Gabe funny

Last night Cory was getting Gabe ready for bed after his bath. He got out some Baby Vicks Vapo Rub and put it on Gabe's chest because he was coughing. He told Gabe it was medicine to go on his chest. Gabe responded with, "So now will I get HAIR?!?"

Dear Gabe - I sure hope not - I've been using that stuff all week long....

Some New Rules

Just wanted to inform you of some new rules that we have decided to institute at our house. I'm sure you will want to join in.

1. If any of the children in the household are sick - the parents MUST feel 100%. Kids and parents are NOT allowed to be sick at the same time - no matter what!
2. All calories consumed while sick do NOT count. If you feel like crap - you should be able to eat like crap and not have it count against you.
3. If you get a nasty bug you should have a MINIMUM of one month to recover before being subjected to another evil bug. You should have time to recover and get your house back in order before you return to the world of sniffles, freight-train like headaches and body shaking chills.
4. If one parent is sick - the other should not be allowed to feel ANY symptoms of sickness until the first one is completely better.
5. If both parents happen to be sick at the same time (which should not happen - see rule #4) - NO kids are allowed to be sick under any circumstances.
6. If everyone in the house has been sick for 3 week - JUST GIVE UP.

The SICKIES are back

Yup - we're sick all over again. I never quite kicked the last bug we had, but we have something new now. I've been coughing non-stop, Gabe's started coughing, and Cory and I both have yucky body-aches, a headache, Gabe has a fever - all the good stuff. Cory even stayed home from work - the whole day - so I know he must be feeling pretty awful. We were trying to figure out how long it's been since our whole house has been 100% healthy - and I'm pretty sure it's been almost since the first of the year. It's frustrating because I can really say we're generally pretty healthy people. The people I think we got sick from also had really bad diahrea and stomache flu in addition to the crud we have - so let's pray those symptoms skip over us.

Here is a layout I did last week as I was starting to feel better...The journaling reads:

"This picture cracks me up. Here you are sitting down to open your Valentine present...on the toilet. This just kind of captures a slice of our life. We were in the bathroom bathing Hunter, Gabe wanted to open Valentine's presents - so here we did it. I like where our life is right now though; two kids, craziness, and still in love - that sounds like a perfect Valentine's Day to me! Love you sweetheart! (February 14th, 2008)"

And at the risk of some of you thinking I'm actually caught up to Valentine's Day 2008 - not even CLOSE! :) Sometimes it motivates me to jump at current pictures - then I work on the others later...at least that's the plan someday.....

Happy Birthday Little Brother!

Today is my little brother Paul's birthday. Wish we could be in New Mexico celebrating with you guys - but hope you know we love you and hope your birthday is fantastic! I have loved to see Paul as he's become a dad. He is so sweet with Taylor and it will be exciting to see him with her as she grows up and changes.

Love all of you guys and hope your birthday is awesome!

Edited to add: A few weeks ago I said to Gabe, "Tell your little brother goodnight". He said, "Good-night little butt-fur." He knows how to say brother - so Cory and I really cracked up when he called Hunter his little 'butt-fur'. So I guess I should have said "Happy birthday little butt-fur" :)

a couple more layouts

Hunter's rash

When we got up this morning Hunter's rash is almost 100% gone! I am thinking that maybe the dr was wrong and he didn't have HSP, but a more mild reaction to the fever...but I don't know for sure. We'll still watch for the side-effects, but I'm feeling like we're a closer to being out of the woods. So here are a few pictures of what his rash looked like. They're not great pictures, but you can see how it was bright red, and also had purple marks. I hope it doesn't come back - but at least for now we'll be grateful that he's doing a bit better.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

So I had hoped to post this earlier - so I could be wishing you all a Happy Valentine's Day, but that just didn't happen. So Happy (kind of belated) Valentine's Day!

Here are some pictures of our day. In the morning the boys got to open their Valentine's from grandparents and Cory and I. Gabe was really excited about the Valentine he had picked out for Cory, and surprisingly even kept the Spiderman chocolates a surprise. Gabe got a Geotrax toy for his trains and Hunter got a peek-a-boo book (he LOVES playing peek-a-boo!)

Then we went out to lunch with Cory. I asked Gabe what he wanted for lunch and he said, "I want lunch with Daddy. I want to go to the lunch-store with him!" So we met at our favorite hamburger joint (Brad's Food Hut - YUM!) before heading to the doctor for Hunter.

Poor, poor Hunter. As I posted I thought he was getting better. That is until yesterday morning when he woke up covered with a rash all over his poor little body. His fever was down, and he seemed to be doing better, but the rash got worse. So we headed to the dr for the second time this week. He has what is called HSP or Henoch-Schonlein Purpura. It is basically a reaction to the virus his body has been fighting - kind of an allergic reaction to the virus. It can have dangerous complications, but the Dr said it is likely that it will go away on it's own. However, the rash can last up to several weeks - like 4-6 weeks. It could also go away in 2-3 days....so we'll see. Keep the little guy in your prayers - I don't think he's very comfortable. If I get around to it I might post some other pictures of it later....but they might just gross you out.

Then we came home and read some fun Valentine's stories, delivered some Valentine's to some of Gabe's friends, and called it a night. I did give the boys some fun Valentine's Pajamas. I had bought them around Thanksgiving time online at the Gap and I was so excited to put them on them after baths tonight. They looked so cute!

Oh one more thing - have to record the cute thing Gabe said today. I was telling him that when we took our Valentine's around (he picked out Cars Valentines with Cars pencils to give out to friends) that he needed to say, "Will you be my Valentine?" I said, "Now what do you say when you give the girls their cards?" He thought for a minute and yelled, "Will you be my PARTNER?" I don't know where he got that one - but it made me laugh :)

Well everyone - I hope you all had a fantastic Valentine's Day and that your sweethearts surprised you with something sweet and romantic!

LOVE YOU ALL!

Joanna

This picture cracked me up. Hunter was falling over as I was trying to get a cute picture of the boys together and Gabe started screaming, "HELP! HUNTER'S FALLING!!!!!" But as you can see - Gabe wasn't doing much to help him up :)

on the mend and a couple other layouts

Well, we're on the mend here. I'm still fighting a cough and exhaustion - but I'm getting better. Now it's just getting Hunter back to 100%, and praying Gabe never gets it. Hunter woke up pretty sick Sunday in the EARLY morning hours. He felt rotten all day Sunday and yesterday - but he seems to be doing a lot better today. I did take him into the dr this morning and he seemed MUCH better (does that happen to any other moms - you make the dr appointment and suddenly the child gets better on their own?) The dr said it's a virus (which I suspected, but wanted to be sure) and to keep an eye on him. His fever is down quite a bit today and he's much happier - so that's a good sign. He has been up ALL NIGHT LONG for the last several nights and is just a mess unless we hold him. So I haven't gotten much sleep for like 5 nights now and it's really starting to wear me out. But that's life I guess.

Here are a few digital pages I made a while back, but hadn't added the photos. It was nice to just take a few minutes this afternoon while Gabe ate lunch and finish them up. I have a few others I need to add pictures to as well - so keep watching, I'll post them when they're done.

A few people have asked if I do digital scrapbooking only now. I am still planning on paper scrapbooking....someday....It's just a lot easier to deal with digital stuff than to get out the messes with paper scrapping. Especially since my office right now is a disaster - I wouldn't know where to even start to create a paper layout! And though I have yet to print out any of the pages I do, I did get a nice large format printer from Cory for Christmas, so I will eventually start printing them. I also want to try out Shutterfly's photo books.

Sick and some layouts

This has been a crummy week at the Ellis house. I came down with the cruddy cold that's been going around and have been sick for the last several days. Yesterday I felt SO awful - I honestly don't know when I've been so sick (aside from pregnancy). We're talking fever, chills, body aches, a sore-throat like no other, headache, cough, stuffy everything. YUCK! But I feel remarkably better today after a reasonbly good night sleep. Hopefully the worst of it is over...



Well today I luckily feel well enough to sit and do some digital scrapbooking. Cory's taken Gabe with him to get the truck washed and other Saturday errands. Hunter's asleep - so I'm getting some scrapping done. Nothing strenuous, and it's even fun :)



Hope you all have a fantastic weekend.

(EDITED TO ADD: YIKES! I realized later that in the SPLASH layout that I didn't specify why I looked like a beached whale. I was 8 1/2 months pregnant with Hunter. Sadly the pictures don't look like that - but look more like I ATE an 8 1/2 month pregnant ELEPHANT!)

And the winners are.....

Are you ready?

Just a second, hold your horses! First I wanted to thank you all for the comments you made. I loved hearing what you all want to leave as your legacy and what you want others to think of when they think of you and your life. I loved the simple things - like wanting to be known as being the fastest cookie eater (although I think Dad definetly has you beat Jed!) and I also loved ones like being a good missionary, a good friend, a great problem solver, or being dedicated. The list goes on and on - I think you all have fabulous goals to work towards - and many of you are mastering those (at least from where I can see!)

And secondly I wanted to say thank you for all of the kind comments that so many of you made. I hadn't written my original post to boost my confidence - and I wasn't trying to throw myself a pitty party about being known as a stressed out person. It was simply an observation I had made, and a feeling I had after some recent comments from some people. Anyway - I really appreciated all of the comments - many brought a tear to my eye, and helped me to see myself in some nice ways. Thank you guys - it meant a lot to me. (more than you'll know!)

So now the reason you're reading this post - you want to know if you won the movie - right? We had 16 people respond to my question. So I wrote down 1-16 on slips of paper and had Gabe draw the winners. The winners were:

#3 - Jed

#11 - Mom

And for fun - #12 - Kristi

So Jed - you get to choose first which DVD you'd like.

Then Mom will get the movie that Jed doesn't choose.

And Kristi - I'll pick something fun to send you because I love sending fun mail out! (almost as much as I love getting fun surprise mail!)

New First Presidency

What a neat thing to have happen today - the appointment of a new First Presidency for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I have always had a special place in my heart for President Monson - since I was a little girl. Even ast a small child I loved hearing his calming voice, his stories, and his love of service and of the gospel. In fact, when I was in 4th grade he was speaking at the hospital my dad worked at. I begged to be taken out of school because I wanted to be there to hear him. My parents checked me out of school (which they honestly didn't do for anything short of death!) and I attended his talk at the hospital. He came out to the hall afterwards when I was getting a drink and he gave me a big hug. I remember feeling (and still do) so special that he took the time to do that. My mom reminded me today that I also was surprised at how tall and big he was :).

I know that no matter who had been called as the First Presidency would have done amazing work, but I look forward to the experiences these wonderful men will bring to the church. I love their passion for the gospel, their love of the Savior, and the way that they can speak and really touch my spirit.

I am so grateful for a church that has a seemingly seamless change in leadership - as opposed to the way the world chooses leaders (example - the current election 'mess' we deal with every day). The peace that is evident in this change is so different from the contention we are faced with as we watch the news as our country works to choose our next government leaders.

I am also grateful for the chance to teach Gabe tonight about the new First Presidency. A few months ago when we go the November issue of The Ensign we got out the pictures of the new apostles and talked to Gabe about the new member of the First Presidency. We worked on the names of the apostles, and he really caught on quickly - it was neat. So tonight we talked about how we needed a new prophet since President Hinckley has passed away (Gabe tells us that President Hinckley died - and that means he went to live with Heavenly Father). But by the time we were going to bed Gabe kept saying the names of the 1st Presidency over and over and over again - and was begging to see a picture of them in the 'magazine'. I know he doesn't totally get who these men are, or what they do - but I would like to think he has a little glimpse of their importance.

And if nothing else - for now I love how he points to his eyes when he says, "President EYE-ring" (the way we taught him to remember President Eyring's name).

Chilly