July 24

In my last post I said we'd be trying to head out to Salt Lake, and we did. But we did not go to Liberty Park because there were a whole lot of people there and not much going on. So, since we were in Salt Lake we went over to the Gateway Mall. We had to go to the Apple store for Jason to look at the iPad because he wants one. Then we took the kids to the Discovery Children's Museum. They had a blast.

Jayden playing with the water toys.

Stacey climbed the rock wall. Neither of the boys wanted anything to do with that.

Kail found the vacuum in the little house and started to vacuum. He even made his own noises. It was really cute. He makes his own noises at home with the real vacuums too.

They had so much fun. We were there so long that Jason and I got bored. We had to finally drag the kids out because we didn't want to be in there anymore. It was crazy, but they had fun and that's all that mattered.

On a different note, my grandpa is in the hospital. He went in for a doctor appointment on Thursday where they found fluid in his lungs and his ECG was unusual. So they sent him over to a different part of the hospital his doctor is in after they drained the fluid out of one of his lungs. There was a complication when they did the draining that caused a small tear in his lung which caused that lung to collapse. During the move from his doctor's office to the other part of the hospital his doctor sent him to, grandpa was in so much pain from the collapses lung and his back that he fainted. Grandpa also has a problem with his back that makes it so he cannot sit up straight.

I did not go see him until last night. He was awake from Thursday to Saturday, but he was in a lot of pain. Saturday night he was having problems and they had to put him on a respirator. He is mildly sedated and restrained so that he does not attempt to pull the many tubes he's connected to out. It was a sad sight, especially when he used to be so vibrant and active. We are praying that he does better.

Plans

So, as it has been a fairly slow summer for news, I'll just give a little more. I am enrolled in the EMT intermediate course for the fall, so I actually have something to do next semester. I am still in search of people to write reference letters for me, but I hope that won't be too much of an effort. Jason is enjoying his new job. He gets up at 3 in the morning, does his work from one of our home computers, goes back to sleep when he done and then goes into the office at 8 or 9. He likes the fact that he can work from home for the early morning part. Getting up and being to work that early was killing him.
Stacey and Jayden are doing what they always do, playing with their friends. They are getting quite tan too. Jayden has a funny tan on his forehead and I don't have any idea why. It looks like he's got two circles on the left and right part of his forehead, but the middle was protected somehow. It's not that noticeable if you're not looking for it, but it's still interesting.
Kail is loving the fact that Stacey can take him to the park. Sometimes people will go outside with him and let him ride his bike on the driveway. He's really funny though because he will go to the park for about 5 minutes and then want to come home because he's hot. Just like his daddy.
Today is the 24th of July and all those who have lived in Utah or have family or friends know that it is Pioneer day. We were thinking of going up to Liberty Park in Salt Lake to see if they still do the carnival type thing they did when I was a kid. Hopefully we will find what he are looking for and have a really good time doing. If we do, I'll post pictures and update.
We are also looking for a place to live now. We've found a few possibles, but we'll have to see. That is another update that will be coming.

Just a quick note

For those who are not on facebook or don't go on there very often, I am updating you on my CPAT test results yesterday.
Plain and simple, I failed. The very first event one takes part in is a 3 minutes with a 20 second warm up stair climb with 75 pounds added on. I made in through the 20 second warm up and then made it to a minute and 35 seconds. I lost my concentration and faltered quickly at that point. What I'm most upset about is the fact that I could have done it had I been able to concentrate on anything other than my legs burning. Once I lost focus of everything else but my legs, I lost my balance and my spot in the fire academy. What I said to Jason after I spent my grieving and anger period telling Jason all about it was I should have told those administering the test to talk to me about anything except what I was doing at the moment. But that was long after the fact and I cannot take it back.
So, instead of moping about the fact that I failed I will begin to train at the school with the equipment so that I may attempt the fire academy about next fall. My plans for this fall are to become an EMT at the intermediate level. I am currently and EMT at the basic level and the intermediate will give me more practice for the paramedic program I still plan to attend in January. As I have yet to turn in my application for that, I don't know if I've been accepted. I will fill you in on that progress.
As for now, I will just finish my courses I have now and enjoy my summer with my kids and Jason.

A quick note

As everyone knows, I am in school for Emergency Services. I had to take physiology as a prerequisite of the paramedic program. I took it over the summer and the class was half the summer semester. So, that being said I had 17 weeks of physiology crammed into my head in only 7 weeks. I struggled a bit, but yesterday I got my final grade and it is a C+! It may not sound like much to some, but let's see them take this class! I am proud of myself and this accomplishment.
I can now cross that off my list of classes to take before I can apply for the paramedic program. Now I just need to find 2 more people to write reference letters for me.

Fun Times with Grandma

So, the kids did spend a lot of time with Mary. She took them to parks and Thanksgiving Point, which has a dinosaur museum. Saturday we all went up to Park City to play on the Alpine Slide and the other stuff they have there. We all had a blast. Except Jayden close to the end of our day. Jayden was riding with Jason down the Alpine slide. They went down a dip, the bump at the bottom caused Jayden's foot to fly out and rub against the track with caused enough friction to flip their sled and both of them ended up with road rash from the slide as they slid an extra 50 feet down the slide from where their sled flipped. I've added only a couple of pictures of Jayden's injuries, but I think we counted 15 or so on him from the slide. Jason was lucky and got away with only one injury on his left forearm just under his elbow.

Other than that one tragedy, we all had a great time. Kail even went down the slides with me. He loved going down when we were on the slide but said no every time we asked him if he wanted to go down the slide again. It was quite entertaining because he never put up a fuss when we went down even after saying no.

On the following Monday, Mary took the kids to Promontory Point to see whatever it is they have up there. Kail was sick that day. He woke up at 3am with a fever of 103.6. We were able to get it down and he broke the fever after a few hours, so he stayed home with me.

On Tuesday they went to the aquarium in Salt Lake and some more parks. They wanted to go swimming so bad, so Mary brought them back home and took them swimming. They just had a blast with her. They sure love their grandma.

Sealing

So I've been slacking a little in my duty to this blog. It's been over a week now since we got sealed and I'm just now getting to write about it. It was wonderful. The spirit was so strong and the kids looked wonderful. We really enjoyed the whole experience of getting our endowments as well as getting sealed. We had a bunch of family with us. Don, Dianna, and their kids made it just in time for Don and Dianna to attend our endowment session and we had a fairly good turn out for our sealing session thanks for my family and friends.

Once the sealing was done and everyone was changed, we went outside for pictures. My wonderful cousin-in-law, Larissa, took pictures for us. I haven't received those yet, but my sister Jaimie was taking pictures with my mother-in-law's camera, so I have some. After the sealing we had a pot luck at our stake center pavilion and it was a blast. All the kids got to play together and us adults got to visit. It was really fun and I loved being able to see everyone again since we all live so far apart.

We really enjoyed having Don, Dianna and their family here as well as Jason's mom. Thanks to everyone who came and all the cards, gifts and well wishes everyone!

We've made it

Today is the day Jason and I enter the temple for the first time. At 6:30 pm mountain time we will be endowed. I'm actually kind of nervous because I don't know what to expect, but that will all just have to be left that way and I will try to do what I've heard everyone say, enjoy the session and don't think I have to memorize or remember everything that is said to me tonight. It has been a long, but wonderful, eight years that we've spent growing in the church together. The final push for Jason to become an elder and take the steps he needed to become worthy to enter the temple is all thanks to his wonderful friend Travis. Travis is so wonderful, he gave Jason a new job for a company called Asea where Jason is the shipping manager. Jason now has fairly steady hours and he is salary based instead of commission based. This means that Jason will now be paid a steady pay check and we will be able to support ourselves outside of my parent's home. I'm now hoping that a blog update on us moving will be here soon.
On Friday, we will be sealed as a family at 11 am. We are having a pot luck with family and friends that day as an unofficial reception since we didn't have one when we got married civily. I'm happy that Jason's mom will be here and so will my Don, Dianna and family from Missouri. I love when family can make it for such special times like this.
As we all know, Father's Day is Sunday. Kail's birthday is also on Sunday. He'll be a big 3-year-old. He's getting so big and so smart. He can name most colors, shapes, letters and numbers. He also knows the sounds common animals make. He speaks extremely well with the little kid "slurs" and he forms complete sentences.
Stacey and Jayden are doing the same thing kids their ages do. They are out playing with their friends pretty much all day. We finally got Jayden to eat bread, so now he eats sandwiches with just meat. He won't eat the sandwiches with mayo and he won't touch peanut butter and jelly sandwiches either, but it's small steps. I'm just happy he's eating bread.
I'll be taking my physiology lab final tomorrow and the lecture final next Tuesday. I'm hoping that I get a passing grade as this has been a tough class. It sure is cool to see how things work and what makes them work. I attended the Candidate Physical Agiligy Test (CPAT) orientation last Saturday where they let us play with the stuff that we will be taking out test with. I cannot believe how out of shape I am. The very first event, there are 8 total, is a 3 minute walk on a stair machine wearing a 50 pound vest to simulate the gear and air tank firefighters wear with an addition 12.5 pounds on each should to simulate 2 hoses I would be bringing up the stairs in a 5 story building. The rest of the test is done with the 50 pound vest on. If I don't actually collapse there, I will when I get to event #7 where I have to drag a 165 dummy 70 feet. I just about passed out doing it Saturday. Hopefully I can find the motivation to get out and do some exercise before July 10th. I know, it's soon. I just have to do the CPAT in 12 minutes to be accepted into the fire academy completely.They are holding my spot pending my CPAT results. If I pass, I'm in, if I fail, I'm out. Let's hope I'm in.