Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!!

The kids had a great time making gingerbread houses. Tay and Gabe were a team. Their's was rightfully awarded the Candy Lodge.

Drew worked really hard on his. He burned through two or three packs of gram crackers trying to get it just right. His was awarded the Candy Cottage.

Luke had his friend over.They were awarded the Candy Shacks.  Everyone seem to love to eat the candy as much as they did decorating with it.

Gabe had his Preschool Christmas Program. He did an amazing job singing. He knew all the words and sang them loud and clear!

He was in heaven when it was his turn to sit on Santa's lap. He told Santa that he had been a good boy and would like a lego police truck.

On Christmas Eve it is a family tradition to go to Mark's parents and have dinner and do Christmas activities. Cole with is aunt Jenny and cousin Harley.

Grandma and Grandpa Spencer

Our activity that we were in charge of for the night was decorating gingerbread men. Here is our cousin Layney showing off her's.

Tay and cousin Zoey.

Cole loved hanging out with his grandma and grandpa.

We had to get a picture while all the grand kids had their elf PJ's on.

Well Santa came to our house! Everyone seems to be very excited about their presents.

We had a great Christmas day. We enjoying hanging out and playing with toys, but most of all we enjoyed be together. Thinking back to last year at this time we where just getting ready to be apart for a month. It's amazing our different this year is. We are so grateful for Cole and that he is with us now. We are to grateful that he has been doing as well as he has. The Lord has truly blessed us.

We were very lucky that is finally snowed Christmas day. The boys were very excited to get our 4 wheeler out and take it for a spin around the circle.

More December Fun!

Cole has not been feeling well. His brothers have been coughing and still giving him kisses.So we have learned our lesson, we hope the kids have at least. That Cole will get sick if you are sick and kissing on him. I took him in because of Christmas coming up and sure enough he has an ear infection. So glad we could get some meds going, so hopefully we can fully enjoy Cole's first Christmas.

On Monday we had an appointment with the Cardiology. Cole's heart is looking good. The Dr was glad to have only good news to report. We will be having a bigger test done at the beginning of next year to rule out any issues. Hopefully we won't have to come back for a very long time or maybe ever again after the next test.

Basketball is what our Saturdays are all about anymore. The boys are doing very well! Cole, Gabe and Tay are having a great time cheering them on.

Here is Luke shooting and making a free throw.

Miles is a great point guard. 

Drew is great at bring the ball down the court and making a shot.

Cole LOVES baths. If he hears the water running he starts to smile and flap his arms. So when his brother asked if they could take a bath with him, he was way excited.

We are having a hard time in the eating department. We feed Cole a couple of weeks ago some beef and beef gravy. In which he did not like at all. He didn't even have it in his mouth for more than a second and he started dry heaving, then he projectile vomited. Ever since then he will only eat yogurt. When we try to feed him anything else he closes his eyes and turns away. I talked to our PT  about it. She thought it might be a good idea to have the Speech Therapist come and see if they could help us out. The sad thing is he was eating baby food so well that I had just gone to the store and bought tons of baby food. I hope that we can get him liking baby food again.

A little over a week ago we went and meet a family that just had a little baby girl with SB. She didn't qualify for fetal surgery, her legion is at the very end of her tailbone and they still haven't done surgery. I think they are waiting for her to get a little bigger. It was great to meet them. They have such a cute family. It will be fun to watch their little girl grow up and do amazing things.  

December fun!

   It's been such a warm winter that we went on a walk to deliver our Christmas cards to our neighbors. Gabe and Cole were very excited to get out of the house.

    The big brothers are back on track, so Cole and Gabe are enjoying their alone time together.

   Gabe loves playing dress up. He told me that they were playing super santa  heros.

    Guess who won the center piece contest at the ward Christmas party? Yep it was us. Cole was the hit of the party. He was so good to sit and let everyone take his picture.

Enjoying Fun Family Time

    Cole is starting to be big enough to sit in the cart at the Costco. You could tell he was very excited about it too.

 
  We got to have our cousin Layney come over and play.

The Tree of Life

In Draper City Park, a willow tree lights up the crisp Christmas air with over 1,000 strands of lights.  This tree, seemingly ablaze with white fire, symbolizes so much more than the light and warmth of the season.  It has become a living symbol of the love of Christ—a vision from the Book of Mormon come to life. (LDS Living)

This tree was so neat to see in Person. The whole park had lights but this tree was the main focus.

For Christmas Mark's Mom gave all the girls a night at the Nutcracker. It was so fun.

Thanksgiving

A little late but here are some pictures of Thanksgiving. This year we celebrated at my Mom's house. There was a lot of food, family and fun.

Gabe helped me make the rolls.

Cooking Buddies

The next day we went to visit Mark's parents.(sorry it's blurry)

One Year ago....

         One year ago today was my 20 week ultrasound. We had already found out that we were having a boy, so we were just excited about getting to see him again. The lady that was doing the ultrasound was fairly young so when she was taking a lot pictures and a long time, I just thought that she must be new. But after the ultrasound was done and she said that there was something that she found and would like the Dr. to come in and talk to us I knew something was wrong. But it was nothing close to what I thought it might be. Two of our other kids have had a heart murmur so we had to come back for another ultrasound. But nothing really needed to be done about it. The Dr came in and start to tell us that they thought that our baby had signs of having Spina Bifida. Large head, large ventricles and what looks to be an opening in his spine. As he was telling us this my husband was on his phone googling Spina Bifida. Which is not a good idea. We spent the next 4 hours talking about our options. With it being the Tuesday before Thanksgiving we were  kind of on hold. Which is the worst thing to be on when you just find out that your baby has Spina Bifida. It was all that I could think about. At this time I'm sad to say that I had a hard time relating to the baby. I wasn't seeing him as a baby anymore. He was Spina Bifida. But as I prayed and asked the Lord to help me know what to do to, a thought came into my mind that he is my baby, he will look just like your other kids. So now that he is born and people comment on him looking like one of his brothers. I remember that time when I was told that he would. It really did help me reconnect with him. If I could see our family today, last year at this time I wouldn't of worried so much. We are so blessed to have this little guy in our lives. He brings us so much joy. I'm so grateful to be his mom and can't wait to see all the amazing thing he will do.

Great things are happening!

        This last Wed. was our Young Women in Excellence program. We are so proud of Taylor and all her hard work. Getting your Young Womanhood Recognition is a pretty big thing. I was 18 years old when I got it my first time. It took me the full 6 years. Taylor was able to get it in 3 years. So proud of all her hard work. She is one amazing girl!

Here are all the women (young and old) that earned their award that night.

 Bishop Frank and Taylor when he was presenting her the award.

Yes Taylor is much taller than I, but I'm not sure if she is that much taller. :-)

             This year Taylor shared about her Virtue goal, which was to read the Book of Mormon. She was able to go with some of the leaders and girls to one of the leaders cabins. The spend two days reading the whole book. She said her favorite part was when they went to the Logan Temple to read the last chapter. She said it was hard to read it in such a short time but she's glad she did it!

Here is what the award looks like.

On Sat we were able to do Miles' Eagle Scout Project. His project was to have all the helmets cleaned and check in his little league. To make sure they are safe and protecting the kids properly. We are so proud of all his hard work and so grateful for everyone's support and help.

Even little Wil came and helped.

   Cole has been in heaven playing trains with his brothers and Dad. We are all in agreement that we think he is going to LOVE trains when he gets bigger.