gophers, and horses, and deer, OH MY!

There are certain charms that come from living in a more country setting. The past 48 hours has proved a little less charming and more like the animal world is out to get us.
Encounter 1:
We are just now seeing fruits of our labours in the the garden. We got a bit of a late start and so seeing the first tomato turn red felt like a miracle. I wanted to pick it instantly but Josh said it could use a few more days (and he was right). However, the next morning, when I went out to check my precious firstling it was half eaten and there was an all too familiar pile of deer droppings right next to it. (They are also enjoying our dogwood that we planted).
Encounter 2:
Just a few days ago Josh notices a few mounds of dirt popping up near our property line. He thought it might be gophers. It was, and that is when we also learned gophers like pumpkins (and tomatoes).
Noah has given three suggestions to get rid of them: Call the police and have them come get those bad guys. Call the mean gopher guy from Curious George (reference to not so promising episode...a farm completely dug up and gophers freed by a monkey). Turn on the sprinklers and maybe they'll run away.
Encounter 3:
I let Scout out yesterday morning and saw him play around with this large bug. When he moves on I notice that it might actually be a large, dead spider. I called for backup. Josh swoops it up with his (bare) hand and an empty water bottle only to see it uncurl its huge black widow self and walk around inside the bottle. I still get the shivers typing it and my only peace of mind is knowing pest control has already come out to spray this morning.

Encounter 4:
This morning Josh rushes in "The gophers have taken over, look at the lawn!" From the window you just see little mounds ALL OVER the grass. On further inspection Josh comes back in, "Well its not gophers, a horse must have got out last night." Sure enough, you could see divots and horseshoe marks all over backyard, right up next to the house, everywhere. I have no idea what horse it was (the neighbors horses where all accounted for and no visual sign of a breakout by the fence).


As you can see we are 0 for 4 and hoping for any advice to help us better coexist with our creature friends.

little bit of this and a little bit of that

Noah's first day of preschool.

Oh my big boy, he is so brave. Newcastle has a pretty strict drop off/pick up procedure where you stay in the car and pull around while a helper takes them out and leads them to class (even on the first day). As a past kindergarten teacher I totally see the wisdom and safety of that, but as a mom, it was so hard driving away seeing his big eyes filled with uncertainty. The drive home I let the tears flow. He had a great first day and just loves the sandbox and basketball hoops during play time.

Pregnacy bump and bruises.
Yeah! I'm into my second trimester. I thought I'd document the tummy bruises from the twice daily shots. I hope it was not too much skin for you. So happy to be 15 weeks.

Noah at the Provo farmers market. Did I mention he likes to swing?


Clara loves being Noah's sidekick. They take daily rides up and down the driveway. We're trying to figure some sort of shovel hookup to have them plow in the winter:).

lemon cupcakes

I'm not a great cook. (When we were first married Josh proudly brought up at a gathering what wonderful tater tot casserole I make. I was mortified, yet on a cold night I still make that dish.) From then on, I think of myself more as a baker. This was one of those unplanned, "What do I have in the pantry?" desserts that worked out great. I made them for Lissy's birthday.
Cupcake:
1 box white cake
1 box lemon pudding
4 eggs
3/4 cup water
zest of small lemon
lemon juice of small lemon
1/3 cup oil
I used my kitchen aid on medium for 5 minutes. Baked at 350 for 18 minutes.

lemon cream cheese icing:
1 pkg cream cheese (softened)
1 cube butter (softened)
2-3 cups powdered sugar
zest of one lemon
1/2 a lemon (juice squeezed)
I went a little heavy on the lemon and added the sugar to taste. The lightness of the lemon makes the icing seem not as naughty as it really is. It was so yummy. I could (and maybe did) eat it alone by the spoonfuls.
(I did go to allrecipes.com to get ideas and tweak to what I had and needed to make.)

night at lagoon

noah on the swings, what a happy boy!
little buddies had so much fun together clara's first ride...it was a little traumatic, I felt so bad, but she happily went on the boat ride with noah (so I guess no serious damage done)

Friday night we joined the masses for a fun, hot time at Lagoon. We went with our good friends the Wests. Noah and Hailey had so much fun on the rides, and we had so much fun watching them. Clara even went on few. It was a great end of summer activity.

summer fun

the backyard "swimming pool" as the kids call it
Grandma Peggy came in town and we went to Aunt Lissy's Pool (the Scera in Orem)

(more to come...I can't find the cable to our camera so these were shots from Beck's phone)

P.E. (a whole new meaning)

I deliberated over blogging about this, but for posterity sake I'm going for it. Choose your course.(the long, long or short of it)
THE LONG VERSION--
(background) We are expecting our third babe in February, this is earlier then we would normally share but it's already made it's way through the rumor mill, so we want the excitement that goes along with it.

I've been in the beginning dredges of pregnancy fatigue, nausea, vomiting etc. so a few weeks ago when the back aches began I'm thinking what a wimp I am, I'm giving myself pep talks "come on, laura, I thought you were hand cart material!" After almost two days and one MISERABLE night, a phone call to mom, and finally listening to my body I called Josh at work to have him look up instacare's in our insurance network. I had this hankering that I should call first (I didn't want to wait forever only to hear because I'm preg. they wouldn't see me) it was good I called because they did tell me I should go to the E.R. Josh watched the kids and I drove to the E.R.(around 3:30p.m.), Becky was in town and came to the hospital to keep me company shortly after I arrived.

I described my pain. Left side under shoulder blade that wrapped around to my chest, felt like broken ribs, unable to take deep breaths, and severe pain if I tried to recline at all. Doc says, "sounds mechanical" but goes ahead and orders a chest x-ray. Get warned and sign that I'm knowingly pregnant and getting an x-ray. (I'm the girl that takes every precaution while pregnant, they comfort me by saying it's okay just having one it's when you have multiple that there is cause for concern.) X-ray comes back clear, blood test comes back high level which could signify blood clots. Doc orders chest CT. After wheeling me in to radiology the tech completely terrifies me "wow, your in your first trimester...this is radiation...it's like having 300 x-rays", I'm asked to sign again that I am knowingly doing this procedure being pregnant. I timidly ask, "Isn't it necessary?" he goes on to explain my patients rights and responsibility. I'm totally confused and asked to be wheeled back to talk to the e.r. doc...again. He was a bit frustrated, patronizing but clearly gave his informed opinion. So back to radiology to go forward with the CT.

This ranks #1 in my pain to date experience. I know it sounds simple: Lay on my back flat and my arms overhead, completely still, follow breathing instructions. That was the longest most painful, traumatic five minutes even with oxygen on I could not catch a breath in that position and my back/chest pain off the charts. I think when result finally came back and the doctor explained I had two pulmonary embollisms(P.E.'s) in my chest I felt a weird sense of relief (a feeling of validation that I really did feel that pain, and the danger of the CT to the fetus was not for nothing).

I'm now a solid 5 hours into my E.R. visit. I've had no food, about 8oz. of water. Josh comes and switches out with Becky. He has the nurse get me some saltines. My new nurse zealously tries to manage my pain by giving me two doses of morphine, a lortab, and something else through my I.V. Meanwhile they are trying to get me admitted to another hospital because Altaview doesn't take Bluecross and we would be completely responsible if admitted there. Things are arranged to take me via ambulance to Jordan Valley. By this time the pain meds are all in and a complete shock to my system (In normal life, I have to be dying to take two ibuprofen). The poor paramedics have to move me convulsing, throwing up, and then dry heaving the ENTIRE 15 min. ambulance ride, wheeling me through a maze of a hospital, and switching me to my bed. It was my first ambulance ride. My only sweet relief was seeing Josh's headlights following right behind. The paramedics started fluids in my IV and a big dose of fenegren? which finally let's me sleep. It's after midnight.

Josh goes home to the kids, I sleep. I woke up and 4 a.m. sitting completely upright my legs in "Indian" position. I asked the nurse if I would get to go home that day and she said, "Sweetie, the doctor just said that of her 46 patients she's over you are of greatest concern. No, I don't think you will be going home today." How odd, I know it was serious but I don't think it had hit me. The next two days in the hospital were pretty uneventful...painful, lots of waiting. I learned how to give myself shots which I continue to do morning and night. I had leg ultrasounds, baby ultrasound, blood tests, more blood tests, dealt with weaning Clara cold turkey, etc.

The recovery has taken longer than I expected but am starting to have some pretty good days. I've been so grateful for the love and support of my family, friends, and even strangers in our new ward. I really prefer to be on the other side of service and found it very humbling. This promises to be a long, and memorable pregnancy. My dad said that sometimes these special spirits come at a cost. I think of that every morning and night when I give myself my $20 (after insurance cost) shot that will need to be taken the whole pregnancy. It's all worth it. We really are so excited to be a family of five and pray that all will continue to go well.


THE SHORT VERSION--were expecting!!! (not due till Feb. 21st), went to E.R. with bad back and chest pain, diagnosed with two P.E.'s (pulmonary embolisms/blood clots) in my lung, spent a few days in hospital, adjusting to giving twice daily shots to keep me anti coagulated, hoping for the least eventful pregnancy possible under these circumstances.

Service Awards---
"Steppin it up" goes to Josh for working hard at work to pay for all the meds. and boundless energy helping when he gets home.
"Unconditional love" to Clara Jane and Noah who still love me despite being a complete bump on a log. (PBS should get a shout out as well for their entertainment).

five years

Josh and I celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary. We had the most amazing 16 hour vacation ever! Liss watched the kids last minute and we headed up to the Park City Hotel to a cottage, dinner at Ruth's Chris. It seemed too simple to be so great, but it was. The stress of the day was long forgotten entering Parley's Canyon and fun memory sharing of the last five years ensued. It's funny how many big things happen in the midst of feels like the same 'ol, same 'ol. This is just a few of the major events...

Bought our first home in the Santa Cruz mountains three weeks before we were married (much to the dismay and chagrin of many friends) but it worked out great josh had time to move in and get things ready before we were married and it's where we spent our wedding night.
Three weeks after our wedding Josh leaves his steady corporate job to make his way on his own with real estate and mortgages (rocks Laura's tied to the dock, anchor loving stable boat)
Laura continues teaching 1st grade in Palo Alto (3 attempted burglaries in my classroom, 2 scary confrontations with thieves, my identity stolen)
Remodel our first home...while pregnant with Noah
Josh buys a home to flip in San Jose while we have our home in Los Gatos, a rental in Utah, and our future home on Coalville way that I won't see for the first 8 months we own it.
(Yep, that's four mortgages, one very pregnant wife, and one very stressed 24 year old.)
Laura works on her hands and knees trying to get the San Jose home ready to sell while extremely pregnant.
Sell the home in San Jose days before Noah is born and just before the California real estate bubble bursts
Our first born, little Noah comes.
Big scare with Noah in the NICU for one week when just three weeks old.
Move to Utah without having sold our home in Los Gatos and with no secure job for Josh - still feels right.
Josh finds temporary work as a lender rep and then starts with his current company First National Mortgage of Utah.
Fix up and sell our rental property in Provo.
Josh goes back to California to fix up our home in Los Gatos so we can sell it. We sell our Los Gatos home (it was so sad to sell that home that we loved so much)
Josh buys out his partners at the mortgage company.
One home, one child, one dog, life is simple.
One more addition, our sweet Clara Jane, life is even better.
Buy a new home, still in Draper.

It's interesting that our response typically to the question "Whats new?" is the ho-hum "nothing much" response. If you had told me on our wedding day that five years later we would have sold/bought/remodeled five homes, moved from CA to UT, visited China, traded in the Trooper and Passat to drive the 10 in every parking lot Pilot, and had two beautiful redhead children and a dog. Why that's plain crazy talk. Well here we are in a place where we were led and were we need to be. Can't even guess what is to come next.



(three squeezes josh)