You will be missed Uncle Franchot

 I originally wrote this July 2013. For some reason I never published it.

As I sit and ponder the events of last week I am truly humbled. Jared's uncle unexpectedly passed away. He was the third child of eleven, and the first to pass away.  

Franchot was a Vietnam vet who ultimately gave his life for his country. He survived "Hamburger Hill" and he still had shrapnel through out his body from the war. There was a piece by his heart that they could not remove that caused the aneurism that killed him.

He was a kind man that was always helping other people. 
As I look back at my memories of him, I remember that he was kind of a pain in the butt at times, BUT I am so happy I got to know this kind man and spend the time with him that I did. Let me explain. 

When his second child was born him and his wife were going through a divorce and a bitter custody battle. I would babysit this little girl while her mom worked. Franchot would come over to my house to visit his precious baby girl whenever he was in town. He would come about 3 or 4 days a week and stay for anywhere from 3-7 hours at a time, for several months just to hold, play with , and bond with his baby. At the time it would annoy me because I had stuff to do and sitting here with him was not exactly convenient. I have been thinking about this a lot this week and I am so glad I gave him that opportunity! His little girl just turned 15 and I told her about this experience at the grave site on Monday. She had no idea he had gone to such lengths to spend time with her as a baby. I hope she realizes how much he loved her and wanted to spend time with her. 

He always teased me about my boys. He had 2 girls and every time I was pregnant he told me it would be a girl "because our family doesn't have very many boys, mostly girls." When I was expecting my 5th boy he said half jokingly, "Why do you get all the boys?!"

My little Ammon next to his great grandma's grave wearing the Lindsay plaid straight from Scotland! Franchot is buried right next to his mother.

Jared and I had the privilege of making the video tribute for the viewing. He was there guiding the painful process the whole time. We could not have gotten it done, and had it turn out so nice without him helping make it what he wanted it to be!

He was a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and did his best to follow the commandments. I know he can help his daughters more from the other side of the veil and I hope they can feel his presence and his love for them! I know we will all see him again one day. 

You will be missed Uncle Franchot! May you rest in peace.  

Homecoming 2013

Morgyn was asked to Homecoming this year. To say that she was excited would be an understatement!!

They spent 2 days of homecoming fun. On Friday the went bowling at Boondocks and then went to the Dartwalk and tailgate party before the game, then they went to the game. On Saturday this fine young man picked her up and they went to a Murder Mystery themed diner. Morgyn was an archeologist. They had a lot of fun!

Then she came home, got changed, and off to the dance they went!!

This is Bretton Steiner. They have been friends since 6th grade. He is an awesome young man! We really love these kids!!

This is one of my favorite pictures!

Where does the time go? When did she turn into such a beautiful young woman!?! Am I really old enough to be her mother!?! I better stop blinking, she will be married with her own kids before to much longer.

Birthday Season!!

Well birthday season has begun at our house! Half of our birthdays are within 3 weeks of each other. We started off with Isaac's birthday on September 20th. He really had a great birthday.

He wanted a pair of binoculars and we scored with these!

The original price on the box was $59.99, but they were on clearance $11.99!! I love me a good deal!

Then my birthday was a week and a half later. Morgyn and I have been working on personal progress together and we both received the Young Woman Medallion in Sacrament Meeting on my birthday!

John's birthday was a few days after that. He was really happy it snowed for his birthday!

And he really wanted ninja stuff. Thank heaven for the dollar store! Another score, now we have enough ninja stuff that 3 boys can be ninjas for Halloween if they want too.

Jared's birthday was yesterday. His aunt came over and said she has the perfect gift for him, a car and a gun!

I think Ammon had a lot of fun with all these birthdays! He really enjoyed the sword fighting!

I just wish I could keep these kids little a little while longer, but I guess that isn't part of the plan. They all must grow up so I will cherish these moments as long as I can.

Tender Mercies

Moving...I HATE it...This time it has been like rubbing salt into an open wound. I have really tried to be optimistic. "This house won't be so bad, we're still close to where we want to be, everything will turn out as it should" hoping and praying that "as it should" will be the way we want it to be.

This has been our home for almost 3 years. Even though at times it feels like we are all on top of each other, it feels like home. It is where we want to be. But the landlord gave it back to the bank so we had to move. We have been searching for another place to rent for several months. It has been a huge challenge. Either no one wants to do a month to month lease or they almost have a panic attack when we tell them we have 6 children. Then about 3 weeks ago we found this place.

It did need some fix-up before we could even move in, but Jared offered to do it in exchange for a month to month lease without the extra fee. They agreed. Tender Mercies!

During this whole process little Ammon started to have an issue, blood in his stools. Our worst fear is that it would be intussusception like Jacob had. His pediatrician though it was probably a food intolerance to something I was eating. I went off dairy (usually the biggest culprit), but it was still happening. He wanted me to take him to a Pediatric GI. Well I took him to a Dr in Murray, and he has the same opinion. He also came up with a bunch of other things he 'thought' could be wrong and wanted me to give him medication, but Ammon doesn't have the symptoms of those so I don't completely agree with him on that. At least at this point it is not intussusception! Tender Mercies!

On the way to Murray I started having car trouble. All the electronics in the van completely shut down and the van lost all power. I pulled over to the side of the freeway and said a quick, pleading prayer that I would at least make it to my appointment. I shut off the radio and the heater and didn't have anymore trouble that day. Tender Mercies!

We took about a week and a half to two weeks to move. Partly because we did most of it ourselves. Don't get me wrong, we had plenty of good people offer to help, we just weren't able to say OK this is when we are moving come then. This house is about half the size and we had to stack everything to get it too fit. We also had to pack boxes and totes, bring them to the new house, unpack them, take them to the old house and pack them back up. We clearly didn't have enough boxes. The person that offered to get us boxes couldn't find them. There was another family in our ward moving at the exact same time. They finished up a few hours before us and had a few boxes left over. They brought them to us and it was just enough to finish up with! We finished Monday night Tuesday morning at 4 am. I was so tired! Luckily Tuesday night Ammon slept through the night! Double Tender Mercies!!

Our first night sleeping here we realized the thermostat wasn't working. The house wouldn't get any warmer than 62*. Jared went to replace it and the new one broke in his hands. I needed to get milk as it was Saturday night and I don't shop on Sunday so we left to get what we needed. Well, we got as far as the high school and the van started loosing power again. We made it to the parking lot of the school before the van died. It wouldn't start, or even turn over. The alternator had gone bad and killed the battery. It was a cold and windy night, and I couldn't get a hold of  my mom and Jared's parents couldn't come help either. We didn't know where any of our phone books were so we called Morgyn and told her to start calling people she knew in the ward to see if someone could come and give us a jump start. She called a couple of people but couldn't get anyone. I thought call the Standings (former home teacher and current visiting teacher)! Their number was in the caller ID. He rushed right over and helped us out, and even followed us home to make sure we made it. (They aren't always the first ones we call, but every time we call them they are able to help!) We then took the truck and were able to get the things we needed. Tender Mercies!

We tried to finish up moving on Sunday. I know, not a good idea, but we didn't have much of a choice, we needed to be out on Monday the 15th. The Allred's from up the street came and helped as well as Brother Deppe, and Jared's brother Jeremy and his daughter Kayla, and his aunt Lorna. Jared's mom stayed with the 3 youngest kids. Morgyn and I were carrying a box that weighed about 75lbs and I missed a step up behind me and fell. I was lucky! The box fell to the ground, and I went down like a tree! TIMBER! I kept thinking "just don't hit your head". I didn't, I only got a scrape on my elbow (as well as a little embarrassed).  Tender Mercies!

Jared and his brother moved the camper and had trouble with it. The jack bent and it nearly fell over. But it didn't! And no one got hurt! Tender Mercies! 

We also charged the battery on the van for about 24hrs so we could drive it to the shop. Jared checked and it was going to be over $300 for a new alternator, and he would have to find the time to fix it. His dad called his mechanic and he would only charge around $200 for the alternator and labor to install it. We got the van there and after checking it out the problem was a corroded connection. He cleaned it up and sent us on our way NO CHARGE! TENDER MERCIES INDEED!

My only hope now is that a miracle will happen and we will be able to buy our house and move back HOME!

We all have Tender Mercies in our life! We just have to open our eyes and look for them. God loves us all and only wants the best for us. Our trials are easier to bear if we try to learn what we can from them and look for the positive. We have trials to strengthen us and help us grow! I know God loves us. I know if it is meant to be, to buy our home, it will happen as long as we do our best to make it happen!

Thanks for reading!

Our Newest Little Man!

Now that I have figured out why I haven't been able to upload pictures onto my blog and fixed the problem, maybe I will be better about keeping it updated! We will see. We had a fun summer, but my first update will be the most important event we had in 2012.

Our little Ammon finally came into this world on December 17, 2012 at 10:10 pm.  He came in weighing 8lbs 4oz and was 21 inches long. He had a hard time gaining weight at first, but after about a week and a half he had gotten back to his birth weight. YAY! We had to take him in about every other day for weight checks which was not fun, but at least the Dr. is only 5 minutes away!

He sure has grown fast!

 Best Christmas present ever!!

 The kids sure love him...even Morgyn!

 I finally captured a smile



We sure do enjoy him! I hope you enjoy the pictures!

My Secret!

I've had a secret the last several weeks. We are expecting another baby! It is due on Dec 27th. We had our first ultrasound today. It showed everything is going well so we are ok to tell people now. After having 4 miscarriages I have learned it is easier to put off telling people. I am 10 weeks and 4 days along. We told the kids today and they are all soooo excited! They all want a girl except Isaac. He is hoping for another boy.

Air Show 2012

We went to the air show at Hill Air Force Base over Memorial Day weekend. It was so awesome! We go every time they have it as a family and we all love it.

 This was the first plane we got to walk through.

 And this was the second plane we walked through.

 With how bad the weather was I was amazed that these guys actually jumped from the plane!

This year we didn't get to enjoy much on Saturday because it started to rain really hard. We came prepared for the rain. We all had raincoats and umbrellas for our chairs, however the rain that came was like flash flooding or a Monsoon or something. We had over an inch of rain in the cup holders on the stroller in about 5-10 minutes. Needless to say we got completely soaked and decided to go home when there were reports of lightning. We were parked near the front gate in Layton and had taken the shuttle to the show entrance. By the time we got to the shuttle pick up location the lines were huge! At first I was thinking maybe they would let us on sooner because we had little kids and they were completely soaked, shivering and turning purple, but then I looked around and everyone else was in the same boat. Some of the kids there were in shorts, short sleeved shirts, and sandals. We decided not to wait for the shuttle and just walked to the van. It was quite a walk, especially since the sidewalks on the base are not stroller friendly, but I am so glad we decided to walk. My cousin said they waited for the bus for about and hour before getting on and then it was another 1 1/2 hours before they got off base. We were able to get off base in about 45 minutes to to 1 hour from the time we decided to leave. We were all very upset that we had to leave so we decided to go back on Sunday. Normally we wouldn't attend something like this on a Sunday, but we felt it was important for us to go. Jared has been working a lot since his surgery and he had taken this day off so we could go and to have it canceled was upsetting to say the least. We came a little more prepared for the weather on Sunday and I am so glad we did! We each wore a tee shirt and a sweatshirt, and we took our warm coats and raincoats. We got to take some pretty fun pictures and the kids had a blast!

 This pilot was so awesome! He talked to all the kids who came to him. Ever since Jacob was old enough to talk he has told us he wants to be a fighter pilot. This guy talked with him for several minutes! He was on cloud 9!!!

 We found our stroller rain cover to keep everything dry, including the little one.

 The kids had a lot of fun with these guns!

 Then they all got to take a turn "driving the jeep".

Jacob

Isaac



John




Jared



 As we were getting ready to set up our chairs it started to rain so we headed for the hangar where they had a movie playing and took shelter until the rain stopped. Then we went and set up our chairs. We brought some plastic sheeting normally used as a painting drop cloth and clipped it to our umbrellas and chairs. I am so happy we did that because the rain came back... ...then it started to hail!! We stayed warm and dry this time!

Our shelter

Then we got to see the awesome show. It amazes me what these pilots can do with these airplanes and jets!

 Mig fighters

 THUNDERBIRDS!!! We LOVE the Thunderbirds!

I have a bunch of video's that I was going to insert, but I think I will just insert the one of the Thunderbirds for now. If people comment that they want the others then I will insert them later. Most of the music in the video's is obnoxious and they are made with clips I took with my cheapo camera and just put them together in windows movie maker so they are not professional by any means, but they show some awesome things these pilots can do!



We all had a lot of fun and eventually the sun came out and we got sunburned. Crazy weather.