Born again

We are still breaking out in smiles, remembering what a great week we had surrounding Cloudburst's baptism.  We don't have immediate family close by, and so we began planning this week sometime last year.  Thunder and I really wanted it to be special, and we were so happy that so many people were able to come!

Here you can see Papa (Thunder's dad), Sunshine, Uncle Robert, Aunt Jenny, Grandpa (my dad) and Grandma (my mom).

Here you can see Cloudburst, Grandma, Aunt Allie and Nana (Thunder's mom).

And here's Thunder.  Notice how he's not moving his left arm?  On Friday morning (the baptism was Saturday) he was weight lifting and blew out his chest muscle.  But more on that later.  We had people fly in from New York, California, Texas, Virginia and New Mexico.  We had such a great time just being together!

The day I picked up Grandpa, we had some time to kill until Grandma's flight arrived.  So we drove around Salt Lake City, visiting the apartment he lived in as a grad student, where me met my mom, and the church they got married in.  Well, at least we think it was the right church.  :-)  Thunder and I went to a BYU basketball with my parents.  It's been quite a year for them.

Once everyone arrived by Friday, we took Cloudburst out for a girl's afternoon.  Our fist stop was to Claire's where she got her ears pierced!  Both Grandmas were there and almost all of her aunts (we missed you Aunt Vicki!) so it was quite special.  She didn't cry and was so excited to pick out her new earrings.

While we were there we also got pedicures.  Girls day, right?

On Saturday morning we all made a mad dash for the showers to get all 13 people ready on time.

Cloudburst was beaming from ear to ear.  We had a very special service for her.  Grandma gave a talk, Aunt Jenny gave the opening prayer, I gave a talk and also sang a song I wrote just for the occasion, and Sunshine gave the closing prayer.  Thunder baptized Cloudburst.  I had both grandmas help with getting Cloudburst dressed after she got baptized.  Thunder and I both got a bit choked up, me during my song, and Thunder during the baptism.  It was such a neat feeling to have everyone there to support her.

And then it was off to eat!  We went to a restaurant called The Mayan, which has an awesome indoor jungle theme and cliff divers.  My Aunt and Uncle Soderquist, and my cousin with her children were able to join us.  It was so fun to see everyone seated at one big long table.

We also surprised my dad with a flaming cake- it was his birthday too!

Here are Nana and Papa.  It was a short trip for them and they missed us so much that Nana came back to visit us shortly after.  (Well, actually it's because by then our family was slowly falling apart from medical issues and it would have been hard to get through that next week without her!)

Here is my cousin with her kids.  I haven't seen her in a few years.

Playing around outside the restaurant...

That evening we rented a room at Noah's, which has rooms with wallyball courts, pool tables and places to hang out.  We let Cloudburst invite several friends and their families so we had quite a crew.

When Cloudburst turned 7, she decided to read the Book of Mormon all by herself, and she did it.  She has asked us a lot of questions, and made the decision herself to be baptized just like Jesus did.  We are so proud to be her parents.  We feel so lucky to have had so much support from family and friends.  We had an amazing week, and it all traces back to one special girl and her decision.

Eye am warning you now...

... the following pics are not for the faint of heart. I thought the whole process was fascinating, but many people get grossed out too. What process you ask? Why, LASIK!  Here is my last day wearing glasses.  Before the surgery I had to wear them for 10 stinkin, ankle-twisting days.  I had to take a final picture with Cloudburst with both of us sporting our specs.

And then it was off to Hoopes!  They gave me some Valium to calm my nerves and led me in to the cold procedure room.  They first used a laser to cut a thin flap of corneal tissue from my eye.  They applied suction (yes to my EYE BALL, thank goodness for that Valium).

Then they fired the IntraLase laser to create thousands of tiny air bubbles beneath the surface of my cornea.  Here, it is about half way done.  Over the next couple of minutes those air bubbles congealed together to form one layer of air just below the surface of the cornea.

Then I moved over to a second machine, the Allegretto laser.  Dr. Hoopes cut the flap away and folded it down.  You can see it folded back at the bottom.  Then the laser did its magic for 6 seconds.  See that cloudy part in the middle?  That's where the laser burned away parts of my eye, and yes I could smell something funky.

Then Dr. Hoopes smoothed back the flap.  Then he did the other eye of course.  They put all sorts of eye drops in my eyes.  Then I got to lay in the most amazing massage chairs for several minutes to let my eyes rest.  I still dream about those chairs.

Once Thunder drove me home, I put on my fancy new eyewear and slept pretty much all day.  But guess what?  When I woke up from sleeping I COULD SEE!!!!!

It is still weird to not take care of contacts at night.  It is so nice to wake up with Sunrise in the night.  Wait, it's nice to be able to SEE at night when I MUST wake up with Sunrise (the darn kid is not a good sleeper).  And being able to wake up at 5:30 AM for a run and NOT have to fiddle with contacts?  Oh wait.  I don't have to do that any more (see upcoming post on the medical drama....)

Happy Birthday Cloudburst!

Alrightie... Cloudburst's birthday was back on February 25, but we've had an exciting few weeks, so I'm just posting the pictures now.  This was a big birthday for her because she turned

8!

There was a place up north that she had been asking to go for months.  It's called iFly and you really do fly.  They had a deal for families, so I snatched it up and we made the plans to go.

When she got home from school, we first opened presents.  She got so many cute things!

Then we trekked up to Ogden and got ready to fly.  The first had us watch an instructional video and taught us hand signs to use in the giant wind tunnel.

Then we all got suited up and ready to go.  Everyone could fly except for Sunrise, so Thunder and I took turns holding him.

Here is the big wind tunnel.  Air comes up from below, and the fan can blow at different speeds depending on  the person inside.  An instructor is in there with you at all times and helps you get the best body shape to catch the wind.

And here is everyone's best cheerleader.

Here's the birthday girl!  She sailed right up there.

Here is Thunder.

He got some pretty good air.

Here is me.  It was so loud in there and hard to see that you could really just concentrate on the position your body was in.  Each twist of your arms and legs could send you up, down or into the wall.  It was fun to learn.

Here is Sunshine.  He was very nervous and shed a few tears, but conquered his fears and had a great time.

Here is Tornado.  He wrapped every arm and leg around the instructor and wouldn't let go.  He wouldn't be peeled off until his turn was over.

We all got two 1-minute rides.  On our second time, the instructor took us each high up in a large spiral.

Tornado got up a little more courage his second time around and managed to let his feet loose.  At the end of everyone's turn, the instructor put on an awesome show, doing some great tricks.  We would love to go again sometime!

And then we came home to eat cake.  It was such a special day for a special girl.

Now that she's 8 years old, Cloudburst is really starting to spread her wings and fly.  We love you!

Coming attractions...

The last few weeks have been insane.  I will be uploading pictures and blogging about it all, but I wanted to just send a short update now while I have time.

* At the end of February was Cloudburst's birthday, when she turned 8.  We went flying (for reals)
* At the beginning of March she was baptized.  We had family fly in from all over the country to be here, and we had a rockin' good time together, even if it went by in a flash
* Thunder ripped apart his chest muscle while exercising.  Last week he got the tendon reattached to the bone, where it had separated.  Then he had some complications that have led to a long stressful recovery.  I hurt my foot on a long run, and it turns out I have a stress fracture in my foot too.  Goodbye marathon.  Also the kids have had strep, pink eye, stomach aches and have been waking up at night.  Thank goodness Nana was able to come help us out!

It has been a trying week but we will make it!  We always do!

Thank you hairy much

On Sunday I walked up the stairs to see Sunshine brushing Cloudburst's hair. He tries to be such a tough guy, but he is really a softie.

And Sunrise, oh Sunrise.  What a phase you are going through.  I came upstairs to find he had discovered the Vaseline.  And thought it was shampoo.  Which needed to be applied several times.

Do you know that it is impossible to get that stuff out of anything???

Buds

Tornado and Sunrise get to spend quite a bit of time together these days, now that Sunshine and Cloudburst are at school every day.  They have fun building things with Trio blocks, coloring (preferably on paper) and following me around.

They both love to help with laundry, of all things.  Ohhh, I am definitely encouraging this.  Sunrise will take things out of the washer and put them in the dryer, while checking the light to make sure it's still there in that fun hidden corner.  Tornado can now switch loads over and get a new one started.  He has learned this from waking up with wet sheets, unfortunately.

Sunrise is moving into the "little brother" role nicely, now that he's started knocking over Tornado's towers, swiping his beautifully colored papers, and asking "where Dallin?" when he can't find him.  It's fun to watch these two little friends.

New banks

We've been doing allowance for almost 2 years now, and the kids can also earn money for doing extra jobs around the house (pulling bags of weeds, washing and folding loads of laundry, cleaning kitchen chairs, etc.) They can get a "match" for money they put in savings, and then they also put 10% in tithing and 10% in a mission fund. For a while I have been using small tupperware containers for the kids to hold their savings, tithing and mission funds. After they came raining down from the cabinet again the other day, I finally upgraded... to fishing tackle boxes!

The banks lay nice and flat now, and they organize everything very nicely. The kids love to get them down and carefully count everything in them.

Happy Valentine's Day!