Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Tuesday pregnancy musings.

My biggest craving this pregnancy has been seaweed. That should give you some indication of the state of my brain because let's be honest, WHO CRAVES SEAWEED? And if we want to take it one step further, who orders Costco-sized packages of dry, salted seaweed and inhales them with such force and excitement that little seaweed flakes can be found all over her body for days to come? This is weird and leaves me with only one conclusion, I can't be trusted. Take everything I say for the next month (and everything I have said for the last eight) with a grain of sand because anyone who prefers sea foliage to chocolate cake and ice cream just can't be standing on two steady legs.

Speaking of, standing on two steady legs I am not. I've been doing the sciatic shuffle the past couple of weeks and just when I thought things were improving after a particularly painful spell my right leg gave out on me this morning as I was walking down the stairs. Although I didn't fall and drop that precious Quinny in my arms I thought to myself, again, I can't be trusted. That sciatic pain is really something else. The biggest problem, from what I can gather, is that the baby is doing a headstand with what I can only imagine is a typical (ginormous) Wigginton noggin directly on the sciatic nerve which runs directly under her home/my uterus. The 2nd biggest problem is that relief from sciatica during pregnancy is hard to come by--stretching, exercising, resting, yoga and massage just don't cut the lightning bolt pain. I saw a chiropractor when I experienced the same pain with my Talmage pregnancy, but it didn't help and let's be real, ain't nobody got time for one more appointment. The 3rd biggest problem, and this one's a doozy, is that last week I went to the gym locker room to stretch out my poor be-hind and found a middle-aged woman laying buck naked on a yoga mat doing some stretches of her own. I can't for the life of me shake the image, and the mere thought of using any yoga mat in the whole darn Y now gives me the eebie-jeebies. So even if stretching did help, I mean, she kinda ruined it for me. So there's that.

In other pregnancy news, I finally fit into the pregnant zebra dress again and even though it is clearly the most unflattering pregnancy dress in existence I find myself wearing it super often because it feels like a nightgown and I LOVE SLEEPWEAR!!! I also love to sleep, but that's just not my lot in life at this point. And you wanna know a fear of mine? I'm super afraid that by the time my kids are old enough to realize that long, lazy mornings are blissful I will be so programmed to wake up early with them that my body will wake up whether I ask it to or not. Depressing. So back to the dress, Chase said I looked like a pregnant zebra when I wore it during my Everett pregnancy and the name just stuck. In his defense as I looked at the pictures of me wearing the dress compared to pictures of me at the gym from the week before and the week after I was appalled to see that it adds a good 20 pounds to my figure. But hey, I could take a nap in it like whoa and zebra mamas are pretty cute, right? I've also been wearing a whole lotta parachute pants which James calls MC Hammer pants and Talmage calls pajamas and neither think are attractive but, yep, they're a staple and I love them.  I'm far bigger this pregnancy than I've ever been and not much is fitting these days so I'm just happy for anything that doesn't show any unsuspecting strangers my mid-drift. It's harder than it sounds.

Let's see, what else. You want to know a really awesome part about being pregnant? Pregnancy boobs. Those raging hormones are doing something right!!! I'm not one bit embarrassed to talk about it because for a woman that post Quinny was told by a reputable bra manufacturer that she might fit in a training bra, filling an A cup is like winning the lottery. I know there are more important things in the world, but is it wrong to pray that my boobs don't shrink again post baby? And at the risk of making you feel awkward, you mind praying for them as well?!

Half my head is baby hair right now. I can't even wear my hair in a pony without a whole slew of hair falling from every direction. It's growing in fast and thick and in the wrong direction of every part I've ever known. A mind of their own, these baby hairs have. James jokes that I should be grateful that my hair decides to grow back instead of peacing out forever like his, and I am, but it's a bit silly. The other day in the car I was trying to control the fuzz and noticed that I must have gotten some tinsel on my head. Maybe from preschool? Maybe from my craft cupboard? I couldn't figure it out. I got the tinsel off of my head, root and all, because you wouldn't believe that what I thought was sparkly silver tinsel was actually my first gray hair! I laughed and laughed and saved it to show James and even joked that I was going to tape it into my journal. Since finding the first, I realized that there is actually a sea of silver hair coming in with the brown babies. The point is that my baby hair is actually quite old and you know what, I'm not sad about it at all. 

Let's finish this novel off by stating the obvious, in a little over a month I am going to have four kids. FOUR KIDS! We still live in a 2 bedroom apartment and you should see the tetras we've been playing in our minds trying to figure out where an extra crib, extra clothes and extra baby are going to fit in a room that is already bursting at the seams. I met a woman a while back who asked if I was pregnant with my first baby. I laughed and told her it was actually my fourth little friend. She looked at me with wildly shocked eyes and said, "You don't belong in an apartment, you belong on a farm!" Some may have been offended by her comments, but I was like, "Yah, I know! Do you know of one that's close to my husband's work and doesn't cost 5 million dollars?" We do kind of belong in a place with more space but hey, we live in LA and this is what city life is all about so I'm trying to come to peace with the chaos that our closeness causes. Still though, if praying for my boobs is not your cup of tea maybe a prayer for a house would suit you? I'd be ridiculously grateful!

Random pregnant post done, here are a few pics of my extra large middle section:



I have no idea how many weeks I am (35ish?), but these are in order from the past couple of weeks. Grey shirt first, then zebra dress (see what I mean?) and just a few days ago I took that picture in the red shirt. If my protruding belly button is really a turkey timer as James often jokes then I think this baby might be ready to come out, but I'm hoping that she'll continue cooking as long as possible!

Monday, April 25, 2016

Eight years

We've been married for eight years as of April 24th, which is kind of a big deal if you ask me. We went to Japanese food and shaved Taiwanese ice the night before our big day and our order number was 24, which if I was the least bit superstitious (which sometimes I am) I would take as a good sign. The condensed milk covered ice was WAY better than our noodle bowls, but a night out is a night out and we enjoyed the freedom that a babysitter offered! 

To some a Sunday anniversary would seem like a drag, but I was SO excited because Sunday is the only day I know that James will be home. Having him to myself/ourselves all day seemed the perfect way to celebrate our family birthday. And since he said I could choose all the meals, I went to town. We had french toast with buttermilk syrup for breakfast, cereal for lunch and sweet and savory crepes for dinner. It was amazing!!! The crepes though, they were unreal. I had 1) chevre, blackberry, bacon 2) marscapone, basil, strawberry and 3) nutella, banana, raspberry. Honestly, breakfast for every meal is what my heaven looks like!

After naps and dinner and crying through our wedding videos (oh wait, that was just me crying?!) we went on a walk around the neighborhood where the boys caught scooter air on the bumpy side walk, Quinny hogged all of Daddy's attention and picked up hundreds of sticks and I looked at this life we've created in the last eight years and felt grateful and satisfied. We've done good, James. We've done real good.

Friday, April 22, 2016

T's Beatles Concert

We had an {almost} front row seat to watch Talmage and all his 1st grade buddies sing Beatles songs during their Spring Concert. Their angel voices singing Let It Be, When I'm 64, Octopuses Garden, Obladee Oblada, Yellow Submarine and other classics had me in tears the whole time. Sometimes life seems so hard and then sometimes little kids are singing such profound songs and life feels so beautiful. I wanted to go hug T's music teacher after the performance for the gift he gave T, his classmates and all of us privileged to hear them sing. What a treat!

James was able to come and we were all thrilled to see him, no one more than Talmage-boy! (Although if I'm being honest, Quinn clung to him the WHOLE concert and growled when I so much as looked at her so I'm pretty sure she was a close second!)

Family of five at the concert!

Wednesday, April 20, 2016

He's 30!

Everything was planned out perfectly (and had been for months) to make James' 30th birthday a rousing success and then, one by one, everything started unraveling. If I'm being honest it was a really disappointing week because while I'm usually a pro at managing my expectations, I was SO excited about every fun surprise and it's intended reaction that I didn't leave much wiggle room for things going awry. And awry they went!

But regardless of whether or not the celebrations were a success, we were all still grateful that James was born, that he is ours, and that he is 30! I always love this time of the year when we share the same age, and being 30 together feels particularly fun. Happy birthday to our favorite Dad-Man!

 

We wanted to surprise James at work with balloons, California donuts, flowers and party hats the day before his birthday since he was going to be out of town on the actual day. We talked to his secretary to figure out a time and you better believe we surprised him, but mostly maybe because he had a meeting two minutes later that we didn't know about. Whoops! We grabbed a picture, he walked us to the break room, and then those three Wiglet's and I ate donuts alone before sneaking a couple of pictures, nearly dialing a partner on Daddy's phone, and sneaking back down the elevator. It wasn't exactly the party I hoped it would be, but he was grateful for our efforts so that's good. 

The week before and of his birthday work picked up considerably and we didn't see him at all. I knew that a night-time celebration was probably out of the question so I made the executive decision that we would be having a breakfast birthday party with his requested cookie dough ice cream cake. I had never made an ice cream cake before, and who eats ice cream cake for breakfast anyway, but what was important to us was that we got to sing to James and celebrate his birthday together as a family and if breakfast was the only time we could do it, so be it! Everyone loved the cake (phew) and loved watching him open up his presents. Everyone was so generous and it was fun to see the cards that people picked out and the presents they decided to give him. He know doubt felt loved.

My big present to James was a family tent and a camping trip. He's wanted to go camping for SO long and I worked for months on finding the most beautiful camping site (that wasn't too far), booking it after being wait-listed for nearly 6 weeks, buying the tent, borrowing other camping gear and planning a delicious menu for a weekend in the woods. To say that this all came at the wrong time would be an understatement, and even though I want to erase these memories from my brain I'm including them, for posterity (and also for sympathy). James was busy and stressed with work, Quinny got really sick, the "easy pop-up tent" ended up being broken and after hours of working on it had to be Jerry-rigged to stay up, Quinn was up all night long screaming in pain and James and I had to take turns sitting in the car with her to muffle her screams for other campers, and on, and on, and on. We ended up staying only one night instead of two (in fact, we were only there for like 12 hours), we ate the money for the extra night of camping and we returned the tent instead of exchanging it--probably not going to go camping again anytime soon. We got home, showered, and then spent the rest of the day washing smelly blankets and clothes, running around to baseball games and other errands and working. I thought it was going to be the 30th birthday that dreams were made of but it may have swayed a little more towards nightmare! Oh well, better luck next year for 31!

Thursday, April 14, 2016

a FABULOUS visit to the heart center

I always feel anxious when our yearly visit to the Heart Center comes knocking, but especially this year as Everett's past cardiologist's believed that his mitral valve replacement would need to happen around his fifth birthday. Adding to the craziness of this year's appointment was that we once again have moved states and are starting practice with a new cardiologist, and also our new baby's fetal echo showed a few warning signs that I wanted Ev's doctor to review. My mama heart was feeling just a little shakey as we walked through those doors.

But you know what? I think that was the best heart appointment we have EVER had. My Ever Knight was a champ, sitting through nearly four hours of tests and talks with minimal complaints. When Ev's new doctor came in to discuss results, he had a long conversation with my boy about Star Wars before diving in. Everett's only request when we were finding a cardiologist at UCLA was that he really wanted a boy doctor, and since I feel passionate about empowering him in the medical world I did everything I could to find the best boy doctor around. Let me tell you, this amazing man did not disappoint and I am so grateful for him!

In medical news (providing me the biggest ever sigh of relief) Ever's mitral valve seems to be growing with him. Sure it's a little wonky, but hey, we are not going to be in the OR anytime soon and that should be celebrated! His EKG came back with unusual results and it seems that one of his "electrical outlets" in his heart was more damaged during surgery than we once thought, but every appointment is a mixed bag and this is one I could handle. Also, the doctor and I discussed this new baby and he is cautious but not super concerned. She will have an echo after she is born and we'll take it from there, but since I'm already scheduled to have the baby mid-week at UCLA there are no other arrangements that need to be made. I can't tell you what a relief this appointment delivered.

We left the doctor and Everett got to choose any treat he wanted for being so stellar. He requested a "smoovie and a donut" and both were promptly delivered to his cute little person. This heart journey with Ever Knight has taught me so much and I'm so grateful for that little lovey who is braver than he knows.

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

T's Restaurant

There aren't very many opportunities to hang out it T's class so when one pops up you better believe I'm all over it! His class is learning all about restaurants and in preparation for their personal places to open up in a few weeks they were able to visit a couple restaurants that us parent's ran. It's always fun to see my T in his element, and even if Louis was more excited about this selfie than he was I'm sure glad I could spend some time loving on my blonde boy.

Friday, April 8, 2016

Conferencing

Wearing PJ's all day and sitting around watching TV is the dreamiest when you literally NEVER get to do it. Us Wig's are adventurers and we try not to take a second for granted, but boy is it so nice to have a weekend that houses a religious excuse to hunker down! The first weekend in April was General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This conference happens twice a year and they broadcast it online, in church buildings and on TV from Utah straight to our living room. There are six two-hour sessions (one for the women, one for the men and four for families) and I cling to the words that are taught. Our Saturday was full of baseball (luckily between sessions) so we were in and out for that but otherwise it was just us and the good word all weekend long. And good food of course, which is basically synonymous with Conference weekend. 

Living across from the temple has its perks, especially when it's Friday afternoon and the kids want to get out but there's not much time before dinner is ready. Our destination was the Visitors Center and the hour spent there did not disappoint. The boys played with the electronic church games, Quinny ran to see Jesus 1,000 times and I got to hear the love story of the cute senior couple at the front desk. It was a great lead-in to Conference weekend.

On our walk home I was struck with the beauty of the temple grounds and the lively spirits of the little people with me. We stopped on a bench near a fountain to take a picture and eat a snack, the remnants of which you see on Quinn's face, and smiled really big when I looked at it later and noticed that Ever and I were still wearing our matching necklaces he made for us in Pre-K.

Daddy the photo-bomber in a Mommy/Quinny selfie! She sat and listened to all 8 hours of conference and learned soooo much--ha! Mostly she made it her personal mission to distract us for all 8 hours of conference, and she was pretty successful.

We usually have cinnamon rolls for Sunday breakfast on Conference but since I didn't have it in me this time James saved the day with cinnamon roll pancakes. They were absolutely delicious and wwwaaayyyy less time-consuming than the real deal so I do believe we have ourselves a new tradition! James is the master chef during breakfast anyway, so it works out perfectly. Ever Knight made sure that not a slice of the two pounds of bacon we fried up went to waste. He's always helpful like that.

Five and a half Wig's cuddling on a couch and loving every second of it.

After Conference James and the boys orchestrated a whole puppet show based on Lehi's Dream. It ended up being darling and kept the boys occupied and happy all afternoon long, #miracle. What a great Conference weekend. Can hardly believe that next time we sit on that couch to watch there will be another baby girl in our arms!!!

Tuesday, April 5, 2016

Spring Break 2016: Utah

The thought of going through these pictures and posting about Spring Break has seemed like too daunting a task lately, but finally this afternoon after checking a million other items off my to-do list I decided it was go time. That little introduction makes this seem like much more of a chore than it actually is because looking at these pictures of all our fun Utah adventures brings back so many super fun memories I can hardly stand it, but you know how it goes when there are 2,000 pictures looking you in the face!

In full disclosure, I was straight rubbish at taking pictures on this trip. Luckily Ash and Mad picked up my slack in a big way because without their pictures my kids would never even know they went to Utah for Spring Break! Also, because these pictures are coming from all sorts of email, phones, cameras, etc. they are all crazy out of order--and heaven forbid I take the time to organize them! I think the crazy order in this post might just be a metaphor for my life these days.

Excuse me while I travelogue away (although in the interest of time, and sanity, I'll mostly let the pictures do the talking). Follow along if you dare! 

The kids and I drove out to Utah on our own since James still had to work. Basically the nearly 12 hours in the car were occupied by the boys fighting over the ipad, Quinn screaming at the top of her lungs and me trying to decide whether or not my bladder would have mercy on me until the next pit stop. Adult diapers were something I really should have considered. We all sang a hallelujah chorus when we saw Y Mountain in the distance, although Quinny's praises sounded kind of like the same screeches she had been making for the last 12 hours and the boys' sounded like whining. My hallelujah's were full of legitimate praise because there were times when I thought we might not EVER make it!

The boys escaped the car in search for Kai's toys/room/backyard within seconds which left Quinny and I at the car when Logan and Ashleigh came out to greet up. That little baby still favors men to a crazy degree and seriously wouldn't even look in Ash's direction (but jumped right into her Uncle Gogo's arms). We all try not to let it hurt our feelings, but girlfriend is relentless! I love the picture above with the babies in the shopping cart because it was at that moment that Quinny finally, FINALLY, would acknowledge Aunt Ash's presence and give her the lovin' she deserves.

And yes, those two paragraphs describing that one picture is my attempt at being brief. It's one of my talents.

Quinny loved playing in Aunt Ash's jewelry box and stealing all of her necklaces and bracelets. Turns out Quinn might just have a girly side after all! (Sorry baby girl that your Mama doesn't have Aunt Ash's skills...)


This picture cracks me up. It's amazing that pictures even exist where more than one child is looking at the camera! All three of us moms were doing dances trying to get these kids attentions but they simply weren't having it. Except Ever Knight, bless you Ever Knight!


This picture is one of my very favorites! Talmage has been desperate to hike the Y every time we go to Utah but it always seems like our schedules get away from us and we don't have time. This trip we were determined to make it happen so James and Logan got up early one Saturday morning and took the big boys on their own little excursion (sans crazy Quinn, whiny Ever and prego Mama). It was freezing and harder than he imagined it would be, but he was SO proud of his accomplishment and especially liked his hot chocolate reward from Kneader's at the end.

Ashleigh posted this picture on instagram with a caption about hiding your wallets when shopping with me! The funny thing is that I thought I was going way low-key this year and Ash said she spent double the money she usually spends...hahaha! And whoops! I guess the magic of the holidays sometimes get to me, and to James' money! ;)

Ash and I had a sisters date before the Women's Session of General Conference and went out to get our nails done, shopping and then to dinner. It was SO much fun to spend so much one-on-one time with her (even if I did order us a HUGE plate of sweet potato fries as an appetizer totally forgetting that she does not like sweet potato fries!) I dream of the day that we'll be able to hang like this more often, but for now it's just the sweetest memories when it does occur.

James and I also got to go on a hot date to SLC to see our amazing friend Erin Morley sing in The Messiah with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Orchestra at Temple Square. She is one of the most talented people I know and watching her sing left me in total awe. We sat next to the Soukup's at the performance and met up with the Allenbach's afterwards and the night left us feeling so grateful for the incredible people our stint in NYC brought to our lives. Do I have pictures of our fun friends? No! Just one of us kissing in front of that gorgeous mountain. This is the view right outside Ash's front door which in James' mind means she lives in the Celestial Kingdom!!!

A trip to Lehi Bakery to visit our dear Crystalyn and eat her family's perfect donuts was a must and the best. She spoiled us with a tour of the bakery, warm freshly glazed donuts and threw in a few of her favorites to the mounds we requested. I'm a donut fanatic and have had some of the best from around the country, but I kid you not their chocolate bar (my donut of choice) was THE BEST I've ever tasted. They have just the right amount of chew to them and they use real chocolate frosting on top. I want another one more than I can even tell you right now. Just yum.



James was just looking at this picture over my shoulder (while massaging my back, because it's hard work to be pregnant and to blog simultaneously) and said, "That's such a good picture. I just wish Chase and Meghan had been there too." Amen to that! This was at the Museum of Curiosity at Thanksgiving Point which was two thumbs way up.


This is the view out of Ash's back window. Like whoa, amiright? James and I were driving down their street and all of a sudden he was all, "God must love me so much because LOOK AT THOSE MOUNTAINS!" James loves the mountains like I love donuts. Enough said.



This little bunny really loved that she got her own big bag of graham cracker bears in her basket. You should have seen her going to town on those!

After church on Easter Sunday we went down by the river to take some family pictures. Quinn had been throwing up the couple days prior (and a few more family members went down for the count that night and the next day) but this moment by the water with my little family was just bliss.

Baby bump at 30 weeks!!! This is the biggest by far I've ever been at this point, but this is my fourth baby so it's probably just as it should be! I really love my cute bump and this part of pregnancy so I'm trying to soak it all up. 


I don't think this picture needs any explaining, it's by far my favorite picture in the world right now!!! Let's just say we were admiring each other's assets! ;)

We absolutely could not keep this girls shoes on the whole time we were in Utah. All of a sudden we'd notice she only had one shoe on and we'd find the closest spare we could to fill the void. Mad and I laughed so hard when we saw this darling picture she had taken and then noticed the mismatched shoes. Oh well, it's a great story!






The triplet pictures above make me so happy. I know these babies must have been best friends in heaven and it was no coincidence that they all blessed our family in the same month. I'm so happy we've been able to get them together so often and I hope they'll always know how much they're loved.






James wanted to make the trip back home less of a grueling drive and more of a fun experience. Quinn threw up for the first hour of the trip and T threw up for the last two hours of the trip (fun!) but in between we really did have a great time. We decided to drive the 3 mile loop in Kolob Canyon and it did not disappoint. Sure, Ever refused to get out of the car more than once but the rest of us were awe-struck by the beauty of the red rock. Someday soon we hope to visit Zions and Bryce and the Grand Canyon and Lake Powell, but for now this offered a great vista and was right off the freeway. #winning





Bare feet and crazy hair is basically Quinny's recipe for success! And Daddy...he is most definitely on her need list!

Shake Shack for lunch on the strip in Vegas was also a win. Sure, we have a Shake Shack in LA now but there are McDonald's everywhere and that doesn't stop people from driving through, right? It was at this point that we realized Talmage was going downhill so our stay was short, but I'd consider this a successful first visit to the strip for my favorite four up there!

I wish Spring Break was every week and we could party with our fun family more often. Thanks for being such a great hostess Ash! As always we had the best time with you and yours!