perspective

"If you are still in the process of raising children, be aware that the tiny fingerprints that show up on almost every newly cleaned surface, the toys scattered about the house, the piles and piles of laundry to be tackled will disappear all too soon and that you will—to your surprise—miss them profoundly.

Stresses in our lives come regardless of our circumstances. We must deal with them the best we can. But we should not let them get in the way of what is most important—and what is most important almost always involves the people around us. Often we assume that they must know how much we love them. But we should never assume; we should let them know."

-President Thomas S Monson


I was grateful when I first heard these words during conference, and I'm grateful that I ran into this quote again on a friend's blog. I'm in constant need of a reminder, of a perspective change. So when I saw these...




I just smiled.

mormon battalion

We took a day trip with other families from church to visit the Mormon Battalion and the San Diego Temple on Saturday. I have never visited the Mormon Battalion before. It was super interesting to learn more about my spiritual ancestors and to feel their trials and faith. They amaze me.
The girls had fun pretending to be pioneers afterwards. Panning for gold, washing clothes, and pumping water. I'm grateful that my Father in Heaven knows me and that I wasn't born during that time. I would have been a terrible pioneer. Tim had to help me pump the water every time because it was just too hard for me.






The San Diego temple is MAGNIFICENT on the outside. I've driven by it on the freeway a couple of times and it is no wonder it literally causes collisions on the road. So as you can imagine I was dying to see the inside. Not only is it huge, it is BEAUTIFUL. All the temples in the world are, but I secretly hope one of my daughters gets married in San Diego. :) Stunning.
Tim and I have made it a goal to visit the temple as a family as often as possible. Once we even met Tim during lunch and had a picnic on the temple grounds at the Newport Beach Temple. We really want the girls to know and feel the importance of the temple. It truly is a sanctuary and I know the girls felt the spirit.



After it all, we stopped at the ever so popular In-n-Out. During the always long line, Marisa wanted my camera and I love the pictures she took. Here is the perspective of our little 3 year old. If only life was as simple as hers.

apple farm

I think we are done with the visiting of farms for preschool fieldtrips. I'm farmed out. :) But if my kiddo is having fun, then it is all worth it. It was a very long, busy day so I'm going to let the pics do all the talking for me.

The first thing we did was make freshly squeezed apple cider. Anything fresh is right up my alley.



The farm had a few apple presses lined up where the kids got to throw in fresh apples from their farm into a grinder. The grinder spits out the skin and everything else into a bucket below while the juice of the apple slowly drips out into a pail.


Once the bucket below is full, our guide wrapped up the grinded apples in a sack and then the machine pressed the apples down real good until the juice from the apples were flowing down. My mouth was already watering at this moment. Once the pail at the end of the press was full he filled up a gallon jug with our fresh apple cider. We drank it for lunch and it was d.e.l.i.c.i.o.u.s.




The apples, the fall colors, the coolness in the air, so yummy.



Next, they got to go on a tractor hayride. Hayrides are even fun as an adult I have to say. During the hayride we got to see a rooster, which kept "cock-a-doodling", as Marisa would say, really loudly. It was pretty cool to listen to so up close. And the piglets were just a few days old and they were sooo tiny. Pretty cute for such ugly little things.






They also got to "learn" about corn, the different parts to a corn, different ways they used the parts back in the day, and how they grind it. This part was so boring as the lady talked for like what seemed forever in the most uninteresting way possible. So many times I wanted to interrupt and say, "They are only 3." But I know I can be overbearing and bossy sometimes so I didn't. She definitely acknowledged how young they were, but she had no idea how to really reach them. The only fun part after the 30 minute lecture was pretending to grind the corn.




At the end, the kids got to fill their own bag with apples they picked from the trees themselves. Marisa thoroughly enjoyed this part.





I love the look on my kid's face when she is having fun.

little miss busy

Because of all that transpired on Thursday I haven't yet posted the good news on Natalie's 15 month check-up. So here it is!

First thing, the doctor hands me the little piece of paper with her stats and says, "I bet you never thought you would see those numbers for her!"

So true!

Weight: 21 lbs 14 1/2 ounces 40th percentile
Height: 31 inches 70th percentile
Head: 18 inches 45th percentile


My tiny baby is getting big!

Natalie had a great appointment. She is perfect. ;)

I know moms always say this, but her life has flashed before my eyes. Time seemed to go by slower with Marisa, I think because she was my only child, but with Natalie I can barely keep up with all of her changes and milestones. I guess that is life with two kids?? I don't even want to know how fast life goes with more!


Natalie is talking a lot. Mostly jibberish but to her she thinks she makes perfect sense. But to my amazement she has been learning almost a new word a day. Natalie is always happy and loves to love life. She loves to say hi and wave to anybody. Whether it is our neighbor's dog or a stranger walking by our shopping cart at a store. She physically can't keep still and we are in constant amazement how she can maneuver her little body to do the things she does. Can you stand up straight on tip toes on the bottom edge of the back of a table chair? I didn't think so.

I love my little Natalie. She keeps me way busy. Two kids make me way busy. But I'm loving where I am at, I am loving my two girls. Life is good right now.

what it means to be a mother

"You don't know what love is until you have a child," were the words of the paramedic as he was trying to comfort me while I'm holding my baby girl on the couch on her 15th month birthday...

You know those situtations you hear about and watch on tv?? Those moments where you can't imagine it would happen to you and you wonder if it does, how you would react?? Well, I was there last night. I had the scariest moment of my life.

Marisa and Natalie were playing on my bed with some soft balls while I was in the dining room on the phone with my sister. I figured they would be fine. Natalie knows how to get off of things so easily now, plus I regularly check on them anyways. I had a feeling that I needed to check on them at this one particular moment on the phone, but I ignored it. I'm always told that I am an overprotective, paranoid, high stress mother, and that I need to relax more. Told that everything is fine. I should have listened to my motherly instincts though because right then I hear a thud...then no sound...then instant loud crying. I quickly told my sister, "I gotta go!!", and instantly had this sick feeling that this wasn't going to be good.

Natalie is my active baby. Always climbling, always getting herself into something. She is very daring and loves to challenge herself physically. This has ultimately left me more paranoid than ever about keeping my eyes on her. I wish I had an extra set of eyes just for her. As a consequence of her curiousity and her adventurous personality she has bumped her head more times than Marisa has ever her whole life. Not even a close comparison. So although having Natalie fall of something was nothing new to me, I knew this time felt a little different. It sounded like a bad fall.

I rush into my room to see Natalie on all fours crying right beside my bed. (Luckily, before they were jumping on my bed, I had moved a coffee table, that was broken and upside down and left along our bedroom wall for the trash, further away from the bed. Thank goodness I listened to my instincts then because she would have definetly fallen on top of it.)As I pick her up, Natalie is really, really, really crying. Dang I thought. This was a bad fall. My first thoughts were, I really hope she didn't do any permanent serious damage to her head??
As that little thought came to my head, Natalie suddenly pushes away from me. She then suddenly arches her back and there is no more sound coming from her anymore. No crying, no nothing. She is silent as her body, arms and hands go rigid, her face turns blue and purple, and her eyes look up toward the ceiling in a spacy, empty kind of way.
Instant panic.
While her eyes are looking up, kinda seizure-like/fainting-like, her body goes kinda limp. Absolute total body and mind transformation happens to me. Panic like I never imagined I could feel before.

It is amazing how fast your brain can process in literally one second.

My thoughts in one second were...

"Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. This is not happeneing. This can't be happening. Is she going to have a seizure? Why is she doing that? How hard did she hit her head? Is she going to stop breathing? Is this how she is going to leave me?"

I'm then running full speed to my phone screaming. The panic, the shock, the scare. I'm yelling out loud to the heavens, "Heavenly Father please! PLEASE! PLEASE DON'T TAKE HER AWAY FROM ME! PLEASE! PLEASE! HEAVENLY FATHER PLEASE!"

I had no idea what was happening to her. As I'm running and dialing 911, the call I never thought I would have to make, I hear her crying again. This time it is a cry of pure terror. I have never heard her cry like that before. And I hope I never do again.

Thankfully I hear her crying, but I'm still in full blown panic mode. Something wasn't right and I need someone here, NOW. I'm hysterically crying on the phone trying to give the lady my info and trying to find a pacifer for Natalie to calm her a little. The lady on the phone can't hear me though. I'm yelling into the phone desperately trying to get something, anything through as I try to find her pacifer, careful not to drop the phone and move Natalie too much. Luckily, I find the pacifer pretty quickly which drowned out the noise a bit and was slowly calming Natalie down. I'm finally able to explain what happened in full blown tears and she assured me help is on the way and that everything is going to be ok. The lady on the phone tells me that this happens all the time and not to worry. The only thing running through my mind when I heard that was, "I know. I know! But you didn't see what I saw! Why did she react the way she did? Why was she blue and purple! Why did it look like I was losing her!"

I eventually calm down as much as I could at that moment. I hear the sirens down the street. I heard it almost instantly when I gave my address to the lady on the phone. The fire department is super close to me. The lady then asks me how Natalie is breathing. Her breathing was steady again, but she was completely lethargic-like in my arms. You can tell she was trying to slowly recover.

The paramedics arrive at my front door, check Natalie while asking me questions. They were super nice and comforting, but were not giving me the answers that I wanted to hear to my one question.

"Why did her body react that way??????"

"Well, she may have had the wind knocked out of her plus she is just super angry."

"Angry? My child doesn't go blue and purple, limp, eyes roll back to her head, stops breathing, every time she is angry!!"

I asked him 3 times. Same answer everytime.

They advise me that everything is ok. The most important signs are there. She is walking around, eyes are fine, no bumps on head, but to bring her to the hospital just in case and for my sanity.

I had called Tim right after I got off the phone with 911 balling my eyes for him to come home because Natalie had fallen off the bed and was going off in an ambulance. Luckily, and obviously, that didn't happen, but you can imagine Tim's reaction and thinking process when he said, "Ok", then hung up the phone immediately with no further explanation from me. While the paramedics were at my house he was calling my cell a ton of times on the drive home.

One of my best friends, and luckily my neighbor as well, had heard the ambulance from her house and saw out her window that it had stopped right in front of mine. How grateful I am to have her so close by because I can't explain how incredible it felt to walk out onto my porch and see her there. I'm crying right now just thinking about it. I really needed a hug and shoulder to loudly cry on while I waited for Tim. And I did just that.

Natalie was given a priesthood blessing by Tim and again our good friend and neighbor.

I really needed to hear that blessing as well because I felt so much peace afterwards. I knew she was going to be 100% fine. Plus, we were going to have her 15 month check up the very next day and I knew I was going to get my answer of what happened exactly to her during the fall.

Last night I kept crying really hard on and off all during the evening, even while in bed, and even until I finally went to sleep. The feelings of panic, fear, and love kept pulsing through me like a wave all that time.

I know it may have seemed so dramatic or not a big deal when Tim came home because Natalie was smiling and laughing after her blessing, but it was very real to me. Even to those of you who are reading this probably feel the same way. But it was too real and absolutely frightening to me. I caught a glimpse of just how fragile and minute life really is. I have always known and felt how much I love my children, but I learned after this scare that my love for them runs through my blood and body. I learned that love is literally a physical part of my being. I caught a glimpse of understanding when people say they feel physical pain over a loss of a loved one.

The check-up was this morning and the doctor said that the reason why she reacted that way because she had the wind knocked out of her, plus she was crying so hard out of fear, hurt, anger, whatever it may be, that she literally forgot to breathe. Have you ever cried so hard that sometimes you have to gasp for air? I think she was trying to do just that plus forgot to breathe which caused her to not breathe and struggle for breathe resulting in blue and purple face and almost fainted. The doctor said that a lot of kids will actually cry so hard and get so angry that they forget to breathe and faint. That was Natalie. When I heard his explanation I knew it was right. I was very relieved to hear that, plus so much more that he explained to me and assured me with.

What a relief. What a scare.

I'm not really sure why I am writing all this down in detail. Mainly because I think the feelings are still so intense and raw right now that I just have to let it all out. I never want to have those feelings again and I'm so grateful for the Lord's tender mercies. Oh how I love my little girls.

halloween

We started the Halloween festivities this year with a preschool Halloween party at the park. Marisa makes a beautiful Cinderella. Her favorite Disney princess.




Then, with Halloween falling on Sunday this year I am sure grateful for the annual trunk-or-treat church activitiy that took its place yesterday! Always a hit.
Marisa has been particularly beyond excited for trick-or-treating this past month. She totally remembers last year and just couldn't contain her excitement for this year. I love seeing her pure enthusiasim for the holidays. Plus, she got to walk around with Grandpa! Who doesn't love that?






Natalie, our cute little bumble bee, was perfectly content with a sucker. Her favorite piece of candy. Doesn't she look so dang cute?!
And lastly, we carved out a jack-o-lantern from the pumpkin Marisa picked out at the pumpkin patch from her fieldtrip for preschool.












Does the face look familiar?? Hint: She has four teeth now. Two on bottom and her top fangs. No two middle top teeth. Weird huh? haha

Happy Halloween, from the Harts!