Halloween and Ginny's Baptism

October 31st was both the day that Ginny was baptized and also the day the fun Trick-or-Treating hunt happened. There were many people who came for the special day. My parents came up from Henderson, Chris' parents flew up from Las Cruces, NM, and my brother KC and his family drove down from Ogden. Ginny had a wonderful baptism at 10:00am. That evening we did our fun door to door hunt for candy! Ginny was the Statue of Liberty for Halloween and even won an award at her school for one of the best "Home-made Costumes". Asher was a monkey and Lucy was Max from her favorite TV show, Max and Ruby. My older nephew, Zach was Superman and my younger nephew, Miles was Bob the Builder. I really don't think the day could have been more perfect. Thanks to all the family who came and all the friends who supported Ginny on her special day!

Asher (the monkey), Miles (Bob the Builder), Zach (Superman), Ginny (Statue of Liberty), and Lucy (Max from Max and Ruby).

Daddy and Ginny right before her Baptism.

Ginny with her pretty roses that Grandpa and Grandma Wood gave her.

Ginny with Gramp and Grandma Wilkins

Ginny with Grandpa and Grandma Wood

Ginny with her Family

A full year?......pathetic!!

It's hard to decide where to begin when so much has happened this past year. Hmmmm...... I guess I'll just choose a few of the most important events and go from there. You know, blogging is hard for me. I feel like everyone else just either have these amazing hunky-dorey lives or they are just more optimistic than I am. While I am happy, I need someone to rub off some of that silver-lining on me. I say this because this past year has been the hardest year of my life. Or should I say, the past few months. My bishop recently told me, "laughter is the best medicine". He is right. I need to laugh more. Anyway, I'll go more into that soon....

First off, I love my family. I really do. I feel so extremely blessed to have all that I have. I am also so grateful for the many material things that I have. While I don't live in a life of lavishness, on the contrary I live a great life which is a little more modest, but secure. Through this whole economical crisis, I'm grateful for my husband's job that has remained steady and secure so we can have the things we need with a little selfishness on the side.

We went to my favorite place just a few weeks ago. Disneyland!!!!! Everyone knows that I just love that place. Chris' amazing twin brother Charlie along with his amazing wife Carrie let us stay with them in their Irvine, CA condo. We had great trips to the beach with them and they even spent the day at Disneyland with us one day. They took care of our dog a lot of the trip. Unfortunately the little stinker decided that he needed to "mark" all over their house! Sorry guys!!!!! My sweet little nephew Isaac was also so good to share all of his toys with his rambunctious 3 cousins! It's hard to share at the age of 2 and he was amazing!!!

Cracker (Charlie and Carrie's dauchsund) and Oliver (our Cavachon).

Lucy giving her daddy a kiss while he's laying in the sun.

Ginny and Isaac checking out their seashell collection.

Isaac soaking in some of that lovely salt water air!

Chris and Charlie battling the waves. Too cold for me. No thank you!!

Of course the other great part of our journey was the fun trip to Disneyland. We went two days with my mom and dad, my brother KC, his wife Lynnette, and their two boys Zach and Miles. It was a fun group. We also went the third day with Charlie, Carrie, and Isaac. I just love this place. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

The whole group getting ready to start a great Disney Adventure!!!

Asher on the Haunted Mansion ride with his Gramp. Asher absolutely LOVED Disneyland, but spent a lot of time plugging his ears because some things were a little too loud for him.

Chris and Lynnette took the younger kids to visit some Villans while the other adults and Ginny went on an adult ride. This is the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland.

Asher on King Triton's Carousel. He loved the merry-go-rounds.

My dad, Miles, my mom, and Lucy on Winnie the Pooh.

We ate a delicious dinner where I had AMAZING crab cakes at a restaurant inside the Pirates of the Carribean ride. The restaurant is called Blue Bayou. KC, Lynnette, and their infamous Pirate son Zach!!!

Ginny liked her Fantasia Mickey Mouse hat!

Meeting Mickey Mouse!

Lucy loved meeting any character she could get a hold of, but Goofy and Pluto were the most exciting for her.... well, maybe they come in second after Mickey.

At the beginning of July, we had a Wood Family Reunion right here in Price. It was nice of everyone to be willing to come here for the occasion. We had people travel from Boston, Ogden, California, New Mexico, and even South Africa!!! It was Chris' parents, all of his brothers, spouses, children, and even a few pets! We went to a Lake, floated a canal, and mainly had a great time just lounging in the backyard catching up on life.

At the end of July we had the first official Keele Family Reunion. My Grandparents, their children and spouses, their grandchildren and spouses, and even great-grandchildren were there. Every single person was there!....except for my one cousin Jeremy who is faithfully serving his mission in Jamaica right now. Good excuse. Well, the second day into the reunion, we were up on the mountain and Asher tripped and fell. It didn't seem like anything too dramatic, but he was screaming hysterically and holding his arm. He has a high pain tolerance and I could tell that something was hurting really bad! Chris and I decided to take him off the mountain down to the Beaver, UT hospital. I knew there would probably be a crack. Boy, was I surprised when the PA comes back to us and says, "He needs emergency surgery right away!" He didn't crack a bone, he completely busted the bottom of his humorous completely off and it had shifted over! Here is a picture of the x-ray. You have to look closely, but you can see down by his elbow the problem.

This is in the hospital bed in Beaver. You can tell how much his left elbow hurt!

If you look at the humorous bone (big bone) at the tip by his elbow, you can see how the bottom broke off and shifted up a little bit. My poor Asher!

Here is Asher with his cute orange cast. His dad wanted orange so that he had some Phoenix Suns spirit!!! Go Suns! I took Asher up to a hospital in Provo where an Orthopedic Surgeon was waiting for him. Asher had a 1/2 hour surgery where they put the bone back into place and held it there with a couple of pins. 4 weeks later, they removed the pins and TA-DA!!! We now have a functioning elbow again. He was such a trooper through the whole ordeal.

In the middle of August, Chris went on another deep-sea fishing adventure in Alaska with his dad. They fished for Halibut and Salmon. Here was Chris' biggest catch of the trip. My sweet mother-in-law stayed with me while Chris was gone. She was a wonderful help!

Chris and his 77 lbs. halibut.

There are so many other fun things that have happened the past year. Ginny is now 8 and in the 2nd grade. She is getting baptized this Saturday. Asher will be 6 next month and is liking Kindergarten at his Special Needs school. Lucy is 3 and enjoying time home with mom. She has been completely potty trained for a long time now. We traveled to Las Cruces, NM in May to see Chris' parents for a week, I took my girls to see Annie at Tuachan in St. George, Chris' cousin Kinsey from Maine stayed with us for a week to spend time with us and get a taste of the western side of the US. We went to Goblin Valley, and also had a day at Lagoon with KC and Lynnette's family. A few fun adventures down to Beaver to see Grandparents as well. All and all, it was a fun filled summer.

Now, the reason why I mentioned earlier that this has been the hardest few months of my life is because I have entered into the world of Panic Attacks!!! Anyone else ever have this problem? Mine got to the point where my whole body would tremor. It looks like I'm having a seizure, but I'm completely coherent and aware. My stomach was so nervous and shook up that I couldn't eat for a few days and I lost 12 lbs. during my worst week. I even had a hard time sleeping because any little noise would scare me or make me nervous. My parents had to come up and stay with me for a week and just help me and my kids. For a long time, I just sat on my upstairs couch and staired out the window. Life in general just scared me. I still have issues with that on a daily basis, but not near as severe as last month. I do have to take medications now to keep me calm and relaxed. I went from being scared to death to even walk around the block to where I went with my family to Disneyland a few weeks ago. I was scared to go, but I did it! As much as I love my sweet little boy, a Psychiatrist and an Internal Medicine Doctor both think Asher was the underlying reason for this problem. I love my son so much, but he has been so much work mentally and physically that I think one day my body just snapped!!! I guess a lot of people have had this happen to them, but keep it very private. I have chosen not to keep it private. The reason? While I've gone through this, being able to talk with other people who have dealt with this has helped me so much. I want someone else who will later go through this think to contact me if they go through this because I'd love to help. I also go on a daily 3 mile walk with a friend to just get out of the house, have someone to talk to, and get some cardio in at the same time. I still don't feel normal and I HATE that. The doctor said it may be a few years before I feel completely like myself again. It's been the scariest and most emotionally draining experience of my life. It has caused me also a lot of depression.

We often question why Heavenly Father gives us different trials in our lives. For a long time I couldn't understand why I have to go through this. I've tried to find my own silver-linings in this and I have come up with some good lessons that I have learned from all of this. Mostly, I've learned that I just need to love my son for who he is and just love the many wonderful things about him and not sweat the things he may never do.....like speech. There are many other things I've learned, but I won't go into all of that. I have to give special thanks to my parents for all their love and support as I've gone through this. They have been AMAZING. Mostly, I have to let my husband know how much I love him. He's been a great supporter and he's been so patient with me.

Anyway, there is a year worth of blogs in one post. If any of you made it all the way through, I'm sorry. I probably bored you all to death, but thanks for reading anyway. I'll try to post more often in the future.

Potty Ups and Downs Update

So, I appreciated everyone's helpful advice on how to avoid my home being decorated in the colors YELLOW and BROWN. Well, I do have to admit that there was a little clean up involved...of course! I HATE having to clean up that disgusting fact of life. Well, I think that Sara's idea would've worked very well, but it's already so cold here and it's too expensive to keep my home warm enough here to let her run freely through the house in the buff. While that was a great idea, I had to count that one out. Mikal suggested I pour warm water on her "yaya" (I appreciate you remembering my funny nick-names of the past by the way). I had tried that many times and I also have heard that works. With her, it was just something fun. Didn't trigger anything. She finally just figured it out once and actually went on the potty and then was more interested in it. I was so thrilled when she finally went the first time! The first day, she had a few accidents, but not too bad. Day two, she had a poop accident and made a huge mess.....hate that!....on my friend's carpet no less. I was so embarrassed, but luckily I was able to clean it all up. After that, it was just one accident after the next and I kept getting more and more angry with her. I was hoping I'd scare her into not wanting to mess up. It totally back fired in my freakin' face! Today, I made a goal to just be very happy everytime she went and not push her or saying anything negetive if she did mess up. So far, we've only had one accident the whole day and it's almost 4pm. So, positiveness and happiness work way better than negetiveness and grumpiness. I think I just made her too nervous to go on the potty yesterday. She's already to the point today where she'll tell me if she has to go rather than me constantly asking her every 10 minutes. The last thing we need to work on is her being able to distinguish the difference of just having to pass gas or actually have to pass more than that. She hasn't figured that out yet so, we've made lots of trips to the potty just so she can sit down, do a nice echoing fart and then be done. I'm so happy to be this far into it. Potty Training is so HARD!!!! I'm going to wait until she really has the hang of it before I move onto her brother. The SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS!.........do I hear an "amen"?

Potty Training Help Please!!!

So.... I potty trained Ginny right before she turned 2. I tried to get her to go on the potty all day. She finally peed and liked the sound of it hitting the water so much....she was potty trained! So, I had her taken care of very quickly. Asher is about to be 5. He is still not potty trained, but it's common for it to take a very long time for autistic children. The average child with autism is 6 or 7. I hope it's sooner than that, but who knows. Anyway, here I am with Lucy who turned 2 in July. I have tried over and over about 10 different times in the past 4 months. So, she is finally understanding how to poop on the potty. The child will not pee! I have tried so many times. She'll even drink tons of pop, start to pee in her pants, I'll throw her on the potty. She does an incredible keegle and will hold it for a half hour. I finally let her off the potty and as soon as she's off, she'll walk down the hall a little bit and pee right on my floor! So, what am I doing wrong? Why will she go anywhere, but on the actual potty? I have yet to ever get her to pee on a potty! Anybody have any good tips on potty training? My first child was way too easy. This is my first real attempt at it. HELP!!!!!

And to be completely random, my friend Natalie did a 4th/4th on her blog. It's where you get into your picture file on your computer. You go to your 4th picture file you've ever put on your computer and then you go to your 4th picture in that file, post it, and then explain about it.

This is a picture of Ginny and I when she was 7 months old. We are on our way upto Bozeman, MT to live for two and a half years. On our South to North moving excursion, when we first got into some beautiful trees of Montana, we got out to walk around for a minute and admire the beautiful scenery. This is May, 2002. This picture makes me miss Montana a lot!!!

Sorry....Things are Boring

I haven't posted anything in a while.....maybe that has something to do with the fact that my life is very uneventful! In a good way, though. It seems like there is always so much going on that it's nice to feel like life is temporarily dull and boring. I love adventure, but for the sake of financial issues we can take a break now and then. We are even sticking around here for all of the upcoming holidays. We did cheat and headed away over night to Moab last week. Chris' work paid for the whole thing, so we couldn't complain. Chris reserved a motel that had a big slide that curves around in about 2 circles into a very warm pool. We then walked down the main road that night and went out to eat. Beautiful evenings there and I love tourist shops! It was a fun family outing.

Anywho, let's see. Well, my oldest child turned 7 on the 15th. Can you believe that I'm the mother of a 7 year old? My life is seriously flashing right before my eyes. Things are going so fast. Unfortunately the one thing that has slowed way down is my METABOLISM!!! I hate that it's not like my childhood anymore where you can eat everything and anything and be fine. Now, I take a bite of a candybar and my thighs grow two inches in circumference! Back to more important things. My daughter had a Hannah Montana birthday party. The girls all received "pop star make-overs". They all got there nails polished, make-up done, and pink hair streaks (all courtesy of me...hehe). I think she had a great birthday. Now, I have another birthday coming up on the 20th of November for my sweet Asher. He will be turning 5!

Blowing out her candles on her cake covered in Hannah Montana guitar suckers. After she blew them out, she panicked because she realized she had forgotten to make a wish. So, I just lit one up again so she could make her wish and blow it out again. She's so funny!

This is her whole clan that she invited to her birthday. They were quite the silly bunch and I think they all had a great time.

If you remember back a few entries ago when I mentioned how Lucy (my 2 year old) stuck a remote into the microwave and turned it on. Well, we had episode number 2! This time, she thought it would be a great experiment to see what happens when you put a CD into a toaster and cook it. We now know it makes a horrible smell and requires the whole toaster to be replaced. I wouldn't have ever known that had she not been so helpful in teaching me! (sarcasm)

OUR HAPPY CLAN

Here is a recent photo of our family taken about a month ago. I know I haven't posted pics in a while, but our computer is not being as stubborn all of a sudden.

Here is my silly Ginny posing cute in her slightly large glasses!

Asher and Lucy having fun on a tire swing with their cousins. Too bad you can only see the back of Lucy's head, but I love Asher's smile in this one!

My House is Still Standing!

Lately my 2 year old Lucy has been showing interest in the microwave. She usually just opens and closes the door over and over again. Well, I guess this was me not seeing the dramatic scene forth coming quick enough. I am in the next room and all of a sudden I hear the microwave turn on. Well, I am one to always think worse case scenario (ex: yesterday I was in the front yard talking to a friend for just a minute and the whole time I had in the back of my head that Lucy is choking on her quesadilla in the house and I'm not in there to rescue her and she's going to die. Then I run in the house to see that she's still eating her food). I think panicing just comes with the territory of motherhood. Not to get too far from my story. Anyway, I did the panic thing and started to think if she put something in the microwave that could possibly be hazerdous. I run into the kitchen as fast as I can to all of a sudden seeing through the microwave screen that something is zapping and flashing light. I hurry and turn off the microwave. Lucy had put two glitter pens AND A REMOTE into our microwave. Yes, the remote also had batteries in it. They only heated for about 5 seconds before I got to it. It filled my kitchen with smoke and the most disgusting smell. Yes, the remote and glitter pens are history. So, I guess it's okay to think worse case scenario sometimes because you never know what children are capable of or when they will put themselves in danger and if you're not there quick enough....! I don't know if she was in any real danger like getting electricuted or causing my house to catch fire, but like I said.... I THINK WORSE CASE SCENARIO ABOUT EVERYTHING!!!