My 1st Residency

As I have gotten some questions about this, I thought I'd clarify. The program I'm in divides the classes into two halves. At the end of each half, they have you attend a residency. The residencies are only a week long and take place around the country. I have one class left in the first half and will be completing that this summer. We decided it would be vastly easier to do a residency with the baby in me than out of me. At the end of September, I'll fly to Phoenix for a week. Rob has taken the time off work and will stay home with the kids.

I did the first half of my classes in about 18 months, but I think we're going to try and stretch the second half out a bit longer, maybe 2.5 years. I'll only take one class a quarter instead of doubling up every other quarter and maybe every once in a while I'll take a summer off :) When I finish my classes and my residencies, I start my internships (700 hours stretched over 3 quarters). We had planned it so I would start my internships about 2 months after Jack started school full-time and finish a week after school let out for the summer. If we stick to that plan, the baby will only be about 18 months old.

There is a 6 year cap on my program, but as I've been working my way through it at a pretty good pace, I have a bit of wiggle room. I think we're going to try and push starting my residencies back another year. That will still give me 6 months leeway for emergencies or whatever, but the baby will be almost 3 before I start. The first quarter of internships I have to do 100 hours over 10 weeks, which only translates to about 10 hours a week. Easy peasy :) The next two quarters I'll have to do 300 hours each over 10 weeks, so that's about 30 hours a week. That will be a bit harder, but it's only 20 weeks total. I've had two friends offer to provide childcare for the baby and my parents may be down here too, so there will be options :)

We think we've decided :)

If the baby's a boy, he will be Greyson Daniel.

If it's a girl, she will be Eva Grace.

Short list of baby names

We've picked a girl's name for now ~ Eva Grace

We have the boy's names down to five ~

Grayson
Colby
Kade
Stuart
Cody

Grayson and Colby are our favorites at the moment :)

Another quarter over!!!

Sorry for the lack of recent posts! I've had a ton of homework the past few weeks and with everything else on top of that haven't had time to do anything :) Friday was the last day of my spring quarter. I took Theories of Psychotherapy and Marriage and Family Systems. Both classes required 18 (or so) page term papers, plus I had a project due for one as well. I got everything done and turned in on time! Thank you so much to Rob especially for all his help, and also to Beca and Brittney for watching the kids on various days so I could get homework done and so the kids could have fun! I have my final grade for Marriage and Family Systems - 100%!!! :) I did not get a 100% in Psychotherapy as I didn't do well on what I thought was a quick quiz, which turned out to be a test worth 15% of my grade, and am still waiting to get my term paper grade back, but I had a 100% before the test and currently have a 96%. As long as I get above an 82 on my term paper, I have an A in that class as well :) If so, I am still managing to maintain my 4.0! I know a lot of the credit goes to God as well as I know I couldn't have made it through without His help! I'll get 3 weeks off (I think) and then start the summer term. I'm only taking one class though, the final class in the first section of my degree program. I'm going to my first residency at the end of September. It's in Phoenix, so to those of you out there, we'll have to get together!

Other than school, I've been working on church stuff. We've had two activities in the last few weeks, plus I gave a talk in sacrament meeting (our main meeting where everyone is together) and taught RS (the women's class) one Sunday as well. My morning sickness has not gotten any better. I'm still on those anti-nausea meds, which help, but I try not to take them too often. I think I've actually shrunk the last few weeks. My dr told me I need to eat more. I'm trying :) Nothing sounds good though. We made our appointment for the big sonogram, where we'll find out the gender of the baby. It's three weeks from today :) It will be an interesting appointment as all four kids, plus Rob and Brittney will be there :) I still have no clue as to the gender. I'm guessing girl still I think as I was so sure when I found out we were pregnant that it was a girl. Rob's pretty sure it's a boy though and I have to admit that this pregnancy is much closer to Jack's than any of the girls'. I would love to have another boy so Jack gets a brother, but on the other hand, I'm concerned that having two boys will increase the trouble they get into exponentially, so a girl would be fine too :)

We had names all picked out, both boy and girl, but have recently decided they weren't quite right, so we've gone back to the drawing board. The discussion today is about boy names. The middle name will be Daniel. First name possibilities at the moment include ~

Cody
Tyler
Edward
Kade
Kingsley
Stuart
Sidney
Greyson
Wyatt
Colby

We welcome any thoughts or suggestions, but make no promises to change our opinions because of them :) My top two names at the moment are Greyson and Colby. Rob refuses to express any favoritism, but when pushed, says those two are ones he likes as well. I'll post girl name possibilities when we have them :)

The kids are doing well. We're enjoying summer and spending lots of time at the pool :) Brittney's neighbor has a wonderful pool that usually isn't very crowded and has the benefit of being free :) We've gone swimming 3-4 times a week, always with Brittney and sometimes with Travis and/or Susan. The kids all have tan lines, which Rob is very impressed with. He said his family never had them because they just burned. Megan got Rob's skin so we have to reapply her sunscreen every hour or so, but the other kids got my Italian skin and tan beautifully :)

The Return of the Jungle Pool

It's hit the mid 90's for the last week or two straight, so today we took out the "jungle pool" and set it up in the backyard. The kids were thrilled, although it took a bit of searching to find bathing suits for everyone and we've discovered that we really need to buy Megan a new bathing suit.

The kids had a lot of fun, although Beth got very upset when her arm got wet (having to keep her cast dry for a month made an impression). They set up a sort of slip and slide, running across the grass and sliding across the pool. Beth decided to swing instead. I got a few pictures before she got out of the pool though :)

Birthdays, Sewing and Pumping Iron

A couple of pictures of Kylie's birthday ~


Attempting to hold everything she got from school that day ~


Kylie was very adamant about this pose with the peg board she got from Sus, Travis and Christy ~


Jack with what's left of his much beloved foam swords ~


Jack fell asleep watching tv on Saturday ~


Even though Rob still wasn't feeling 100% on Monday, he and I tried to work on organizing the house. One of the things he did was redo the library. In the process, he took out everything we had been storing in there (as we have no closets - note to self - never buy a house without sufficient closet space) and we rediscovered three beautifully embroidered pillow covers my grandmother gave to me before she died. I have tried for quite a few years to find round pillows the right size to use the covers, but have decided they don't exist. I finally bought stuffing for them and decided to just sew them shut. I didn't buy enough though, so they were all half stuffed and that was where the project had ended. I bought more stuffing, but hadn't finished it. I called Megan down and she was thrilled to finish stuffing the pillows! After they were stuffed, I gave her some basic sewing lessons and handed her a needle and thread. Megan sewed them shut! She did really well considering it was her first time sewing! She had so much fun and even offered to teach her friend who came over for a while how to "sue" (her pronunciation of sew as she keeps picturing the word in her head and thinking that's how it should sound) since she was now an expert :) I love that we've added a new memory to those pillows!


Before bed the other night, Jack announced to me that he needed to do his exercises. Rob uses weights in his workouts and after watching him, Jack decided it was necessary. Jack apprehended Rob's shoe trees and with much grunting managed to do several sets of overhead presses ~


School gets out this Friday, which we are all really looking forward to! Megan and Kylie had their awards ceremony yesterday, which we did not go to as no one told us when it was. Both girls completed their respective years of school (obviously :) ). Megan got an art award as some of her art work was chosen to be displayed at the school district's art show! Kylie got two awards. She got one of the art awards for outstanding achievement and she got a music award for outstanding achievement! We're so proud of both our girls!

I have to say, I'm grateful this school year is over. We really have not been impressed with Megan's teacher. She's nice, but has not helped or encouraged Megan like her other two teachers did. On the other hand though, Megan finally got her Hughes High Flier Award from this teacher, although I was ticked that with everything Megan has done, her teacher gave it to her because Megan made a balloon animal for her son. Oh, well. It meant a lot to Meg to get the award. Kylie's teacher has been wonderful, as have Megan's other two teachers, and their school district is supposed to be the best in the area, so we're hoping this teacher is just a fluke.

I'm doing ok. Still not feeling great, which has me a bit concerned since morning sickness usually peaks at 9 weeks and I'm at 12 and am still dealing with it. I guess worst case scenario it ends in 6 months when the baby's born! We're keeping busy. I talked in church on Sunday and am teaching in Relief Society (the women's class) this coming Sunday, plus I have two 18 page term papers due the following Sunday, so life's been a bit hectic. I'll be glad when this quarter's over in two and a half weeks! Rob is doing amazingly well at work and will start doing client visits soon! We have a date this weekend (with Travis :) ) to go see Andy McKee, who plays acoustic guitar. He's one of Rob's favorites, so we're really looking forward to it. Brittney is really looking forward to spending time with the kids :)

Beth got her cast off yesterday afternoon and her x-rays look perfect, so she is now cast-less!!! Yay!!! We can't wait to hit the pools! Beth, Jack and I are headed out this morning to the pool at the gym (they have a kid's pool as well as two lap pools) for an hour or so :)