Farmer Consumer Awareness Day

Belle thought the Jackrabbit Mascot was great at the first football game of the year.

Belle loved watching the Farmer Consumer Awareness Day parade.

We saw friends...

and family. (Uncle Fred's big truck)

We walked around all the booths, had some yummy BBQ lunch, and bought some great produce from the FFA kids.  We wished we had gone to the Hot Air Balloon festival that night because the fireworks show was amazing!  We watched it from our front steps and it was incredible-it was the most amazing show I have ever seen and everyone that went thought so too.  We are definitely doing that next year!

County Fair & Rodeo

We went to the Grant County Fair as a family.  Belle had so much fun and really go into things this year.  We ate yummy food, saw all the animals and booths and took Belle on a carousel ride. She loved the carousel and cried when we wouldn't let her ride again.

We got a lion ear (an elephant ear from the Lion's Club booth) and took it to the rodeo with us.  My mom passed on her tickets she got from work to us so we had great box seats.  Belle just licked the cinnamon and sugar off her lion ear.

It was Jarod's first time at a rodeo and he loved it.  Here is a buckin' bronco!  It was great entertainment and we loved the different events: roping, riding, and barrel racing.

Scout Camp

Jarod is the Scout leader over the 12-13 year old boys and went to Scout Camp this year at Camp Cowles just north of Spokane.  There was a huge LDS Encampment this year that has not been done for over 25 years.  There were several stakes from Washington, Idaho, and (maybe Montana).  There were thousands of Scouts there and it was a great experience for the boys in scouting and in spiritual things.

Here they are at check-in, as you can see-so many scouts.

Our troop had a great turn out, almost all the boys in our troop were able to go.

One of the firesides.

Spirit Lake

For the 4th of Jul week we got to go stay at my aunt and uncle's cabin on Spirit Lake in North Idaho.  It was so much fun to get to spend a few days together with my whole family (all of my siblings and their families were able to go).  On the 2nd of July, Belle fell off a chair at my parents house and landed on her shoulder and broke her collarbone.  It was pretty sad that she had to be wrapped up for most of our trip.  She did so well having her arm wrapped up and trying to play in the water at the same time.  Her collarbone is healed now and we are so glad that it was a pretty minor ordeal.

What a great view from the cabin!

Even Emma had a great time (my new little niece).

Today

Today is always a hard day.  It's a day filled with a lot of mixed emotions, some happy, but mostly sad.  It's hard to believe that my little baby would have been 4 years old today.  I just can't imagine what she would have been like or would have been doing.  Happy Birthday Hope, we miss you everyday and can't wait to be together again.

Cute pictures

We went to a fun and cute reception for one of my cousin's getting sealed in the temple (YAY for Zack and Becka!).  Belle fell in love with the photographer and was following her around and so the photographer snapped a couple of cute pictures of my sweet girl.  

I made some yummy chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese filling and chocolate frosting to add to the dessert table.  I loved the cute pearls all over the top and it went well with the vintage theme of the reception.

This last one is my favorite.  I think I need to frame it and hang it up!

Things are going great with the baby.  We had our big ultrasound a couple weeks ago and everything looked good.  A four chamber heart,  good measurements on everything, and a cute profile.  I decided to get the quad screen test this time and that came back negative.  I have another ultrasound scheduled the beginning of November.  My doctor and I have have talked about all the monitoring we will do as I get farther along and how we may consult with a perinatalogist again (I say one monthly with Belle's pregnancy).  We will have a lot of non-stress tests (basically monitoring the baby's heart rate over a period of time) and a lot of AFI's (amniotic fluid index-measure the amount of fluid through an ultrasound). With Belle we induced me about a week early but it didn't go as planned (nothing happened-my body just wouldn't go into labor). So we waited a couple of days and tried again. I would like to be induced again so that we can monitor the baby the whole time I am labor and know that everything is ok but how early we will do that I am not sure, it will all depend on how ready my body seems. I have been a little less sick this pregnancy than with either Hope or Belle (with Hope I threw up 4-5 times everyday for 9 months, with Belle I threw up at least 1-2 times a day for 9 months). But with the this pregnancy there have been several days in a row where I haven't thrown up so that is nice (still a lot of nausea but the medication I have been taking this time has worked better for that and I feel better this month than last month and last month I felt better than the month before that-so progress).