Merry Christmas!

I am so late in posting pictures, but better late than never.

Jessie Lee Chlarson was born on December 6, 2009. Weighing 8lbs 5oz, 20 3/4 in. long. She has been such a joy to our family and endures lots and lots of smothering hugs and kisses everyday from her brothers and sister. She has been such a trooper with all of the appts. and programs we have had to go to since she has been born. We are so happy that she is here and healthy.

No being jealous of how hot I look! LOL

We had to travel to Mesa when she was only 5 days old. We had had a Dr. appt. scheduled for Connor on 12/14 and it couldn't be missed. It has taken so long for us to be seen by a developmental pediatrician so we had to make the trip. For the last 2 years, we have been to all kinds of doctors, trying to figure out a diagnosis for Connor and to see if this would be something he would grow out of. We have only known that he has mild CVI (Cortical Visual Impairment) and that he is Developmentally Delayed. Well we went to the Developmental Pediatrician and he did tests and evaluated Connor and has diagnosed him with Autism. It was hard for me to hear at first, but it doesn't change who Connor is and now we have more to go on and he can get more help and hopefully better/more therapy. He keeps improving and we are so grateful for that. We are also grateful that his Autism is not severe. He is such a happy boy, and so loving whereas most kids with autism aren't. Our next step is to get an EEG done. When we saw our primary doctor last, the Dr. saw Connor go into a blank stare, which happens often, and he believes it was a seizure. So we are hopefully going to find out about that soon.

We are all doing well and are very excited for Christmas! Jace is especially excited and he even got to see Santa and his elf's. Connor and Kendall have fun taking off ornaments and putting them back on so they are all in one spot. So our tree is not the cutest, but it is decorated with love :) Today we got to build a Snowman. It was lots of fun, then we came inside and had some yummy hot chocolate.

We feel very lucky and blessed to have healthy kids, a warm home to live in, and Larry's awesome job to provide for our family. We hope you all have a wonderful Merry Christmas!

No baby yet

So, the baby ticker says that my baby is 7 days old, but she is actually 7 days late! I don't know how to take the thing off my blog. I don't even remember how I got it on there to be honest. Any way, I am patiently waiting for our little girl to arrive. I know most people might think I am crazy but I want to go into labor on my own and not be induced. Right now I am dialated to a 4 and I am 75% effaced. I have been having contractions off and on for a week, but nothing too painful or consistent. We will text family and friends when she does arrive, then when I have a chance after coming home I will post pictures on here and on face book. Wish me luck! I am scared, excited and nervous.

I updated the post below with pictures.

Busy Life

For the last month and a half, things have been so busy and crazy at our house. Here is what my calendar looked like :)

9/26 - Went to Mesa for a baptism, and bought a Van
9/28 - Took Connor to Opthamologist, still has mild CVI
- car broke down in Payson, good thing we had the van
10/1 - Jace - Soccer game
10/2 - My Dad's B-day
10/5 - Dentist appt. for Jace
- Cooper's B-day (Lamar and Jaime's little boy)
10/6 - Jace - Soccer game
- Jaimie's B-day (Amy and Mike's oldest)
10/7 - Me - Foot Dr. in RV
10/8 - Jace - Soccer game
- Christie's B-day (Amy and Mike's youngest)
10/13 - OB appt. for me in RV
- Jace - Soccer game
10/15 - Tiff had baby Owen!
- Took Connor to ENT- has enlarged tonsils
10/16 - Larry and Lamar turned 30!

We met Lamar's family in Globe for lunch to celebrat the them turning 30

10/19 - I turned 26 went to foot Dr. and
had plantar warts cut out of my feet.
10/21 - Zach's B-day (Jaime and Lamar's oldest)
10/22 - Parent Teacher Conference- Jace is doing great!
- Reilly's Birthday
10/23 - Carson (Logan's boy) and Courtney's (Deb's girl) B-day
10/24 - Connor (turned 4) and Cheri's (Ruth's youngest ) B-day

10/27 - Was offered a job with NEC and I accepted!
10/28 - OB and Foot Dr. Appts in Showlow
10/31 - Halloween was lots of FUN!
- Natalie's B-day

Jace was Bumble Bee from Transformers, Connor was Sherriff Woody and Kendall was a Lady Bug Larry and I were just supposed to be a King and Queen, but he looked like the Burger king guy, so we were Burger King and Dairy Queen.

11/04 - Connor had his tonsils and adenoids removed
- OB appt. for me

So lots of trips to either Round Valley or Show low for Dr. appts and lots of birthdays. October always seems crazy with all the birthdays, but adding all the appts and trying to get myself ready for a new job and for the baby to come, it has been even more hectic.

Larry has a deer hunt up by Thatcher next weekend and I start my new job on Tuesday11/10. I will try and get as much training done as I can before the baby comes. Let's hope I don't have her early. I've never gone into labor early before, but watch just because I have so much that needs to be done she we come early. We'll just have to wait and see. I have 3 weeks left, wish me luck!
Larry and his scruffy beard for his dear hunt, I can't wait till it comes off!

Apache County Fair

I just Love these Kids!

This last weekend was the county fair. I have always loved the fair and the carnival, but this year it was even more fun to me. We entered in our animals and some zucchini from our garden. Larry said that you could enter almost anything in and suggested that I make some bread and enter in some of the crafts that I had made to decorate our house, so I did. We had so much fun and we all won some ribbons! I guess my brain had been in left field or I had completely forgotten that you can enter things in for free and you win prize money for the ribbons you get. I had never entered anything in before so maybe that's why I never really thought much about it. Anyway, we had lots of fun seeing what we won.

Here are some of our pictures.

Jace won most outstanding exhibit for his animals!
He got blue ribbons for his turkey and two ducks, red ribbons for his chicken, rabbit, zucchini, and the mutt show, and he got a white ribbon for one of his other rabbits.

Here is Jace with his zucchini. He has been a good helper with the garden this year.

Here is our dog Copper and the bull dog he was up against.

Connor won a blue ribbon for the chicken he entered. He was so excited to take his picture.

Kendall won a red and blue ribbon for her rabbits. We had to bribe her with candy to get her picture taken.

Larry got a blue and red ribbon for his rabbits and chicken and a red one for his zucchini. Larry is the reason we even entered anything in and won ribbons. He is the best ever, even if he looks like Grizzly Adams.
I won a blue and red ribbon for my bread, a white ribbon for my zucchini, and some blue, red, and a white for the crafts that I entered.

Our family won a total of $133 woo hoo! It was nice cause that covered all the money we spent on all the yummy fair food and the fun carnival rides!

There was no way we were going to be able to get pics taken with our wild kids and all of our entries at the fair, so this is how we decided to document our achievements. I am so proud of my family. They are so good at helping with all the chores, and we had such a blast at the fair. It was neat to see all our hard work pay off.

Lots of fun!

These last few weeks have been so fun and so crazy! We had fun at the 24th celebrations visiting with family and friends, although I remember the 24th being so much funner when I was a teenager and didn't have to worry about too much. Now being a mom, it is fun, you don't get to visit too much and there is so much you are responsible for. It is fun to see the kids enjoy everything. It is also a special time for us because Jace was born on the 25th of July so we always get to celebrate him in our family around the same time. He had begged for a pool party, so that is what we did. It was lots of fun! Aunt Nicole took lots of fun pics of the kids jumping off the diving boards. I will have to post those when I get them. Here are a few I got with my camera.Jace making a funny face, he always wants to do goofy pictures!

The crew of cousins and great friends!There is nothing like some yummy hot dogs with chips and dip to go with a pool party! Hope everyone had fun with us!

Here is one of my favorite pics of Larry and Jace! They both love to be silly :0)

We love you Jace! Thanks for being such a good helper, good example, and a hard worker. You are so smart, and dad and I are so proud of you! Hope you had a fun 6th birthday.


Yesterday was Kendall's birthday, she is already 2! It is so hard to believe. She is such a little pistol! She can be so sweet, but most of the time she acts like she is the boss and that she doesn't have to do anything you say. It is hard not to laugh at her. We love you sis! You bring such joy to our family!

They had a hard time keeping their hands off the cake :)

I tried to get her to smile for the camera, but this is what I got. I love it! She is always making faces like this! LOL

It was just our family for her b-day, so we went to breakfast together and then later in the afternoon daddy took us out shooting. We had lots of fun!

She doesn't look so happy, but she did have lots of fun. We just have a hard time getting her to smile for the camera.

Daddy and Connor

Jace got his very own BB gun from uncle Logan for his birthday, so he was having lots of fun being able to shoot it himself.

I was a little scared to take all the kids out shooting, but it turned out to be lots of fun. I am glad Larry is the kind of dad to take time like this for his family. Some of my favorite memories are when my dad took us out shooting.

Thanks to everyone who came and stayed with us! We have had so much fun celebrating and spending time with family!

Photo Sesson Giveaway

My friend Becca is doing a giveaway! Go to her blog at www.agirlnhercamera.blogspot.com and check it out. She does a really nice job!

IT"S A GIRL!

Here she is, Jessi Lee Chlarson!

Her cute little profile, I just love it and can't wait to see her in person.

We were originally not going to find out what we were having, but when my sister Amy came back from her appt. with a DVD of her ultrasound and they told her she was having another girl, Jace really wanted to go with us to the Dr. and see if we were having a boy or a girl. It really didn't matter to me or Larry so we went ahead and found out. Jace loved watching it, is very excited about having another sister, and he even got a toy from the ultrasound tech. We are really happy and excited. Now we can call my tummy Jessi instead of just baby.

Definately a Girl

Here is a shot of her cute legs. When we were doing the ultrasound she was moving and it looked like she was running, it was so cute!

Fun Farm Life!

Since moving to St. Johns things have been so fun and so crazy. We are renting from my brother-in-law, Matt, and we love it out here. They have 10 acres of land and we are on the outskirts of town. It is nice to just let my kids run around and play and not have to worry about them running into the street. This is the house, it needs painting and some yard work done in the front, in time it will come!

It is so nice to be closer to Larry's job. I see him so much more now, and I love it. It is also way cheaper to live here too! The crazy thing is that because we are saving more money and we live on lots of land, Larry has started a farm for us. Seriously no lie. We have over 25 rabbits,

Here are just a few of them.

4 ducks, 10 chickens, 1 turkey, and 2 roosters.

We would have had 13 chickens and 3 turkeys, but we get bull snakes on our farm too and it ate 2 turkeys and killed 3 chicks. Then it got stuck in the cage with the other chicks and turkey. All of this happened when Larry was gone. He wanted me to get the snake out! HA! He had to call his friend to come and do it. I could do without the snakes, Larry says they are good for killing the mice.

I would much rather have a cat to do that then a snake, and I hate cats! We will probably get one though for the mice. Not too excited about it, but I know it will help and the kids will love it.

Here is our dog Copper, the kids love him!

We will be getting a horse soon from Uncle Neuel, but right now we are horse sitting for some friends of ours. Here is a picture of one of them.

Then Larry really wants to get a milk cow or some goats in the future. Who knows, we will just have to wait and see. It is nice and all of this will help us become self sufficient and teach our children responsibility and good work ethics, but almost every time he goes to the feed store he comes back with something different. He has the cutest childlike grin when he comes in and that's how I know he bought something. It drives me crazy sometimes, but all of it will be worth it in the end.

We have even started planting a garden. The picture was taken about a week ago, but we have finished making the rows and planted some corn, watermelon, and cantaloupe. We also want to do cucumbers, tomatoes, squash and maybe some carrots. I am excited about it and so proud of all of Larry's hard work. Thanks babe, I love you!

Tough Girl

My poor little Kendall is always getting beat up by Connor. He is always tackling her, pushing her down, or sitting on her so she can't move. It was really bad there for a while, and I could never even leave the two of them in the same room. He has gotten so much better lately thank goodness, but now he is throwing things all the time. He always gets in trouble for it and we are always telling him not to throw, but it just doesn't seem to get through to him. Seriously we have done everything but beat the crap out of him. Well last night he threw this stupid toy and Kendall just happened to be in the line of fire.

It is pretty heavy and I have almost thrown it away several times cause I was afraid something like this would happen, but haven't cause I have had it for all my babies to play with when they get to that stage at about 7-9 months when they love the toys that move and make noise. Well it is in the trash now!

I saw him starting to throw it and yelled at him so he would stop, but I was too late. I got up to go spank him, but when I got in there I saw Kendall doubled over and blood squirting from her head. I yelled at my friend, Carin, to go get Bridger who happens to be an ER nurse. I picked her up and put pressure on her head to try and stop the bleeding. He and Larry came running in from outside and Bridger looked at it and continued to put pressure on her head and found out that it was only a small, but deep cut. He told us that because it was a head wound is why it was bleeding so bad, but that we didn't need to take her into the ER. Thankfully their family was here when it happened, cause I know I would have probably called 911 and been freaking out. She quit crying after about two minutes and was fine. We tried to put ice on her head, but she just wanted to eat it. She is perfectly happy now. It is as if it never even happened.

A huge thanks to the Stradling family for being there and helping out. Carin was so sweet to go clean up the puddle of blood off the bedroom floor. Thank you both so much for your help and friendship! We love you guys!

Exciting news!

Our family is very excited about another baby! We will be having baby #4 around November 28th. We are all very happy! Jace loves telling people that his mom is going to have a baby come out of her tummy in November. He also blesses that the baby will come out cute every time prays. Lol It is so fun. We will be happy for a boy or a girl, and because we already have clothes for both, this one will be a suprize! I know that is annoying to some people, but we did it that way with Jace and we loved it.

Goodbye Piper

Today has been a sad day for our family. Our dog Piper died last night:( I am not usually one to care too much for pets, because our family never really had one for very long and we never got that attached. Larry's family had all kinds of pets when he was growing up and we wanted a dog that could grow up with our kids. We thought that Piper was going to be the one. We only had her for a couple of months, but she was so good with the kids and she didn't bark all the time. She was given to us by our sister-in-law, who breeds Malamutes. She would have normally cost about $1000, but she was a Christmas present for Larry, and we all loved her very much. I don't remember ever crying about losing a dog. I was ok and didn't cry until I told Jace that Piper died, then he started crying. He said,"Mom, I'm really going to miss Piper she was good to us. She would always sit when we gave her a bone cookie." It was so cute. He tried to tell Connor and Kendall that Piper died and that she went to heaven, but got frustrated cause they didn't understand. They would just point outside and say "Piper!" All the kids loved her, but Connor probably liked playing with her the most. I didn't get any pictures of Jace or Kendall with her which makes me sad, but thankfully I got some with Connor. He was always smothering her:)We are not sure what happened to make her sick. We know it wasn't parvo cause she had all her shots, but she might have gotten into some kind of poison. Someone my dad works with said that there was someone in town poisoning dogs, but who knows. We just miss her, and hopefully we will find another dog someday that we love just as much.

Pay it Forward!

Here's the idea. Be one of the first 3 people to leave a comment on my blog and you will be the lucky recipeint of a hand made gift from me some time this year. When it comes will be a total complete surprise! Now here is the catch, you have to post the same thing on your blog and do the same for 3 lucky people. GOOD LUCK! This is going to be fun!

Love my kids!

I just have to write down a few fun things my kids have been doing lately before I forget.

First I will start with Jace:

Right before New Years, we were in St. Johns at my mom's and we were in the kitchen and out of the blue Jace says to my mom, "Grandma Ruthie how come Heavenly Father thought you were so special to make you my mom's mom?" It was so sweet. Several months ago he asked me why Grandma Ruthie was my mom and I told him that Heavenly Father thought she was special so he sent me to her. I love when they remember things like that. It made my mom feel good too! . . . Then just recently we were sitting at the table finishing up dinner and Larry told Jace that when his watch says Eight o'clock that it is time for bead, and Jace says, " Eight o'clock or eight o'watch?" I thought it was so flippin funny. Jace is such a good kid and is such a help with Connor and Kendall.

Now for Connor:
He is making more progress on all levels so we are very happy about that. He is loving school and riding on the bus. Although we do not always understand what he is saying, he will try to say things if you ask him to. I love it when we drop Jace off at school and I tell him bye Jace I love you, Connor will try to say it and it sounds like this, Ba Jiss ala. I love that he is trying so hard to say words. Just tonight we were having family prayer and Connor wouldn't come sit down so we said it without him and he was so sad afterward so we said another one and asked if he wanted to help(he normally never does) and this time he tried to repeat after me. He only gets the first sound of the word like Fa for father but he bowed his head and tried to repeat each word with me and it almost made me cry. My heart was so happy to see him make such huge steps with us. He just beamed after it was over and we praised him for doing such a great job.

And Kendall:

She is our little Fire Cracker. This girl has so much attitude it is not even funny. She has to have it though to put up with Connor's constant tackling. She can be so sweet one minute and so feisty the next. She is always telling us to go away and she gives the perfect stink eye! I know she gets that from me and my sisters. She already loves shoes and clothes and is always into them. It is cute, but it drives me crazy and I now I have a glimpse of what she will be like when she gets older and it is scary! Lately she is into giving hugs to everyone, even Connor and I love it. I need to get a picture of it. She is also such a helper when it comes to throwing things away. she will come to me with stuff and say,"garbage, garbage?" so I can open the door for her or she will get Connor to do it for her. She is so smart and I think her ability to communicate with us so well has helped Connor.

I love my kids and I am so proud of them!