11 Months

Tanner is getting too close to being a year old. He is less than a month away now.

He is eating us out of house and home. He eats about double of what Molly eats (and she's no bird). He was weighed about 2 weeks ago and was an ounce shy of 21 lbs. (Molly is barely 27 lbs.)

He loves following us everywhere we go. If you want to move make sure he isn't under your feet first.

He babbles all the time. It's really cute although we have no clue what he says. Sometimes we decifer a Ma Ma Ma Ma Ma Ma or Da Da Da Da Da Da... I don't know if he realizes he's saying it but I'm sure he knows our names by now.

He is a mover even though he is not walking yet. He cruises on everything and can crawl like crazy, especially when he peeks around the stove and sees you. He can sure book it!!

He is doing great in his big boy bed. Best. sleep. ever!! Although we did have a few bad nights recently but I contribute that to his top 4 teeth that are all trying to come in right now. :(

Besides the grouchy times that he has recently been having (because if his teeth and a cough) he is still our super happy little man. I am always getting people commenting on how cute and smiley he is. we love him too pieces and are excited to celebrate his birthday with him!

Maybe? Who really knows.

This post is a very sensitive and a personal one for me so please keep that in mind while you read this. I have not shared these concerns with anyone other than my dear sweet husband. Maybe that's the way it should stay but I feel as if it's something I would like to share instead of keeping in. This may have TMI (too much info) for some, so read on with caution!

Sometime in mid of February I started to get really nauseous. Like pregnancy sickness. It was really bad in the mornings and again late at night before I went to bed but it was also uncomfortable during the day too. Then my "chest" started becoming really painful, I would get shooting pains in my boobs all the time.

I have an IUD right now but since I personally know of at least one lady who has still gotten pregnant, I took a pregnancy test. It said negative.

This whole nauseous painful boob thing went on for about 2 weeks. Then on Leap Day afternoon as I was going to the bathroom I wiped to find bright red blood. My period wasn't suppose to be coming for another at least 4 days. (That's if I was on time, I'm always another week or 2 later. Never in my life have I been early!) I just figured my period was going to start anyway. That was all the blood that came though. I didn't bleed for the rest of the day or night. In the morning there was nothing there until I went to the bathroom and wiped. There again was blood. Weird. Then the rest of the day there was nothing. That night the bleeding started again and lasted. Now here's the thing... with the IUD I have super heavy periods with lots of painful cramping, it only lasts about 3 days though and then it's gone!! This was no different in the bleeding and cramping but it lasted and lingered around for 10 days. The blood also had TONS of little clots in it which I have never had with a period. I was extra emotional during this "period" too, like the dumbest little things would almost make me cry.

What I wonder is if I really did get pregnant and then it miscarried early because of the IUD. From what I read about miscarriages is: it probably isn't one if it comes before your missed period BUT what if you miscarry because you have an IUD in? Can it happen early? This is information that they don't really have available. I mean pregnancy symptoms, heavy bleeding with clots, painful cramps, crazy emotions... seems like it to me but what do I know about miscarriages. The only one I have had was with Molly's twin and my body absorbed it (which also is hard to think about that happening, my own body eating my baby. :( )

In my heart I think I was pregnant and miscarried early but I don't and will never know for sure. I'm just having a hard time thinking about maybe I could be pregnant right now but since I chose to have an IUD I was the cause of killing my own baby. Then again I may have miscarried anyways? I will never know.

I do know that Heavenly Father is in charge though and if He wanted me to be pregnant it wouldn't matter if I had an IUD or not, I would be pregnant. I'm just grateful for the two beautiful babies that I have right now and will try not to dwell on the "what ifs" in my life. When we are ready, willing and able to be blessed with another child we will be.

Seattle

This trip was back in 2010 but I had problems getting the pictures set up right and then we got rid of the internet so.... 2 years later you get to see our vacation pictures.

Brian, Molly and I took a trip to Seattle at the end of May. We left on Tuesday (May 25th) and got home at 2 am Saturday morning. We went to see the Seattle/Detroit baseball game. It was Brian's birthday gift back in April. Since we are always trying to pinch pennies we decided to camp the whole time. That normally would be great except... IT RAINED THE WHOLE TIME!!!!!

Tuesday night we stayed about an hour outside of Seattle, right next to Lake Kachess. It was lightly raining when we were setting up and we weren't really thinking so we put the tarp under the tent. Needless to say in the morning we were quite wet! We stayed just night and then got up and heading into Seattle for the game on Wednesday morning.



Traffic was a nightmare but we made it to the stadium (thank you MapQuest), then we found a place to park. We were getting a good deal when we found parking for only $20. After we got in we found that our seats were right next to the area where Detroit was warming up. Lucky for us since that is who we came to see. It was fun trying to figure out who was who without looking at their numbers. We really enjoyed the game and had a few close fowl balls. Unfortunately we lost the game during the bottom of the 8th when Seattle finally did something.



After that we drove by the space needle. We didn't stop because it was getting a late, raining and we didn't want to find parking again. So we headed out of town to find our next camp site.



We wanted to see Mt. Rainer so we headed that direction. We found a really nice site just up the road from Mt. Rainer and decided the stay the night there. It had a 9.5 foot diameter Douglas Fir to show off there also. We drove around the camp circle a couple times looking for a site where we could tie our tarp to some trees and cover the tent. We found the perfect site and it worked great! At this site I freaked myself out thinking there was a dead body in the port-o-potty so Brian had to stand in it with me. I feel bad for him but it sure calmed me down!

The next morning we headed toward the Mt. Most of the roads were still closed for the winter and it was really cloudy but it was still amazing and beautiful. She showed her head a couple of times while we were stopped next the road eating lunch so that was nice!

We then headed toward Mt. Saint Helen's. We went to the interpretive center and learned about that amazing and extremely devastating day. WOW!! Then we walked out to the marsh area that they have there. It was BEAUTIFUL!! Unfortunately we couldn't see the mountain because there were so many clouds.

When we finished there we went on our way to find another camping spot. We found one just at the base of the mountain. It was really full but still very very beautiful. It also prohibited alcohol use. I have never seen that before and it really gave me a piece of mind knowing there weren't going to be any drunks wondering around. We put the tarp over our tent again (good thing). In the morning we went up the mountain. We saw where the lahars came through after the eruption. I think a 200 foot wall of water coming at me would make me pee my pants, luckily it didn't erupt again while we were there!!

We left there and headed to the John Day Fossil Beds. We saw 2 out of the 3. The first one was the Clano one and you climb up the mountain and can see fossils in rocks that have fallen. I was hunting for a 4 toed horse that they said used to exist. (I never found one.)

The second fossil bed we went to was the painted hills one. It doesn't have any fossils but it was still really cool. All of the hills are made of different colored clay. I couldn't get enough of it. (We also saw some antelope that didn't seem to be scared at all.)

Instead of camping one more night we decided to just head home. We drove through and ended up getting home at 2 on Saturday morning. It was wonderful sleeping in our own bed with a pillow and blankets that weren't damp!! I'm glad we took it and were able to see so many cool things. Molly did great on the trip only crying (usually) if she was tired or hungry so it worked out really really good. It was a nice time to bond. I'm excited for our next trip as a family!!!!