The Big News!

So it's been crazy the last few weeks like I had said before...We've been blessed with so many visitors. Cause not only did we get the ones I blogged about before, but Julie Hunt came and stayed with us the weekedn following Thanksgiving, and then my brother Brek was planning on coming last weekend, but travel plans didn't quite turn out.

But it's been even more fun than usual because we got to share without our families and friends that we're expecting a little one in June!! So now that this last Wednesday we were able to go into the doctor's office and get ultrasounds pictures, we thought it was time to share with everyone!!


The other part was Chad's birthday present that I couldn't tell anyone about before was finding out that I was pregnant. To understand the picture of Chad below, you have to know the background....So last year for Chad's birthday 2007, I decided that I was going to get him a pastel pink polo. Now I know that some of your are thinking, Chad? In pink? Well he happens to look great in it. But when he opened that gift last year, he thought that I was telling him that I was pregnant and we were having a little girl. I was totally surprised and thought "How did he get the idea that I was pregnant out of a pink polo shirt that was his size?". So this year when I found out a few days before his birthday I went shopping and bought 2 little baby outfits, one for a baby boy and one for a girl and wrapped them as a present for him to open.

I don't know how many of you have kept a secret like that from your husbands...it was difficult. The night before his birthday, I slept horribly. I kept waking up, (not quite sure if that was hormones or nerves), but when I woke up about 0600 am having to use the bathroom I thought. "I'll just go use the other bathroom and grab the gift and have it waiting for Chad when he wakes up." So that's exactly what I did and as soon as Chad woke up I was shoving a gift in his face and was telling him to open it. It was killing me!!! I just couldn't wait any longer. So in his half awake and half asleep mode he opened the gift and then had to ask me a few times if I was serious. Last year he pulls that idea out of a pink polo and then has to ask me if I mean we're expecting when I give him baby clothes. It was pretty fun and neat all at the same time. What a neat time when it something you've both wanted for a long time. We're just so excited to be parents.

So here's a few pictures of our little one. at 12 weeks. You can see the head and body pretty well in these two. He measure the head to rump lenth at 49mm. So it's about 2.5 inches long so far and so we're right on target for the due date of June 23rd!!

And if you look close at these you can see it's arms, hands and fingers. We wish we had taken a video of the ultrasound, because when it first started it was just kicking it's legs so fast. Dr. Minudri told us we had a fiesty one on our hands!!!

Thanksgiving and the day after.

So this year I was scheduled to work the 3 days before Thanksgiving and then the weekend after Thanksgiving. So needless to say we didn't go anywhere because I only had 2 days off. But we were able to have 2 couples from our married ward over and had a great day.(The Mowers and Duncans) It was fun to see what things were traditional foods for each family. We had fabulous food and lots of it and it was nice not to have to prepare it all ourselves. What a good day over all, even though we missed being with family on such a special day, but thank heaven for the great gift of ward family to fill in the gaps.

So the day after Thanksgiving, Chad and I went crazy and cleaned the house and prepared it for Christmas. Chad has been listening to Christmas music since the day after Halloween, which I thought was hilarious. But we official kicked off our Christmas season. I am a strong believer in not starting Christmas until after Thanksgiving, because I think it's an important holiday that needs to be observed. But I also had been encouraging Chad to go out and put the Christmas lights on the house since he was out for Thanksgiving break. Last year we only got the icicle lights on the first story of our house and felt that it just didn't do our cute little house justice. So to be blunt, I felt disappointed, but didn't think it was worth the life of me or my husband to get out on the roof and climb to the next level and hang more lights when there was snow and ice on the roof. So that is how we did it this year, before the ice and snow came. It worked pretty good and I think that I'll continue to do that as long as we don't get a too steep pitched roof in the future. I personal feel like it faster than a ladder.


Not only did we get the lights up, but we also went and bought our first Christmas tree since we've been married. What a momumental moment. For some of you that have been Christmas tree shopping with me you realize how dumb I can be to find the perfect tree. Which to me is one that is full and evenly shaped. But I was pleasantly surprised that we found one for $25 at Rite Aide. Sweet!! I have been known to pay a pretty penny for my trees in the past but didn't feel like I needed to cause we found a good one for not too bad of price. We could even fit in the back of my Honda Accord. Yeah we just tied the tree branches near the bottom back up and placed a tarp in the trunk and layed down the back seat and pulled the tree in. We even got the trunk latched. No white trash tie-downs this time(in regards to our dining room table escapade). So then we spent the rest of the day decorating the tree and finishing the other decorations.




I even finished making my wreath with lights, that I've been trying to make for over 4 years. AHHH what a rewarding day!!!! One day I'll the get the pictures of the icicle lights and my wreath and post them too. So here a picture of our icicle lights. I'm sure it's a memory Chad will never forget... getting on the second story roof from the first story roof!.

November 22-24 addendum

Something that I forgot to mention about the weekend my brother Derek and his family came to stay, was how fanatical his children have become with the Star Wars series. They play this game of "Who said it?", Which goes like this....One person quotes a line from one of the star wars movies and whoever can guess who said the line and name which one of the 6 movies it's from gets to come up with then next clue. Pretty funny. I guess it wouldn't be funny until you saw 3 little girls between the ages 4-9 beat the pants off any adult I've ever met.

We also got in a little crafting, drawing time. Knowing me (I was this way even as a little girl) we had to get out some constructions paper. I also got out some colored pencils and away the kids went... Not a big surprise when Halle came up with the following picture.

So I hope you can read everything, but basically it's most of the characters from Star wars. Way funny!!

Another wonderful weekend!!! November 22-24

Sorry that it's taken me so long to write all these up, but I'm starting to feel like we've been running a bed and breakfast the last few weekends and then I'm working in between them and it doesn't leave a lot of time to blog.

So I was really excited to get an email from brother, Derek, about 2 months ago asking if his wife and 5 kids could come for a visit!! They haven't been up to visit us due to their own busy schedule and not to mention the 9 hour drive for 5 kids.... So they ended up breaking up their drive a little by driving to Boise on Friday night then driving the rest of the way on Saturday morning. We just had so much fun with them here and were surprised how our 1450 sq foot house handled the crowd.



We got to go to Sunnyside park the first day they were here to feed the ducks and see the animals next door. And how can you not play on the playground equipment too. The older girls really liked the merry go round? Is that really what they are called, please anyone help me..!! Anyway we got them nice and dizzy on that. Kallen on the other hand really likes slides and right off the bat decided to go down the really big slide. I was impressed. He went down without any real hesitation. I just laughed though, because by time he was half way down the slide he was sliding head first!! It was way cute. What a sport. I'll just let the next video of him on the horse say the rest. What a funny little guy with so much personality. It was still a pretty cold that day so we didn't stay too long and we all had cold little fingers and noses by the time we were at home.

Another highlight was going to the single's ward sacrament meeting with 5 kids. It was so funny to see people expressions. It was holiday weekend so the crowd was small to begin with, but we took up a whole row just by ourselves. I was impressed with how quiet the kids were and the various interactions the kids had with people. Cage (21 months) was quite enthralled with the gal behind us as she was doodling during the meeting. He just sat and stared. She stopped for a minute just to see what he did and he still didn't even blink!
We were able to watch some movies together and let the kids explore the backyard. I got some good cuddling with Ellisi while we watched the show. She is so lovey, it's great she'll just climb right in with Chad and I on the couch. Chad and I got in some good visiting with my brother and his wife Brittney when the kids were in bed. All in all, I felt like we had an empty house when they left. I just don't think I could get enough of them and just can't wait to be closer to our families. What a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving with family when you don't really get to be with them for the actual Thanksgiving dinner.

Wonderful weekend-November 12-15

What a crazy weekend. We had so much fun though. On Thursday evening (12th) after I finished up with my work class. I scurried home to make sure the house was all set up for Chad's family that should be there about any minute. I had been working on it all morning, but I didn't have a chance to do a few things. And I still needed to made something for dinner. I was lucky enough that I ended up having about an hour until they arrived and Chad got home not too long before that.

Shandarae and I popping popcorn while Janet is working on the cramel popcorn topping!!

So I had 2 Stampin'Up card parties planned months before I knew we were having company and also our married ward was having the super saturday craft day. All the things to fit in a busy weekend. Chad has been bombarded with test it seems these last few weeks and so he has been studying very hard for these, so I was able to hang out with his family all weekend and then we'd do things with Chad when he was done. Thank heaven that Chad's dad, Boyd, can entertain himself cause I had all these girly things I had to do, so he went all over exploring the area. I greatful that Shandarae and Janet were so willing to just come with me to attend all the things that I felt I should be going to, also.

So Shandarae and Janet came with me to my card party on Saturday and then stopped by the super Saturday thing to make an appearance and grab my project. It was fun to see Brenda and Anna, that I work with, there and had to stop and visit for a little while. I'm glad you guys came and I hope you enjoyed the projects.

And the highlight of my weekend was how special they all made my birthday. Chad picked up an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen on Friday the 14th, my actual birthday, and then we were treated to dinner at La Casa Lopez!!! My favorite place, but we haven't been there for a while. It tasted so yummy!! Thanks Mom and Dad Christensen!!! I even got a cute singing to from my family back home. My youngest brother Ryan even called to wish me a good birthday even if it was 11pm our time and midnight back home. Oh the life of a college kid.

Halloween Eve and Night

So I really used to be into carving pumpkins. I used to do it every year and spent a pretty ridiculous time on it too. I used to make my own designs and everything. So this year is the first time that Chad and I have ever carved pumpkins together. Sad huh! But seems like it is just always so busy. But this year I decided we were going to fit it in. The night before Halloween we sat in our kitchen working away. So I hope you enjoy the slideshow of us carving our pumpkins and baking pumpkin seed! HMMM!

For Halloween, Chad and I were really boring this year. We didn't even dress up. But we asked if our neighbors Garrett, Renay, and Gabe would like to come to the trunk of treat for the Pullman University 2nd Ward with us. We had fun watching Gabe go from door to door and watching all the kids run around the gym while we enjoyed donuts and apple cider. Renay and I grabbed Laillie Yancey from Bekie and played with her too. What a cute little chick!!

Chad's birthday-October 25th

Yeah again I'm late. I can't seem to be timely about any post.
But thought I'd share some of the funny things that just happen to land on Chad birthday.

So Chad told me that there was to be no party or people over for his birthday, cause he was just ready for a relaxing weekend. My family has always had a little party with the family with ice cream and cake and open presents whenever it's someones birthday. I felt so sad, cause we had already bought all of his presents together, when we were at home in July. So no new presents to give him. And then Chad had wanted a cake the week before his birthday so he made one. So Guess what... He didn't want a cake either. What is a girl to do to make it special. I felt kind of lost.

We bummed around town together in the morning and ended up going to Dissmores and Chad had this great idea of something he wanted...Sugar cookies. So that was his birthday dessert. How depressing and what a horrible wife I am. But what we ended up doing was going to the temple that day in Spokane. Which is usually a treat in itself. We went to the distribution to pick up some more garments and low and behold we ran into Josh Heim there. He's one of the guys in the single's ward where Chad is currently serving in the Bishopric. Funny thing was that he was so relieved to see Chad, cause once he reached the Spokane area he realized that he had left his temple recommend at home. So after the distribution center, we went to the temple session where Chad was able to help Josh get into the session. And for the first time in my few years of temple attendance. The men outnumbered the women. I've never seen that happen. We had a very enjoyable time and then ended up going to dinner while we were in Spokane too. Chad even had a hard time picking a place to eat. But we ended up eating and TGIF's. It was pretty good. Then we just went home for an enjoyable restful day. Can't really say that it was much of a celebration, but I sure had fun cause Chad hardly even studied that day!! So really I got my birthday present early!!

Finally doing our tag of 8's.

The 8's in my life- Chad

8 Favorite TV SHOWS:
One Tree Hill
Grey's Anatomy
The Cosby Show
Property Ladder
So you think you can Dance
Planet Earth
Extreme Home Make Over
Wife Swap


8 Favorite Restaurants:
Olive Garden
Texas Roadhouse
Bajios
La Casa Lopez
Pizza Hut
Quizno's
Rupe's
Applebees

8 Things that happened yesterday:
Woke Up
Showered
Went to school/class
Studied
Studied some more
Studied even more
Ate dinner
Watched a conference talk for FHE

8 Things I'm looking forward to:
Graduation
No classes
Christmas
Seeing family
Getting a job
Getting a pick-up
No student debts
Starting a family

8 Things on my wish list:
A pick-up
a shop
farm land
Neighbors that are > than 8 feet away
A job in South Eastern Idaho
Kids
an I-pod
Trip back to Guatemala with the Barnes'


The 8's in my life-Jessica

8 Favorite TV SHOWS:
One Tree Hill
Grey's Anatomy
Private Practice
CSI
CSI NY
CSI Miami
What I like about You

8 Favorite Restaurants:
Johnny Carinos
Olive Garden
Bajios
Outback Steakhouse
The Canton-Chinese in Idaho Falls
La Casa Lopez
Sangria
Wendy's

8 Things that happened yesterday:
Went to work
Worked on Beacon Award gap analysis
Chart review YEAH! oh man
Ate lunch with Anna
Made dinner
Ate dinner with Chad
Had FHE
Couple scripture study

8 Things I'm looking forward to:
Visit from my in laws and niece this weekend
Visit from my brother and his family next weekend
Thanksgiving with Chad (I don't to work! and that's a good thing, cause the Griffiths and Barnes' aren't here to entertain my husband)
Going home for the Christmas break
Stampin' Up Convention next year
Being a mom
Being out of debt
Not having to work full-time

8 Things on my wish list:
A trip to Guatemala with the Barnes'
Chad getting a job/getting done with school
a Honda Pilot
a big craft room that I can hold workshops in my house
My own Vinyl letter cutter
More sixxiz alphabets for CHIPBOARD!!
Settling down in South Eastern Idaho
Another vacation with my hubby!!

8 Peeps I'm tagging:
Stacie Christensen
Stacy MacConaghy
Amanda Joos
and anyone else who'd like too. You know it's never too late. I think we were tagged weeks ago!!

Hard decisions

So I've been meaning to write something on my blog for a few weeks about an interesting experience that I had at work. I really love my job. Even though Chad could be surprised to hear that. Cause I tend to complain about all the bad at the time when I get home after my 12 hour shifts.

But to understand the situation, I have to go back to when I was in nursing school. Most of you know that I went to Rick College for nursing school, which was one of the greatest blessings in my life. Not only did I get accepted to such a great nursing program, but I was able to be taught about the spiritual side of healing as well. In class we were always bombarded with the idea of nurses becoming an "advocate" for patients. This is kind of an interesting idea, cause I had never really heard this term, except in reference to our Savior being an advocate for us with the Father. Which in turn makes nurses pretty amazing by comparison.

So in my career there have been a few instances when I have felt a challenge sometimes to be able to become an advocate for a patient, whether is was just to motivate myself to do everything I knew the patient needed from me, when I was busy to making sure the patient and family have all the questions answered about up coming procedures or treatments.

So not too long ago I was able to care for a patient that was in the hospital with liver cirrhosis. This man was very sick and had severe ascites (fluid that builds up in abdominal cavity). I have taken care of a few patients in my career that have had similar severity of ascites and am very sad to say that they don't end up living very long or having much quality of life. This guy had recently had a paracentesis (using a needle to drain the fluid from the abdominal cavity) where they took of about 3 liters of fluid a few months prior to this admission to the hospital. Doctors do this to make the patient more comfortable. This helps the patients because it allows them to breath easier. Eventually the fluid comes back though. This is exactly what had happened to this man. He had eventually got sicker and sicker until he didn't want to eat any more at home and difficulty breathing and ended up with pneumonia.

It was a very long stay for this patient the their family. The patient's nutrition had been poor for so long that he would get bed sores on any area he layed on for more than 1 hour. It was a struggle for our nursing staff to even change the patient's position enough to try to avoid getting more bedsores, let alone to get them to heal. The patient finally got a short term feeding tube that went down his nose into his stomache. This helped alot with his strength, but the patient just wasn't getting better over all.

The most difficult part was that the wife and daughter really wanted to take the patient home after this stay. I really felt like this was not a realistic expectation. But after many conversations with the family I realized that the Doctor had not given them any reason to think that the patient wouldn't get better.
I know that several nurses had talked to them about a Do Not Resuscitate order. This is where when a person's heart and respirations stop, we let them pass on without using CPR and other medical interventions to bring them back. These allow someone to die with dignity and not the disaster that seems to happen when you bring someone back that has no quality of life to begin with. It was very appropriate for this man, which all the nursing staff could see would never have quality life again.

After a couple weeks the doctor finally told the wife that they needed to look into nursing home placement. This was a very internal struggle for her because her husband had said that he never wanted to go to a nursing home. Because he had said this, the daughter was totally against it and was determined to come help care for him at home. (Also the daughter didn't want us or the wife to discuss any of the test results or treatments in the room around the patient, because she thought he would give up if he knew the prognosis. This was totally not appropriate in my opinion) But I feel like the wife was more realistic about the matter. I felt even going to a nursing home was suicide too. Even us at the hospital with all the staff, we couldn't keep his skin from breaking down. I know that nursing homes don't have as great of staffing ratios as we do. The other things is that this man was 6 foot 3 inches tall, and even though he was emaciated, he still weighed a lot. I just couldn't see this daughter and wife even moving him in a hospital bed that helps some.

So with all this happening I felt like the doctor was not being straight forward with the family. What kind of outlook had he let them have? When I called to get a better idea what he thought the outlook would be, I realized that he even had a very unrealistic idea and didn't even mention the fact that he'd probably die from the liver failure.

So then I had to make a decision do I just stand by what the doctor says, or do I really tell this family what is most likely to happen....
Kind of an ethical decision. I didn't want to undermine the doctors education and say that I knew better, but I didn't think he was being realistic or up front with this family. It was so hard.

I ended up talking with the wife about exactly what the doctor had said could happen, and then ended telling her that my experiences with liver failure never turned out as good as the doctor was stating. I encouraged her to help us take care of the patient to get an idea of what would be demanded of them once the patient was at home. She was very overwhelmed with the repositioning and the flushing of the feeding tube and using the pump for the feeding tube. Really it would be overwhelming for most people. I felt that the wife was being realistic and decided that the nursing home would be the best bet. But then she had to deal with the daughter who felt that she wasn't making the right choice. What a struggle for this family. Something that really wretched at my heart strings. That night I went home and cried as I shared some of the emotion I was feeling dealing with all of these issues.

The craziest part of all of this is that I was there the day they transferred this man to the nursing home and I really felt like this was the best decision. But then I heard that the next day this man died. Things like this happen and make me wonder if I had done the right thing. What a hard thing. I thank heaven that I don't have to deal with this every day of my life.. But even though I do.. I get the opportunity to help patients and their family through some very big life changing events so better than others. It also makes me thankful for religious beliefs that help to have peace with the big decisions of life and death.

A big change part 2-September 19th

So it had been a few weeks since we were getting settled into the single's ward, when we were asked to help with Single's Fest 2008. Our ward's bishopric was in charge of a dart toss at the activity. It was very fun to go and see the single's from around the area. (Even though it wasn't as well attended from other areas as they had hoped.) They had a DJ there with music and hamburgers for dinner with the fixings and chips. They had popcorn, slushy drinks, elephant ears, a cake walk, basketball shootout, roping and a bean bag toss. It was really all quite fabulous. They even had a dance and talent show to end the night. I really enjoyed the time and the new people I was able to meet there.

But you know it just couldn't be just that... Presiden VanTassel pulled us both in for an interview. And so I got a new calling this time. So I was called to be the
2nd Counselor in the Stake Relief Society Presidency. I was sustained that Sunday and went to my first Stake meeting the following Wednesday. Lucky me... I was asked to bear my testimony in the meeting too. So of coarse the tears came. Chad met us afterward and I was set apart. What a neat opportunity and blessing. I was so glad to have Chad there to support me and be part of the priesthood in the circle!!

It has been so fun to serve with Gail Schoenburg, Christine Comstock and Lynnette Carpenter. We have been busy the last few months with the Stake Conference annual Soup and Bread. Do you realize they make (7) 20 quart cookers full of soup!! It was amazing to be a part of it and remember how to cook things for that many people. Sister Schoenburg is just great.
We also have met together and come up with a theme for the Spring Women's Conference. It's been very fun and neat getting to know new people to ask to speak. Cause I don't feel like I know many people up here that are great speakers yet. Too bad Jean Benson, Carolyn Andrus, etc, aren't closer. I'm sure I'd get them wrapped up in all sorts of things. But I've been impressed with last few years conferences and realize there are amazing women everywhere. I just can't wait to get to know more of them. The bad thing about this conference is that I have to conduct and also get to speak. So fun!! Or scarey or something!! Wish me luck!!