Family Time

Ryan's rotation this month (Emergency Department) has been a breath of fresh air for us! The ED runs on 10 hour shifts instead of the typical 12-14 hours we're used to with the other services. He has had odd hours too, like 6am-4pm, or noon-10pm, or 6pm-4am. So Ryan has been able to be home with us either in the mornings or in the evenings which has been so nice! We are about to enter the PICU month which is supposed to be a pretty bad one, so we are soaking in the time with him while we can. :)

Here are a few things we have done together as a family lately...

Checked out the hiking trail at Chestnut Ridge park, and played on the playground there.

Dinner at Chik-Fil-A before his 6pm-4am shift. I forgot Logan's bib so he ended up shirtless. So classy, I know! p.s. This boy doesn't like chicken nuggets... even Chik Fil A nuggets. Crazy kid!

 Went to see the movie "Planes". Gotta love Grace's face... I swear it's just from the flash and she was very happy to be there. We all loved the movie, even though Logan was a wiggle worm the entire time. I was sweating by the time it was over from dealing with him the whole time.

Ryan had saturday AND sunday off in a row last weekend, which he calls his "Golden Weekend". They are few and far between. We went on a date to Easton for a burger at The Flip Side and grabbed a "dirty DP" or "loaded DP" (Dr Pepper with coconut flavoring) from Sonic on the way up to give it a try. People in Utah seem to be obsessing over this combo. Overall we thought it was in between "so-so" and "pretty good". The intense blue color of the coconut flavoring was grossing me out a bit though. I mean who wants to drink a BLUE Dr Pepper? haha Maybe if I had it from "Straws" in SLC I would have liked it better. ;)

 The kids enjoyed having daddy around to play with and read bedtime stories to them!

 On monday, Ryan had his Pediatric Clinic shift which starts at 1pm. So we used our COSI (science museum) membership that morning and walked through some of the exhibits we hadn't seen yet.

"Progress" exhibit 

Not a good pic of them, but you can see the makeshift street that looked like the late 1800s. We showed Grace what the first telephone looked like and she wouldn't even go near it. For some reason she was weirded out. haha

The next time period was set in roughly the 50s... We were checking out the diner.

Grace especially liked the appliance store and guessing what all the appliances were since they look quite different now: ovens, stovetops, washing machines, radios, etc.

An old 10 cent kid's ride

Logan filled up his Bug with 25 cent gas. Oh, if only...

Ryan talking to his honey in the phone booth...

This was going into the "Oceans" exhibit. It looked like a shipwreck on the outside and I think the kids were a little freaked out because of how dark it looked in the "cave". 

After Ryan left for work, the kids and I went to the play area which is always the highlight!

Outside the museum there were a whole bunch of different tractors, trucks and farm equipment on display for "Farm Days" that had just ended. This was the biggest one. The kids were like ants up next to it! Grace thought it was stinky (of course) and had her nose plugged almost the whole time.

We also have been able to be much more on top of doing FHE every monday this month! This time we taught the kids about obedience (obeying rules and obeying mom and dad). It was a lot of fun and Grace asks sometimes multiple times a week if we are doing family night that night. :)

 With Ryan's schedule being this relaxed, it has opened up the possibility for me to go running by myself in the early mornings. I have taken advantage of almost every morning he has been around, and I am really enjoying it! I haven't really RUN like this in a long time... and it takes me back to high school cross country when I was running like a mad woman. So far I've been going between 3.75-4.5 miles, roughly 8-9 minute miles. I'm not training for anything. It's just for fun and to feel better physically. I am IN LOVE even more with this place we live. My favorite place to go is to drive just 5 minutes down the street to the beginning of the bike/running path at Pickerington Ponds and run a few miles in. This morning I drove a couple miles further along the path and ran further in than I ever have before so I had a change of scenery and it's even MORE beautiful, green, dense, and lush the further you go.

At 6:30 am, with some lingering fog and the sun just barely rising, even the cow farms and soybean fields are beautiful.

I'm sad that my running mornings are going to end next week when he starts a new rotation. But I'm very grateful for this month that we could feel more normal and have so much more time together. We have been blessed and made some fun memories!

Happy 30th Birthday!

Ryan has officially left his 20s behind. It is a little strange to be 25 myself and married to a 30-year old! ha. But he has accomplished SO MUCH in his 20s. To name a few...

-served and completed a full-time mission in Detroit, MI

-met and married his wonderful wife ;)

-graduated from the University of Utah with an undergrad in Exercise Sports Science while working part-time

-started and completed medical school at Touro University-Las Vegas and received 2 prestigious awards upon graduation

-was accepted to become a Scholar in the National Health Service Corps.

-had 2 children

-got accepted to residency in Pediatrics at Nationwide Children's Hosp - Columbus, OH

-has owned 5 different cars 

-has moved 6 times (not including transfers on his mission)

-and has grown MANY gray hairs, which he is quite proud of

Whew! What a decade he has had! I am so proud of all he accomplishes, all of the drive and motivation he possesses, and the love he has for his family that keeps him on track. I am so lucky to have a man who wants to do all he can to take care of us and to achieve his big dreams. He has taught me to love life, to forgive and forget, to laugh and have a good time, and pushed me to become much more independent. I've had to become pretty self-reliant and I'm actually grateful for that, to be honest. 

I wanted his 30th birthday to be more exciting and to have more surprises involved than usual, so I put together a 10-day countdown until the big day. 

Day 10: Movie and popcorn night after the kids went to bed. 

Ryan has been begging for an air popper machine for quite awhile but I found this microwave popper bowl on amazon for a whole lot cheaper. It works really great and we use it all the time now! We rented Jack and the Giant Slayer from RedBox and enjoyed our date-night at home.

 Day 9: Two Dates

Date #1 was two tickets to a matinee of Despicable Me with Grace! She closed her eyes during the pic because the flash was too bright haha. 

Date #2, Ryan and I went out to Bd's Mongolian Grill at Easton Mall. He just so happened to get a free birthday meal in an email earlier that day so it was perfect all around! We walked around after dinner, because the weather was absolutely perfect, window shopped a little, and got some Jeni's ice cream to finish up. :) Perfect!

Day 8: Midnight Snacks (for his 28-hour shift)

Day 7: An ultra slim wallet.

Ryan has lost his meal cards for his rotations SEVERAL times. He always finds them somewhere strange, but it always happens because he puts these loose cards and papers in those dumb pockets of his scrubs which don't keep anything in them for long. He needed something to hold just a few cards and maybe a few dollars at a time. 

 Day 6: iTunes gift card with a BYU lanyard for his hospital IDs

Day 5: honestly, I can't remember... :/

Day 4: Lemon Bars to share in the resident's lounge.

He had another 28 hour shift, and planned to leave the house at 3:30am on that thursday morning (which meant I wouldn't see him at all until friday). So I stayed up really late wednesday night making them after he went to bed, and then made sure he noticed them before leaving for the gym and work that morning.

 Day 3: MONSTER movie and pizza night (with "Monster Cookies")

Ryan was post-call (sleeping off his long shift) and it was friday afternoon when he got up. So I made us some pizza, we ate it picnic-style while watching a borrowed copy of Monsters Inc, and had some of our favorite cookies for dessert.

 Day 2: Family bowling! (day off for ryan)

There was a groupon that week for a place about 25 minutes away and it was a really awesome deal for our whole family to bowl for 2 whole hours! Even though it wasn't exactly a surprise for Ryan (because I wanted his input on this last big gift since the weather didn't cooperate with my original idea). We had SUCH A BLAST! It was so much fun...

 ...even though Logan was not happy for the last 45 minutes.

 Day 1: RYAN's 30th BIRTHDAY! (another day off)

This day was sunday, so we all went to church. Ryan had a meeting after church so Grace helped me get started on Ryan's surprise cake by dividing the reds, blues, and yellows from a couple bags of m&ms. She's such a good helper and was super excited to be involved.

 The final product. Not too bad... but I can't do much more when it comes to cakes. 

 For dinner we had chicken chili in bakes tortilla bowls (Ryan wouldn't make a decision on his birthday meal so I just chose for him). 

 I forgot to take a picture of his final birthday gift, but it was a new Superman shirt. It's a nice charcoal gray color which I picked on purpose because it goes better with all the funny colors of his scrubs. ;) haha No joke. He was thrilled and loved the superman theme of everything, of course.

We love you, Ryan! Here's to many more accomplishments and another 30 years to enjoy. :)

iPhone photo dump and update

We can't survive our weekly Meijer trips (our grocery store) without snacks and visiting the "glowing" fish.

 The kids and I visited Dayton a couple weeks ago to spend some time with Erica, Marci, and their boys. Erica's pool was the PERFECT place to be on a super hot day and we had a great time! I feel like I do way too much complaining or comparing residency stories when I'm with these 2 med school friends, and I'm sorry about that, Erica & Marci! ;) It's just so nice to have someone to talk to who understands, even though our husbands' programs are so very different. I still can't believe we have all made it through the first year.

Love you girls! Thanks for a fun visit!

 The kids didn't last long on the 1.5 hr drive home.

 Our blackberry bush is going NUTS! It has taken over 1/3 of our garden and continues to send out new chutes every direction! It's wound itself through some of our tomato plants and the retaining wall around it. But we have all been enjoying the fresh (and HUGE) blackberries it is producing. 

 Ryan was post-call, tired and laying around with a movie on his iPad, and the kids joined him.

 We had a few days straight of upper 90s and 95+ percent humidity. Yuck. It was pretty miserable. But one evening we met Ben and Amanda for ice cream at DQ which was nice... however their AC had gone out and it was hot both inside and outside. So we slurped up our quickly melting ice cream and let the kids play on the bike rack for a few minutes. :)

Look at those rosy cheeks!

 We have been back and forth about whether to try Logan and Grace in the same room. There were pros and cons to both ways. I mentioned to Ryan on one of his post-call afternoons that I thought maybe we should try them together, so he jumped up right then and got it done! I helped of course, but it only took us about an hour. 

Now Grace is on one wall and Logan and his things are on the opposite wall. We had tried this last summer when we first moved in but quickly moved Logan to his own room because he wasn't quite sleep-trained yet. 

They're doing great though! We had a couple days where Grace climbed into his crib too early one morning and woke him up, or other times when Logan cries in the middle of the night. But Grace usually sleeps through his crying and in the mornings when she wakes up before him, she usually will quietly leave the room and lets him sleep longer. It's working great!

 I LOVE having a play room. I think they do too. I love that if Grace needs a time-out, she goes into her room where there are no toys or books anymore. So it's not a "fun" time. I love the natural light in there. When the toys were in Grace's room, I usually had the windows blocked so it wouldn't get too hot or too bright during nap time, etc. So now they can have the blinds open all day. It's a little thing, but it's great!

 Two saturdays ago we had a pretty strange day... We woke up, got ready for the day, and found our plumbing acting weird. Then we realized that the drain in our laundry room floor was backing up and all this nasty, smelly, disgusting water was coming up the drain. So gross!! Ryan, thank goodness, had the day off (first one in weeks) so even though I was grateful he was there to help deal with it, we were also really frustrated that we had to spend his day off in a nasty mess. :( The kids and I went to my brother's house while Ryan waited for the plumber. The plumber came, snaked the system, and we spent a couple hours bleaching, disinfecting, doing laundry, and throwing things away. I had towels down on top of the areas where the plumber walked around with his yucky boots ('cause I'm a germaphobe like that) for a couple of days until we could get a carpet cleaning company in. Thank goodness for our landlord for covering the costs of everything! 

As I was heading back from my brother's house that afternoon, a TERRIBLE rain storm hit and I honestly thought I wouldn't make it the couple miles home. I could hardly see anything through my windows! Lightning struck right on top of/near us and I thought I might cry, no joke. But I was trying to keep my kids calm too. And then of course half a mile later it was just drizzling and no big deal. So weird!

An area of our backyard was flooding.

 I tried homemade Pesto Cavatappi from Noodles & Co. the other day. I have practically a basil TREE outside and figured I'd make some pesto with it. Anyway it was sooo yummy.

 With Ryan working as much as he does (80 hours or more a week), we do all our communicating via text. Sometimes he is loopy like in this conversation that we had right after I put the kids to bed one night...

 Some new friends just moved into our ward! The Coons. Chad is starting a PA program here, and his wife Brooke and I have already been able to get together a lot. We are pretty far from downtown Columbus where the schools and hospitals are, so it was a surprise when they moved in near us instead of Hilliard where it seems like most students/residents end up. We're grateful to have new friends! Their kids (Addison 5, Eli 4, and Brady 9 mos) are adorable and so sweet to my kids.

We went to the AHA children's museum in Lancaster last week and had a really great time! There are some really fun things to do there and our kids could have stayed hours longer.

Grace and her new friend, Eli. ;)

 This last week has been gorgeous! Cool in the mornings and a high of 70s or 80 at the most. So great!

 Riding bikes down the driveway.

We went to the local Violet Festival parade with the Coon family. It was a longer parade than the 4th of July one and yet less cool. haha But still a fun. local thing to do in our community. :)

 We realized 32 miles late that our Mitsubishi passed 100,000 miles! We bought it in 2007 when it had 18,000 miles on it. It has taken us on many road trips (mostly Vegas to SLC and back) and has served us well. 

 Ben and Ryan have July birthdays and both turned 30 this year! We had talked about doing a sunday dinner, but of course Ryan works most sundays and it didn't work out. Then we planned for s'mores one evening, but then it decided to rain that day. So we ended up with Chipotle for dinner, thanks to Ben's free meal coupons he got! Thanks, guys!

Grace begged me to let them have a picnic for lunch, so... That's what we did! I love our backyard this year so much more than last year. Last year the grass needed some major work, our garden was being eaten and ruined by bugs, and we had no toys. Plus it was way hotter last summer and everything was dead. We love being back there this season!

 Yesterday we went to the zoo with Amanda, Amy Stone (another new family in the ward), and Jessyka Parsons. We had lots of fun! I love our zoo pass. It takes 40 or so minutes to get there, so it's quite a hike, but it's so worth it.

Staring contest with this big guy.

 Amanda had some coupons for the little kiddie rides they have on one side of the zoo. She let Grace go on a couple of Owen and they were having such a blast! So many smiles and giggles. :) Thanks Amanda!