Our New Life :o)

Matt is done, and life begins. Not that we weren't living before, but life after school is so amazing. I feel like I have my Matthew back, he's been gone for 7 or so years. We laugh now looking back at our time in Rexburg when he worked nights and was gone all day at school and had all our little kids. We see now how the Lord really blessed us, because now looking back I don't know how we made it, but at the time we were having so much fun! I think about Matt applying for Pharmacy school, wondering if he would get in and if not what would we do next. I should have known it would work out, Matt got in to all three schools he applied to. The dean of one of the schools even called him and told him he was accepted. That first year of pharmacy school :o( what a hard year, hoping we could make it to the end. Not long after the end of that school year my Dad passed away. We are so sad that he wasn't able to be there for Matthew's graduation. He and Matt were such good friends. Anyway before I start to cry here are some pictures of the past few months. I will post more in a few days :o)


Here is our family at Matt's Grad...

This is what most of the pictures of our family turned out like. It is hard to get 7 people to look forward at the same time! Matt and his parents. We were so glad that they were able to make it.Great friends! Ya, we know, we are really short.

Kinda hard to see, but here is Matt being hooded.

Grandma Walker and Levi

Matt is loving his job. It is much better than he thought that it would be. There is a lot of responsibility he is the Director of Pharmacy at the hospital. He is starting new programs and checking charts, billing, ordering, you name it he does it. He is on call 24/7, but having a husband who loves his job is so worth it. Here is some things that we have been doing on the weekends...

Here we are at the charcoal ovens

This is cave lake, and anyone who says that Nevada is ugly has never been here!

We got to ride the train here. It was so much fun.

Levi thought that it was neat

We also got robbed :o) They put on a big show, it was really neat.

We are in the middle of a ton of mountains

Here is the mine, just out side of town

Owen is 4. Crazy how fast he has grown up. I will post more pictures later.

Here is our snowman and his puppy. People drove by and took pictures, it was really funny.
Playing in the water. Do you see that white lump??? That is the snowman. We sure have crazy weather. Snow one day, HOT the next. And I thought that Idaho's weather was crazy :o)

Feeding the birds

Now here are some before and after pictures of our house. We have been working and working, but loving every minute of it. Our back yard was in BAD shape. This grass was a garden, we wanted a fire pit. Here is the before...(Noah took this picture for me, he really likes to zoom in ;o)
Here is the after. It was lots of work but so worth it. Soon the fence and those benches will not be blue.
This one is for my Mom :o)

Here is a before of our main bathroom. We took down the wall paper, painted the trim and walls and the cabinet.Here is the after. We are going to change the lights and put a frame on the mirror. Soon...

Here is our hallway. The trim in the house was so dark. I only have a bit more to paint, but I had to take a break from painting trim because I was going crazy.

Here is the after. So much better. We are going to change the lights here too.

Here is our fire place before. This is a picture the real estate agent sent us. i forgot to take a before picture of the fireplace.

Here is the after. I really wanted a mirror, and lucky us they left us a few. I told Matt what I wanted and he built the frame and I painted and distressed it. It only cost us $8.00, better than $100!!!
Here is the beam in our basement, Matt stained and painted it.
Here is the after. It's hard to tell in the pictures, but it looks so much better now.

So there you go. There is a lot more i could post, but I am blogged out. I am so thankful for all of our blessings. I am so thankful for Matthew and all his hard work through school. I can't believe we have made it here, and it is so much better than I could have ever imagined!!!

Back to being myself!

It has been a few weeks (maybe 9) since my last post. Here is why... after my first trip to the hospital I got sick again. Right after I stopped my antibiotics I started to feel sick and was in a lot of pain. I went into the doctor and had an ultrasound and they found that I had retained placenta. I went into surgery not long after. I was praying that I would feel better but no such luck. For two weeks I still felt sick and was not getting better, and I was still in a lot of pain. I didn't want to go into the doctor because we were having Levi's blessing that weekend. Matt's family came into town (they were great and didn't care that I was a terrible hostess. They played with the kids and got us pizza for dinner and i just got to relax) The Monday after the blessing I went back to the doctor, another ultrasound, and back to surgery. (It was awesome, as I was going back to surgery some drunk 19 year old hit a power line and the surgery center had no power.) So we had to go back over to the hospital. My doctor told me I was cursed!! Oh and more fun stuff I had a root canal in between the two surgeries. Any way I am starting to get back to feeling good. Matt found out that a pharmacy student 2 years ahead of him lost his wife 3 days after their baby was born from the same thing I had. So it has been a crazy 10 weeks, but we are feeling so blessed!!!!He is so sweet and happy all the time!Here is the best shot of Libbie's hair cut. She is never sitting still.Our little monkeyLibbie at the fun zone for Emma's Bday. Aunt Regan! We have so much fun when she comes! Aaron couldn't make it. The kids were so sad!!!Crafty EmmaThis kid has had a smile on his face since he was 3 weeks old!!I love the look on Emma's face. These presents are from cupid :o)Levi getting ready for his blessing. I have more pictures on my dad's cameraMy 3rd and last new beginnings with my AWESOME YW. I will miss them all!!!Sweet chubby little naked Levi :o)Noah did awesome at his pinewood derby. He got 2nd place in his age group!Levi ready for church. He is so cute, and looks like my other boysHe was laughing at Noah
We just had Emma's party! Every time we were going to do it, I was back in the hospital. 2 months late, but oh well!She wanted tiger cakes, I think they look like Garfield!

Levi Brian

Here is Levi!!!


Owen is so in Love with this little guy! They are going to be the best of friends ;o)

He is so sweet! The kids are all in love. He is the perfect end to our little family! Levi was born Jan 4th at 5:03am. Here is the story. We went into the hospital around 1:30am. I was having good contractions and was at a 5, but after we got there they slowed. The doctor that was on call broke my water and put an internal monitor on Levi because I am a VBAC. (I was lucky that Dr Jones was the on call doctor because he is the only other doctor here who will deliver some one who has had a c-section.) He didn't like that my contractions weren't as strong as he would like so he gave me some pitocin (not fun!!) They checked me and I was at a 7. I decided to get an epidural, but before it even started to work I told Matt I think the baby is ready. I had the nurse check me and she ran and called the doctor and Levi was here a few minutes later. I was glad to have the epidural after he was born because, just like with Owen, they couldn't get my bleeding under control. I was thankful that I didn't have to feel any of what they had to do! I was very happy with his birth and felt great after! Then Friday morning I went shopping and i knew that something wasn't right. I thought i might pass out as i was driving home but made it. My mom freaked out a bit when I came through the door and made me lay on the couch. My temp was about 103 so I called Matt and the doctor. I was told to go to the ER right away. My temp got to 104.9. It sucked, and after being in the ER for 6 hours I was admitted. I was getting better and was on 3 IV antibiotics, then my fever came back. They wanted to keep me until Tuesday, but we begged them to let me go home and they let me out Sunday. I don't think i have ever felt so sick in all my life! Matt's Mom came from Washington to help. It was so nice to have the Grandma's here to help me. If you ever have the opportunity to have two grandmas take care of you and your kids, do it, it's great. I am so thankful for all the help and prayers we have had. For all the meals and calls from friends. I am thankful to be here with my kids and to take care of them again. What a blessing it is to have this new sweet little spirit in our home. We are in love with him and we are so thankful for all that we have!

He sleeps great, eats great and only cries when he is naked!I have to fight to get a chance to hold this little guy!Noah is loving being able to help me out. The first thing he says when he comes home from school is " can I hold baby Levi?"Emma is also in love with him, and told me the other day she loves him more than Hannah (our puppy) And that is a big deal for an animal lover like she is!Libbie helps me out so much when the kids are at school, she is a great little mommy!

Our Trip Home :o)

Well, this was our trip to ???. Matt and I are so excited to move to! We knew when we drove into town that this was the place for us. People feel sorry for us when we tell them where we are moving. It's funny, but it is nothing like what we were looking for in a place to live, but it is perfect! Matt has the most amazing job, and i know that he is being blessed for all his hard work and service. He is just about finished his rotation and his preceptor told him that he wished he would stay on with Fred Meyer but he can tell that Matt has more in store for him, and that he is going to do big things. I am so proud of him. He is amazing, and he is going to get mad at me for posting this but, oh well :o)

Here is my sweet little family. Matt had just came back from his interview. He was so happy to be done! Now he is going to be the Director of Pharmacy at the hospital there. Amazing!

Noah and Owen loved the trains!

34 weeks

I posted these on Facebook and forgot to do it here.

Not doing my job!

I have not been doing my job of keeping this blog up to date. Matt is the one who started this post. With being pregnant and the kids and my calling and matt's schooling and working and his calling and him trying to pick the right job, things are really crazy around here. So I am going to just post a few pictures. Here are the kids at the zoo a few days before it closed for the winter. The kids playing on the tree house slide.

Here is our halloween dinner. It was really sad, because Emma was SO sick, and then Noah got SO sick. Only Libbie and Owen got to go out trick or treating. We were sick at our house for about 5 weeks. It was crazy, I ended up going to the hospital, and all of the kids were sick two or more times. We had the barfs, H1N1, and some strange fever that lasted for days.

Here are the kids a few days before Halloween. They are so cute and sweet and I love them so much.

I have tons more I should blog about, but I am going to go to bed. I have 6 or 7 weeks left before we add another Walker to the family. I thought that it was going to be so easy to be pregnant when the kids were older and could be more helpful, but I was wrong. Life is so busy the older the kids get. I really do miss the days before my kids were in school.

I will try to post some more pictures in the days to come...