

Island park bear! Hyrum was a little scared at first!

Hyrum and I by the bear.

Hyrum and Nate on the bear.

Hyrum went four wheeling while I stayed at home being a good pregnant lady. Here is Hyrum all decked out! Thanks Patti & Richard for a great weekend and showing us around!

Ben & Hyrum on the four wheeler trip.

Grandma and Hyrum riding.

Hyrum fell asleep on the way home on the four wheeler. So cute!

The family!

Hyrum & Ben.

Grandma and Hyrum.

I cheated a little and took Hyrum for a ride around the cabin.

Grandma got Hyrum some new tools. Here he is showing them off.

This one is for grandma....the race car pjs.

Labor Day weekend we went to the Idaho State Fair. Hyrum loved all the animals! He wanted to touch all of them but the pig "startled me" as he says.

Hyrum and the goat!

I also gave Hyrum his first haircut by myself in a while. It looks not as bad as the ladies I"ve paid to do it lately...

Cutting hair!

So everything is going well. We feel so blessed and happy right now and Hyrum is convinced it is another boy!

Hyrum is doing really well with speech now. He has been going for 6 months and we retested him and he is age appropriate now! Yeah! We're going to keep going through the end of the year but we're really excited. The speech therapist told me the first day he would need speech until kindergarten. She was so shocked how fast he improved! Hooray!

Our next big adventure is Virginia in 6 weeks! We can't wait to go see our family/friends out there and all of us get to go! Hyrum is excited for the airplane ride! It will be a quick trip of 6 days but we can't wait!

Marathon Post Warning!

Too much has happened lately to leave out so pardon my really long post and feel free to rush through! My mother in law got diagnosed with Breast Cancer almost 2 months ago and has since had surgery but I made her a breast cancer survivor quilt and my mom quilted it for me! Below is a baby blanket I made for Ben's cousin Adrienne. My mom also quilted it for me!
Our lawn has required some extra watering lately so Hyrum has had fun running through the sprinkler!

So happy!

It took a whole week and with much help from our family the Lukes, we finished our rock project. This is the before....

This is the after. 2 dump trucks full of 2 inch rock and many wheelbarrow fulls later we are done and still have rock left over. Someday we will tackle the front flower beds but for now we are resting! To the left of the picture is a small garden area. We did this because we are sick of looking at weeds! What a project!

Just too cute in his hat! He wants to wear it every time he helps Ben mow the lawn. Yes, we are still obsessed with that around her. Although we have progressed to if we say no to mowin the lawn he says Wednesday...the day we normally mow!

So, after weeks of shots we got the green light to start stimulating the heck out of my ovaries! Due to daily doctor's appts (even on the weekends) we stayed at hotel for 5 nights. We tried to get out as much as we could to entertain Hyrum. Lets just say we won't be planning any long hotel trips in the future! Cranky 2 year old all week but we did have some fun! Friday July 2 we went to the zoo and saw the new baby elephant. Hyrum was impressed!

I think he was a little shocked how big the animals were since in books they look so small.

Included at the Hogle zoo is a carousel ride and a train ride. He screamed when he had to get off the lion on the carousel ride. He loved it!

Pictures are out of order for a few...but on Sunday the 4th of July we took a trip to temple square after or dr appt. It was a beautiful day (yes I took this pic). Can't believe its almost been 5 years since we got married there! Of course in December it didn't look so nice!

Hyrum on the platform where Ben and I had so many wedding pics taken.

Back to July 3 now. Ben's cousin Adrienne invited us to play with them for the day and watch fireworks at Thanksgiving Point(in ut they do fireworks on the 3rd due to Sunday). Here is a picture of us waiting 2 hours in the windy cold for fireworks to start. Hyrum loved them!

Earlier in the day on July 3 we went swimming at Adrienne's inlaws house. Hyrum is a fish(see videos below).

Another picture of mom and baby elephant at the zoo.

Family picture at temple square.

Hyrum standing in front of his namesake.

Closer up.

Monday (our last day before heading home Tues) we drove up to beautiful Park City. I have only been there in the winter for skiing but it was fun to go in the summer. We had to hit the outlets and Ben spoiled me by letting me try stuff on kidless while he played at various playgrounds scattered throughout the outlets. After we went to Olympic Park and saw where they did bobsled and ski jumps at the Olympics. Hyrum did not want to get out of the bobsled.

Ben & Hyrum in front of the practice ski jump. There is a swimming pool below that the jumpers jump into. Looks fun! Hyrum just wanted to go swimming in it.

Our IVF has been successful so far. On Tuesday they put me out to retrieve eggs! They got a whopping 27 eggs...17 mature...13 fertalized. The embryos are 3 days old now and all have made it and in 2 days we will go down to have 2 put in! We keep asking Hyrum do you want one baby or two babies? At first he said two...now he says one...I'm hoping for anything...in the words of my niece Jocelyn "you get what you get and you don't throw a fit!" So we're hoping for a baby or two next March but time will tell.

Below are some videos of Hyrum swimming on July 3. Too cute not to show grandparents!