Happy New Year!

Whew! The presents are played with, the food has been eaten, and everyone is back home-safe and sound. This holiday has been lots of fun for us and we hope it has for ya'll too.
With the new year coming up Jamie and I decided that our family resolutions would be to be more active, try to keep our house organized, and invite the spirit into our home more often. We have lots of handy charts to help us with all of it and I am super excited :) and today I got to finish a project to help us keep Hazel's room neat. How does it look?

Happy New Year!

Fair Isle Knitting

Let me just say that I might be a bit slow in discovering this wonderful way of knitting. But I now love it!!! It is a style of knitting in colorwork that allows you to knit with multiple colors of yarn at once. I've never been brave enough to try this before, and I fell in love with a blanket pattern I stumbled across. While trying to figure everything out I came across a blog that called the blanket the "pattern from hell." At first I agreed, but now that I understand what's going on and how to read the pattern I have to disagree! The Love of Knitting pattern "Hot Chocolate Swirl" is simply devine. :) I just wish I had more time to work on in, but here is a little sneak preview ;)

Sorghum Festival

This year Jamie was put on the detail for the sorghum festival. It's been a year since the tornado that struck West Liberty, and I must say that they have come a long way. It was a lot of fun to be able to go down and spend some family time together at the festival while he was on breaks :) I found a couple of really cute things, but the purchase I am most excited about is the stocking hanger plaque that I found. Since we moved into our new place I've been so excited about all the holidays that we'll be spending here! And Christmas is my favorite. I'm am so excited to be able to finally take pride in decorating for it and the warm cheery air that comes with all the baking, music, and decorations. We usually spend the holidays with Jamie's family in Alabama. And its been great, but we said when we first got married that we would like to alternate holidays that we spend with them. Since my parents are a bit too far to visit we usually just spend Christmas with them. With that said, I never get to decorate and when we come home its depressing... But this year we get to switch and spend thanksgiving with them and Christmas up here. It's Hazel's first Christmas but we would only have four days to go down, whichever holiday we picked. So instead of a short Christmas we decided to go for a long thanksgiving. Now I get to do all my decorating, baking and music here in our new home! I'm so excited about it! And I can't wait for the family to come visit us for Christmas!  :)

Hazel is geared up and ready for the fall football season. She got a super cute set of onesies that are sporting our football team, courtesy of grandma and grandpa in AL. Here's a sweet sneak at the cuteness of our first little cheerleader ;)

Enjoy your week!

The move and other tid bits

I can't believe its taken me so long to realize that there was probably an app for blogger! Yep, there is. Lol. So expect to see some more posts from me :)

Our move was somewhat chaotic since Jamie was gone that month. But now that he's home and things are settled in, we love it! It's close enough to town and college that Jamie can ride his bike, but its also only 5 minutes from uptown too! The best part is its tucked away a bit so you don't feel packed in, or that your even in town really. Now if I could just get used to juggling Hazel and all the house work I'd be set ;)

Speaking of Hazel, she is getting so big! She is now 6 & 1/2 months old, can walk with help, has two teeth, and can eat baby food. She says mama, dada, and nana. And she is the happiest baby I know! We just can't get enough ;) Here's a few photos for all that family that doesn't see her everyday :) We love you all!!

Become Aware

So a few weeks ago, I had the wonderful pleasure of getting into contact with a wonderful woman who is an inspiration to any new mother. Her name is Heather Von St James. This is her story.

Fighting for My Life and for My Family

My daughter Lily is 7 years old and she loves telling people that she saved my life every time someone mentions my fight with cancer.  Lily was just three and a half months old when I was diagnosed with pleural malignant mesothelioma. This was shocking news for my husband, Cameron, and I.  While some people think Lily is exaggerating about saving my life, I know how true her words really are!  

I had a lovely pregnancy, even though we waited until I was 35 to start trying.  Cameron and I had spent 7 years simply enjoying marriage before we started trying to have a child.  To our sheer amazement, it only took us three brief months to get pregnant!  I was excited and anxious to have our baby.  A little part of me was somewhat concerned whether or not it would be difficult for me to be pregnant and to have a baby at 35 years old.  In spite of all my concerns, my pregnancy could not have been more marvelous!

I enjoyed every moment of being pregnant and I often would sit and fantasize about what type of mom I would be.  I wanted to be a cool mom, a loving mom, a fun mom…there were so many possibilities! More important than anything else, I wanted to be a great mom to our daughter and I was more than ready to tackle this challenge! Cameron and I felt like this was the most blissful season of our lives as we anxiously awaited the arrival of our daughter.  We were ready to add to our family and at this point, she could not arrive soon enough!

Lily was born through C-section after the doctor discovered she was in a breech position.  I did my best to make light of the situation, and when she finally was born, Cameron and I could not have been happier!  We instantly fell in love with our daughter and the future looked amazing and bright!

It was only three and a half months after Lily’s birth that I finally went to the doctor because I had not been feeling like my normal self.  We received the staggering news that I had pleural mesothelioma.  My doctor stressed how urgent it was that I began treatment as soon as possible.  He told us that if I did not immediately get the best care possible, I would only have a little more than a year to live.

I went to Boston for a major surgery that removed my left lung and the lining of my heart and diaphragm.  This was followed up with 18 days of recovery in the hospital, and two more weeks in an outpatient facility. My parents were a huge help taking care of Lily while Cameron and I were in Boston. After a month on the east coast, Cameron and I reunited with Lily at my parent’s house in South Dakota. We stayed with them for two months while I recuperated further, and then we went home to Minnesota. There I began chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

A month apart from my baby girl was one of the hardest decisions I have had to make but I knew it was a necessity. I needed to be there for Lily and Cameron in the long-term. Lily was correct when she said she saved my life, I fought for my life so I could see her grow up. I can say confidently that without her I would not be here today.

If you'd like to hear more of her story or even just more about the condition feel free to visit here. Hopefully, you've been inspired by her story and made more aware of this dreadful condition.

Thanks for reading about this serious post! Check back again soon to here about how our move went :)

Father's Day

This is Jamie's very first Father's day that actually means something. So I wanted to do something special for him. However, since we are in the process of looking for and buying our first house, we don't really have a lot of extra money to purchase extravagant gifts. If I could, then I would. So this year I've decided to make it sentimental. I've made a map journal of all of the important places in our lives. It was inspired by a post I believe was from the date divas, but I can't find it now. Then I made some Mr & Mrs pillowcases because we always get confused whose pillow is whose. And then I'm going to make a Reeses pieces pie for Father's day that says, "We love you to pieces!" But I love the card, it's my favorite part right now.

That's all that I have for now. Check back again soon! :)

Almost 3 months!

It's hard to believe that my sweet little Hazel is already almost 3 months old!!! She is unbelievably cute and getting cuter every day! I must say that I love being a mom. Its the most amazing accomplishment that a woman can do and it has the most far-reaching affects. I find myself continually reviewing the parenting styles of my parents and my in-laws. While I can't adequately access the pros and cons of both, they do give me wonderful examples to base mine on. I am so grateful to both sets of parents (now grandparents) for the amazing parenting that they accomplished with Jamie and me. I am truly amazed by our story and how we both managed to turn out so grounded and fun in completely different circumstances. And I am so grateful to my loving Heavenly Father for preparing us for each other and helping us to meet and be sealed in the temple. There is no other greater blessing I could have asked for my family. It has been a wonderful experience to watch Jamie with Hazel. They are so cute together and I love how enthralled she gets with him. :) I know, I know, on to the good stuff. Here are your pictures :)

 

I do remember that I promised to post pictures of the finished blanket. I finished it a few days before she was born and I never got around to it so here are those. :)

Hope you enjoyed staying up with our growing little family ;) Have a wonderful day!

30 Weeks & Counting

Whew! What a rush from the Holidays! I hope that everyone enjoyed their Christmas and is as excited about the New Year as I am. : ) I am truly excited about all that this year has to offer. Especially the prospect of a sweet little addition to our home!

This is a picture at 29 weeks, look how cute I am! And yes, I already get people who say things about me popping or it being any day and I get to tell them, "No, not due till mid-March." And I just smile and move on, lol, cause what else can you do?

And I am super excited to be able to use this lovely gift that Jamie's Grandma gave us! It is the sweetest little blessing gown! Just adorable! And before you say anything I am already prepared to bring her to church in a different outfit and put this one on her right before she gets blessed and then take it off right after until pictures so that she doesn't get it messy ; ) But I don't know what exactly I'll bring her in, I think I might make a cute little skirt that will go with some white onesies. As of right now we don't have any real church clothes for her in the range of 0-6 months. So I think it'll be a lot of tights with onesies and skirts I make. Which is fine by me! Simple and sweet : )

In other news (because I'm sure you didn't come to listen to me droll on about my not-yet-born baby) I have been a busy little momma-to-be. We had our Young Women's in Excellence Night at church. For those of you unfamiliar with what exactly that is, it is a night at the end of the year where we showcase all the hard work of the young women in our program. They each get to talk about a Personal Progress project that they accomplished over this past year. I was in charge of the decorations and the theme of the night. I cannot take all of the credit for the theme because I found the idea on pintrest of all places. The Youth theme last year was "Let your light shine" so as a take on that we had the girls display their projects and when they were finished talking about the value they were explaining and their projects they turned a lamp on. So in the beginning the room was just slightly lit with some spot lights and Christmas lights hung around the room, but at the end the room was really bright because of all the lamps that the girls had turned on. It symbolized how as they slowly let their lights shine more will join until all the world is filled with light. I failed and didn't take any pictures that night while we were there, but the decorations got left up for the Ward Christmas party the following Friday and I got pics just before they took it down.

We, and I say we but it was really Jamie and some guys from church, made a false ceiling across the gym with the paper lanterns and tissue pom-poms. I did make the pom-poms but we had the lanterns. And then the Christmas lights swagged along each side of the gym like that. Due to the placement of the plugs the lights had to go back down like that to reach, lol. But I tell you, that it looked really good all done up with the low lighting and all. Just dreamy ; )

And if you think that's all that I have been up to you are sorely mistaken. : ) I have been a busy bee! I even made reversible pacifier holders and a cute little printout that we will put up for Hazel. Check them out!

 I can't take credit for this idea either. It was indeed a pintrest find, again. You can't tell it but there is a white boarder around the purple block. I think it's just adorable and simple; that seems to be a trend around here ; ) I had gone back and forth between doing just her first name and all of her initials but her name won't be alphabetical, Hazel Adelle Jex. So you'd come to the A first and you be like why didn't you say that one. And they'd all be highlighted on the firs two lines so I went with this one. But we like it :)








And these paci holders were super easy to whip up. I did them in one afternoon, or at least I would have had I actually owned the clips before I began. My Wal-mart didn't have any! Can you believe that?! So I had to get them off of ebay and they are stinking cute! I got 10 of them for $7 including shipping. These little babies are usually made from ribbon but I had scrap fabric that I liked and it didn't cost me a thing! So they cost me $0.70 each! Pretty nice if you ask me : ) and to put the paci on the end I just cut an elastic hair band in half and sewed it in the end. It's stretchy and it works perfectly. Couldn't be more pleased with them.

Whew! That is all I have for you today but when I get finished with my knitted baby blanket I will certainly post pictures. That thing has a 12 row pattern that gets repeated 24 times! I'm only on repeat 7, lol. So definitely more to come : ) Hope everyone enjoyed this little update!