Gymnastics Recital

Robby had a gymnastics recital last night which was so adorable! We've been sick all week so I was really hoping he wouldn't miss it. He was doing ok yesterday so we decided to just go for it. He had such a great time showing off his "cool tricks" to everyone. He was even lucky enough to have his best little buds, Liv's kids, show up to cheer him on!

The three little kids are Robby's preschool class and then there were three big kids were an older class she had. I love how in this picture Annie is whispering to Quattro... they had so much fun being in the same class together!

Balancing on the beam...


Warming up... doing some bridges...



Doing his little donkey kicks... this is how they learn to do handstands. Now he can balance on his hands a second and he'll go all the way over and kind of land on his back... and do handstands against the wall... it's neat to watch them get better at the things they're learning.



Bridge meltdowns on the cheese mat...

So proud of our little guy!

With his best buddies!!!

Now gymnastics is over... Miss Kandice is going to have a baby and is taking a break from teaching... anyone have any other ideas for a fun, not expensive activity like this for Quattro? Annie's going to do a little ballet class and while I'm sure he would LOVE doing that too Rob is putting his foot down on that one... and everything else seems too expensive or too intense... ideas?

Grateful

I know I haven't been blogging as much lately... sometimes my heart and mind are just so full with deeper thoughts that it's difficult to not share so at the risk of constantly oversharing I think I've just not written anything... does that make sense? So here's just a few thoughts because my heart is overflowing and I need to get some things out...

I'm grateful for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time surrounded by family and good food.

I'm grateful for Christmas - and the chance to teach Robby about the true meaning of Christmas and in the process remind myself!

I can't NOT be grateful and happy with my life right now. I thank Heavenly Father EVERY DAY for the amazing little boy that I have and wonderful husband and just a great happy life. I can't even believe they are mine and we get to spend each day together! Obviously we are heartbroken and sad and want to have another baby and we pray for that every day... "Please bless for a baby... please bless for a baby brother and a baby sister... please bless that mommy's tummy will get big and pregnant..." It breaks but warms my heart to hear Robby's sweet pleas to our Father in Heaven.

Sometimes he'll come up to me after he sees me finish praying and ask, "Did Heavenly Father say we could have a baby?" Or if we are going to the temple he asks, "Are you going to get a baby there?" Or when I went to the hospital to be with Liv he asked, "Are you going to get a baby at the hop-is-it-tal?" He can't quite wrap his brain around it. But I know he has faith and he believes that one day he will have a brother or a sister and we do too.

It's just hard... the illusive "one day"... and "somehow".... you want to be doing all that's in your power to move things along and yet being restrained by money and not knowing what's going to work exactly is difficult and frustrating.

But I'm grateful that I know where to look for comfort and guidance and that I am still able to enjoy the NOW... the present... my hilarious son and darling husband. It's weird to feel such a mix of emotions on a daily basis. I know it's because of my faith and my hope that I'm able to fully enjoy each day as it is and I'm so grateful for that.

Happy Birthday to My Handsome Older Man

Happy Birthday darling!

Thanks for being my best friend and such a great dad!

For me it was love at first sight... with your black roller blades and red bandana, I knew you were the guy for me. And I patiently - and not so patiently - waited for you to figure out you wanted to be with me forever too!

In some ways you haven't changed at all in the 16 years I've known you and in some ways you've changed a lot. Like there's no way you could've grown a crazy long beard back then... ;) And you've become Mr. Mountain Gun Man... And your name has changed from Robby to Rob... But constants like football and loving BYU remain. And you will always be my handsome older man!

I love seeing you and Robby together and the dad you have become.... thanks for making me so happy honey! I love you!!!!!!!!! Happy Birthday!!!!

(I woke up from a Sunday nap a few weeks ago to this sight - so adorable!)

Side notes...

Robby and Annie put all the candles on... I gave them a box of 20 and a few more to make 28 candles and they just put all the candles from 2 boxes on.... 14 extra for good luck?? It was quite the fire hazard. :)

And when Rob was opening his gifts Robby was sitting on me and nervously asked me, "Are there any mascots coming???" I assured him there weren't. Except Spiderman. Obviously....

Marie Diane Jeppson

Olivia's sweet mother, Marie, passed away last week... Tuesday morning... After her first stroke in 2001 I know her health has been very bad and life was pretty difficult for her. I've watched over the last 9 years as the roles reversed and Olivia became the care provider for her mother... as an only child and with her parents divorced this became such an important role in Olivia's life! I know we were there to help with the occasional move or cleaning party but for Olivia she saw and served her mom almost daily.

More importantly I know that Olivia loved her mom and now she misses her. To have her mom no longer a 10 minute drive away will take time to adjust to....

I know Marie is in heaven with the ability to run and sing again - our testimonies of the Savior and the plan of salvation have truly carried us this week and I know this knowledge comforts Olivia tremendously.

I'm so grateful for Marie and for her raising the wonderful daughter that is my best friend... I know she will be watching from heaven, smiling down on Olivia with pride.

Gymnastics! And Annie...

Robby has LOVED his gymnastics class! It's once a week for 45 minutes and he looks forward to it all week! His teacher, Miss Kandis, is a former BYU gymnast and is great with the kids. It's only $30/month and it's in Provo.

Robby goes to the "preschool" class. She does a mom and me class for littler kids and it's only $2/class and you can just come when you want! You don't have to pay upfront or commit to a certain amount of time.

I know she still has openings in her classes - check out her blog! http://ilovetotumble.blogspot.com/

And these videos are specifically for Aunt Ness who requested some! :)



It's always easy to tell which one Robby is - he's always in a BYU shirt. (Not to mention there were 2 kids in the class that day... in a different video there were more but I didn't post it) In fact this week he was getting dressed for class, looking through his t-shirt drawer, and pulled one out saying, "I don't think Miss Kandis has seen this BYU shirt before!" Okayyyy.... he's so funny!





Handstands!




It's been so fun to go and watch him enjoy this so much! And he and Annie are so funny together! The dialog between them is always hilarious to listen to...

Annie: Ok, and you're my brother and our parents are dead, right?
Robby: Right. And you're my sister and we're in the car, right?
Annie: Right.

Everything they say they add "right" at the end, like constantly confirming their story with each other.

One time we were at dinner with A&B and kids and Annie didn't want to finish part of her meal and so Quattro started eating it for her and I said, "Robby, don't eat that - one of her brothers might want it, it's their food." And he looks at me all hurt and confused, "But I am one of her brothers!" Oh! It just made my heart hurt! I was like, "Ok, yeah, just eat it..."

They sure are special little friends!




This is like a 2 second video - I didn't know it was on video but they are just too cute and then when I took the picture it was the one above, not quite as cute as the video so I just had to include it...


I'm so grateful that Robby can have such wonderful cousins close by to be like siblings to him.

Childbirth Classes

ATTN: Anyone who is pregnant, even barely pregnant, or knows someone who is pregnant!!!

I just want to let you all know that my darling sister in law, Rebecca, is doing another round of Childbirth Classes!

Tuesdays starting October 12th from 6:30 - 9 pm for 6 weeks
Fee is $150 per couple - this includes materials

I'm so grateful for the awesome example Becca has been to me and I have learned so much from her! I've had the honor to be at 2 of her births and let me tell you, she knows what she's talking about!! :)

I feel sad for people who are scared of childbirth or who have had somewhat negative experiences in the past - there is SO MUCH TO LEARN about pregnancy and labor and delivering a child and it can be such an amazing experience! Educating yourself is the first step to removing any fears and having a positive experience.

Whatever kind of birth you are planning this class covers all kinds of useful information for you!

You can look at her website here and email her at rebecca@gentlebirthchoices.com.

If you know anyone who might be interested pass this on! Thanks!

Diving board

One of Robby's most favorite things lately has been videos on my phone. As in, I take 1 minute videos of whatever he's doing and then he spends forever watching them all back... it's kind of great.

This summer when we were still in Maryland and Rob was in Utah Robby went off the diving board for his first time. It was pretty awesome and I'm glad I thought to grab my phone to get some videos to show Rob and Robby LOVES watching these back.











By the end of this summer he was swimming like a little fish - it was amazing! We did one week at the beginning of the summer of swim lessons but it was really basic stuff - blowing bubbles, jumping in the water... and then we did a couple private lessons with someone at our pool... the real kicker was just the fact we went swimming every single day pretty much. I love our pool. :)

Robby update

Robby is hilarious. He makes me laugh every day... here are some random Robby thoughts for you...

One day we borrowed a book from Provo library that had a "Governor Walker's collection" sticker in it with a picture of the lovely Governor Olene Walker. We don't know her, ps, just saw her sticker in the book. Ever since then we will randomly find that other books we have rented and brought home have a Governor Walker sticker in it too.... and you would've thought it was a Golden Ticket from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory! On Sunday we had Andrew & Becca over and Robby comes running in holding this book about football in the air yelling, "Mom! MOM! GOVERNOR WALKER!!!!" So excited!!! I explained it to Andrew and he was dying laughing....

I was talking to Robby about what would happen if he ever got lost and if he was talking to a police officer and role playing...

Me: "What's your name?"
Robby: "Robby Parsons."
Me: "What's your mom's name?"
Robby: "Esther Parsons."
Me: "What's your dad's name?"
Robby: "Uncle Rob Parsons."

Ha. He loves calling Rob "Uncle Rob" - that's what Tyler & Robby and all the cousins call him and he thinks it's funny.

He sure does love his daddy. He is so observant and always makes sure to "match" daddy when leaving the house. One day Rob was going on a long run (training for a half marathon) and he didn't have a shirt on. When it came time for Robby and I to leave the house to go to the mall Robby would NOT put a shirt on. I finally figured out it was cause "daddy didn't have a shirt on." The mall is a less acceptable place to be shirtless though... sorry kid.

Another time Rob had on a sweatshirt and I watched as Robby noticed Rob's sweatshirt and went and got out his big winter coat... we tried to get him to leave it at home, Rob even took off his sweatshirt but then Robby was trying to carry his coat over his shoulder... oh wait, cause that's what Rob did with his sweatshirt! It was hilarious. The things he notices!!!

He is loving playing with his football mat from Liv. He sets them up in different formations, huddles... one day he put them in partners and said, "Look mom, they're dancing!" Ha! But usually it's things like, "these are the Utah players... these are the BYU... and BYU makes a point! Woo hoo!"

Lately he's been playing a lot of "the shadow game." This is where they just repeat everything you say and do. Rob did this to me when we were little, like 12, and of course it was so annoying/awesome because he would just follow me around everywhere to copy me/be near me. I don't know where Robby learned it but he thinks he's hilarious.

Tonight when I tucked him in I told him, "do you know every night when you're sleeping mommy comes in and kisses you and says I love you?" He smiled and said, "will you do that today?" I said, "Yes." He said, "Thank you." He is so cute and is so good about saying Thank You for things. Like tonight for dinner he said, "thank you for making this mom!"

We've been doing a lot of "practicing my scooter." I tried to say, "do you want to ride your scooter?" And he quickly corrected me, "I'm just practicing my scooter, mom." So we had a little photo shoot outside since I've recently realized I have taken hardly any pictures lately!!

I like how he has one leg pulled up... #gangster

I took this one:

And then he said, "Het me see!" He was all upset I hadn't gotten his hands on his hips so we did a re-take:

And here he just looks so grown up! What is he like 5, 6??? I told him the other day, "Can you PLEASE stop growing up?" He said in a concerned voice, "I'm trying, mommy!" Ooo, I don't want to stress him out or anything but oh my goodness he is growing up way too fast.

Oh how I love this little boy!

Trying not to think about it...

I think I've been missing the "therapy" that is writing about what I'm going through...

In other words - SKIP THIS POST if you don't want to hear about trying to get pregnant and all that jazz...

So we did the one cycle of IUI (insemination) and that failed. The day we did the IUI they said the sample we had brought in looked low - low count and low motility... we did the IUI anyway but they suggested we do a full SA the next week. It was stressful waiting those 2 weeks, waiting to find out if the IUI worked, waiting to get the results from Rob's test.

At first I thought I was pregnant because my chest was really sore and then I looked into it and that is one of the main side effects of progesterone which I was taking. Then my temps started to go down and I just had that sinking feeling that I knew my period was going to come. Combine that with then getting the results of Rob's test, over the phone, delivered by a not so smart nurse who said, "Uh, yeah, the count was 5 million so.... um... it looks like the recommendation for you now is to do Invitro with ICSI. Does that sound right?"

I wanted to scream, or cry, and I was just shocked. We went from thinking we'd be spending like $800/cycle to $11,000/cycle for IVF w/ICSI. NO that did NOT "sound right." I was so mad. Flustered. Upset. I got off the phone quickly and just cried.

So basically the result from the SA showed counts so low they recommended not only Invitro which is super expensive but ICSI as well. ICSI is an acronym for intracytoplasmic sperm injection - which is a fancy way of saying "inject sperm in the middle of the egg". This process adds a couple grand to the cost of Invitro.

Anyway this is just really not an option right now, IVF, so I felt kind of deflated. I eventually made an apt to go in for another consultation with Dr. Slater to talk about my options. She walked me through the process of invitro and ICSI and the success rates with that. She also said we could still try IUI which is obviously much cheaper but the chances would be less. We could try taking multiple samples of sperm and combining them and doing IUI like that which might be a good option...

We decided to do a blood test for Rob to make sure his hormones and all that were fine. We were a little concerned because when we had him tested in 2006 when we were trying for Robby his SA came back with great results! It is interesting and helpful to know that apparently that can change over time!! So even if your DH had good levels at one point, there's a chance there could still be a male factor problem.

Rob's blood test came back fine, all normal. Oh yeah, she said if it was because of "stress" then his FSH levels would be low but they were normal. Now we are just trying to figure out where to go from here. Do we try another cycle of IUI even if the odds aren't great because that's more affordable? Do nothing now and save up money for invitro? Or what about the fact we can't even really afford everything we've done so far?? Minor detail.

It's a super busy time for Rob at work so we are trying to just put this on pause right now.

Meanwhile, I apparently am having hysterical pregnancies each month where I randomly feel so sure that I'm pregnant. No really. I've taken 2 pregnancy tests MID CYCLE just because oh my tummy looks so big, or my chest is so sore, or oh this random thing and then I can't get the thought OUT OF MY HEAD. It's like a stupid obsession. I hate it! I don't WANT to think I'm pregnant when I'm not! I don't want to think about but the thoughts just keep coming. It's so annoying.

You want to know something else that is hard? There are SO many random things that other people do right before they got pregnant that are things that you think, oh we should try that but there are SO MANY different things and obviously none of them actually are proven they are more like coincidences and it's just SO HARD to want to do all that you can to improve your chances but I'm already making Rob and I choke down a handful of multi-vitamins and supplements each night and it's just hard to know what else, if anything, we should try. HARD.

Even though this is a trial and even though it's hard I do know that we have so much to be grateful for. I don't need people to tell me it's part of Heavenly Father's plan because I already believe that with all my heart. I just also know He wants us to try our hardest and do all in our power to work for the things we want before He does His part and I feel this is me doing that.

I am happy, I have a great life, the most amazing little boy, wonderful husband...

MARYLAND

We were able to go back home to Maryland to visit both of our families! We spent the first week at Deep Creek Lake with Rob's family and then in Kensington with my family. Rob had to leave before me to get back to UT so he missed out on some of the Pincock fun.

We had such a great time seeing all our family! We missed the beautiful green scenery there, the lake, being so close to the DC temple, some of our favorite food places like Qdoba's and Continentals... but really just being with family was the best!

side note - things we have NOT missed about Maryland: the HUMIDITY & the TRAFFIC!! And for Rob, the gun laws. ;)

I don't envision us moving back there anytime soon but we sure enjoyed the good dose of family time and will need another one soon!

*the Lake*
boat rides, tube rides, waterskiing, barefooting, hot tub, watching movies, getting to see Will & Amanda, kids doing a talent show, naps on the boat, MaryAnn's homemade pancakes and ice cream... we missed Liz & her family! And I can't believe I didn't get more pics of all the bigger/little kids!!! They are all so grown up now!

*Pincock Time!*

staying up late at night, watching SYTYCD, Girls night out... twice, playing at the church gym, laying on Babu's bed, eating lots of ice cream, having my mom put velcro rollers in my hair, visiting Kensington ward, lunch at Lebanese Taverna, going downtown, seeing Grandma Hazel, family Temple Night... but we missed Taba and her family there!

Hopefully one day soon we'll be able to have a reunion where no one is missing. It's impossible these days to get the whole family together - now for both families! But we sure are lucky to be blessed with such great, big, loving families!

Hill Family Reunion

We had a good time attending the Hill Family Reunion last weekend up at Heber Valley Campground. We spent Friday night there in cabins and then spent Saturday doing one of the ropes challenge courses.

**I didn't mention who the Hill Family was! This is Rob's mom's family! So MaryAnn's maiden name was Hill.

Warning: picture overload

Some of the Hill family making treats!

Enjoying smores! He was posing all funny. And thanks Amanda for this awesome fleece, he loves it! :)

Rob was telling stories to Robby and Annie to get ready for bed. Stories about a boy named George which Quattro pronounces "Dordge." After each one ended he would say, "Read me another story about Dordge." How can you say no to that?

Proof I was trying to be a happy camper - despite the lovely woman issues I was having that weekend! Party! Hey, I was happy to be sleeping indoors at least and we weren't freezing cold all night!!

We played this game where we had to swing from one spot to the other... the rope hung between the two places and Rob had to dive out to grab it... I usually hate these kinds of activities but it was actually pretty fun.

Robby couldn't swing across by himself so he held onto Rob to get across. Oh yeah, and we were supposed to all stand on that black mat together - if one fell off it we had to start over. Kind of tricky!

We had two groups, and raced on these wood boards - had to hold on to the ropes and all lift up the same foot at the same time... teamwork...

This one was two cables that formed a V, you held hands and walked down the cables getting farther and farther apart - you had to push against each other's hands to stay up. Annie and Quattro looked so cute doing this!!

Almost there!

"We did it!"

Me and Becca's attempt...

Yay for us!

Andrew and Rob - getting to the end!

Zip line time!

Ok I kind of can't believe I did this so it needed to be well documented. Sorry for all the pictures.
I kind of surprised myself by just climbing all the way up quickly - I was trying to go fast to not be scared.

Oh yeah, let me just walk across this beam all the way up high. No big deal. AH!

One word: PROOF

So proud of mommy! :)

Or you could go like Rob and JUMP off and then not even hold on! I sat down before I got off the platform and ended up bumping my bum on it - so not recommended... but a safer feeling way to go! :)

The last time I went on a zip line I was about 5 years old - I was the test dummy for my brother and his friend's zip line they made in the back yard... let's just say they hadn't quite worked out the "stop" part which they figured out as I slammed into the tree. ;) I survived. The ride at Heber Valley was fun but I'll say for the scariness factor once I finally got going and enjoying myself the ride ended much too quickly.

Wish I'd gotten more pictures of the family but it was a good time!