To my lonely man

Hi Rye-Pie, it was so lovely to talk to you tonight for an hour or so.  Oh, I can tell you miss us terribly.  We miss you.  I miss you.  I am so exhausted tonight.  Your daughter wore me out today!  I can hardly wait until Thursday, when I can hand her over to you!

Your children played in the old garden spot for a good hour or so.  Gracie and Conagher are new BFF's.  She followed him everywhere today.  

She called you on her kitchen phone all morning and made lots of mud soup.  I am saving it for you to clean up! 

  Your "Buddy boy" was an angel.  He quietly played in the yard all day

and raced monster trucks with his sister.

She pulled the little truck attached to a string and mowed Jace over a few times.  But he didn't seem to mind.

I have no plans for tomorrow. We may go see the dinosaur tracks with Randolyn, but I am not sure.  We are really hoping Boston gets her mission call on Wednesday.  We are all on pins and needles.  Do you want to make a guess as to where she is going.  I will put a pin on the map with your name.  A prize goes to the winner!

Well, my mom is waiting for me, I am reading her the book your mom gave us--"Being George Washington."

Talk to you tomorrow I hope.

I Love you.

PS.  Jace says to tell you, "I miss him."  It is 10:00PM and he is here in the kitchen with us dreaming and eating cinnamon rolls.

Good night.  XOXOXO#$%!

Headed West

This picture has nothing to do with this post, but 'tis a picture nonetheless!  Living room car races.

Yesterday (Sunday) Jace, myself, and Gracie packed our bags and headed west to warmth and sunshine.  We flew into LasVegas where my brother- in-law Paul picked us up and drove us to St George.  It was 70 degrees in Las Vegas when we landed!

I love the desert!  The kids are THRILLED to be in Utah for Thanksgiving.  This is our first time home for Thanksgiving in over 6 years, and the first Thanksgiving Ryan will have off since he started residency.

While we are in Southern Utah Jace has plans to go see the dinosaur tracks, hike a volcano, see the Grand canyon, and eat lots of turkey with both his Blake cousins and Swigert cousins.

My camera is packed in my suitcase, so I will definitely take pictures of our excursions.

Ryan meets me here on Thanksgiving Day and we head home on the 29th.  So we will be back in Iowa on the 30th.

My parents do not have the Internet, so my time online is limited, but if I get a chance in the next two weeks to post pictures, I sure will.

Have a very Happy Thanksgiving everyone!




PS.   If you want to reach me by phone, my cell phone is turned off, please call me at my Mom's house, 435-673-9280.  (She doesn't have long distance service--so anyone outside of St george--I can't call you!)

Jenny R--I think you should call me at the above number!  Rye-Pie you can too!
Grammy Jill-Jace is so excited to see you in 3 days!

A lot has happened...

and I am coming back slowly.  Most of you who talk to us on a regular basis already know our news, but if you haven't heard, I want you to know that we have lost our April baby. When I went in to my 16 week appoinment there was no heartbeat.  They think he died around 15 weeks gestation.  His name was to be Truman Ryan and he had Trisomy 21.  I delivered him on Friday, November 2nd, and I am home from the hospital and recovering.

We have felt the calming influence of the Spirit in our hearts through this experience and we appreciate the thoughts, prayers, meals, flowers, and words of comfort that have been shared with us.  We feel so blessed and loved.  Thank you.

It's Fall

While I have been comatose for the last 5 weeks the summer has slipped away and fall has come.

Last week Ryan dragged all 4 of us to Kent park for an afternoon walk on his day off.  I am glad I let him convince me to go.  I was sick, and didn't really enjoy the excursion, but I realized I was either going to be sick at home on the couch or sick at the park.  So the change of scenery and the fresh air was nice.

On our walk around the lake we passed a beautiful willow tree.  I walked behind listening to Ryan tell our children a story about their Grammy and how she had a willow tree when she was young, and how she loved this tree and would talk to it and play in its branches when she was a little girl.

Earlier that day, they hooked up a garden hose to the pool and drained it. Then Ryan took a power tool to the front yard and pruned back all our overgrown shrubs.

Jace used the stroller as his "garbage truck" and hauled all the clippings into the garage for Ryan to bag.

He invented this "garage truck" out of the blue and was thrilled to help out his dad with this project.

Ryan said it was great because it made everything go much quicker.

I am now looking  forward to October.  It promises me to be feeling better within the next three weeks I hope, and maybe a trip to Wilson's Orchard for pumpkin picking and delicious homemade apple turnovers. 

Blood and tears

 

We are still alive here in Iowa.  Ryan has taken over running the household for me because I am really out of commission right now. A few days ago, he took the kids for an evening walk.  I stayed home in bed.  Thirty minutes later I knew they were almost home because I could hear both kids crying from the street. 

 

Christopher Robin came in sporting this nasty scrape.  He tripped running down the hill while he was chasing his monster truck.  His hip and knees were scraped too.  He really wanted his Grammy Jill to know that he was hurt "really bad!"

 

Gracie had fallen while running too, but she always does, so she recovered from her trauma much faster then Jace.

 

 She took this self portrait of herself while Jace was being bathed and bandaged up.

 

 

Then their Dad read them books and put them to bed.

 

And this is what the Dr. does when he is home.

Each other

 

The only things going on around Swigert land these days is Robin and Rue entertaining themselves while Mom takes it easy.  I am so glad they have each other.  Yesterday, the weather forecast said  tornadoes were going to rip through the living room and break our house all apart.

 

So Jace built himself and Gracie tornado shelters.

Gracie sure loved hers and stayed in there for a very long time.

 

Which made her mother

very, very glad.

Volcanoes and the dark abyss

It is volcano making time!

 Despite the fact that I have entered the dark abyss of morning sickness, I am still trying to hold it together enough to do home-school with Jace.  In case you haven't heard our news, (most of you have who read this blog), we are expecting baby number 3 in April. It is the other birthday present I received from the Dr!

Jace adding sand to his salt dough

Jace has no clue why his Mom is slow going these days, and it hasn't stopped his enthusiasm about school.We learned about volcanoes last week and I promised him we would make one this week, and he didn't forget.

So this morning, we mixed together some salt dough and he excitedly went outside to his sand box and brought in a bowl of dirt to add to the dough and them we smashed and shaped it on the outside of a water bottle.

It was a delightful sticky mess!

 But it turned out pretty good!

He put all the extra sand around the volcano.

He added the baking soda and vinegar and

Wah-la a lovely lava flowing mess erupted with a big sha-bang!

Then they re-loaded it and 

made blue lava the second time.

And green the third time and then purple the fourth time. Luckily we ran out of colors.

But when Dad got home we did it all again for him.

And that was our morning.  Now will someone please put me in a coma until November.  Thanks!