S-A-N-T-A

Christmas is without a doubt my favorite time of year. I love all the magic and wonder that comes with having children around. We SO look forward to the day Santa visits Daddy's office. Natalya and Branson spent a lot of time writing their letters to Santa. They dressed in their Christmas clothes and paced around the house until I could get them in the car to drive to Dad's work.

Santa parked his sleigh and reindeer on the roof. Natalya asked.


Natalya loved Santa. She said she especially liked his voice.

Branson loved Santa, too. He especially liked the cookie and candy cane he gave him.


Irelynn had a different experience. She had the I'm-15-months-old-and-you're-a-weirdo-who's-freaking-me-out experience.

Irelynn was much happier from a distance. She eventually warmed up to Santa and agreed to a smile, high-five, and she even let him hold her little chubby hand for a minute. It was very cute.

Give Thanks

Thanksgiving was blissful this year. Brian took a few days off of work and we chose to not travel for the holiday. So we stayed home, cooked, ate, and hung out. My sister, Ellen, from southern California came to visit. I couldn't have ordered a happier Thanksgiving!

On The Menu:
A 21.5 pound turkey
Traditional stuffing
My mom's gravy
Cranberry sauce
Seasoned, sour cream mashed potatoes
Green bean casserole
Homemade cream corn
Fumi Salad
Orange Banana Jell-O Salad
Rhodes rolls
Pumpkin pie
Chocolate Trifle
Apple-grape and apple-cranberry Martinelli's

We ate leftovers for almost a week. I love Thanksgiving.

The food.


The family.


As a little surprise for my family, I wrote each of them a special note describing what I loved about them and used the notes as place cards. After our meal, we made a thankful tree (for the kids, they loved it) where we wrote things we were thankful for on fall leaves and glued them on the trunk. (Thanks to Granny Kim for giving us extra supplies to create a thankful tree a year or two ago.)


The day after Thanksgiving we were looking for something to do that was inexpensive and fun for the whole family. We got everything we wanted when we went to our church with a basketball, several Nerf balls, and a Frisbee. We had so much fun just messing around! The kids were hilarious.


Irelynn kept trying to hide in the gym's curtain dividers. She would jump out at us and say, "Boo!" Branson enjoyed shooting basketballs and playing catch. Natalya preferred organized sports - usually when she did the organizing. Brian and I liked playing catch. It reminded us of life before kids - when we used to go to the park after work/school and play catch. Everyone had a great time. The kids didn't want to leave!


This is my pretty trifle. We didn't save room for dessert on Thanksgiving, so we ate all our dessert the day after.

This Thanksgiving, I realized how blessed I am to have a wonderful husband and family. Simple as that. Family is everything. I always loved the saying, "We may not have it all together, but together we have it all."

Busy Bodies

Natalya's my little diva. Branson's a ham. Irelynn is feisty. Together they're trouble. But cute.

Playing with expensive toys - fun. Three kids in a box - way fun.

They pretend each tunnel is their "house". I guess the center is their common area. :)


Irelynn has more fun pushing her friend on the ride-along toy than riding it herself! And she's strong.


Irelynn and Karlee, her best friend.

I'm sure every parent feels this way, but our kids are some of the busiest I know! At least I can't complain that my life is boring.

Little Girls

I love little girls. I love that Natalya noticed that she and her little sister were dressed alike - which meant they should absolutely have a tea party together. She was so patient with her. And Irelynn soaked it up. She knew exactly what to do although she had never experienced a tea party before. If that had been Branson, he would have thrown the tea saucers across the room like frisbees. (And I would have laughed - boys are great, too!)

A Baby With Style

Natalya has wanted to paint her sister's toe nails since she was a week old. Well we finally did it. And I must say, they are the cutest little pink nails I have ever seen. As long as I was painting hers, I painted all of ours (except Branson's, of course).

It took some serious skill to paint the toes of a 14 month old. I had to pin her in her high chair, distract her with a treat, and dab her teeny nails with lightning speed. But I arose triumphant! And I think she liked them.

More Cotton Balls...

I was talking to my friend Meagan today and we agreed that we are growing and learning as mothers everyday. Sometime we do or say things that we're not totally proud of - and we learn from our mistakes and try to be better next time. In a way, we sound a lot like children!

Just yesterday I said somthing that I taught the kids not to say. Natalya told me that I needed a cotton ball jar so that she could take away a cotton ball for my naughty behavior. Meagan and I got to thinking... maybe WE should make ourselves a, "Cotton Ball Jar for Good Behavior." That way our children can learn to better appreciate our good works and reward us for the many ways we serve them. They can also help us to remember when we've lost sight of the patient, loving way we should conduct ourselves. When the kids fill their cotton ball jar, they get to choose a one-on-one date with the parent of their choice. But when I fill my cotton ball jar, I will choose a family activity that we can do together on a Saturday!

I hope that our kids learn to recognize not just mine but others' efforts to be kind and are quick to give compliments. I also hope that I will remember to practice what I preach! I already made myself a cotton ball jar. The kids were excited at the idea - in fact, they've already given me a cotton ball for my excellent sharing. :)

Trick or Treat!

We had such a busy Halloween this year! It felt like 3 days of Halloween. We had a school party, Brian's office trick-or-treating, a birthday costume party, our ward trunk-or-treat, and two other costume parties that we had to miss! Needless to say, our kids got a lot of use out of their costumes.

I got the kids' costumes several weeks in advance so they could play in them and enjoy the anticipation of the impending Halloween. This year Natalya had her heart set on being Fancy Nancy, the main character in the Fancy Nancy book series. She made such a fantastic Fancy Nancy! When I took Branson costume shopping, we found a firefighter uniform and fell in love. He started running around in circles saying, "Whoo-woo!!" like a fire truck siren. Sold. Branson would be a firefighter this year. So what would compliment a handsome fireman better than a cute fire dog?! I found a dalmation costume from Old Navy and it was perfect! All three of them loved their costumes and wore them about a bazillion times during October.

The best part of trick-or-treating was watching Irelynn get the hang of it! It didn't take her long - she caught on all too quickly. In fact, I think she made off with almost more candy than her big brother and sister! She's hilarious.

Brian's office invited all the firm's kids to trick-or-treat at the secretaries' stations. This was a perfect way to kick off Halloween. The kids had a great time and I think the secretaries did too - the Reeve children are VERY entertaining.





So when Irelynn discovers that people are handing out free candy in little buckets, our trip to Daddy's office got interesting.


Instead of choosing one piece of candy and moving on to the next station, Irelynn decides to make off with the whole bucket and charge down the hall without looking back! While we were left buckled over with laughter, Irelynn was halfway home with her loot. She's a crackup!

Branson was by far the most handsome firefighter I've ever seen.

Fancy Nancy is such a cute series. We own the first three hardback books and we have checked out most of the others from the library.

Natalya has perfect hair - and demeanor - to be Fancy Nancy.


This is her dress. Very fancy indeed!


I think she has the sunglass tilt down pat.

We visited with Grandma for a few minutes before trick-or-treating. The kids not only loved wearing their costumes, but acting their part too!

We had a very Happy Halloween. Branson keeps asking me if we can do Halloween over again. I hated to break it to him - but we're going to have to wait until next year...

One-On-One Dates

In our house our children earn cotton balls for good behavior. Once their cotton ball jar is full, they get to go on a one-on-one date with a parent of their choice. Branson recently filled his cotton ball jar and chose to take Mommy on a bowling date! It was one of the sweetest things I've ever seen. Branson was beyond excited. He was counting down the minutes before we left the house and had his shoes on waay ahead of time. I couldn't help but get teary-eyed on multiple occasions because of how seriously adorable he was! Here's the play-by-play:

I took this picture over my shoulder as I was driving. His face says everything.


When we got there, Branson wanted us to park on level 3 of the parking garage - because he's 3 years old. He thought that was so cool.


The ball was so hard for him to lift. But he wanted to do it all by himself. :)


He would take a minute to get situated. Sometimes he even put his fingers in the right holes (not that that mattered much - he pushed it down the alley anyway) but it was cute.

It sometimes took for-ev-er for the ball to get from point A to point B. But he waited so patienly. The anticipation was killer.


His squeals were ear-piercing! It seemed like half of the bowling arena would stop and smile at him - or join in the celebration with us of his meagar 1 or 2 pin victory.


A few people even asked if we wanted our picture taken together. I was so proud of our son. His personality was infectous. One can't help but be happy when around him.

The only tears he shed began when I told him that it was time to go home. He told me, "But Mommy, I want to live here for ever and ever!" Needless to say, Branson has been working extra hard since then to refill his cotton ball jar so that we can enjoy another bowling date together!

Never a Dull Moment

For the last couple of weeks Natalya has had a little cough. I wasn't overly alarmed considering how bad our allergies have been lately. But Wednesday morning she woke up not feeling well. She seemed lethargic. I thought she just needed to get up and move around so we got ready for school. It wasn't until I picked her up a few hours later that I noticed that she was truly not well. For almost three hours she didn't move from the couch - totally out of character for her. During that time, her cough worsened, she began to fever, she lost color in her face, and her breathing became extremely shallow. She seemed as though she were panting - taking a little breath in between each syllable of every sentence she spoke. Finally her eyes rolled into the back of her head and I noticed her chest refracting as she tried to breathe. It looked so unnatural.

That's when I really began to panic. Her health deteriorated so quickly! I rushed her (along with out other children) to the doctor. He put the pulse oximeter on her (a medical device that measures the oxygen saturation of a patient's blood) and her saturation level was only 91. Normal is 98-100. The doctor said that anyone under 95 should be hospitalized. It took only a minute for him to write the orders and call the hospital. His initial reaction was that she was probably suffering from pneumonia.

It was hard not to get emotional. My sweet 5 year old was running around seemingly normal just a few hours earlier. She quickly turned into a pale-faced, frail little girl who was struggling to breathe and unwilling to walk or talk.

Once she was admitted to the hospital her saturation level bordered 90. Brian and my dad gave her a blessing and in it they blessed her that she would make a full recovery and be comforted during her treatment. I knew she would be ok.

They immediately performed a number of tests including RSV, influenza A and B (which also covered the swine flu), chest X-rays, blood labs, etc. Everything came back negative - except that in her blood work her white blood cell count was high (meaning infection) and she was dehydrated. Though the chest X-ray came back "unremarkable" according to the radiologist, the doctor maintained that she was most likely suffering from pneumonia. He said that since she was dehydrated, her lung alveoli were so constricted that the pneumonia probably did not show up in her X-ray.

Regardless of whatever this mystery illness turned out to be, they treated her for everything. She was on steroids to open her airways, two different antibiotics to fight the infection, breathing treatments with a respiratory therapist every two hours, and an IV with fluids.

Natalya's condition would improve significantly one hour then she would regress the next. During the night was the most difficult - her pulse ox dropped to a steady 86 until they put her on oxygen that brought her back up to 90.

When she was doing well, they encouraged her to get up and move around. Above she's pictured on a tricycle! She loved being able to unhook herself from all the monitors and ride around the PICU. They would follow her "exercise" with a breathing treatment and pound on her back to help knock some of the junk out of her lungs.

This is her room. She loved staying in room number 555 (because she's 5 years old).


A cart came around with arts and crafts for the PICU children. Natalya was thrilled to paint a flower pot picture frame. Being able to color, paint, or watch movies helped her to forget how uncomfortable she felt at times.


What really made her happy was when Pammie, Natalya's kindergarten buddy, came to visit and bring her some classwork. She perked right up when she awoke to little Pammie sitting on the edge of her bed. And Pammie brought her some My Little Pony fruit snacks, Little People, and a picture she drew of the two of them. What a little sweetie!


We took them on a short ride around the PICU. We had to go slow because Natalya's IV had to follow her everywhere.

Natalya started a sticker collection. When she was dehydrated, we promised her a new sticker every time we got her to drink something. That was the only way we could get a lethargic little kid to sit up and drink. Hey - it worked.

Natalya wanted to decorate her walls with her artwork.

She named her nebulizer mask that resembles a dinosaur, "Purple Heart."

Last night Natalya slept well. She didn't require oxygen at all and her pulse ox stayed around 91/92 all night long. Even though she's not totally well, she has improved so much that she doesn't require aid from the hospital anymore. The doctor discharged her this morning! Natalya was so excited. But she was most excited to just get her IV taken out. I brought her home this morning after being hospitalized since Wednesday afternoon.

I was impressed with how good she was for the doctors and nurses. We're continuing with her treatment at home (antibiotics, steroids, nebulizer treatments) and we'll follow up with the doctor again on Monday. Just having her home is causing her to improve already.

What a little trooper! I am so proud of you, Natalya!