One Last Time

Last pregnancy!  So crazy.  

I wanted to document a few things.  Like how giant my stomach was.  I can't believe my skin really stretched that far!!  I felt so huge and slow and uncomfortable, all the time.  Emma was squished in there so tight; as soon as she was born it was immediate relief, I could be comfortable and I was so amazed that I had lived for so long with her inside me!!

My legs....they were SO bad.  I was so happy it was winter.  They only hurt if I pushed on the skin, or accidentally banged it on something!  But boy they looked terrible.  Maris kept offering to "make my ouchies feel better" by cleaning them with baby wipes lol.

Towards the end I got a little nostalgic.  Last time I will sit with my hands around my huge stomach like I'm protecting it.  Last time I will feel my baby kicking, punching, turning her head, having the hiccups, etc.  Last time I will not be able to sleep because I can't get comfortable haha.  Last time me and my baby would be THAT CLOSE; she was completely dependent on me for life.  No one else could do for her what I was doing.  No one else could love her like I did. My voice was the one she heard most, my heartbeat was her constant soundtrack. Pregnancy is such an amazing miracle; I"m so glad I got to do it one last time!

And some days I was like "Are we done yet??"  The nice thing was, once I decided to get induced 3 days early, I had a deadline.  I knew I had only 2 weeks, then a week, then 4 days, at the most!  I wanted her to come on her own though, I just thought it would be "cooler" for my last time, since I got induced last time.  But, it didn't happen! 

I went a little crazy decorating her room with a bunch of stuff I already had, that I repurposed to match her blanket.

the blanket I had so much fun making. :)  I decided to go with my favorite color, aqua, and purple/lavender.

And finally the day was here!  I was so ready for our family to be complete. I said goodnight to Maris,

and Owen, one last time with the big tummy! I would be going in to the hospital early in the morning, so the next time they would see me would be with their new baby sister!

Last time holding a 2-year-old while pregnant!  Quite a feat to have her on top of that huge stomach!  :)

Whit Rocks

Whitney totally rocked her first year of city basketball league- real games not just developmental.  Eric was her coach, we had a couple of cute girls from our ward on the team, one of them's dad played for BYU and is our friend so he helped at a couple of practices, and it was way fun.

It was so great to watch Whitney improve.  She ended up being her team's leading scorer, and her high was 16 points in a game.  She was an ANIMAL on defense, so fun to watch!!  At one point in the season I started to wonder if she was going to be better at basketball than soccer!  (Now that we're back in soccer, I'm sure that's her thing again haha.)  It was good times and she worked really hard.

 She's #4, taking the ball down the court.

 In the middle, playing her heart out!

 Sweet defense.

 Pretty sure she made this shot.

 In other news, she dressed up as a pioneer for "Favorite book character day".  And she works SO hard on her Spanish and math homework every day with zero reminding from me.  I am so proud of her!

 Also I had great fun timing all the kids for Hershey Track this year-- especially when my Whitney ended up being the fastest girl in the whole 3rd grade in the 100 meters!! (Her class is on this page, and there are 4 other 3rd grade classes!)

 Also, Spoiler Alert, Emma is born!!!!  And Whitney is AMAZING with babies.  Such a natural.  She is loving having a new baby sister, and helps me a ton with her.

Basically, Whitney is rockin' in so many areas.  She is not perfect, but she is awesome.

Oh and another quick thing- she gave a talk in Primary a week after Emma was born, it was really good.  She talked about the Plan of Salvation, how this life is a test.  She read a great scripture and quote from an apostle, and talked about Emma.  She said "When I hold her I can feel the Holy Ghost like a fire." So sweet.  And she said "we all want to get 100% on this test".  Classic awesome Whitney.

Day 6 and 7: Madera time!!

Our last stop was for 2 days in Madera.  It was PERFECT.  The kids got to sleep at my parents' house, play with all their toys, and just BE in the house I grew up in.  They got to hang out with Grammy and Grandpa Jamie, and bonus, with BOTH sets of my grandparents!  It was pretty chill.  We played on the trampoline/with the dog outside a couple of times when the rain stopped for a little while.  We picked delicious oranges/grapefruit and both days Eric went and got lunch from our favorite Mexican food place up the road haha.  The first day we went to visit my mom at her library during her lunch.  The kids loved getting to check out books. :)  Then we went to Chowchilla to see my Hansen grandparents.  It was awesome.  Eric helped my grandparents fix their TV, and my grandpa played the harmonica for us.

They also came back to my parents' house with us for dinner and more visiting, it was perfect.

Also that night my Wallwork grandparents came, and stayed the next day too.  One of my favorite parts of that was this hour-long conversation Eric had with my grandad!  Eric got out his drone to show him, and they spent the next hour talking about it and other engineering topics.  SO cute, my Grandad is so much fun and Eric is the best. :)

The next day we went out to the farm!  I had hoped to get the kids to do some service there, but it rained the whole time and was all muddy, so we settled for exploring Grandpa Jamie's shed and taking turns going on Tractor and Gator rides. :)

Owen definitely loved it all the most!!

Well, my dad probably liked it a lot too. :)

By the end of the second day, there was more water in the yard than I can ever remember seeing!!

It was crazy, we went and parked at the neighbor's!

It was SO cute to see my kids playing with my grandparents. 

And we had a birthday dinner for Grandmom, then she and my Dad were working on a puzzle and Owen wanted to help.  He ended up having a WAY longer attention span for it than I thought he would, and he was actually pretty good at it!  So cute.

I stayed up late talking to my parents and grandparents the night before we left, and this is me when I went in to get ready for bed.  I was happy to be home, happy about the whole trip, and content and prepared to make the return trip.  So I took a picture of me with my big belly haha.

One last picture before we left to come home!

And last but not least, this random landmark on I-15 near Primm/Jean Nevada is almost EXACTLY halfway, mileage-wise between our house in Salem and my parents' house in Madera.  FYI.

We actually had the SMOOTHEST trip home we have EVER had... it was amazing!  The kids were great, we made great time.... I had tried to be super prepared with fun stuff to do, and they were used to travelling after the last week of it, and Eric had downloaded some shows on his tablet so several times Whitney sat in the back with owen and Kate to watch.But wow it still felt like a blessing.  And I wasn't too uncomfortable in my bigness. Yay!!

Day 5: Monterey and the Donny Hansen Family!

We were so excited to spend a day in Monterey with Donny, Christine, Evelyn, and Claire!  I wanted my kids to have some more memories of them before they move to Japan for at least 2 years! :)  And we had never been to Monterey, (besides my 4th grade field trip) what a cool place!  Donny and Christine really have been living in paradise. :)

We spent the night in a cheapish hotel in Monterey, then came over first thing in the morning to their apartment.  Within minutes of our arrival, this was happening!  Katelyn is such a good sport with little kids.  She and Whitney both had fun with their little cousins.

Soon we left to go to the Aquarium.  Christine had magically managed to borrow passes for all of us so we got in for free!  It was a fun place.  The kids really liked this tide pool wave simulator thing:

So cute!

Katelyn and Whitney were into petting the stingrays:

 

And Evelyn and Maris were into holding hands, adorable!  Maris's hair was doing the crazy curly thing again. :)

Oh and THIS funny thing happened:
Donny had to work for a couple of hours, so he left us at the aquarium....and took their car keys (and house keys) with him!  So here is Christine breaking into their apartment to look for the spare keys.  She couldn't find them, so we ended up just feeding the meter down at the aquarium for a few more hours until Donny came home.  But at least we could get into the apartment!

We hung out and the kids played in their cute little yard.

At one point we looked out the window and saw Owen doing this and heard him saying "ohhm.ohhm." He said he was meditating lol!  Also, check out the ocean view from their windows!!

While the 2 littlest girls slept, Christine and I took the other kids to the park.

Then Donny came home and it was time for our big tide pool exploration trip!

Owen poking the "anenomies"? with a stick to make them curl up.

More "Maris by the ocean" pictures

Cuties.

We had a great time being adventurous by the ocean!  Hiking is the best.

And thanks to Donny's long arm we all got in one picture!

I loved this starfish in one of the pools.

owen trying to pick up a rock that Eric said was one of Kristoff's troll friends, from Frozen haha.

Had to get a selfie by the beach... I love it!! 

Back at their apartment, Donny showed the kids their shell collection, Christine made a delicious dinner, we got to chat some more, and then it was time for bed so we headed for our last stop, Madera!

Sayonara Hansens and thanks for a great time.