Sickness and Soft Scratches

So Brynlyn has caught the yucky bug that has been going around. She's been so congested and then it went into her chest. So we finally took her into see Dr. "Tinker Bell" aka Dr. Stewart, our buddy DR. She hooked Brynlyn up with some good treatments and time "on the vest." She always says, "Vest is Best!" Brynlyn is starting to feel better already. And of course, she'll ONLY watch Dora the Explorer saves the Mermaid Kingdom during her treatments. Anything else is absolutely out of the question!!!

And she especially loves it when she gets to hang out with Dad and he gives her an arm scratch. She holds her arm up for him so he can scratch her arm. It's so cute!

Ashlyn's Choir Concert

Ashlyn was involved in a quad-school musical concert. She sang in the choir and had lots of fun. The concert was at Highland High School on 3-6-08. These are two of her best friends Atlyn and Kamrie.

More Susie's 34th birthday

My family took me out to lunch to Olive Garden for my birthday. It was alot of fun and great soup and salad! On the far right side of the picture against the wall is my Mom, Cathy, sister Janelle, and sister-in-law Barbie. Sitting on my left side is sister Tanya (pregnant with baby #4) and then "Aunt Patty" Sykes (Barbie's Mom). Patty is a permanent fixture in our family. Everything is always more fun when Patty is there. We really didn't stop laughing the entire lunch. It was so much fun! Thanks guys!

Katelyn and Becca

So the sun rises and sets with Katelyn's best friend Becca. They are such peas in a pod and love to spend time together playing. Becca came over one Friday and spent the afternoon with us and the girls loved playing dress up, bead project and eating dinner together. Becca is such a sweetheart and we're so glad that she's such a buddy to Katelyn.

The Cupboard Climber

Brynlyn, I could just follow you around all day and laugh at the things that you do. I usually follow you around picking up the things that you are messing up anyway! You are such a funny little lady and you've discovered my tupperware cupboard. You love to climb in and try to match up the lids to the containers and then put them back and then mess it all up again. And you usually always end up leaving with some stray cups in your mouth. Silly girl!

Susie's 34th Birthday with the Jensen's

Pat and Farrell are so great. For my 34th birthday, Mike's Mom didn't want me to cook dinner at all (love her) and so they invited us all over for a delicious dinner and dessert: chocolate cake, of course! Only the best. And they gave me a gift certificate to Michael's so I can buy...scrapbooking supplies, of course! Thanks guys for the fun memories.

The Wengert Family

Our dear friends and neighbors Trace and Jeanette Wengert and family have moved to the Pinetop/Lakeside area. We are soooo sad and miss them so much already. We saw them, hung out with them, talked with them in some way or another every day! And we are missing them like crazy. The top picture is of Trace and Jeanette at the going away party that was held in their honor. And then the bottom pictures is of Ashlyn and her buddies having a last play date with Makenna before they moved. Makenna has been one of Ashlyn's best friends for the past 6 years and Ashlyn is completely torn up that she moved. Atleast they're only a few hours away and they have lots of reasons to be down to visit. But we will miss them as our neighbors. Good luck in Lakeside!

Disney Princess on Ice

We love going to see the Disney on Ice shows. In January, the show was "Princess Wishes." It highlighted the main princess stories and told how their wishes came true. Special appearances by Tinker Bell, Minnie and Mickey, Goofy, and Pluto were highlights also. We had really great seats so our view was terrific. The costumes were gorgeous and the skating was awesome. We invited our friend and neighbor Nikki Hicks. She has a darling boy Zane and so we figured she needed some "girly girly" scenes. She was alot of fun to have there with us. Mike had a work meeting that night so Granda, Papa, and Candace (Jensen) watched Brynlyn for us so we could go and enjoy the night. It was a fantastic show and a wonderful night!

Best Buddies

Brynlyn has become Ashlyn's little shadow. Wherever Ashlyn is, Brynlyn is never far behind. She loves to hang out with her big sister and Ashlyn's favorite thing to do is to play with Brynlyn. She has come up with the cutest little games to play. No one can get Bryn to giggle quite like Ash can. It's so adorable to watch them play together. But THIS scene was pretty cute itself. They both fell asleep on the couch watching TV, curled up side by side next to each other. They look so content and sweet laying there, just like best buddies!

My craft scrap space

Okay so I'm loving this room. We took half of Brynlyn's room and converted it into a wall unit full of my scrapbooking and crafting supplies. The shelves were unfinished from IKEA and we had a painter come and paint them. (They were truly a nightmare to paint. Glad it wasn't my nightmare.) Then we found a great, sturdy table on Craigslist for $25. Some organizing bins and baskets later...Voila. Scrap space created. Love it! Brynlyn obviously sleeps in here which makes for late night scrapping a little difficult, but I'm usually too tired by then to scrapbook anyway. When Brynlyn is grown out of her crib, then we will move her into one of the other girl's bedrooms and then we'll put a long table on the other side of this room and make it a big craft room for all of the girls to share. And to make it even more fun, the theme of the this room is "the beach." So relaxing to be in here...

Tired of the swing

Tired of the swing! It is such an old scene. We need a new one. Brynlyn has had it. She doesn't want to sit in it any longer. 18 months is enough...and she's giving us the picture real quickly. But it's tough because the best way to feed her through the feeding tube is to sit her in the swing and let it drip "continuous" over an hour. She used to not mind the swing at all. In fact, she used to fall asleep and so she would get her food AND a nap. Bonus! But now that she's more mobile, she just doesn't want to sit in the swing and eat any longer, especially for an hour. In these pictures, Lauryn is doing her best trying to entertain Brynlyn during an hour long feeding session.

There is another way to feed Brynlyn. It's called Bolus feedings. It's where we take a large 2 oz. syringe and fill it with her formula. Then I feed the formula through a feeding tube right into her button (takes only about 30 secons). I do this twice in a row. Then 30 minutes later, we do it again. Atleast she's getting the food she needs, but she doesn't have to sit still for an entire hour and get the food. So far, so good...and no more swing. In fact, she hasn't sat it in since these pictures were taken in early February. This new technique must be working. =)

Hannah Montana 3D Concert

Well who in the world is NOT a fan of Hannah Montana??? C'mon...she's the best of both worlds! (ha ha) We couldn't resist going with a huge group of Moms and Daughters from our ward to the Hannah Montana 3D concert at the movie theaters. So much fun! The theater was packed with our girlfriends. Lauryn didn't realize it was a concert instead of the actual TV show. So she was a little disappointed and fell asleep soon after the concert started. The other girls, however, rocked away all night and had a blast!

I'm Tired Mama...Really I am

To quote the Disney movie The Aristocrats..."I'm tired Mama, really I am."

Brynlyn must've been absolutely pooped! But she couldn't even take a break from playing and miss out on any fun, but she needed a quick nap. So she napped on the fly...standing up...using the furniture to hold herself up. Too funny, baby!

Liking Food, Sort of... - January 2008

Atleast she'll sit in her high chair seat! That's about all she'll do. She wants to play with the spoon, play with the food, throw things off of the tray, and occasionally she'll get a little bite of food in her mouth. These are all good steps in the direction of eating food regularly. It still might be a while until she is eating fully to replace the nutrition she gets from the feeding tube. Our wonderful speech therapist is Sarah from TCH. She comes to our home once a week for about an hour to work with Brynlyn. She is very encouraged by Brynlyn's progress and says that these are all important steps to get her eating.

Keep it up Brynlyn!