He is here!!! Welcome to earth Little Man!

BRAYDEN NEUEL CHASE
born on Sept. 25th
at 11:46 am
weighed 7 lbs 3 oz
19 1/4 inches long

Brayden and mommy are both doing great now! There were a few bumps in the road for both of them but they are happy and healthy now and very happy to be home!!

Brayden has lots of blond hair and looks just like his daddy! Shocker I know. :)

His sisters are very happy to have him home (and mommy and daddy for that matter). We look forward to getting to know him more and more each day. Details of the birth will come in a later post.

Pregnant bellies & kicking our feet up!

So I finally let Billy take a picture of my pregnant belly to show those who do not believe me when I say I feel and look huge! Also please ignore my frizzy hair! ha, ha

This picture actually doesn't even do it justice. This is me at 33 weeks. I am excited for Brayden to join our family but nervous at the same time.

Then as I was sitting at the computer that same day checking my email and blogs I look at Kylee and this is what I see.

She was just sitting back with her feet kicked up drinking her juice enjoying a movie. It was to precious not to take a picture of. She loves to be the only kid at home when Mattie is at school. She loves it when sister comes home don't get me wrong but she loves her one on one time. She better enjoy it now because in a few weeks things are going to change again. :)

Green Sticker Reward!!

Ever day Mattie comes home from school I check her folder for what her homework assignment is for that day and to see what color behavior sticker she got for the day. Green is Great! Yellow is Good. Red is BAD! Mattie has NEVER received a red. Anyways she came home the other day and she had received a green sticker! Yahoo!! I was so excited and I wanted to make sure to point out to her how proud mommy and daddy are that she got a green sticker. We want to really draw great attention to wonderful behavior. So I told her that because she received a green sticker in class that day we were going to make homemade chocolate chip cookies. Needless to say she was very excited.

Of course this is always an interesting endeavor with 2 little girls and a very pregnant mommy but we had fun!

At one point in the process of making these yummy cookies I realized my brown sugar was hard as a rock so my loving husband went out in the smoldering heat and got us some fresh brown sugar so we could finish making cookies. I checked to make sure we had all the other ingredients before he left. So daddy returns we add our brown sugar and 2 more ingredients when I go to get the eggs out of the fridge. (The only time I didn't check to see if we had because we ALWAYS have eggs). NO EGGS! Once again my loving husband goes to the store and gets us eggs. First we even went to see if we could just borrow some from the neighbor but of course they weren't home.

So we eventually go ALL the ingredients into the same bowl and we started cooking our reward. They turned out delicious! You forget how much you love homemade cookies when you have been buying the bulk Costco brand of pre-made cookie dough because it is so much easier. :)

Both the girls had a great time putting different ingredients in the bowl and then watching at how it all came together to make something so yummy! What a fun memory!! I love you girls! Also on a side note 2 days later Mattie came home with another GREEN sticker and she was so excited to tell me when she got home from school. I love how much she loves school!
Oh yeah and this is how Mattie ended up by the end of this cooking session! She is just so dang cute! Thanks Aunt Krista for the adorable apron!

Where were you???

Where were you 8 years ago when our country was attacked? I remember I was getting ready to get in the shower to get ready for work. I went to turn my cd player on and the weirdest thing my stereo turned on. I don't remember turning my stereo on. I then heard the dj's saying that 1 of the buildings from the World Trade Center had been hit by a plane. I ran and turned on the tv where I watched stunned and shocked! I watched as the 2nd building was hit. I remember feeling so many emotions, numbness, shock, fear, anger, sadness and more shock. I remember feeling warm tears running down my cheeks not even knowing when the tears started. I ran to my dad's bedroom where he to was getting ready for work. I was crying and telling him that the World Trade Center was under attack. I felt like my breath was leaving me. I was lightheaded from emotional overload. My dad was saying to me "What? What are you talking about?" Then we hurried to turn his tv on and there it was the horrible scene of reality. I was praying that my mind was just playing tricks on me and I was in a nightmare and I would wake up soon. Unfortunately it was all to real. I continued to get ready for work while crying the whole time. Praying continually for all those people who were there. I prayed for their families. I prayed for a way that I could help. I remember praying ALL DAY! When I got to work there was a numb silence in the huge corporate building. Nobody felt that we had anything important to say. We had employees who were from New York who didn't know where their family was or if they were alright. All of those employees were sent home to focus on their families. I went and donated blood as much as I could (which is a huge thing for me because I HATE needles) but I knew that their were people who were more in need then me and they NEEDED blood. I helped raise money to send to the relief fund. I am so grateful that I had and continue to have a Heavenly Father who showed me that I can make a difference and that he can't stop evil from happening but he can call on us his children to help those who are in need from the aftermath of such situations. Lastly I wanted to share this video that is posted on lds.org it is about a 9/11 survivor and how he is still a survivor in many other ways. Please take 8 minutes out of your day to watch this video. It can and will help you reflect on what is really important in your life.

God bless America! This truly is the promised land and Satan knows it so he will do all he can to try to destroy it. Don't let that happen! Stand up for our country! Thank you to all our military for your dedication and service!

P.S.
If you feel like reading a few more inspiring blog posts about 9/11 go to these blogs
http://cherylweathersby.blogspot.com/ or click on Mommy Dearest on my list of blogs
http://elizabethbryant.blogspot.com/ or click on Lizzy Writes on my list of blogs

Strength of a lion!

So Kylee and I had just picked up Mattison from school and on the way home both girls had fallen asleep in the car. So I called Billy and said "Can you come outside and carry our girls into the house please." So Billy came out to get them and they woke up slowly as he was getting them out. They both insisted he carry them both at the same time. Needless to say that is not a light load but he was nice enough to hold them a few seconds longer than needed so that I could get a picture of this precious moment.

I'm so glad my girls have a daddy who loves them both very much! He loves when they want to snuggle and have daddy time.

Thanks honey for being such a great daddy and for being such a great part of our daughters lives. I am also very excited to see you with our son who will be here in a few weeks!

Mattie's breakfast choices!

So Kylee woke up at 5:30 am and said "Toys" and goes running to the family room. I said "NO. Toys is asleep and in a few minutes WE will be asleep again!" So I took Kylee to bed with me and she was asleep quickly. Then at 6 am in came Mattie. I made her lay in my bed for 30 minutes before I just decided to let her go in the front room to watch Disney channel for a while until Kylee woke up. Kylee slept until 7 and I as pretty happy. So Kylee and I are heading out to the family room to join Mattie. Mattie is very excited see us both. She quickly confesses to me that she had some chocolate pudding and then just a little bit of brownies that she ate with her fingers. It wouldn't have been hard to figure this chocolate situation out though because the evidence was all over her lips.

So I told her that she doesn't have those things for breakfast and we went and had a more suitable breakfast. I then went to make Mattie's lunch when I walked by the brownie pan......WHAT! She ate a little bit more than just a small bit. I don't know what do you think? The whole right side is her "small" piece that she ate! :)

You'll notice that she also was careful enough to put the plastic back over the top of the brownies. What a little monkey!

It is nice to have such an independent child but apparently we still need to work on health choices. Not that brownies are healthy at any point of the day! hee, hee

The winner is...! True Joy! You are not alone!

In my last post I asked for all of you to share something funny or something that would really make me laugh because I needed it. Okay people seriously I only got 5 comments (and 2 of them were from my mom)! I guess only my mom and a couple friends really wanted me to laugh. :( Oh well. So my amazing mom went above and beyond and posted 2 times! Both were VERY funny so she is the lucky winner! Thanks mom for always doing what you can to make me smile and for being such an amazing friend!

On a more serious note I recently felt a strong prompting from my Heavenly Father telling me to go to lds.org and I would find what I really needed to hear. I followed the prompting and this is what was at the top of the page.
I know that Heavenly Father is mindful of each of us and that he can help us understand what we really NEED at any particular time in our lives. If it be to be uplifted or to help us stay strong or just to tell us he loves us. I have felt so much recently that I was running up that "heartbreak hill" and never seeing the end or even the top for that matter. Today I can say that I can see the top! Even though I know that everything worth having takes hard work and persistence, I also know that it is attainable if we have Jesus Christ on our side. I know that there will be many more hills and mountains to climb throughout my life but I pray that I will stay focused on what really NEEDS to be done to allow me to return to my Heavenly Father and Savior and to be with my family for eternity.