MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Ayva and Cheyenne had a great morning opening gifts from everyone. Thank you so much to all of you for giving to their Christmas.

Denver here we come!!!

For those of you who don't know yet, we are moving to Denver. We will be moving January 4th. We are excited for a new adventure but also sad that we are leaving family and friends.

Thank you to all of you that have helped us with this stressful time we really appreciate it.

Doughnuts continued!!!

Just wanted to inform you all that we did not eat all the doughnuts.

Doughnuts, doughnuts and more doughnuts!!!!

Have any of you ever been to the bakery department at the grocery store when they are getting rid of the doughnuts? Well I was at Hy-Vee tonight and I was sniffing (ha ha ha) around the doughnuts deciding whether I need one or not and the lady came over to get rid of them. She looked at me and said "Ten for a $1." I thought she was joking but realized she wasn't so me thinking "Oh my gosh, that's the best deal I've ever seen!" How silly is that? How many doughnuts do we need between two people? And do I really need to eat any of those? Certainly not but it's a curse, doughnuts are my favorite treat. There was this guy that heard what she said too so he dove in there and said, "oh my kids will love this!" And as I got in there I said,"Oh my husband will kill me!" So I filled up the box with ten doughnuts and then I saw another doughnut thinking, "well that one looks good too, and that one too, oh and I have to have a sugary twist one and so on." How stupid is that?!!! Again, how many doughnuts do you need between two people? So the lady and I counted them up and I got 20 (I'm so embarrassed to even write that) but yes, 20 doughnuts.

As I walked off thanking the lady for thousands of calories in a box I saw that she only put $1. So I got 20 doughnuts for $1. Isn't that just sick and wrong?!! The funny thing is after the first one I have I'm going to be sick of them. Isn't that funny how we do that. You have something that you love so much, you get a good deal on it, think that it's the greatest thing and you take more than you should have in a year! Well that's what happened to me tonight.
FYI...We are not going to be able to eat all of them (at least I hope) but I'll keep you posted.

I hope my stupidity brings laughter into your life.

Have a good one and enjoy a doughnut once in a while!!!

ICE STORM

For those of you who have not had the pleasure of experiencing an ice storm, this is what happens! There's ice everywhere.

This is looking outside our back door. We had snow

and then the ice storm came and now there is a layer

of ice on everything.

Those are power lines behind our house.

Because of all the ice, last night we lost power. It started to get cold so the four of us went upstairs (hot air rises) to sleep together.

Ayva had a great time jumping on her mattress.

Cheyenne's Home!!!

Just wanted to update everyone. Cheyenne's home and is doing well. She had her first doctor's appointment and is back up to her birth weight 8lbs. 7oz. She sleeps all the time, which I'm sure later Josh and I will look back on this time and wish she was this age again. She's very cute, smiles all the time and is so fragile. Josh and I always talk about how sturdy Ayva was when she was born. Josh is afraid to hold her sometimes because she is so fragile. Ayva is very curious about her, everytime she sees the baby she laughs. Today Avya woke up from a nap, came out to the living room, looked in the carrier and saw that Cheyenne wasn't in there and she said, "oh no." I'll get some more pictures on here, I'm working on her baby announcement right now.

Hello everyone, I'm here!!!

Hello, my name is Cheyenne Bates. I came into the world on November 5th, 2007 weighing in at 8lbs. 7oz. and 21 inches long. I hear my mom has big babies with full heads of hair. Apparently mom had an appointment to have me on Monday at 3:30pm. Mom and Dad went to the hospital at 1:30pm and got settled in. The nurse got mom all prepped and ready for the surgery then mom started to go into labor. I decided to come. Mom was in a lot of pain and the nurse came in to tell her that her doctor was still in another surgery so mom had to wait. They finally got her in the operating room at 5pm. They gave mom some drugs and she felt so much better. Dad came in and I arrived at about 5:30pm. They were getting me all cleaned up and Dad was taking pictures while mom was getting closed up. Dad and I went to the nursery to get all the measurements and mom went back to her room. We finally met up with mom in the room and my sister Ayva, Grandma Payzant, Grandpa Payzant and Aunt Brittany were there to meet me.

The nurse came in to check on me and said I was breathing too fast. They ended up putting me under an oxygen hood and they told mom and dad what was going on. It took them a while to figure out what was going on with me and the doctors finally decided that I needed to go to Children's Mercy Hospital. I don't know all the medical terms that they were using but apparently I had under developed lungs and there was a leak in one of them. The air in my lungs was going into my chest cavity so they had to put a chest tube in to extract that air. They also had to put a tube down my throat so I could breath.

So they transported me to the other hospital and mom had to stay. Dad and Grandpa Payzant came to be with me. Mom was able to leave the hospital Wednesday and came to see me.

I finally got to see mom and she was very happy to see me. Mom, Dad, my grandparents and my sister have been coming up to see me. I keep getting better everyday. They got to hold me and feed me and I think that made them very happy. The nurses that take care of me have been very good. I plan on coming home next week but we'll see how it goes. So this has been my life story so far.

Halloween!!!

As you can tell, I'm Dorothy. Totto was camera shy and didn't want to go trick or treating with me. Mom and Dad took me trunk or treating at the church and I was a little shy but got some candy. Mom didn't get any pictures of me trunk or treating because she was taking me around to the cars. Hope you guys had fun on Halloween too!!! Sorry it took so long to share my pictures with you. My mom will share some pictures of my new sister soon.

Ayva's Sister!

So yesterday we went in for an ultrasound and found out that it is a girl. I just hope the technician didn't get it wrong and we are surprised when the baby comes out. Anyways, the baby has hair and she estimated that the baby is 6lbs. 10oz. and for her age she is in the 75th percentile on weight. The delivery is set for November 5th, in about 3 weeks. That just seems like forever to me. I guess it's not as bad as going over 2 weeks.

I Like To Climb On Mommy!!!

I love climbing on mommy, she has become my jungle gym!

My New Bed!!!

This is my new bed. Mom and Dad decided to try just a mattress on the floor first to see if I would take to it ok. I loved it and have been sleeping on it ever since. Sometimes I'll fall asleep half on the bed and half on the floor.

Ayva's 18 month pictures!!!

So I finally have some new stuff to post. These are a few pictures I took for her 18 month pictures. She is the hardest kid to take pictures of. Can you believe it, my daughter is difficult with picture taking.

OUR TRIP TO UTAH!!!

I finally got around to posting pictures of our trip. Sorry for the delay. So we went camping while we were there. Well we attempted to anyway. As you can see it's really wet and Ayva managed to find every puddle and splash in it. When we got to the camp site we all pitched our tents and then we had a big down pour with hail. Tents and sleeping bags got wet and it was dark and cloudy all day. The boys and Emily went fishing, then we had a dutch oven dinner and then roasted marshmallows. We then decided to pack up and call it a day.





Ayva looking for the puddles and Grandma saved her from one.




It was a little cold so we bundled Ayva up in the blanket and put her in the stroller. That blue tent would have been our tent for the night.


Here are a couple pictures I took after the storm while camping. I just thought they were cool so I thought I'd share them with you all.