What a difference a year makes

One year ago (On April 11, 2011) we were waking up at 4 in the morning with a "fasting" 5 month old baby to drive down to Denver. We had been busily preparing for that day, making a few trips down to Denver to donate blood for a possible transfusion and then also for a pre-op appointment a few days before. A tender mercy in timing allowed both sets of parents to be there to support us through the surgery and also to attend Maisy's baby blessing the day before.

At the hospital, we watched them do labs and tried to keep her happy, and then we handed her over to the surgeon we had only met a few days before. It still brings tears to my eyes to think of all the emotion that was involved. We knew that the surgery only carried a 1% risk. One percent. What do we do every day that involves that kind of risk? Aren't you at least at 1% risk if you have siblings? Still. It felt scary to know that something could go wrong or that there would be some kind of complication.

The nurse practitioner came in every hour or so to give us updates. I can still remember the time she came in and said, "We've successfully stopped your baby's heart". Longest hour of my life. We felt relieved and blessed when we heard that the heart was successfully beating again and then that surgery was completed and had been successful.

I remember walking back to see Maisy. They had explained what she would look like days before the surgery. They warned us and described in detail how it would be. But somehow, I was in denial. I didn't think that my baby would look too bad. We walked in the room and I saw the breathing tube, the millions of wires, and the swelling and fluids that distorted sweet Maisy's almost lifeless body. I remember standing there, with Justin's mom by my side and a doctor coming up to talk to me. Suddenly, I felt too weak to stand. I couldn't hear what the doctor was saying and I just started to sob. Seeing my baby was not the comforting moment I thought it would be. It was scary and hard and overwhelming.

How grateful I was later, however, for that moment. As the hours passed I watched this baby heal before my eyes. Pretty soon she was breathing on her own, smiling, laughing, eating, and doing all of the things a normal baby should do.Even her scar has seemed to almost disappear. 

I guess I am a little sentimental because a great family in our ward has a baby who was diagnosed with a brain tumor. His road hasn't been as smooth as ours and it has been a slow and long recovery. He just had his second brain surgery a few weeks ago.Two days ago, on Sunday, his grandmother was talking to me about how rewarding it would be if this little baby could smile again... he has facial palsy from the surgery and they are not sure whether or not it will heal. We are so blessed. I talk to people who's babies have the original diagnosis that Maisy was given, Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. We are so blessed. I look at mothers and families who anticipate multiple surgeries on their infants. We are so blessed. 

So, I guess the purpose of this post is to express my gratitude for the way this trial unfolded. The question that remains in my mind is, "why us"?  How did our story become a warm fuzzy memory of the love of God and his miracles while so many suffer with heartbreak and sad endings. I'm not sure, but I do a keep a prayer in my heart for those families and feel thankful for our blessings.

  And remember how exciting it was when she got to come home for Justin's birthday?

I know I already posted this picture, but it makes my heart happy that she is doing so well and that her scar has healed so well. A friend posted a picture of her baby online with a tutu and no shirt. I found myself looking for the baby's scar (she didn't have one)...I guess I'm so used to that now it almost seems normal.

We celebrated the anniversary with some heart shaped jello and some heart shaped grilled cheese. We also celebrated by going swimming with Gracie's pre-school class:)

Anyway, a year does make a lot of difference and I watch a busy and strong-willed toddler with new eyes. Knowing that it is that strong spirit that makes her our "Miracle Maisy".

For Kellie

 I just sent off a package with this beautiful quilt.  I had so much fun making it. The squares on the front were actually pieced by Justin's grandma. I found a hole stack of them and was amazed that nobody had snatched them up. Anyway, we had Justin's sister's name for Christmas and decided to make this quilt for her and her family. I was really close to Justin's grandma and had such an outpouring of love for my in-laws as I made this quilt.

 Once I finished the quilt top, my friend let me machine quilt it at her house on her long arm machine.  That was a cool experience too!

 It may have taken me until April to finally bind and send off the quilt, but I am excited for them to finally get this in the mail!

Easter

 We had a great Easter. We dyed eggs with Kool-aid for fun this year. The kids had a ball.

 Our neighbors bought a fancy "egg-bot" online. It hold 6-8 sharpies at a time and draws cool patterns on eggs. They raise chickens too, so they came over and shared some amazingly decorated eggs. As a side note, I boiled the eggs to make them easter basket friendly, but the egg-bot was gentle enough that they used it on raw eggs. Craziness.

 We went to a fun easter egg hunt the week of Easter at a friend's house. The kids had a ball. They looked forward to it all week until the hunt and talked about it all week after until Easter. We made some home-made play-dough to fill the eggs we brought. It was a lot of fun.

Resolutions

My version of Fail Proof Pizza

 I usually include one cooking/baking resolution each year. In the past I have done breakfast foods, yeast breads, vegetables, etc. This year my resolution is to get really good at making homemade pizza. I have had fun trying out some different recipes, and am excited to try to combine some of my favorite pizzas to make the true "BEST. PIZZA.EVER". These are some of my results. One trick that I need to follow is using bread flour rather than all-purpose flour. Another trick that always works for me is turning the oven to its highest setting. My best sauce so far is my mom's recipe.

My version of the Pizza Hut Personal Pan

Here are 3 pizza recipes I have liked and I will tell you what I liked about them and how I plan to combine.
1) Fail Proof Pizza -this has a ton of good pizza tips. I especially like the idea about rolling it out on parchment and transferring it all to the oven. I don't really mind cornmeal, but it is sometimes nice to change it up. I also love and agree with all of the recommendations to get a great pizza.
2) Homemade Pan Pizza Crust- I love this recipe because they add all kinds of stuff to this dough. Lots of seasoning in the dough, which makes it extra tasty... more of a restaurant kind of feel.
3)Pizza Hut Personal Pan- I loved this recipe because it actually has you bake the pizza in a round cake pan (I also used a pie pan because I made 3 pizzas and had only 2 round cake pans). This was helpful to me because I love a thick and soft crust but I usually roll things too thin and end up with a very thin crust. I loved this for portioning out the dough and the dough also had a nice consistency.   I also loved that a crust in a pan would be much easier to make early in the day and let sit. I wished, however, that because I could actually taste the crust, that it had a little bit more flavor.

What is next? Bread flour. Try recipe #2 in cake pans (Like in #3) and if it doesn't turn out as nice and fluffy, I will try adding more spices into recipe #3. I also still love recipe #1 for a standard pizza recipe.My other goal is to try some more unique combinations, but my kids and hubby love pepperoni most, and since we usually have those ingredients on hand, that is what we go with on most occasions. My personal favorite is BBQ chicken pizza:)

This is the sauce recipe I like. Please feel free to share your best recipes or pizza secrets. Like I said, I want to be an awesome pizza baker.

Yummy Pizza Sauce (Ruth Ann's Recipe):
1- 15 oz. can tomato sauce
1/2 tsp. oregano leaves, crushed
1/2 tsp. basil leaves, crushed
1T. Parmesan cheese
1/8 tsp. black pepper
1/2 tsp.garlic salt
1/4 tsp. salt
2 tsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. Parsley leaves
1/8 tsp anise seeds, crush
dash ground marjoram

Heat in microwave 1 min or let mixture set overnight to blend the spices

***I just had to laugh when I looked at this posted and saw the word "Resolutions" right above a big greasy pizza. Maybe next  year I should work on my salad skills:)

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

 You know that sad day when you find that empty container of ice cream?

 And you just need to make sure none of it goes to waste.

Maisy's Room

 We switched things up a bit when Gracie moved out and I have been hard at work organizing and putting things in different places. I know it is no Pottery Barn Catalog or Real Simple magazine, but it is functional for us and I am thrilled to feel a little more organized and for the kids to have extra floor space to play.

Conference and Soft Pretzels

 We loved conference. One tradition that I always look forward to is licorice for conference. It is always a highlight and our kids love it too. I don't know when it became a necessary, but it just doesn't feel like conference would be the same without it.

 I had seen some soft pretzels on Pinterest and wanted to try making some. Conference weekend sounded like a good time. Gracie and Gunner wanted to help, so I let them make snakes instead of pretzel shapes. It was a lot of fun. For some reason, Justin was not even acting excited about the fact that I was making soft pretzels. I couldn't figure it out until I started thinking about the times I have had soft pretzels. Probably at the mall. If you know Justin, you know that he isn't one to linger longer at the mall or spend much time there in the first place. I questioned and found out that he had never had a soft pretzel. He had no idea about the goodness he was missing out on. And as I racked my brain, I was guessing it had been about a decade since my last soft pretzel:)

I made Justin's really good with butter and cinnamon sugar. In the words of Gracie, "Without anything, this doesn't taste AMAZING, but with butter and cinnamon sugar, it does." I couldn't get the kids to try them with anything savory.  They were a fun new thing and we froze several that we pulled out a couple of times and ate hot again out of the oven. The recipe I used is here.

I also want to try the recipe here sometime to make ham and cheese pretzel bites. YUM!

Swim Lessons

These 2 cuties are signed up for swim lessons. They just had their third lesson yesterday. It has been fun to watch them and Gracie does a great job looking out for Gunner.  I am feeling really happy that I put them in the same class. Gunner almost didn't get in the first day, but quickly changed his mind when I mentioned that we might be able to go to the dollar store after swim lessons.

Note to self: The ice cream bribe before the dollar store bribe did NOT work.

BUSTED!

We LOVE Nutella around here but don't buy it all that often. I saw the store brand on sale the other day though, and decided to buy some. Justin saw it right away and started using it on his favorite Peanut Butter and Nutella sandwiches and the kids didn't discover it for several days after that. That brings you up to speed for this conversation I had with Gracie.

Maggie: Hey, Gracie. Do you want a Peanut Butter and jam sandwich for lunch?

Gracie: (super annoyed) NO. I want Peanut Butter and NUTELLA. And don't think that I don't know what you  and Dad are doing. You're  just trying to keep all of the Nutella for yourselves and not share any with us.

How are kids so smart?  

Veterinary Teaching Hospital- Open House

This open house is an annual tradition for our family here in Fort Collins. The kids get to see animals- snakes, cats, goats, Cam the Ram (CSU's mascot), Horses, ponies, and Emu. They also suited up for surgery on some pound puppies:)

Justin has some of these bones at home as well and the kids love learning the names of all the horse bones.

Hootenanny

 Nanny and Gunner- December 2011

I heard the kids yesterday morning before church.
Gracie: (Yells) HOOTENANNY!
Gunner: (Yells) GRANDPA'S NANNY!!

I think he must have heard "Who's the Nanny?". It made me smile

The most sharing person in our family.

 Maisy was awarded the title of the most sharing person in our little family. She LOVES popsicles. She even has her own version of the word popsicle. She is always good, however, at sharing her treats with Gracie and Gunner. And, just between us, I think the older kids take advantage of it a little:).

 All you have to do is lean over and say "Ahhhh" and Maisy will laugh and hold up her popsicle to give you a bite.

Maisy is a happy girl and gets the giggles a lot.  She currently says Mom, Dad, Hi, Bye, Night-night, Gracie, Popsicle, Banana, Jesus, No, Yes and the occasional other words that you wonder if she really said or not like Diaper or change, or thank you.  She also sometimes blows kisses and loves to give high fives. This weeks marks one year since Maisy's surgery and is also her 17 month birthday. More to come on that. We love you, sharing Maisy.

Underwear Boy

 We're kind of catching the super hero bug around here. One of Gunner's favorite characters (made up by him) is "Underwear Boy". Here he is working his magic.

And Yes... this is our FRONT YARD. In my rookie days I would have only allowed this in the backyard :).

Gracie Girl

 Gracie has had a big couple of months. She learned how to ride a bike without training wheels several weeks ago and practiced and practiced. Now she is a regular pro. It is so fun. Over spring break, our neighbors were outside a lot and she had tons of friends to ride bikes with. I thought if she did get hurt, it would be from a biking accident. But, she came in crying one evening and had fallen on the sidewalk while running. Poor thing. It was one of those scrapes that doesn't bleed but you know will scab. She was a trooper though, and it healed quickly.

 We are working on all of the traditional Kindergarten stuff these days. We are learning how to tie shoes and memorize our phone number and address. Did I already mention that Gracie will be going to full day Kindergarten? I am going to miss her, but really think she will thrive on being there all day. She is getting excited to take the bus!!

Dresser Re-Do

 I got 2 free dressers on Craigslist, pictured above. They weren't the loveliest dressers on the planet, but like I said, they were free and I had been looking for a dresser for my closet because I gave mine to Maisy. Anyway, I know many of you have been redoing furniture for years, but this was my first actual re-do.

 Justin was on spring break and was my spray paint man. I used a special primer on the dressers that didn't require us to sand first either. It was great.

 We spray painted the dresser handles to look a little more modern. The upper ones have been spray painted, the lower one is what it looked like originally.

 One dresser in our bedroom.

One in my closet. Ahhh. It always feels good to finish a project and to learn how to do something new.