Calling all Tai Pan fans!!!

So this morning jared said he was going to go check the mail before he left for work, what he brought back sent me into a frenzy! A postcard from Tai Pan saying they are opening a new store in............

RANCHO CUCAMONGA!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't believe I no longer have to go all the way to utah (st. george to be exact, drove up one night with my mom, got up shopped for 4 hours straight, unloaded my 4 baskets into my car and drove home). It will now be about 2 hours away (less with no traffic but who are we kidding, there is always traffic in LA) . Best of all no luggage to take up all the room in my car so that I have to watch how much I buy since I still have to get it home. It is supposed to open in Sept. Just in time for Chirstmas. So now of course I need to start saving and planning my trip. There are bargins to be found, cute things to buy, oh the sweet joy of walking into that huge store with so many things I don't know where to start. Oh and lets not forget the furniture that was once just looked at but never purchsed because we could never get it home. For those of you who have been you know what I am talking about. It is the only way to purchase home decorations. Once you have been you will never want to buy stuff anywhere else after you see the prices. I am in heaven and I am sure jared is shaking his head. Start saving ladies there is shopping to be done!

P.S. For our family in texas, since we are driving out for christmas I can tell you where your gifts will now be purchsed. If you have any requests let me know!!

21 days to go!!!

We are almost there. Just a little bit more of dealing with my kids at home, then onto dealing with them in the car back and forth to school, soccer, dance, ect. I would much rather be busy though. Last week we went on a field trip with some other moms in the ward to California Pizza Kitchen. It was great. The kids had so much fun, the guy doing the tour was so organized, and best of all it was free. The kids got to make and eat their pizza, get some soda and watch the little show the guy puts on.

This past weekend we also picked up a Wii Fit. We played it almost all day on Sat. My first Wii age was 43. Then when I figured out what it was asking me to do, I did it again later and got an age of 34. That is more like it. I was surpised at how hard it actually is to do. They have a jogging game where you run this trail type thing. Well while I was running in place I realized that my rear was bouncing at a different pace then the rest of my body. I am really out of shape. It is a pretty fun way to get some exercise though. Sorry no pictures of us playing the Wii fit, it is not pretty.

Lazy Days

So as you can tell i have been lazy about my blog these days. My sister in law teresa says she is about to get fierce with me if I don't start updating. My days have been filled with bored kids and lots of cleaning and laundry. This past weekend we had a 4th of july barbecue and we also blessed ashton. We have had jared's parents here which has been such a huge help. So here are my ramblings for the last few weeks.

The Bachelorette---Come one people. If i hear one more contestant say i didn't expect to fall in love i just might throw up a little. What did you expect when you go on a show where you are supposed to find a potential husband/wife. Deanna....Jesse? Really? I was rooting for jason but i think he will be the next bachelor so i will just wait for that. I thought it would be jeremy but with that embarrassing bout of graveling and crying i don't think so. He is a good looking guy with a good job and a nice family, obviously the guy has issues.

So you think you can dance----I am loving this season. I don't' know how I feel about some of the new choreographers but I do have my favorite couples. Mark and Chelsea, Gev and Courtney, Twitch and Kerrington, and Josh and Katie. For those that don't watch start now. Great entertainment.

Kids Shows---- These i have seen way to much of as have my children. I did learn something about myself from one of my most hated shows. Max and Ruby. I loathe this show but mackenzie loves it. So i let her watch it. After a really bad day of dealing with ethan (that is an entire post itself) I sat down on the couch while mackenzie was watching this show. What I realized was that I am just like ruby. I make the biggest deal out of the littlest things with the kids. I do not pick my battles very well. Ruby is constantly trying to correct what max is doing when what he is doing is either working for him or is really not a big deal. It drives me crazy. So i guess i must drive myself crazy. I have seriously got to work on this.

Cleaning---I need a maid. I just cannot keep up with all of it. I hate it. I avoid it like the plague. Sometimes I will just leave my house for the day just to avoid looking at it and then get upset when I have to come back home and see how messy it is again. With gas over 4 dollars i am now just at my house avoiding the messy rooms. One clean room is better than none so I think we will just spend most of our time in that room.

Wii----we finally got one. I have to say it has been a great threat for discipline. The kids love we and we love it. We did get guitar hero aerosmith which jared really loves and i am slowly learning. I did make it through one whole song though. We even got jared's dad to play it. once he got started the competitive side of him wouldn't let him quit without giving each song a few try's.

So hopefully that will cover me for the next few weeks. Below are pictures from the latest events. I hope we don't melt this week. It is supposed to be a 111 today. Honestly that is too hot even for good ol' bako.

What we've been up to these days

Well, aside from my bouts of weird problems we have been doing a few things these days. (FYI I am now dealing with some sort of nasty cough one of these days I will catch a break from having health issues, I am betting I picked it up in the ER since that place has lots of gifts that keep on giving).

The twins and ashton

This summer is going to be a long one. My kids are bored, I'm sick, ashton hasn't been sleeping too well, and I have run out of threats and bribes for my kids. I really need to get on the ball and have some sort of structure for the day but we have had a rough go of it the last week or so. Anyway, mostly we have just been swimming, swimming and swimming some more. My sister and I did take all the kids minus the twins (can you imagine the looks we would have gotten with 8 kids three of which are newborns) to the free movies the other day. It started off pretty good, then Chloe needed to make like 4 or 5 trips to the potty(she is potty training), Mackenzie made 3, landon and tanner made 1, and I am pretty sure we spilled an entire bucket of popcorn on the floor. The movie was only like an hour long so we didn't sit very much. The kids had fun though I think. My sister blessed her babies at home last Sat. so we did have a BBQ over there after the blessing which was fun. Jared has been busy at work although it seems like he has had to take lots of time off to help me, and while I have been sick he has been doing the late night and middle of the night feedings for ashton so he has scored some major points! The kids are patiently awaiting the arrival of Jared's parents. They are coming out for the 4th of July and for ashton's blessing. They can't wait and neither can I, a little extra help in keeping them entertained will be cause for great celebration. So here are a few pics of the last little bit. I am hoping to get some photos of ashton done if I can ever get around to it before he is able to sit on his own. Other good news is that Carrie Underwood is coming to bakersfield in Nov. and we are all going to go and very excited about that. Tickets go on Sale Sat. for those interested. We hope everyone else's summer is going by faster than ours!

Playing at Lindsay's house eventually we found clothes all over the yard

babysitting monroe grandma's dog

mackenzie finally wore herself out

The bookcase jared built for the boys

I just can't get enough.......

Of the hospital apparently. On Thurs. I woke up felt fine for the most part but about mid morning I started to feel kind of blah. Not really sick but just crampy and crummy. I chalked it up to just having ashton 2 weeks prior and thought let's get the kids out of the house and go swimming. So we went and by the time we left my mom's the cramping pain was so bad I could barely walk. I got home and the only thing I wanted to do was sit in a hot bath and try to relax. So that is what I did. While I was trying to feel better, mackenzie was dumping and entire can of formula on my living room floor. Ethan, who was really concerned about how he could help me feel better (note to self anytime I want my children to listen to me I should cry and tell them I don't feel good, and they all of a sudden start listening) got out the vacuum and vacuumed up all the formula and then went around trying to pick things up. Things got worse so I called my mom at work and she said I'll be right over. She got here, got me out of the tub and dressed and started driving like a mad woman to the hospital. You would have thought I was about to deliver a baby in the car. She drops me off at the ER and says she will take the kids and just have Jared come to the hospital. Well a few hours later I finally get seen by the doctor, he orders blood work and some x-rays, and gives me some morphine. Usually it knocks me out but it just took the edge off the pain. They get back the results and think there might be something more there and order a CAT scan to make sure there are no obstructions or other problems. I have now been in the ER for more than 6 hours and they are telling me to drink this nasty stuff for the cat scan. It tasted like NyQuil and there was like 16 oz of it. I chug it only to realize an hour later I have drink another one. Could someone please have some mercy and make that stuff taste better. I get the CAT scan and wait some more for the results. Come to find out that my body was not getting rid of all the extra fluid that you retain when you are pregnant. It was all just sitting around my abdomen and pelvis pushing on all my organs and making me very very uncomfortable. So what could I do about it? Oh nothing I just have to let my body do the work and take some pain meds. Can I say one more time how glad I am that I am not going to be pregnant again in this lifetime. So after taking some diuretic and pain meds I was starting to feel better. But wait I couldn't leave the hospital without getting something. What I got was a UTI from them having to use a catheter for a urine sample. So this weekend was spent recovering from our 12 hour trip to the ER which resulted in us getting home at 3 am, just in time to feed ashton get about 2 hours of sleep then get up with kids and for jared to get ready for work. Luckily jared called in an Rx for me so I didn't have to make another Dr visit, and my mom came over and picked up my house a little and then took me back to her house so she could help with kids and let me get some rest. I do have lots of pictures and lots of updates on kids and what they have been doing but I just had to get the complaining out of my system. My next post will be much much better!

Glorious Sleep

Today Jared took the kids to church and I am staying home with Ashton. Although I did contemplate going to church since I am starting to go a little stir crazy being in the house and church allows me to sit, visit with some people, and still have my other children out of my hair for about 2 hours. I did think however if I showed up I would never hear the end of how crazy I was for being there, so here I am at home peacefully blogging. We are almost a week into having Ashton home. The first few days were total hell. I thought that he was nursing so good and that everything was going fine, who was I kidding. That has never happened to me before so what made me think it would happen now. For two days Ashton did not poop. We went to the Dr. for his first visit and the Dr. said he has lost a lot of weight and he should have pooped. Go home give it the rest of today and bring him in tomorrow for a weight check. So we go in the next day he has lost 2 more ounces and still hasn't popped. Of course I am thinking the worst, something is wrong with him, his insides aren't working right all the crazy stuff. I told the Dr. he is so fussy and just screaming all the time and doesn't sleep well, then he said in his expert opinion, he is probably hungry. What?!! That couldn't be it, are you kidding me. I have three other kids that have survived I am pretty sure I would be able to figure something that simple out. No, oh no it could not just be that simple. Then I thought of a friend Laurie, who had a baby a few months ago. I remember her saying on her blog that her baby was just fussy and she couldn't get anything done and she just wasn't sure what was wrong. Then she figured it out. He was hungry. So I went home started pumping like the Dr. said to get an idea of how much he was taking in from nursing. I wasn't even getting an ounce. So I fed him that then gave him some formula. We now have a completely different kid. He slept the whole day. Woke up to eat, went back to sleep and by the end of the day he finally pooped. A ton I might add.

So he has been so good the last few days since I have been giving him formula after nursing. Last night I fed him at 10 he slept till 3:30, then I fed him again and he went right back to sleep and slept till 7 am. I honestly feel like I got a full nights sleep. So now I have to decided if I am going to continue to try and nurse and supplement or just put him completely on the bottle. My milk still hasn't come in so at this point stopping wouldn't be so so painful. I always hate making this decision. I know it is good for him and it is free but I am pretty sure my sanity and time are just as good for him. As for my other kids, they are in a sad state. Mackenzie has been dressing her self for the last few days. Landon has done nothing but suck his fingers with his ever so loved pillow covering his head, and Ethan just wants to be hovering over Ashton at all times. It can only get better from here right?

I just wanted to tell everyone who has been helping us with meals and kids thank you thank you. The other day my visiting teacher came and got all three of my kids and took them from 11 am to 4:30 pm. Honestly if that can't qualify her as a saint nothing will.

Ashton is here on our 100th post

Well, I made it to 100 posts and I made it through my last pregnancy and delivery. On Mon. the 26th we welcomed Ashton Michael Simpson into our family. He was our biggest kid yet. 8 lbs 12 oz and 21 inches long. The delivery went really really well until it was time to push. That lasted longer than I would have liked. For one, I didn't feel any labor pains at all. They gave me my epidural as soon as I had one bag of IV fluid in me. Then it was a sit and chat and relax with Jared, my mom and my sister. Then they said time to push, I thought great we are almost done. Well, not only was he large he was also sunny side up so every time I pushed he came down, then when I was done he slid right back up. Eventually we got him out, although today I feel like I have been in a serious brawl. I ache from head to toe. We are home and everyone is doing well. Jared has the week off thank goodness. These are a few of the pics. I am slightly embarrassed of the one with my huge leg right in front, but that is the only one I have of me holding him. We think he looks just like Landon when Landon was born, but they change so quick he could end up looking like Ethan or Mackenzie so we'll see. Now I am off to my bed to relax!

Okay after seeing the picture of me and the lower half of my body almost showing, I had to take it out. That was a little too much. Jared said when he took it that he only took it from the top half up since the Dr. was still working on me. Apparently he forgot to look at the lower right part of the screen in the camera. Sorry everyone.