Easter

Sent: Friday, March 24, 2006 9:11 AM
Subject: Easter

Hi there,

I just wanted to give an update of our trip in April plans.... we are planning on leaving Thursday the 13th of April to come there to WA, not sure if we will drive all through or not... (if we drive through, we have less meals to buy and no motel.... but lack of sleep) so I am not totally sure, we will have to play it by ear I guess. Our plan is to come and visit Rob's sister that will be there from CA on Friday afternoon/evening and Saturday morning till about 1 pm or 2 pm when she has to leave to go back home. Possibly also Rob's brother will be there in Winlock too for Saturday so we would probably hang out there most the day. Robert is coming for such a short time, I have the next weekend to visit as well.

My thoughts, and questions.... is anyone planning anything for Easter? Due to my schedule I was hoping everyone would be getting together on Sunday, because Sat. is shot for me, I can't see juggling anymore on Saturday. But I may be able to squeeze here and there too.

I wanted to kind of see what everyone's schedule is, if there is anything going on.... Mom and Dad's church is at 1 pm, and they said they could probably just go to the first hour, and then come home... Dad said we could have plans by 3 pm. I am guessing Brenda has early church, because she seems to have opposite of Mom and Dad.

On another note.... we were having problems with Pregnancy #7 (current one), sounds kind of funny for 7 pregnancies huh.... anyhow, we went in for an ultrasound, baby looks good and heartbeat strong. They recommended my blood work to be done too. Bad news is that blood work came back bad.... my levels dropped, which typically mean miscarriage but still holding out for more blood work that we will do again on Saturday to check again. I have my normal check up with my DUMB doctor (I know I have to get a new one!!!) for him to tell me, "oh, how old are you? Yeah then you have a 30% chance of miscarriage, no big deal. It is common. It is just something that was genetically wrong with the baby so it terminates itself. Yeah 30% chance." (Which to me, seems more than a 30% chance now that we have had 4 in a row and this would be #5, seems like its more than just genetics, but I am not the dumb doctor who comforts me with empty words and concerns.) Okay I know I should stop complaining and get a new doctor already!!! Hopefully we will know more on Monday, I am guessing they will just order another ultrasound to check things out again to be sure. The good thing is we did hear the heartbeat, which decreases miscarriage significantly and baby was developed to the day of ultrasound and my hCG levels (pregnancy hormone thing) is up really HIGH even though is did drop on the second test. Maybe just a freak thing to add more stress to my life.... since I don't have enough I guess.

I will be in touch soon, and let me know if anyone has ideas or plans for the whole Easter thing.... and if you all could inform Becky and Scott that would be great too. I will try and call Scott since I never get to talk to him.

Love to all, Miss you bunches, can't wait to see you.... and my girls are EXCITED to come and want to leave today!!!

Karla and family

(OH and we are planning on leaving back for Utah on the 24th of April, a Monday.)

Hair cuts for everyone

Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2006 8:22 PM

Hey there,

I had to send pictures of the girls and their hair cuts. It started a few days ago when I was brushing Emily's hair and I told her she needed a trim to help get those tangles out of the ends of her hair. So she kept on me about when I was going to cut her hair. I told her we would do it Wednesday so she wrote all these sticky notes all over her room saying "cut Ems hair on wednday" and "Em needs a noo hair cut" and "Em needs a hair cut". It was pretty funny when I went to check on her before I went to bed, she had all these post it notes stuck to her door and her bed and her dresser and some I didn't even see till the next day.

So... I forgot to do it on Wednesday, and then today the little girls (Lindsey and Lauren) had a bath. I was combing their awfully tangled hair today and suggested that I perhaps cut their hair or if we cut it then it might be easier to brush. Lauren was all for it, so I cut her hair. Then of course Lindsey wanted her hair cut right away too. It was very cute, and I was a little disappointed, I thought their hair would be much curlier once cut.... like it was when they were younger. Oh well!!

We picked Emily up from school, and she was loving their hair and decided to get her hair cut like her friend Hayley. I think I was having more problems then Emily over getting rid of all that LONG hair. But since we did it, I have really liked her new cut and she likes it tons, so what could be better. I did forget how wet hair shrinks up when dry, so it turned out a bit shorter than I was imagining, but Emily didn't complain one bit.

Amanda of course was having a fit that Emily would cut her hair... but I figure if Emily wants it cut, then cut it. Just like we left it when she wanted it long. Maybe it will be easier or maybe just quicker to brush.

Just wanted to share our eventful day. Hair cut day I guess. Now I need a hair cut. I almost had enough confidence after cutting the girls hair, but I chickened out. Maybe I better let someone else do that!!

Hope all is well with each of you...

See ya soon (hopefully)

Karla and family

Message from Emily

Sent: Saturday, February 11, 2006 3:47 PM

I lost another tooth. I was so excited! I was eating an apple (giggle, giggle). I thought something hard was in there. It was my tooth. My mommy kept asking me to say words to see if I said them funny. I am sending you some pictures too. It's kind of funny because this Sunday I am going to church without a tooth and last Sunday I went without a tooth. I am excited. It's kind of funny. When you are done then look at the pictures. It's kind of funny because I lost two tooths. We were having breakfast. It was yummy. I was really excited because of my tooth. I was excited for it to come out and it came out. Your gonna like the pictures. Lauren has pictures too with my pictures. Maybe you'll want to look at the pictures. Lauren has a bump on her head and it is really purple. My mom doesn't know what pictures we should do, so I picked one from me and one from Lauren. Have a good time looking at the pictures. Lindsey's not on this one. You'll get one of Lindsey soon.

Love and miss you,

Emily Hayes (the toothless wonder) and Lauren with the bumpy head.

Emily lost her first tooth

Sent: Sunday, February 05, 2006 11:22 AM

We had a wonderful new adventure this morning... another first for us.... Followed by many other ones to follow.

Emily LOST a tooth!! It was really great! Her tooth was literally just hanging there, she could twist her tooth all the way sideways, and I got it twisted backwards in her little mouth. Finally I just said, lets take it out. She didn't want to, too afraid to, but I bargained with her (incentives why to take it out...toys...candy...) and she finally let me take it out. I did just that, just lifted it up and out it came. It was funny, she didn't even know I did it really. She was surprised to see her tooth there.

We luckily got before and after pics, and her new tooth, is already coming in. (Another reason I wanted to get that tooth out.) Her tooth was behind her baby tooth.

After her tooth came out she danced and hopped and smiled for like 30 minutes so excited about the whole adventure. She just kept giggling and laughing about it. It was priceless.

We wish you all could have been here or us there to participate in this wonderful FIRST for us and Emily, but next best thing is pictures and email I guess.

We love you all and miss you tons!!

Snow Pics

Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2006 1:39 PM

Thursday morning we woke up to snow, and the girls had hours of fun outside. I wasn't as equipped as the girls are with snow suits and all. My jeans were soaked, and my feet, and hands too (I could only find those stretchy kids gloves, and that's what I had on).

As I was shoveling the driveway, the girls wanted me to cover them up... I think they got confused with the whole sand at the beach thing... so I buried them mostly in snow. Poor girls couldn't get out until I uncovered them some or grabbed their hands. They kept saying, its too heavy.

Then we made this wonderful snow tunnel, it was suppose to be a house, but didn't really get big enough for that. I will try to do better next time I guess. Or perhaps I will have to try again when we go to the back yard.

Just wanted to share our snow with you... miss you tons!

Hugs and Kisses

Karla and family

New treatment for our family to be

Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2005 12:34 PM
Subject: Kinda funny - and ironic I guess too
Hey there,

I was at the doctors today to talk about my results back from the progesterone test I took about a week ago. The test was to check my levels of hormones (progesterone-which aids in ovulation and also supports fetus until placenta takes over). My level was a whopping 5 which is low. I guess clinically the levels are from 6-24 but they like them at 15 or above. Dr. said that this low hormone makes it hard to become pregnant and yet then once you are pregnant it is needed to support the fetus for almost the whole first trimester. Which to me means, it might not have been just a "genetic" thing but more of a hormonal thing in that I couldn't support previous babies. (I am guessing probably because there were so many babies in there that I just couldn't support them ALL with my low hormone so I m/c.)

The ironic thing is that now we are on (or will be in a few days) fertility drugs. But have no fear, I read on the internet that it only increases multiple births and most commonly twins in 10% of the time, and the doctor stated it was more like 5% of the time. So I am sure we are okay with this treatment and not having twins again or any other form of multiples. We will be taking Clomid, which says it helps to release one or MORE mature eggs. I feel confident in this treatment.

I may be crazy but if we do have multiples again, I can probably say we are DONE for sure. I just hope a boy is sent if there is multiples.

It seems so funny that things worked so well before and now all of a sudden I have a hormone problem that I have to get treated for. I was telling the doctor that we have been pregnant 3 times but it just doesn't seem to stick. I am glad that I went in for the tests and we have a solution hopefully. We have been off of any BC since May 2004. Seems kind of crazy when I think of it. Hopefully this will work like it is suppose to and help us finish our family. Recently I am feeling really old to be having kids and want to be done with it and all.

Well that it about all for me today.... quite an adventure through this. We will start our treatment (or my treatment) this week and then go back for lab work to check my levels again and then possibly have to up the dose of clomid depending on all things. When this baby or babies if I dare say, do come it will be an expensive one, since I don't believe my insurance will cover all this infertility stuff. Oh well.... it will be just a month to month thing for a while, have to wait for those special windows to get labs or take meds.... I will keep you updated on the discoveries and all that. Hope to be having an official announcement in a few months to come.

Talk at you all soon. Love to you all there!

Karla

Watermelon

Sent: Tuesday, October 04, 2005 3:44 PM

Here are some pictures of our prize winning (okay so we think it was) watermelon we grew in our garden. Emily earlier this spring wanted to grow watermelons and I was like yeah whatever, like they grow here... it turns out they do.

This was our first one we picked, and the first one that grew. It weighed in at 36.5 pounds, which is about what the little girls weigh. Pretty crazy huh! It was really yummy, but we gave half of it away since we couldn't eat it all. Still have 4 more to pick.

Everyday life with the girls

Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2005 7:54 AM
Hey there,

Just wanted to send you a little note to tell you what is going on here...

Emily is loving her Kgtn, she goes all day. She goes in the AM with one teacher and then switches teachers after lunch. She really loves it but it really wears her out going all day long. She is such a sleeper too that we send her to bed often at 7:30pm so she can get up and get going to school the next day. She has to be there at 8am, so she gets up at 7am to get going with breakfast and all that fun stuff. She is as slow as molasses to get going. She just dilly dally's around in the morning... I don't have a clue where she got that from... (ha-ha-ha)

Lindsey, Lauren, and I go to various places while Emily and Amanda are at school. We visit Krispy Kreme donuts (they have a glass window that you can watch how the donuts are made and cooked and frosted and all). Krispy Kreme's has a HOT hour when they are making their "original" donuts so they give you a free sample (whole donut) when you go inside during those HOT hours. We will do this sometimes, but then I feel guilty for just getting a free donut so of course I end up buying a few more.

We have also gone to Sam's Club after we drop off Emily. They have special Business Card member hours in the morning. They have free samples and juice and all that. The girls love it because they always have cookies or something like that for them to eat. We then pick up the milk or bread we need for the day.

It is kind of nice to do these things with the little girls, but then of course when Emily hears what we did, she gets all mad and upset that she doesn't ever get to do anything fun because she is in school. Poor Emily! It is kind of funny.

Amanda is doing excellent here, most of her grades are A's and B's. In biology she had a 109% for a little while, now she has a 99% I think. We were teasing her about how she is slacking, and went down a whole 10% in her science, even though she still has a 4.0 (GPA) in biology. (We love giving her a bad time and she takes it so well too.) Humor in everything I think is the key.

Amanda has homecoming this weekend. She is very excited. We have picked out her dress, shoes, jewelry and even a cute little purse for her. We have to go tonight to get the dress fitted, to loosen out some of the seems, and hem it up if needed depending on her shoes.

It seems like sometimes life is all about Amanda, and her needs. It sure is different. Many times Amanda is like, lets go here or there. I tell her I have the girls and she says oh lets take them with us. I think after we have done that a few times, now she sees why I don’t want to take them with us, or how they don't like looking in Claire's for 15 minutes. (And they drive me crazy because I am so stressed because they won't keep out of stuff or they continue to run the stroller into things, me or other people.)

Amanda took the little girls to church on Sunday for me. I stayed home with Emily who was throwing up the night before, and of course Rob can't really help much since he has to stay on the stand. Amanda suggested to take the little girls, I was like ha-ha-ha, whatever. We talked about it a little more and I made sure she knew what she was getting into. She was saying if they weren't good then she would just bring them home. I told her she could just call too, and I could come grab them. I guess the little girls were excellent for Amanda, and no problems.

Usually during church when I am there, they aren't always excellent and they don't let Amanda help or do anything. I try to pass them off to her or she tries to help and they just won't let her, they ALL just want ME at the same time. They are getting more use to Amanda and liking her more though. Amanda is a big help much of the time.

Well I have blabbed on long enough and I am sure Lorri will never have time to read this as long as it is and as busy as she is. I hope everyone is doing well, and I will talk at you all later.

Miss you bunches,

Karla and family

Pictutres from Amanda

Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2005 8:56 AM

Sorry, I don't have much time to write, two have to go potty.

Here are some of the pics that Amanda took, very cute too. Some of them you can see are inspired from our wedding, Emily wanted to do them. It was cute. Lauren said, we are getting married.

I will touch back with you later.

Love you,

Karla and family

More on Buddy issues

Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 8:49 PM
Subject: Back to the dog thing....
Sorry, I was running late... as always.

We had to put Buddy down, he couldn't walk well, he was in pain, his back legs were lame, he couldn't use the stairs, couldn't sit or jump. We thought he was learning so well to not jump up on us and instead he just couldn't jump up.

Brenda, this might be something to be sure you are aware of due to your BIG dog. It is more common in larger dogs. Make sure you are feeding him a GOOD (call the vet) dog food... in fact I have a 40 pound sack here I just opened on Tuesday if you want it. Our vet said a special diet can make them or break them of having hip displasia (hip joints don't work well, causing pain and lameness, can be lateral or bilateral, usually fixed by hip surgery from $1500 to $3000 per side). Ours recommended their vet brand, PT puppy food for large breed dogs. We were feeding an expensive brand from a pet store, Nutro and the vet said that if the calcium and or the folsate (something like that??) isn't the right blend/combo/ratio then it can cause problems because they are growing so fast.

Any how, we are sad about not having him... the treatment was very expensive and the surgeon didn't think Buddy was a good canidate for it due to age and severity. There was an alternative treatment and that Vet said that if it was her she would take the dog back to the breeder.

When we talked about it and called the vet back to tell them to keep him and dispose and all that of him, we got a phone call back from the Vet asking if we would sign him over to her for testing and treatments that she would like to try on him. She said that if he got so he was in more pain and all then they would just put him down. It was hard to do that though too, him living in a crate and stuck there in the animal clinic. Poor little Buddy. Luckily the girls aren't too upset yet about it, and maybe they are just too young to understand totally. Emily's comments when I told her was, "can we get a pink poodle now?"

Sorry this one is so long, it makes up for the small one.

Hope all is good there with you all there. Amanda is doing well here... she is doing well in school, and all that fun stuff. She has a photography class that she is loving... and has taken some awesome pictures. I will have to send some of them to you sometime. She seems to be respecting our rules and very open with us, as we are with her. She isn't fighting any of our modest issues, she kind of laughs and says WHAT? KARLA!!! But it is good. I know she has had tons of improvement, she is here.... she gave up a lot to be here so that is a HUGE step in itself.

I better get going... I will talk with you later. I still have to go to the store... we have no bread, milk, cheese.... the list goes on and on. Oh, and I have $7 to get that all. I think I will be getting a gallon of milk and 2 loaves of bread if I am lucky... at least then we can make lunches for tomorrow... YIPPEE. Hope I get paid tomorrow!

Thanks for listening....

Hope to get a chance to talk to you soon.

Karla

Our dog buddy went to dog heaven

Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 5:24 PM
Subject: Our dog Buddy
Hey to all,

I hope all is going well with you there... just wanted to touch bases for a second here, while Amanda isn't hogging my computer.... (ha-ha-ha).

We had to put our dog down, he had hip displasia (spelling?) Kind of sad, but what do you do when you are broke?

Talk to you later and tell you more.