Memory wall

One of my favorite places in my home is in the front room. You cant miss it when you walk in the front door. It's a memory wall I have created. It's taken a while to get it all done, but it has been well worth the effort. I absolutely love it.

The first thing I did was a memory box with the dress, hat, booties and blankets Sarah was placed in at the hospital. I also added a copy of her hand and foot prints as well as the bear and head bow they gave her. After I had everything placed where I wanted it it still needed something so I added some flowers to the hat, in the bears hand and on the sides. These flowers also have special meaning because I found them in some of my grandmas crafting stuff! Jared's sister Stephanie sent us a picture of Jesus holding a baby. It was absolutely perfect! We hung it on the wall above the shadow box.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get a good picture of a shadow box!! You get a reflection of EVERYTHING!

Next I made a shadow box with the flowers from Sarah's funeral. I wasn't sure how I was going to make it work. After we dried the flowers I sprayed them with a flower preserver. Then I put them in two bundles and tied a bow around it. I was so afraid they were going to crumble, but they didn't! Then I put the ribbon from the flowers from her casket, Jared's boutonniere, my corsage, and the flower from each of the boys around the two bundles. Then between the two bundles I put the precious flower Jared placed in her hand for the pictures. Above that I put a precious saying my sweet neighbor Alicia gave me on the one year anniversary of Sarah's day. I love it!

It Says "You may be gone from my sight, but you are never gone from my heart!"

I wanted a living plant on memory of Sarah so during the summer I bought a mini peach rose bush to put on the shelf. Well, I do not have a green thumb to say the least and that blasted plant got some kind of mini spider infestation that killed it within a month. :( So I opted for some silk flowers. Hobby Lobby has a beautiful selection so I  picked out some that reminded me of her. It took several different trips because lets face it, they aren't cheap! Luckily every time I went in they were on sale half off!! I got some glass rocks, ribbon, and a tall vase and this is what I came up with. If you look close enough there are six butterfly's, one for each of the early losses (to read that background click here) and one for Sarah (her story) (edited pictures here). I am so pleased with how it turned out!

On the same shelf as the flowers is the beautiful figurine that my dad and Terry gave us when we lost Sarah. It's so fitting.

We also have this ship. Honestly, its been on this shelf for years because Jared loves it. I've been trying to figure out somewhere else to put it when it hit me how fitting is is to be here. The mortuary sent us a card and it had a poem in it about a ship sailing (to read the poem, click here).

Then lastly a photo. A photo that tells what my heart feels. ALL of my children are represented here. Those living and those on the other side. Each shadow represents an approximate age that they would be if they were here. I don't know the gender of five of them, but I threw some girls in there anyway! My heart tells me some of them had to be! Isaac wasn't cooperating very well for the picture. You can see him clear in the back between Jacob and John. As much as I love this picture, I've decided I need a new one. It just looks dark on the shelf and I hope to get one with Isaac more cooperative. I've also decided to use pictures of my living kids and turn them into shadows to personalize it a little better. I may even add Jared and me to the picture, we'll see.

And there you have it. My memory wall!

En Voyage

The poem the mortuary sent us

There's a ship sailing on to a harbor,
To a haven of comfort and rest;
It's a ship of God's fashion and making,
And its voyage by Him will be blest.
It departed with silence and beauty,
With the Master, Himself, in command;
As with dignity truly majestic
It sailed out of sight of all land.

There will always be clear skies above it;
There will always be calmness below;
There will never be storms to harass it,
For the Master is on it, you know,
And His wisdom will carry it safely
To the port of His infinite peace,
Where the light of His love will protect it
With a blessing that never will cease.

You have watched it sail onward and outward,
with a tear of regret in your eye,
For a loved one was sailing, upon it,
And there's grief when you're saying goodby.
But your tears would be tears of rejoicing,
And your heart would be happy and free,
If you could look for only a moment
On that ship that is sailing to sea.


For the one you have loved is at leisure,
With no worry or trouble or care;
There's contentment beyond understanding,
In the way God's passengers fare.
And you'd know from your own observation
That the sailing was joyful - not grim,
For it means a new life and new living,
And a sweet, closer contact with Him.

Oh, the solace there is in the knowledge,
Life is life and it always will be,
And it's simply a change of direction
When we sail on His ship out to sea.
And the tears that we shed for our loved ones
Are in truth shed for us left behind,
For it hurts to give up to the Master,
Tho we know He is gentle and kind.

So believe in His great and good wisdom,
Trust in Him, as you patiently wait;
On His ship God is ever the pilot,
And the one you have loved is the mate.

The Tree Of Life

We thought it would be fun to take the kids to see "The Tree Of Life" in Draper last weekend. We didn't tell the kids where we were going, we just said we were going somewhere special. Jared's aunt Lorna showed up about a half hour before we left so she came as well. We didn't tell her where we were going either. It was fun to keep it a secret and keep them guessing! When we could see the tree while driving they all were saying, "look at that tree over there!" They were pretty surprised when that was our destination!

FYI it is really hard to get good pictures, in the dark, of pretty light, with a cheapo camera! These pictures just don't do it a whole lot of justice, and it doesn't help that I'm not a photographer!

The whole gang

The boys being goofy

Jared and me

 On the tree they put twinkling lights that really give it a neat effect.

We had a lot of fun with the whole thing. When we first got there everyone started wandering over to the tree. I happened to be behind everyone and noticed they were all headed toward a (dried up) stream. None of them were headed to the bridge. I informed them they were all headed to the river of filthy water and better take a better course or they might get lost. They thought that was pretty neat and all ran over to see the stream. One or two of the boys actually ran down into the stream so the rest of the kids and Lorna made a chain to help their brothers return to the path that led to the "Tree Of Life"!

We planned on stopping at Temple Square on the way home, but it got to late so that will have to wait for another time. The next day we went to Home Depot to make the craft they do every first Saturday. The kids love it!

 Then we went for pictures with Santa. What a fun weekend! Santa's elf looked shocked and about fainted when I told her there were 6 kids to be in the picture! HA! It turned out cute though!

 MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Sarah's Pictures!!

After a very long wait, and a lack of proper paperwork (which was finally corrected) we have Sarah's pictures. They exceeded my expectations on the editing! I was really disappointed with the pictures from the hospital after comparing them to other I have seen through the Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep organization.  My nurse took the pictures using the nicu camera, because no one was available to come and take the pictures and I am sure she did the best she could.

Sarah went dark really fast and her skin was peeling. I thought for sure they wouldn't be able to edit everything out but I was so pleased with them! I was so sick after she was born and the guilt I have felt for not being able to hold her more has been really hard. I have wanted to know how she looked without the dark and peeling skin.You can see how beautiful she is in these pictures. Although they make me cry they help on so many levels! I look pretty bad in them, but I am going to share them anyway.

Sorry dad! The color tone they had to use aged you about 30 years!

I love the statement of this last one!

Sarah Elisabeth Olson

Sarah Elisabeth July 27, 2014  7lbs 13oz 16" long Arrived at 12:26pm

We still haven't heard back on the edited pictures so I will try to find some that should be OK to share.

This is going to be a hard post to write. I'm not even sure where to begin.

When we found out we were expecting again I was happy and nervous all at the same time. The baby was due just a few weeks before my 40th birthday and I knew my chances of having a special needs baby were much greater than they were when I was younger. Throughout the pregnancy I felt something wasn't quite right, but I never said a word to anyone because saying it out loud somehow would make it a reality. When we had the ultrasound at 20 weeks there was one point, one view, where in my head I just knew she had Down's Syndrome. Nobody else said anything. The Dr. asked the ultrasound tech if everything was alright and she said yes, so I dismissed my feelings as fears and never said anything.

When I was 28 weeks along I went into pre-term labor. If I had known then what I know now, I wouldn't have stopped the labor. Maybe we would have had a little while with her before she passed away. Shortly after that I started gaining weight really fast. I was uncomfortable all the time, sometimes it was constant pain no matter what I did. I was putting on a lot of water. I didn't have any of the other symptoms of pre-eclampsea so that was dismissed. When I started putting on about a pound a day the Dr.ordered an ultrasound, but it was over a holiday weekend so I couldn't get in for an ultrasound for almost a week. I never made it to that appointment.

On Saturday July 26th I didn't feel the baby move much. I kept poking at my belly and trying to make her move, but with all that fluid it didn't do much. When I went to bed that night I remember praying and asking to just feel her move and give some really good kicks. I fell asleep. When I woke up I was having contractions and spotting a little so we woke up Morgyn to let her know and we went to the hospital. We got there about 6:30am and they couldn't find a heartbeat with their monitors so they dried the doppler heart monitor. They still couldn't find a heartbeat so they called my Dr. who ordered an ultrasound right away. They turned the monitor so I couldn't see it and one of the nurses stood in front of Jared so he couldn't  see it either, but he's pretty tall so he just had to stand up and could see it fine. There was no heartbeat. There was swelling on her brain, and Jared told me when they increased the intensity, you could see her organs were all enlarged. They called my  Dr. back but he was in a council meeting and his wife said he would get there as soon as he could. They checked me at this point to see how far along I was and I was at a 7. I asked for an epidural right away because I usually go pretty fast from that point and quite frankly I had been so uncomfortable for over a month and I was looking forward to some relief! They tried to get the IV started, but that was a joke. I was so swollen that it took at least 7 tries before they finally got a vein to take. They just kept blowing out. The anesthesiologist got there about 9:30. He had a little bit of a hard time as well. He kept hitting a nerve that went down my left leg. I would get shooting pain down my leg as well as my leg kicking without effort from me. He was finally able to get it in and they got the pitocin going shortly after that. My Dr. got there about 10 and broke my water. About a half hour later I was ready but he had a hard time getting the baby to drop because there was so much fluid. All of my babies have been born with about 10 minutes or so of pushing. This was a whole new ballgame for me. I was so numb I couldn't feel anything. My legs were like foreign objects to me, although I could still feel pain in my stomach. Everyone kept saying, "you're almost there!". After an hour I called them on it telling them they had been saying that for an hour. My Dr. kept saying her shoulders were just so big. She had her hand by her face and was coming face first. He was using the vacuum and it kept popping off. One time he almost fell over trying to help get her out. She got stuck at the shoulders. He couldn't get her to budge in either direction. I was exhausted, and I could tell I was pushing wrong, but I was so numb I couldn't seem to do it the right way. My Dr. was trying so hard to help get her out that her neck started to tear. After nearly 2 hours I began really praying and pleading for help to get this baby out. I felt strength come from somewhere else and I was able to push the right way several more times and got her out. My Dr.'s exact word were, "That was the worst one I have ever done, and I've been doing this a long time." I heard him tell Jared that after that experience I should get at least a whole year off of housework, maybe two years. I asked him the next day when he came to check on me if I had heard him right and he whole heartedly said "YES!"

After she was born my Dr. said there was no way she would have lived even if she had been born alive. She appeared to have Downs Syndrome and her stomach was bigger than the rest of her and it was hard. I didn't get to hold her as much as I would have liked because I got pretty sick right after. I started shaking uncontrollably, which can be normal for around a hour or so, but I finally stopped around 3 or 4 hours later. And then it still came and went for a while after that. I also came down with a fever of 101* despite the antibiotics they had given me. I also got really nauseated. I couldn't keep anything down and after a couple of hours they finally gave me something for that. I was pretty miserable to say the least. After the epidural wore off the pain meds didn't do much for the pain. Every time they had to massage my belly it was excruciating! The next morning My Dr. tripled my percocet.

That night after Sarah was born Jared and I had some time to talk. He told me that he has felt something wasn't right all along but dismissed it as fears. Well I had felt the same thing so I think the Lord was trying to prepare us for this all along. I has a blessing shortly before I had her by 2 men who had come to bring us the sacrament in my hospital room. I was told that I would raise her in the millennium. I also had a blessing after I had her by the counselors in my bishopric. I was blessed with a speedy recovery. I remember telling Jared that it was going to take a long time for me to recover after such a horrible delivery, and he reminded me of the blessing. Now here I sit a little over 2 weeks later and I feel a whole lot better than I anticipated. Thank heaven for the priesthood and for blessings we can receive because of it!

After going to the Dr. yesterday and having him call today with the rest of the autopsy results I am frustrated! We don't have any more answers than we had before. I know my Dr. wanted a pediatric specialist to do the autopsy, but that didn't happen. I feel the person who did it didn't have the knowledge necessary to get the answers we were hoping for. The report showed that it was probably an autoimmune disorder that took Sarah's life. That can be common with RH Disease, and I am RH negative, but I have had the RoGham shot 18 times (to read more about why so many times click here) and there were no antibodies present so that was ruled out. They said that her organs were all normal as well, just all filled with fluid. Today when they called the chromosome test came back inconclusive. I wish we could have the answers we wanted, but for some reason we never will in this lifetime.

This whole experience has taught me that Heavenly Father knows me better than I know myself. I never would have gotten through this without Him or my husband Jared. I am so grateful for my knowledge of Heavenly Father's plan! Loosing a child, especially like this, has always been one of my worst nightmares. It's something I never thought I could get through. It was hard enough when I had sick ones in the hospital. I may not have all the answers I want, but one thing I do know is that Heavenly Father loves me. He knows what is best and there is a reason for everything. I am dealing with this far better than I ever thought possible, and I know it is because of my faith, my husband, and the support from family, friends, and ward members. Everyone has been so kind and thoughtful and that has truly helped! Thank you all so much for your love and support!

Sarah's feet

Sarah's hand, my finger

Sarah's hand and foot mold

Sarah's burial dress

Burial blanket Jared's aunt Tonia made.

Itsy bitsy casket

I was really trying to smile.

My favorite picture from that day. Sweet Ammon.

John, Isaac and Jacob

I am so glad all that swelling came off. I just looked terrible!