Oh, Happy Day!!!
The kids and I just got back from the Doctor's office. Our baby is Rh NEGATIVE!!!!! It is back to a normal, hopefully boring, pregnancy. We are going back to the Baby Place next week - back to our wonderful midwives. No more specialist's office for us (knock on wood). Happy, happy news!!!

Computer Education

Two weeks ago, Randy switched our operating system from Windows Vista to Freespire which is a linux based system. Colin has spent every spare second learning his way around the new system.
The first week was spent learning the necessities: Music, pictures, and account management. It took him about a day to find L Songs - the program to download his CDs. Then he worked on his account to create 10 different desktops which each needed a different background. It took him a while to figure out how to upload pictures. Monday morning at about 6:30 he burst upstairs to announce that he had figured it out. He could now upload photos from the camera. He and Robyn spent all day Monday taking pictures of random things and uploading them to his account. Then they created different backgrounds in different styles for each desktop.
On Tuesday, the thing that I have been dreading happened - he discovered the games on the new operating system. Up to this point in his life he has spent his computer time doing "educational" things. The games on Windows Vista were great. My personal favorite was one called Purble Place where you could play logic games similar to Master Mind. I liked those games. However, Freespire has real video games. They are very similar to the Nintendo Games from my childhood - Tetris, Super Mario Bros.... His favorite is a game called Super Tux - it is very similar to Mario only instead of Mario, the guy is a penguin. He has been very preoccupied with Super Tux - always thinking about it no matter what he is doing whether at the computer or not. He has spent the last four days figuring it out. The good news is that I was able to impress all of my children with my video games skills thanks to the limited time I spent on Jensen's Nintendo working my way through level 1 of Mario Brothers. I actually taught Colin a few things after he showed me how to get started - like that if you kill the square guy (like it's a turtle in Mario) and you jump on him again just right, he will slide and kill all the guys in your way. And that to jump over really tall things you have to run fast and jump at the same time. I even passed three levels without dying before I had to leave to get the bread in the oven. Yeah Mom!
I started to get a little concerned about this video game obsession yesterday, but decided to not do anything yet to see what would happen. I know Colin well enough that I know he doesn't like to play by the rules - he likes to figure things out and modify them. Sure enough, this morning he was programing his own levels of Super Tux. It came with a feature that you can create your own game and he made two different levels today. What a relief! I was afraid for his brain for a bit there.
He showed me how to program a bit. It's a lot of fun to play your own game.

Other news

Seems like when you just start to get into a groove and feel like everything is going well and in control, change happens.
We were going along just fine, decided to shake things up a bit and add a new member to our family. Everything still okay so we decide Randy should go back to school for another degree.
As soon as he started his class, we find out that this pregnancy is high risk.
This Sunday brought another new change. Randy is now the 1st councilor in the Elder's Quorum. And for now, still 11 year old scout leader.
Then I come home from my Doctor's appointment today and I find out that a big company in Japan is having fax issues and Randy is renewing his passport to be ready to head to Japan! He has never had to travel with work before. We still don't know if he will be going or not. He said only 25% chance that he will go.

Goodness! Lots of adventures. My advice would be whatever you do, don't try to understand Isaiah - you may get more blessings than you are ready for! :)

It's a boy!

I just got back from my visit with the doctor at Maternal Fetal Medicine. We are definitely having a boy.
The ultrasound agreed with my due date of June 27th.
The MCA scan to check anemia indicates mild anemia possible. Not too great, but the scan doesn't indicate any further treatment - only more monitoring.
Also the umbilical cord only has one artery instead of two. Not a problem yet, but could be later as the baby may not get the nutrients it needs and may need to be induced early.
I did have an amnio while I was there to check blood type. If the baby is RH- then I can go back to the Baby Place and have a happy pregnancy. If the baby is Rh+, then I will remain in high risk. My gut feeling says the baby is RH+. I decided it would be best to find out for sure, I would hate to stress for the rest of the pregnancy and inflict unnecessary interventions on an Rh- baby. The amnio went fine. I am just supposed to take it a little easy for a few days to avoid contractions and such. The results will be back from the lab in two weeks. More waiting - UGGH!
I was nervous about going to the specialist. I do not like the front office girls in Doctors' offices. I only talked to one front desk girl and she is very new and not too impersonal. The ultrasound tech, the nurse, and the doctor were all very nice and the Dr. made me feel like I was part of the team not just a patient. I think everything will be okay. Whew.

The Happy News of the day is that Katie had a baby girl this morning. Her name is Ella. That is all I know for now. Yeah, Katie!

New Fiddles

Darn kids keep growing. :) Both Colin and Robyn have out grown their fiddles. Robyn got her new one this week and Colin's new one is at Duree's getting all fixed up with new strings and a new bridge and such. When you buy cheap fiddles off Ebay, you have to figure on needing some work. We got the last two the same way and they have been AWESOME little fiddles. Straight from Great Tunes they stink! But for another $60, Duree at Shiverick's violin fixes them up just great. With new strings and remodeled bridges, they hold their tune and everything.
When Robyn got her new one back from Duree, she played it for the first time and said, "Wow, It's really loud!" It is amazing how much more sound comes out of a little bigger violin.
Raylene asked them to play their violins in the Primary program this fall. We will start learning "Families can be Together Forever" next week. It would be fun for them (and much better for me) if they got to play in the program this year. I did it last time and it is scary! We will see how it goes.
They have a little group that they play with and they are supposed to be performing at a Nursing home next month. Colin struggles with playing with the group because he likes to be "first fiddle" and it bugs him to have to follow another lead fiddle. His teacher was trying to get him to do his songs like the group is supposed to do them and he didn't want to. She explained that his way the songs are too short and that people will want to hear longer songs. He said, "what if they are in a hurry and only want to listen for three minutes?" That boy has an answer for everything! We need find some classics on humility to study. She just told him that if he wants to play with the group, then he has to play like the group plays. I told her that was just what I said to him. Our goal is love of fiddling and he has his agency to choose how and what he plays. If he chooses to be lazy, he chooses to not play with the group. I think that he will choose to play with the group in the long run because it is so fun to jam and perform. He may have to sit out a few performances before he gets his act together though. They are planning on playing in a few parades on a float and doing some shows during the various community days in the parks this summer. It should be lots of fun. I hope I can keep up with a new baby and all.
Keri, if you are interested in interning this summer as a homeschooling mother, I just may have an opening. The pay stinks, but the experience will be priceless. Hint, Hint.

Lost addresses - please email

Randy and Colin have been busy with the computer. Randy switched our operating system from WIndow Vista to a Linux based one. I don't mind the switch except that I lost all my email addresses in my address book so I need everyone to email me again so I can rebuild the book.
Colin has spent some time on the computer teaching himself all about the features of the new system. He figured out how to burn his CDs to the hard drive first thing, then he showed Randy and I. He still hasn't figured out how to upload pictures though. Hopefully he will soon so I can post some new ones here on the blog.

Summer fun in February

On February 6 we had our Cub Scout Blue and Gold banquet. We had a Hawaiian luau and we as leaders had a lot of fun with it.
Kalyn and Jamie were in charge of decorations and they did well. What creative women. They turned the volleyball standards into palm trees with a little brown paper for a trunk and some green paper leaves.
I was in charge of entertainment. That was very easy as I called Raylene who happens to take her girls to Hula lessons every Saturday and she took over the program. It was awesome! She recruited a few more girls from the Hula School and they hula danced for us during dinner. Robyn said, "Mom, I can't even eat because I can't stop watching the beautiful dancing."
Dinner was easy - each of us leaders cooked a pork roast in the crock pot and brought a big pot of rice. We let the families of the cubs bring the salads and for dessert we had the cakes from the annual father-son cake decorating contest.
The dress was Hawaiian. Some dressed up more than others, but most had on at least a lei. Mom took care of me by mailing me her muumuu. Can't tell you how beautiful I looked with my round belly in a muumuu. :) Goodness! My girls wore bright pink and purple dresses and Colin wore a hot pink shirt with shorts. We went to Zurchers earlier that day and bought flower leis to wear. Randy didn't have time to dress Hawaiian but he did put on the very colorful lei that Robyn picked for him.
I think everyone should have a luau in February. Fun stuff.

Ground Hogs and Raccoons

Last week Colin and Robyn went over to the Garcia's to play with their friend Maddie. Raylene (Maddie's mother) is the Primary Chorister and she was working on songs for Sunday. Colin was helping her while Maddie and Robyn played quietly upstairs. Raylene wanted to sing a Spring song. Colin told her she would have to wait until the next day to know if it would be okay to sing a Spring song because the next day was Ground Hog day. He searched the internet and found a website to tell them about Ground Hog day and then took her to reederhome.net where Randy has a program he wrote using weather.com to tell the weather.
While they were busy learning about Ground Hog day and such, the little girls were VERY busy. The girls got into Raylene's make up and used her water proof mascara to make themselves very beautiful and liberally applied her body spray. Oh my! When it was time for Raylene to go get her big girls for school, she noticed the little girls. She didn't know what they'd gotten into and tried to scrub it off with water and a paper towel. She had to give up and just send Robyn home looking like a raccoon and smelling VERY powerful so she wouldn't be late. I couldn't help laughing when I saw her - my goodness. Unfortunately we were also in a hurry so I didn't get a picture. I had to hurry and get her in the tub to get rid of the powerful smell so I could stand to take her in the car to the library for Colin's robot creations class. We had to work pretty hard to get the mascara off - I hope she learned a lesson. We did have a quick discussion about our asking law. Hopefully she will remember the asking law next time.
Reminds me of the only time I ever saw Nancy get mad - when two little girls played in her make up many years ago. I believe I went home so fast that I forgot my shoes that day. :)

Bad News. I got my blood titers retested on Wednesday and the numbers went way up. I am working on getting an appointment for early next week with the specialist. So much for ideal plans. Anyway, I am trying not to freak out too much. Pray for me.

January is flying by! (I am not complaining a bit. I don't particularly care for January or February. I am all about SPRING!) We have been keeping very busy with life and learning.

I have been reading The Chosen by Chaim Potok and Randy has been listening to it on audiobook as he drives to work and class and back. It has been very fun to discuss it together. We actually went on a date last weekend and talked all through dinner!

Randy and I have been really working on using our leisure time more wisely to get a classic education since last summer. It has been very good for us. The other day we had a good discussion on some stuff he was learning in Plato about whether virtue is something that can be learned and whether knowledge can bring more courage. We decided that knowledge does bring more courage as in the case of 9/11. The guys on the last flight had the knowledge of what the terrorists' plans were via cell phone conversations which gave them the courage to bring down the plane. Perhaps if the passengers on the earlier flights had been given the same knowledge, they would have been just as courageous.

I firmly believe that the Prophet asks us to study and learn for a reason. Even if we never "need" to know the things we study, being able to have meaningful conversations as a family does strengthen family relationships and we all know how needed that is.

Since President Hinckley asked us to finish the Book of Mormon in 2005, we have seen the promised blessings. We have been able to have more meaningful scripture study as a family. We have read the BOM twice since then and started again this month. We have again hit the Isaiah part of the BOM that "makes no sense." This time we have decided to actually learn the stuff and try to understand it instead of just muddle through again.

In reading The Chosen, there is a part where Danny is trying to read Freud in German and can't make heads or tails of it. It drives him crazy until he remembers how he had to start learning scripture in the beginning. He used commentaries and study aids to help him understand it - he didn't just push through, he studied one line at a time until he understood it. Now he easily understands his scripture study and has much of it memorized. He realizes that that is how he needs to study Freud if he wants to get it.

Randy and I, in our discussions of The Chosen, realized that we are not going to "get" Isaiah by just pushing through it and we have been looking for commentary to help us. We have found the Old Testament manual from institute days and W. Cleon Skousen's work to be helpful. I found a big book at Seagull Book yesterday called Understanding Isaiah by Donald Parry, Jay Parry and Tina Peterson that I intend to get into today.

It has taken us three days to get through 1 Nephi 20 which compares to Isaiah 48, but we are getting it now. The reason that it is so hard to understand is that each verse is a different topic that could fill a sacrament meeting.

Goodness. How does a girl journal what she learns in a whole chapter of Isaiah in one paragraph?!!

This morning we learned in 1 Nephi 20: 18-22 that if the Israelites had obeyed the commandments, they would have had peace and have had a larger population. The Lord will always provide for his children, but if those children are wicked, they will not receive. It is not because the blessings are not being given, it is because the blessings are not being received.

How many times have blessings been available, but I have not received because of "wickedness." Even if the wickedness is just lack of self discipline that keeps my kitchen too messy to have neighbors over. Or blessings I have missed being too busy to play legos with my kids because of poor time management. Or blessings in my marriage that I have missed by not starting dinner quite on time so I am stressed and cranky when my darling husband comes home. Since my morning sickness has abated, I have really been working on doing better at receiving these blessings. Maybe that is why January has been so much more tolerable this year. It really works! Wow!