Family Pictures 2013

The beginning of July the wonderful Lindsay came and took newborn pictures of Ava. It was a difficult task since Ava cried and screamed nearly the entire time. I think I fed her four times within two hours just to get her to settle down. As usual Lindsay will still able to get some great shots :) I just picked a few of my favorites to post. Next step is getting them framed and hung in the house. 

 

 

Crying, Screaming, & Crying

The title pretty much sums it up :) But incase you did not believe me...

For some reason Tim and I were under the impression that Ava would be an easy baby. It is our third child and it should just get easier right? Plus hard pregnancy = easy baby. That would only be fair. Clearly we were mistaken. She has horrible reflux and the medication is somewhat helping. We have recently changed her dose and she is now on medication morning and night. But if you miss her dose or are about 30 minutes late you might as well forget it completely. Because it will not do a thing. Poor baby. So we are still adjusting thankfully when she is asleep, she is out cold! She sleeps on her back, tummy, and side. Pretty much any and every position but she seems to favor her tummy. 

Tim recently started a new job the first week of July. He now works at Intermountain Medical Center near Salt Lake City. He is on the Neuro Shock Trauma Intensive Care Unit and has been learning a lot. Some of the most important life lessons being that your life can change in an instant so appreciate it now. The other being that he will never own a motorcycle (sorry to those reading this that own a motorcycle but it's not like you did not know they were dangerous).  He works day and night shifts. The other night when he returned home from work late Ava stared him down for a solid five minutes. I could not stop laughing at the look on her face.

The boys have been great and very energetic lately. They have discovered the worlds biggest hot wheels parking garage -the blinds. They still love and adore their sister. They also tend to play a little too rough. As you can see by Ian's swollen nose from a fall off the bunk bed. Don't worry it was not broke just very swollen.

Pike too loves Ava but not the lack of attention he has been receiving. 

We have been doing a lot of swimming this summer. While we love Seven Peaks water park Ava does not do well out in the heat. Thankfully we have awesome friends that let us come and swim in their pool. The kids are determined that we should install a pool in our backyard. Tim and I have also decided that one day we too would love to have our own pool! Dream big right!

After a long day of swimming this is what everyone looks like.

If you were not aware Aaron loves music. His current favorites are Itsy Bitsy Spider and I am a Child of God. He requests them for every nap and before bed each night. Beware though you must sing all six verses of Itsy Bitsy Spider. If you try to skip a verses he will correct you and let you know. Plus, don't forget there are three versus to I am A Child of God. If only he was able to listen and follow instructions as well as he can memorize and sing songs.

While Ava may not be the easiest baby thank heaven she is a cutie!

Logan and the Gran Fondo

This last weekend we headed up to Logan! Tim had a bike race that weekend so we took advantage of our time in Logan and tried to chat with a few people. We headed out to the Thompson's on Thursday evening. The only time any of the kids stopped moving was when they held baby Ava. Little Miss Ellie is so excited to have a new little sister in November, and we could not be more excited for them! 

Friday morning the Fackrell's were kind enough to let us swim at their pool! The kids had a blast and can't figure out why we don't have a pool at our house. To say they had fun would be an understatement -they had a blast. We walked down the steps to the pool, Ian started buckling his life jacket, and within a few seconds he was jumping off the diving board and into the pool. The scary thing is Aaron is becoming just like Ian...No fear! 

As you can see these boys love the water! 

While we were in Logan my grandparents decided to take a little road trip to meet baby Ava. She was quite cozy sitting with great grandma Diamond

So beautiful!

She is starting to become quite the wiggler and loves kicking. She has also recognizes voices very well. She will whip her head around at the sound of her brothers -which happens quite often and is difficult to ignore. She is also enjoying her mobile and looking at various toys. 

On Saturday my dad and I dropped Tim off at the hospital much to early in the morning for his 100 mile bike race The Gran Fondo. I was amazed and the number of bikers there to race. Just around a thousand bikers. You will hear me in the video say, "there he is." 

I spotted this tandem bike and decided it was the only way I would ever do a bike race/ride with Tim. As long as I am in the back -so that Tim could not see me just relaxing and enjoying the view ;) 

We had fun watching the map to see where daddy was and watching all the bikers go by. Not to mention I slept the entire morning/afternoon while the boys played with Grandma and Grandpa. It was heavenly. Andrew as usual got some great shots of all of us waiting for daddy to finish.

Daddy came cruising past the finish line so fast that boys did not even see him. He did a fabulous job and was just a little tired at the end. We are so proud of him -but mostly we are just glad it is over ;) 

The boys loved watching and supporting daddy! We had a great weekend but it sure made us miss Logan!

4th of July

We started out spending the previous weekend in good ole Preston, Idaho for the Foster Family reunion. Every summer we all get together and it is probably the shortest to the point reunion ever :) We talk while we eat. Then when everyone is finishing up dinner and beginning dessert they start the auction. They ask everyone to bring items to contribute to the auction and the money earned goes to the next years family reunion. As soon as the auction is over we clean up, put away the tables and chairs and everyone leaves. In usual fashion everyone wants the big package of fireworks. Ian decided to start it off at $25 dollars. It was quite funny and he though he was awesome. Unfortunately we did not come home with the fireworks. 

Four generation picture -we always head back to Grandma & Grandpa's house afterwards to lounge around and talk.

Grandma Foster holding Ava.

After a lot of sleeping throughout the week (mostly by Ava) a few days later my parents and Hunter came down to celebrate the fourth. 

No, we did not go to any big firework shows we just walk outside on the back deck and watch the fireworks go off throughout the valley. It is crazy how much smaller they look on the video since they were really quite large. If you look past the larger fireworks in the video you'll see all the fireworks going off throughout the valley. You may also want to turn off the sound I could not get the flash to turn off while I was videoing...it was rather annoying. 

On thursday morning we woke up at about 5:30 am and got ready to head to the balloon launch. Unfortunately when we got there due to the wind it had been canceled. We woke up early again on Friday morning and Tim informed us that the balloons were out (he had worked that night). So we loaded the car and away we went! I really wasn't too excited to go and see a bunch of hot air balloons but it was probably the highlight of our week. It was amazing! We sat down for a little while and watch the hot air balloons right in front of us inflate. Then walked around and watched them all take off. We all loved it and look forward to going again next year. 

Panoramic shot my dad took -love it!

It was a little windy as well that day so unfortunately they did not do a lot of the balloon competitions like the bean bag drop. After watching the balloons we walked over and the boys were able to get inside and look around the IHC life flight helicopter and talk with the life flight nurses and pilots. Ian was quick to impress. He jumped in and buckled up the lower part of his seat belt, look around noticed it had a top buckle and snapped that all in as well. The nurse was like, "wow, that was pretty good you figure out how to put it together." The nurse then turned to me and said (in a yeah right tone), "let's see if he can figure out how to undo it." I reassured him that I was sure he would figure it out. Sure enough without hesitation Ian had it undone and jumped to test out another seat. The nurse and pilot were very surprised as they informed me that they had to be show how to work the seat belt and they had to practice using it.

Ava looked super cute in her forth of july attire. Sure it may have been a little big but thats ok. Uncle Hunter loves to hold her and help out. As you can see Ava doesn't seem to mind him to much either :)

This girl loves to sleep! She is growing and changing everyday. While she doesn't seem to be getting chunkier she is getting taller. Whenever we can actually catch her happy and awake we seem to snap pictures. I am not sure the whole "third child less pictures" applies to her. We have a lot!

 I am so glad that my family was able to come down and spend the week/weekend with us. What a wonderful weekend! Now just a few more days and then we are all heading up to Logan! This summer has been a blast!

Hartzheim's Visit

I have been waiting forever and finally the Hartzheim's were here! I was so excited and yes Lisa -the picture below is my favorite. You see Lisa is not a huggy person so we like to give her a hard time. The best part was Ragnar took forever to take this picture -I think he did it on purpose :) Tim was just sad he did not get to give her a hug too!  

We got together for the morning/afternoon. The kids had a blast running around and playing. In fact, I don't think they had any arguments or disagreements at all, they just had a blast. Lisa and I did head to Ava's doctor check up that morning -yes I know I completely forgot I had rescheduled it the same day since the pediatrician was going out of town. Does pregnancy brain still count as an excuse after the baby? The kids had fun playing with nerf guns, jumping, and running around. Ian was also very excited to show them some of his new fireworks. Channing was in love with baby Ava and I think would have been happy watching her sleep the entire time.

When trying to get a picture of the kids they were all begging to make funny faces. I realize I did not put Ava in the picture -if you had seen them all dog piling and wrestling before you would understand why :) Ian is not exactly a soft and gentle kid and he look kind of scary in this picture.

I can't believe how much all of the kids have grown. It has been three years since we have seen the kids which was far too long. Ian and Cavin are just over a month apart, and Aaron and Ava are just over 6 months apart. Hopefully we will be able to come and visit them in Houston! Luck for us they still have family in Utah!

I am so glad that they were able to come and visit. I only wish that I would have actually put on a little make-up and maybe fixed my hair for pictures. At least I can photoshop the dark circles out from under my eyes due to lack of sleep ;) It was great seeing the Hartzheim's, hopefully one day we can be neighbors again! But there is no way I am living in Texas. Remember my last post -we enjoy the snow!

Hinckley Visit

We were lucky enough to have Aunt April and Evan come and visit this last week. She was in town for a mission reunion and was able to stop by for a few days. I did have to give up some time holding my sweet little girl but I guess thats ok ;) 

The boys had a blast together playing together. We headed to the little lake by our house one afternoon and it was hot (102 degrees hot)! The boys could have stayed forever but after a couple hours we headed home it was much too hot for Ava even in the shade.

That same day they all headed to the zoo for the evening while Ava and I stayed home. 

While they were here we received a package from Uncle Jimmer and Aunt Amy with a beautiful quilt for Ava. It also contained whoopee cushions and nerf guns for the boys. The three boys ran around the house like crazy making fart noises everywhere. It was quite funny.

When Ava was just about a week old she rolled over. She loves to lay on her side and can easily roll onto her tummy or her back. She has no idea she is doing it and I think when she gets a little bit bigger she wont be able to roll quite so easily. I tried to catch it on video but it takes her about 10-15 minutes. This is just her kicking and wiggling on her new quilt Aunt Amy made.

We also tend to call Ava -left eye. It is almost like she opens her left eye to see if you are worth looking at. If so she may open both or decided to close them and go to sleep instead. It gives us all a good laugh.

Awesome picture Aunt April caught of Ava!

Little wiggler. You can see the other side of Ava's quilt is beautiful! The boys spread it all out for her to lay on but I wanted you to see the other side as well. 

As usual these boys still absolutely love and adore her! I keep waiting for it to wear off, but I think they will always adore her. Anytime they walk into a room the always come up and give her a soft kiss on the head (Yes, Aaron is butt naked he had just got out of the shower).

It was great having them come and visit. Hopefully we will be able to see them again soon!