Our Fabulous Life!

So for a couple of days Devonney has been hauling this purse and dog around everywhere she goes. Of course when your still crawling and you are using one of those four appendages to haul a purse and a dog around it can get kind of well .... hairy.... I tried to put the dog in the purse for her so she could haul them around with just one arm, but no that did not work. She wanted the dog out of the purse and free to roam around. So then she would scoot the dog and carry the purse behind her as she crawled around. It was pretty hilarious I have to admit. Heaven forbid you come between this girl and her purse and her dog for that matter...

Bailey's birthday was on September 23rd and she turned 6! I cannot believe it. We didn't have a party for her officially yet. We did have her open presents and she had her favorite Oreo Ice Cream cake! She got the new Tinkerbell movie which she was wanting since she saw the previews for it. The good thing about having 4 girls is they all want the same thing, so once you get it for one then you can move on to the next item on the want list.

Still has her toothy grin, or lack thereof. She was excited to come home and find this bag stuffed with gifts. We made her wait till Daddy got home to open her presents. That is a hard thing to do for a six year old who had to go all through the school day and then wait a little bit longer.. She made it though..just barely.

Aww the pet shops. I have to admit I hate these things because they are so small and all the accessories are even smaller. It wouldn't be such a big deal but I have a 10 month old crawling around everywhere who puts everything in her mouth including pet shops and all their lovely accessories.. But I broke down and got her some anyway because she really does love them and they will play with them for hours!

Her favorite Oreo Ice Cream cake! It was waiting for her in the fridge when she got home from school. Another thing she had to wait to eat until Daddy got home. Can you see her excitement? Let's just say the cake was gone within 15 minutes. It was pure heaven for all my children. I am so thankful for all my children. They bless my life everyday. I am so thankful for my Bailey BOO. I remember the day she came into our lives so clearly. It was a long 36 hours but so worth it in the end. We had waited 5 long years and were blessed with Aislynn. Then four months later we had Bailey. She is such a sweet spirit. She can test my patience like no other...but I love her and I am so thankful I am her mommy. Happy Birthday Bailey!!! You are so big and so beautiful!!!

Rock Hunting with Daddy

Adam works for Searles Valley Minerals. They basically mine soda ash and Borax. Once a year they hold a Gem and Mineral show. People from all over the country and world come and get a chance to dig for some pretty awesome crystals. Adam's company will blow up a couple of areas out on the dry lake and all of these crystals become visible and they let people out to dig and take home anything they find. This happens for two days and believe me it is packed. So because we are a rock hunting family and because Adam works for the company we took the kiddos and had a blast getting really dirty and really hot! In this picture these are the people digging for rocks. You basically just pick a spot and go for it! Pretty dirty stuff.

Here are some of the Halite crystals that the girls found. They wanted to bring their Halloween buckets to put the rocks in, so here it is!! They were pretty excited about their precious finds!

Here is a very tired and very hot Cecely. She got right in there and was digging away too! Daddy was so good about showing the girls were to dig and was so patient to help them find their treasures!

Notice the hot and red faces! They were such troopers. They had such a great time. We all did. It was such a great family adventure. We have so many incredible crystals!! It is so awesome to have a husband who is a geologist! The girls love going rock hunting with their daddy. I hope it is a tradition that never stops. Such great memories. After we came home daddy showed them how to clean each crystal and how to take care of them. It was a great day!

Here are some of the huge rocks that were weighing down the stroller. Notice the mud caked on the stroller. Yeah, needless to say our van was a muddy mess! It was so worth it though.

Big,Bigger,Biggest!

Devonney is just growing by leaps and bounds!! She is 10 months old today. At her 9 month appt she was 18 pounds and 26 inches long. She is still so short!! She barely is even on the chart for her height!! She is so active and into everything. Nothing is safe. She loves to help with the laundry. She is so fun!

We can actually get her hair into a little pony tail up on top. It looks like her antennae!! She can't pull it out though and that is why I love it!! She won't leave head bands on but she can't seep to take out the little pony tail! I love that chubby face!

Aislynn and Bailey are also getting bigger and smarter! I love my big girls. For the most part they play so well together! They love planning adventures and having them in our big back yard!

The girls love their baby sister. They will read to her and play with her on the floor. Devonney loves it and will smile and laugh. She loves her big sissies! She is so blessed because they love her so much and are so good with her!

She is pulling up onto everything and she loves pulling herself up on the couch and playing peek a boo with the big girls. It makes her laugh so hard! Her sisters will clap and make a big deal when she stands up on things. She is the center of attention in our house and she knows it!!

Some Serious Goings On!!

So, now that we have moved we have this incredible backyard!! The girls love it and since it has been cooling down a bit in the evening it's the perfect picnic weather. So we broke out the card table and set up some food and the girls had a blast. Couldn't we move the sun though just a bit? I mean is that too much to ask? Sorry girls.. didn't mean to blind you!

This is what happens when you don't feed your baby. She resorts to other measures like eating cowboy hats! Since she has started crawling she is into everything and eating everything... Fun for mom trying to keep all of the Little Pet Shop toys and all the Barbie shoes off of the floor!

Here is my happy girl.. I can't believe she is nine months old already!! Wow the time flies by so fast. She has two teeth already, she did have a top tooth and it went back up! She crawls everywhere and tries to stand up already, she looks like a stink bug! She is my chunky monkey and such a joy!

Here's another shot of the picnic in the backyard. It was so cute to listen to their conversation. They obviously thought mom wasn't listening. Oh, I was and let me tell you it will be fun with they hit those teenage years! They were giggling and whispering and talking about boys and it was quite the entertaining gossip fest! We have some boys that live next door and they like to peek over the fence and talk to the girls!

This is a picture of Cecely's first day of Preschool! She was so excited. She is so smart. You would never think she was three. She carries on conversations better than most adults :). Now, if she would only stop waking up at 4:45 in the morning thinking she needs to go to the bathroom. We put Devonney in her room and I don't think she liked that at all. So she would wake up at 4:45 am and scream out that she needed to go potty. Of course that would wake up Devonney and so my morning would begin.. So Devonney is back to sleeping in the 4 bedroom until we can work out some issues.. I would love for both of them to share but we may have to wait a little bit.

We are enjoying the end of the summer and now onto Fall. It's still pretty warm here during the day but it has started cooling off at night. The girls are busy with school and homework. Mom stays busy with all of that and busing kids around. We are in our new home and pretty much unpacked. I will post pics of that later. Hope everyone is ready for Fall. I know I am. That is my favorite season! Pumpkin bread and cookies and everything else pumpkin.. I can't wait. We love and miss all of you who are far away!

Peace

You know as I sit here and type this my house is so quiet.... I can hear my husband snoring in our room :) My children are all asleep. I went and checked on each one. I put covers on each of them, I kissed their foreheads, I put falling limbs back onto their beds.... I lingered longer at my precious 9 month old baby. She is so chubby and so precious just like each of my children.(well my other children technically aren't chubby anymore)

I realized something though as I checked on my children tonight. I am sure that I have felt it before, I am sure it's not a new feeling to me. I guess it just kind of struck me tonight as I looked at my precious family sleeping. PEACE. I am at peace. You know our lives have kind of been a whirl wind for the past little while. Between the job losses and moving and moving and moving.. Between the preeclampsia and the bed rest and our preemie little bundle of joy, life has been busy. Good but busy. All along the way we have been extremely blessed. I have felt Heavenly Father watching over our little family. My testimony has been strengthened by the many friends and family members who have helped us get to where we are today.

Sometimes I look at my four beautiful girls and I cannot believe that they are mine. I know that they are mine, I remember each of them as they came into our lives. Blessing us in ways that continue to melt my heart everyday. I am so grateful that each of them are sealed to us. That we are an eternal family. I am so grateful for my husband and how hard he works for our family. He is an amazing father. My girls have such a deep love for their dad and it warms my soul because each daughter should have that bond with their dad. The love that daughter's have for their dad's is a special and tender love and vice versa. I am so blessed to have all of them in my life. So as I look and listen to my family sleeping I feel peace. The days may sometimes be overwhelming. I rarely get done what I think I will for the day. Sometimes I feel like I have utterly failed as a mom.... but at the end of the day when all is said and done when everyone is sleeping and mom is still awake typing and remembering the day and all of it's blessings... I feel peace.

Catching up!!

So this summer we have done some wonderful things! The girls started off the summer in swim lessons which they absolutely loved!! They ended up having three weeks of swim lessons! We did two weeks at the Parks and Rec center here. It was my two girls and Trevor(one of their best friends from the ward) who ended up being in the swim class. Then two young men who were family and friends of some people in our ward ended up teaching classes too. Needless to say the girls were tuckered out by the end of the day. For one week the classes overlapped so they had swim in the morning and in the evening. They are such happy little water babies!! We also went camping with some good friends of our in the ward. It was great! So much cooler and lots of beautiful things to see. Here we are standing by some of the giant Sequoia's!! They are massive and so mystical and haunting. We went on a little hike around the "Trail of 100 giants".
The girls were so amazed by these trees!

It got pretty cold that evening. Here everyone is all bundled up!! We had a great fire and some yummy smores and hot chocolate!! Of course no camp is secure without some kiddos running around finding all the bugs and rocks! My kids kept getting bit by ants!! Needless to say they loved it bug bites and all!

My swimming beauties with their teacher. Aislynn was so sad when swimming lessons were over. When her teacher gave her her award she started crying. I asked her what was wrong and she said "I am going to miss my teacher". That's my tender hearted Aislynn for you.

At Long Last!

So I know it's been forever since I posted!! So sorry! It was becoming more of a chore than anything. I love blogging and for me it's the best thing to a diary that I have kept over the years. Yes I know I am bad! However when something becomes a major chore then it takes me a while to get motivated again. So, I am motivated. Lots of thing have happened in the months since I have blogged LOTS!!! My children continue to grow everyday. I did not give them permission to do this, but alas it doesn't matter they continue to grow and get bigger and more independent. I love them to pieces and just try and cherish those small moments everyday. Devonney has grown by leaps and bounds. Someone needs to tell her that she was a preemie. She is no longer the 4 pound little baby bird as you can tell by the above picture. She has chunked out to ginormous proportions. She is everywhere. She rolls hops and just gets into everything. She gets up on all fours and hops, not crawls. She can push herself up to a sitting position. She sits all by herself quite well and is just a joy!! She is such a happy kid. She eats like it is going out of style! Notice those thighs. She has thighs on top of thighs and I love it. I kiss those rolls all day long. She is still a shorty. At her six month appt she was only 24 inches. Now she is 8 months so we will see how she has grown! Aislynn and Bailey started first grade today. WOW... they are such dolls. They are so kind and loving to each other and their younger sisters. Of course we have the normal sister fighting, but for the most part they really are good to each other. Cecely is my three year old going on 15. She starts preschool tomorrow. She is so smart and pragmatic. She cracks me up. She is my little piece of sunshine wrapped in a tornado. She keeps me on my toes!

Adam loves his job. Ridgecrest is really good to us. We love our ward and our friends. We are about to move to another house, but staying in the same ward which is fabulous. The girls had to start a new school because they are in a different school district. They were so brave and such troopers!! I am in Young Women's and love my calling! Adam teaches the 8 and 9 year olds.. We had a wonderful summer with lots of play dates and parks and everything else you can do while out of school. It's been HOT HOT HOT. It was 110 today. Life is really good and we are enjoying the ride. We continue to be blessed everyday with our beautiful family. We have such great friends here and cannot imagine being anywhere else. Well we would love to be closer to family, but if we have to settle this is not too bad :) We love you all and I promise I will do a better job....

My girls

Since we live so close to Death Valley and other wonderful nature creations, our family has lots of opportunities to explore and really appreciate the wonderful things that we have here in our little part of the world. Devonney is a little too young to explore yet, but Daddy took the "big girls" on a little hike to see some wonderful lava rocks. Devonney and I stayed in the car because it was extremely cold and windy, but the older girls loved hiking over the big rocks with daddy. It's so great to have Adam as a geologist because he knows so many amazing things about the beautiful landscape around us. The girls love spending time with him and love the fact that he knows so much about the rocks. This picture is kind of dark, but here are all three of my "big girls". Cecely no longer considers herself a baby because Devonney has taken that spot. She is a big girl now! She enjoys being out with the big girls and her dad. She is a trooper. She tends to fall down a lot but she gets right back up and keeps going! I am so lucky to have such wonderful and beautiful daughters!
I hope one day when the girls are older I can show them this picture! No matter how much fighting they do, at the end of the day they love each other so much. Since they share a room I love to hear the conversations that they have when they should be sleeping. The have such a deep bond with each other and I am so grateful for that. Where would my life be without my children. I hate to even think about it. This picture explains it all.
Here is our little monkey. She is getting bigger everyday. She is such a little piece of sunshine. Even being so tiny she adds such an enormous amount of happiness and love to our home.
How precious can you get. I have taken pictures of every single one of my children sleeping when the are babies and I cherish every one of them. I love my little Devonney . Who knew such a small package would have such a huge impact on our lives. I am blessed and I know that I am. I have four beautiful, healthy girls. Each fills such an important role in our life as a family. Each adds so much than what we had before. I am so grateful for my wonderful family.

Grandma and Grandpa visit!

So, my parents came to visit us the end of December. It was such a huge surprise and blessing. I really thought that they would not be able to come until the end of January, or maybe in February for the blessing. They surprised us! Of course I knew that my mom wouldn't be able to hold out for very long without seeing her new grand daughter. It was very hard for her not to be here with me with everything that I went through. They have my granny that lives with them and it is very hard to go anywhere or find anyone to watch her if they need to leave.

While I was going through the whole preeclampsia thing my mom would call and text and so would my dad everyday. Of course I had Dr. appts everyday to monitor the blood pressure and the protein in the kidneys and liver. Everyday I could expect a call or text from my parents to find out what was going on. It was so nice to have them checking up on me. They were also worried about Devonney. It was so nice to have them come and see our newest little angel. My dad could not believe that she was so tiny. He kept telling her that he couldn't believe something so little caused so much worry(but then he would tell her that she was worth it). They brought great gifts for the older girls. Lots of fun games and books.

My dad busted out the banjo and we sang and played while the girls danced! It reminded me of when I was growing up. There was always music going on in our house, whether it be the banjo or the guitar. Lots of great memories and I am so glad we can share those with our children. My mom got to hold and snuggle Devonney as much as she wanted. It was so great! There is something so special about having your parents here when you have your kids. Not to mention that the older kids loved having grandpa and grandma here! We miss them already but can't wait for Grandma and Grandpa Bingham to come visit in February!

In Review!

As you can see, all of the girls love their new baby sister. Each of them in their own special way is such a great help to mom. These pictures are almost a month old. This is the first night we brought her home. She weighed 4 pounds 7 oz when we brought her home. I just had another check up for her yesterday and she weighs 5 pounds 14 oz. She is getting to be a big girl now. Well, not really she is still so tiny, but she is starting to fill out. She is such a blessing to our family. She is such a sweet baby. She is now starting to stay up a little more during the day and loves to look around. She loves her sisters already. Bailey loves to read books to her. Aislynn loves to sing to her and Cecely loves to rub her head when I am feeding her.

I will post some more pics of the little monkey now that she is so huge(ha ha). We also had my parents come and visit for a couple of days so I will post those pictures too. It has been almost a month since we brought Devonney home and although I am a little sleep deprived it has been such a blessing. I can't imagine life without her in our family. Each of my precious girls has such an important place in our home.

Thank you to everyone for calling and emailing. We appreciate everyone's love and concern for our family. We miss all of you. Congrats to my friends who are celebrating new babies in their families. Whether or not those babies are here on earth or looking down from Heaven, it is so true that a baby changes everything.