Our walk to remember

the latest.... besides our vacation

We started potty training Carlee yesterday (talk about really diving into reality after a long vacation without kids).  Yesterday was really not very good she never REALLY went potty in toilet.  Today she's gone twice, once first thing after she woke up and the second time I went to her in the room to check on her and she said mommy and was holding herself, I ran her to the potty & after about a half an hour she went.  She really freaks out when she goes pee pee in the potty, she's really scared about what's happening, she was shivering the first time & didn't understand.  But the second time was a little better than the first time, she wasn't as freaked out.  So I'm confident that the more she does it, obviously, the more comfortable she'll be since she'll begin to understand what's happening.  She doesn't have any short on because she went through 3 pairs yesterday before 9:00 so I figured panties will be fine till she gets better at it.  Sam and I really felt like she was ready to start potty training, yesterday I really began to doubt but today I'm feeling much better since she's actually gone twice in the potty.  It may take a little time, she is after all only just barely turned two!

Preston's ear infection came back, it's not as bad as it was but it's a little worse than it was before we left for vacation, poor guy, his ears are always hurting.  But he's on a stronger antibiotic so hopefully that will get rid of all the fluid in his ear.

Sam got an interesting call while we were in France.  First let me tell you that no ones cell phone worked while we were in France except Sam's brother Kent.  She that is the number we gave my mother so she could call with any problems with the kids.  Friday morning, early maybe 7:00 a.m., I was getting out of bed, Sam was already up.  I hear in the room next door (on the boat) Kent's cell phone ringing.  Shortly after Kent came out of his room and asked if I recognize the number.  There was the international 001 numbers before but it looked like it was a phone call with Sam and my area code.  So, there was a message, Sam listened to it, it said "Kent this is (our stake president from church) I'm trying to get a hold of Sam and Heidi, if you could have them give me a call that would be great" (that's not word for word but close).  So we think about it and realize that it's almost midnight the day before where he is at and were concerned to call so late.  After a little debate and thinking that he had just called so he probably is still awake, Sam calls!  He speaks to him for a bit, I begin to realize there is a call being extended.  When Sam finishes he wants to speak with me and proceeds to tell me that he has called to extend a call to Sam to be the 2nd counselor in the bishopric in our new ward & and asked if I would support him in this.  Well, I do support him & Sam had accepted so all was set.  They wanted to get a hold of Sam so they could do the sustaining on Sunday, 2 days away even though we wouldn't be home yet.

I'm happy for him, all will be well.  We thought it was so funny that they were able to somehow able to get a hold of us.  No one where we live had a number to get a hold of my mother in order to get Kent's number as to get a hold of Sam.  But the Lord always provides a way in order to fulfill his will.

This is a map of France.  Our plane took us from Paris to Toulouse (in the pink) we drove to Castelnaudry (bottom center in the pink) and that's where we started, barged down the Midi Canal to Carcassone (not on this map but southeast of Castelnaudry, which is also where the castle was) & then continued up almost to Montpellier.  We were nearing the end of our barging when we got the call.  We had been waiting to get through a lock (you'll learn more about that later).  So basically what I'm trying to show is that we were in the middle of no where but the Lord knew a way, which is amazing.  He always knows away we just have to go to him & sometimes, have patience.

5 minutes & 40 seconds of reminiscing

I've been going through and trying to organize our video's for some time now and came across this video a while ago and have been wanting to put it up here because it makes me laugh.  This took place while Sam and I were engaged.  Two things come to mind about Kent in this video, first, I think this was the only time I remember him leaving the apartment other than for church (very out of character for Kent, for those of you who don't know him) & second, this reminds me a lot of this last Thanksgiving when the guys weighed themselves before and after Thanksgiving dinner to see who gained the most weight from that meal.

Enjoy!  Even though it's long I did edit out as much as I could, so, sorry, it is long!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

us and the kids

Sam finally did a photo shoot for me last Saturday, I had been bugging him to do a shoot with me and the kids and then switch and I would do him and the kids since November.  He finally was able to commit to last Saturday & since the weather was bad that day I were worried it might not happen.  But, we had a small window of opportunity between the end of the rain and the starting of the crazy wind.  We didn't have long but Sam still pulled through and got some good shots.  My new picture on the top left is from this shoot too!

Preston:

Carlee:

me and kids

Sam and Preston:

done till May

Sam had his interview on Wednesday and he said "It couldn't have gone any better".  So happy to hear that, Sam got all of his questions answered and the interviewer said he really liked Sam and that a lot of people, those that go into the flight training he'll have to do in the Air Force, would kill to have as much training as Sam has already had.  The plan is for Sam to go through the next Review Board which is in May, the next after that is in October.  He'll see them and we're hoping that there will be enough flight positions open for him, if not he'll go in October, and so on and so on.  As of right now the wait to get in to OTS (Officer Training School) is a year and so once Sam is accepted he'll have to wait his turn, about a year after the Review Board, to get into OTS then he has 3 months there (without me and the kids, I might add).  And he'll be off to his flight training.  I'm talking like he's been accepted because I'll be very surprised if the Review Board doesn't accept him.  As you can tell we have a long wait ahead of us, so that's great for me to get use to the idea of it all

my bad

With the help of my father-in-law and Sam I have come to realize that I made it sound like Sam plans to be a fighter pilot.  While he probably would love that, he does not plan to be a fighter pilot, he plans to be a pilot of a carrier plane or something like that.  If you're not sure what I'm talking about see the underlined portion of the post below.  I was trying to say the test he'll be taking is to see if he qualifes to be a fighter pilot even though that's not his specific plan he still has to take that test to see what he qualifies for.  I was also just trying to make sure everyone understands that there are many pilot positions in the military since I only really know because Sam is my husband.  Anyway, sorry!

so many steps

I wanted to do a brief update about Sam.  As you know he's trying to get into the Air Force and he took his written test just over a week ago, the physical test Wednesday which he passed with absolutely no problem.  Now, he has a rod in his leg from his motor cycle accident from back in H.S. which was a concern to getting into the Air Force & I was still concerned about it & not sure of what they were going to do, but talking to Sam last night he said oh yes that since he passed the physical test it was completely fine.  He just has another Pilots physical test in which they will determine then if he can be a fighter pilot or not because of the rod in his leg (there are many other pilot positions other than just a fighter pilot).  So finally a few days ago we heard about how Sam did on his written test & he did so awesome.  The average rate that people get on the tests are between 60-70 points (highest is 100), the lowest Sam had was a 68 on his math, his highest was a 98 on his aviation portion (go figure.... he's good at what he does), and all the rest were on the higher end.

The next steps he has is next Wednesday he goes back to LA again to have an interview.  If that person likes Sam then his next step will be to go to the Review Board, then after that he has the Physical test for all pilots.  It's a long process but we are so happy things are moving along so quickly, but at the same time it makes me so nervous to think about what our future will hold!

This picture is the first and only time Sam has taken me up flying.  We had been married for almost 1 year and we were living in Florida, his boss at Velocity basically said it was okay for him to take me up flying.  Before this point I'd never seen him fly at all, for all I knew he could have been lying about being a pilot.  With the permission, we jumped at the opportunity, so we went for a quick little flight and I loved every minute of it even when he purposely did what he did to make my stomach turn in knots. 

I know Sam has done so much to get to where he is with flying and it most certainly has not been easy, hopefully one day soon he can say it has all been worth it.  Thanks for all your hard work & faith Sam to get this far.  I love you!

moomay

Carlee's cute when we put on her Little Mermaid pj's, she says "moomay".   Thanks mom and dad for their Christmas jam-mies, I've wanted to post a picture since then, just now doing it.  I wanted them to be able to see the pj's, Preston may not fit into his by the time we see them in April, I thought I better get on it . 

Carlee has been talking so much it puts a huge smile on my face every time she points to a Jesus picture and says, "seeses".  The other night I was looking through a book Sam's mother made and gave all the kids a copy of it.  It's a book filled with all the poems Dan has written over the years to Teresa.  So as I was looking through the book, Carlee points to a picture and says, "Papa" (Papa is Sam's dad), super sweet.  But by far the two words she says the most is "bood" which is bird, she'll point out the window all day long and point and show me where the "bood's" are.  The other is "zeet zeet" meaning blanket!

Preston has got two bottom teeth now (this is an old picture he only has one here) & he likes to play with them with his tongue, so his tongue is hanging out a lot.

Carlee and Preston play together a lot, the hard parts of having two kids 14 months apart is starting to pay off.  He loves to be around her (he always has) but they love to do what the other is doing, even if the other doesn't want them to join in!  He seems perfectly okay with letting her steel the toy he's playing with (I wonder what he's thinking), so I pay pretty close attention to what he has at the moment & when I turn back and suddenly Carlee has it, she knows she's got a quick 3 seconds to give it back.  It's funny because I do the counting to 3 thing with Carlee, it works well with her but at first I would do it slow & she started realizing she could take her time.  Now I count pretty fast and she moves pretty quickly too so she doesn't have to do time out.

Do you love my super hero's. Sam had a bear that has this super hero cape and mask on it (the cape says super sammy).  So I thought it would be fun to put it on Preston, the next day Carlee brought me the bear and says, "on", so she got to be a super hero too.

Sam took his Air Force written test last Thursday in LA and he took his physical test today in LA.  He sill has not heard from them on how his written test went but he past with flying colors on his physical test today.  He left this morning at 2:00am to get to LA in time, the test started at 4:45am & went till 1:45pm, that's 9 hours.  He was there with about 20 guys and they had to do different variations of things, but for 9 hours, can you believe that, that's forever!  I hope things continue to go speedy with that as much as they have been these last few weeks.

thanks a million

I seriously feel a bit selfish putting this on here, but I have to say a HUGE thank you to Sam's parents.  I can't even put into words how excited I am about this new bed, so, thanks a million times.  For Sam's college graduation gift (one class left to go, he'll be done very soon, woohoo) his parents got us a new bed and mattress.  See, when we got married we found a great deal for a used bed and mattress for $100, well there was a reason for that, & I would recomend to anyone never to do what we did.  The mattress was bad!  Many many a night Sam slept on the couch because he couldn't sleep on our bed, for many reason; not comfortable, I'm a bouncer at night and this bed multiplied that.  Anyway, we had been sleeping with the mattress on the floor for several months because Sam was playing with Carlee on the bed and busted it, none fixable.  Anyway, with serious generosity from his parents we got the dream mattress for Sam and the dream bed for me.  Thank you, thank you, thank you!

the assembly:

the finished product!

I know, I'm spoiled, I know!

Everything about it is perfect the bed is way high up, standing up next to it Carlee isn't even as tall as the bed!  I love the canopy, picture two sheer white pieces of fabric hang across the top and down the sides.  The mattress, oh, so comfortable and the best part Sam doesn't feel me rolling around at night.  Thanks a million we really do love you & not because you spoil us!

so many things so little time to blog it

I feel I need to do a little update, but I can't remember what about!

Preston:

~ We went to the doctor on Tuesday and his RSV is all cleared up, no more breathing treatment, I'm so thrilled about that.

~ He was biting on my fingers this morning.... oh my goodness, he has a tooth coming in.  Totally caught me by surprise (Carlee didn't get hers till she was one) but the only sign he had was a temperature but it all has happened at once with everything else.  He didn't have any swelling or anything to show me, came at perfect timing since I quit nursing last week

Carlee:

~ I mentioned that we weren't going to let her watch TV at all last week.  It went SO good, the first few days were a little tough, time goes by so quick & I get to being busy with things, I didn't realize how much TV she was watching.  But her attitude has been better she'll play more or help me do thing and she loves it.  Still likes to steal from Preston, but I guess I can't ask for too much, lol!

~ Since she wasn't watching TV she is saying SO many more words on her own, I have been so impressed.  One that sticks out in my mind; in nursery this last Sunday they got to play with bubbles, so after we were back home from church I was changing her diaper & she says bubble!

Sammy:

~ His last day of working at Olive Garden will be tomorrow, yahoo!!  Probably a good thing for me too since he just got hit on all night last night with a table of 7 women!  I was totally laughing at some of the things they said to him, agreeing but laughing!   They seriously said things to him that put me in shock!

Heidi:

~ I went to the doctors office last week and got medication for my sinus's & I have been clearing up so much I'm amazed

~ I have been sleeping SO well, I don't know what the big difference is, maybe clearing sinus's or maybe the kids sleeping through the night but seriously can't remember the last time I slept so well and for so many nights in a row, I literally haven't been waking up in the middle of the night at all!

Here's a pictures just because!

thank you sammy

Thank you so much for ever thing you have done lately.  With me and the two kids all getting progressively sick you have been such a help.  I knew when I woke up today and Preston wouldn't stop crying that I needed your help.  You did so much, you:

1. stayed home from work

2. got the kids dressed and ready for the day

3. got Carlee some breakfast

4. went to the store to get me some medicine

5.  changed many diapers

6.  let me sleep all day long

7. got me lunch

8. got the kids down for their naps

9.  took Preston to the doctor while Carlee and I stayed home sleeping

10.  dropped off and picked up his prescriptions

11. cuddled and helped the kids feel comfortable

12. never got frustrated or complained

13.  and much much more

All while you had to start working at Olive Garden today.  Thank you, I love you!  You are my hero!

About the kiddos:

Preston was diagnosed with RSV, so crazy since my friend is seriously dealing with this same thing but with newborns (I hope all is going better for you).  RSV is a virus in the lungs that leads to bronchiolitis and pneumonia among infants.  So the doctor gave us a respirator type thing that we give him his medicine through.  I'll take a picture soon, he did well his first time considering he has a mask on his face during the process.  We'll being doing that about 3 times a day, he's a big strong baby and since he's 6 months I'm confident he'll pull through fine. 

Poor Carlee is sick with a high fever, it's progressively gotten worse these last two days till tonight, the medicine wasn't doing it's thing really but it finally went down from 103.8 to 101.8 within a half an hour, so happy about that.  She is a very easy sick baby, just likes to lay down relax, doesn't cry, so poor thing didn't get as much attention as she deserved since Preston was having a tough time too.

I love my sweet little family!