Utah Trip

It has been a little bit since I have written about our family's comings and goings. I went up to Utah to visit family for 5 days mid November. Yes everyone you heard that right. It was just me, myself, and I that went up. It was so delightful! I had such a fun time hanging out with my mom, visiting my new little niece & nephew, and mostly just being "me" for a couple of days.

These new little babies were so fun to sit and hold. Ty is such a cute little butterball who likes to eat, and eat, and eat. Every time I got to hold him it seemed that he wanted to eat. I was able to go little Ty's blessing on the Sunday that I was there.

Little Alyson is such a sweet little girl. I was so scared of picking her up the first time. She still has her feeding tube in, and I just worried about crushing her ribs and hurting her. After awhile I got used to the tube and just became more comfortable holding her. She is still only about 9 lbs so she is just itty bitty. Every time I would see her I would get teary eyed thinking of what she has gone through so far in her short little life.
Jared was the lone caregiver to our 4 children. He did such a great job. He took all the kids to the roadshow practice, the actual roadshow (in addition he took one of Jessica's friends), and made it to church (8:00 a.m.) almost on time. I am so grateful to him for letting me go up and hang out with my mom for a few days.
I didn't get the warmest of welcome homes though, besides Jared of course, whom I'm sure was counting down the minutes. Jacob didn't want a thing to do with me for an entire day, and when I went to pick up the girls after school Jocelyn looked at me disgusted and said, "I thought that dad was going to pick me up!?" Welcome back to the real world JoAnn! Well now I feel like a brand new mom again since I was able to put aside the mommy duties for a few days.

Gifts from Heaven

In September I became an aunt to another niece and nephew. Heather & Frank Kelley welcomed another little girl into their family. Alyson Colleen was born on September 9th. She was 8 lb 14 oz. Garth & Carri Gnehm are the proud parents of Ty Jon, who was 8 lb 2 oz. He was born on September 10th. Ironically, September 10th is also my mom's birthday.

It has been an amazing month with many emotions attached. We all went through excitement of wondering if these 2 new little ones would be born on the same day. Heather was planned to be induced on the 10th, but little Alyson had her own agenda and decided to come a day early. We all have a feeling that my dad had a great hand in sending 2 more spirits to the Gnehm family so close together. We all went through great relief when the waiting was finally over. And we have all shed many tears and have done much rejoicing at the progress that the babies have made in their short lives. Alyson was born with some heart conditions and because of this she had open heart surgery on Friday, October 3rd. It has only been 4 days since her surgery and she is doing fantastic. The doctors have said that she has recovered faster than they could have imagined. She has had several of her tubes taken out and is now off the breathing machine. She now needs to start eating and gaining back weight so that she can go home.

It is amazing still to me what precious gifts from God we receive when we get a child into our homes. Since these new little ones have arrived, I have been trying to keep things into perspective. When the boys are into mischief together or the girls are ignoring me altogether, I try to remember their sweet spirits when they were born. This has helped me to not sweat the small stuff with the kids as much. That is a lesson that I need over and over again!