The What If's in life

I know that often when things are going bad in your life you often start to think about all of the what if's that you have in you life. It could be the What if I took that other job that I was offered instead of staying where I was comfortable. or during the worst moments, what if I had actually married my old boyfriend instead of the husband that I have been married to for 9 1/2 years. The What ifs always sound better than the current situation, but are they really? Why can't we be happy with the What did happen.

There are many moments in my life that I wish that I could go back in time and change, but if I did would I be where I am today. I would like to think that the mistakes that I made while I was younger have made me a better person today for them. Although life isn't perfect and I often start thinking about the what if's, but than I have to remember that if I hadn't taken the What Did path I wouldn't have three beautiful girls who are the light of my life and I wouldn't have a husband that I love more than life itself.

This has been my main train of thought today for some reason and of course, it's almost 2am and I can't sleep so I am writing. But I think that the world overall would be a happier place if we all started to be more thankful for what we have and stop thinking about what we could've had. Because if we really think about it, would that other job make you any happier, or would it create less stress in your life? If I had chosen to marry an old boyfriend would life be simpler? No matter what choices we have made, they are the right ones for us. Even if things don't work out, I think that everything happens for a reason. I was supposed to be here now. Before I was even born I believe that I made the choices that I wanted for my life. Knowing that there would be hard times and happy times, and that I would need to take the bad to be able to get to the good parts.

Just like in a book, if you skip over the boring parts, sometimes you miss much of the information to understand the ending. I'm not sure where my ending is, but I do know that I am going to start being happy with all of the What Did's in my life instead of pondering on the What if's. I think that just doing that will make my life simpler.

I think having time without my kids and without my husband has made me realize how lucky I really am. Because honestly where would I be without them. They are the light of my life and they make my life worth loving during the tough times.

Once again I apologize for not making much sense during my late night/early morning rantings.

In between asleep and wide awake

I know, I know I really should start getting into the habit of writing in the daytime, that way maybe I end up awake in the night feeling like I have some writing to do. Currently I am in between the stages of being asleep and being wide awake. I have at a few moments been asleep. At least from what I can tell. Mike is also having a hard time sleeping. So he is in the other room watching a movie and I am sitting bed typing.

I didn't get the job at the real estate company that I thought that I would. So my mom and I started planning our trip out to North Carolina so that we could visit Natalie, and go to book signing of Safe Haven that Nicholas Sparks just released today. We were scheduled to leave on Friday Morning. It was going to be a lot of fun. But while I was at the temple on Tuesday with the stake relief society I had been praying about the my job search and being able to support the family and continue to let Mike work on school without him going to work. On the way home I got a call from the temp agency that I work for, and they asked if they could submit a job application in for me. I said sure, not really even thinking about it. But the next day as my mom and I on the phone were looking at hotels and talking about her actually being able to go anywhere the day after surgery, I started to get a little nervous about the trip. I had to run to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things, I had all three girls with me and Laura from Kelly Services called to let me know that the job she submitted the day before would like me to start immediately. So the trip was canceled.

But on the plus side I do now have a job, at least for the next month. It is at ARUP laboratories at the Blood Bank in the U of U hospital. It as actually been really fun to be back at the hospital where we have so many memories from the NICU. It is also letting me get refreshed on the programs that I haven't used in 5 months. I know that I am good with a computer and with the Microsoft office 07 software, but after 5 months of non-use I have become a little rusty. So hopefully I can use this temp job as a buffer to relearn many of my skills and get adapted into a business setting. I have applied for another position for a company that I would love to work for. It is a private security firm, and I would be an office assistant, but the pay is good, not too far from home, and the best part is the benefits. They pay 100% of your medical expenses, there aren't any monthly premiums, family or individual deductibles, and no co-pays. Among many other fantastic benefits. So please, if anyone out there actually reads this, pray for me to get this new job. There also might be a possibilities that Mike would work a temporary 6 week stint down at the plant for the outage. They would need him to work 12 hr days for 6-7 days a week. At least that is what he says. I am guessing that they have to give him more time off, but I could be wrong. The good thing about him doing temp work out there, is that he will be able to have a chance to work out at the Delta power plant without being completely signed on with them, so he can see if he actually likes it or not. And the other added bonus is that he would be able to bring home a good amount of money for us to put into savings, and Christmas, among many other needed items.

The past week or two I have been trying to be more spiritual and be more vigilant about going to the Temple, reading my scriptures more often and saying my prayers with a more sincere heart. I know that it has made my days go better, and my ability to get angry quickly is slowly slipping away. There have also been the two experiences that have really touched me while at the temple, and it was after those sessions that the job search became more positive. I had been going to the temple fairly often, but after the time that I ended up at the Bountiful temple and did Inititories, I started to get calls about interviews and was able to practice my interview skills and get them to where I want them. Then after the last week with the Relief Society, was when I got called into do this temp job. So hopefully I can continue to go forward with the spirit that I have recently had and keep it going for my family.

Well I am going to go to bed, or at least try, I have to wake up in 4 hrs and go to work. So until next time my insomnia hits....

Growing Pains

I think that I have officially deemed that I can only add to this in the middle of the night. Amazingly enough I did fall asleep fairly easily tonight (last night) is was even at the decent parent hour of 11pm. Only to find Elizabeth in my bed snuggled up to me about an hour later. She had had a bad dream. She moved onto the couch where she has a little more light and less distractions from her sisters. Once again I was able to go right back to sleep. But I must have only been sleeping for about 20 minutes when I hear crying. I went to check on Elizabeth but she was fast asleep. I went into the girls room and Megan was sitting up in her bed crying. I tried to lay down with her, but she wasn't having any of that. She quickly crawled out of her bed, and walked practically ran down the hallway to my room where she crawled into bed. She snuggled with Mike, but wouldn't stop crying. She asked for a band aid and showed me her foot. Which looked perfectly fine. So I went to the only conclusion that I could think of, she is growing, again. I grabbed my I pod, turned it on to Up, and gave it to her. I went and got some Tylenol and gave that to her. That's when she finally started to calm down. It took her watching up almost twice before she crawled out of bed, went to get her sippy, handed it to me, and asked for milk. Once she had her milk and her princess and her Princess and the Frog blanket, she was finally willing to go to her bed and stay there without complaint.

After putting her to bed, one I realized that my I pod was about to die and I would not be able to turn on my music to fall asleep to, and then it hit me that Megan might be going through physical Growing Pains, but the rest of us are also having our own version of Growing Pains. After 4 1/2 months of neither Mike or I working we have had to Grow up with our financial planning, unemployment oddly doesn't pay very much. Although I feel really good about the interview that I went to today. It is for a Corporate real estate firm, I would be the Office Manager at their American Fork satellite office. It sounds like a great job for me and my personality. I really hope that I get it. Mike is still working on getting his school done. Although he only has 10 more classes to take before he has his Bachelors degree. The bad part, at least in my opinion, is that he is planning on taking the test at the power plant down in Delta, where his dad and brother work. It pays really well, and they have good benefits and other advantages. But I don't feel like it is right for us to move to Delta. I Love his family and all, but I don't think that I could handle living that close. But I understand that he wants to start supporting us and not being the stay at home dad anymore. It could be worse. So congrats for us for beginning to move forward.

Elizabeth started 2nd grade on Tuesday. She seems to be really enjoying her class, but anytime that you change to something new at that age it is a little stressful. I met with her teacher and he seems fantastic. I was able to talk with him about my concerns with her focus problems, and he started suggesting ways to try and help her. I was really impressed with how accommodating he is. Grace starts Kindergarten this coming Tuesday. We saw her class list on Thursday, and we went over all of the names of the kids in her class and she didn't know any of them. All of the girls from the neighborhood that are her age were in the other class. We talked about how she new some of the boys, and how she would be able to make a whole bunch of new friends. She had been really excited to start school. But when we pulled into the parking lot today to pick up Elizabeth and drop off some papers for her, she told me that she ad changed her mind and didn't want to go to Kindergarten because she didn't know anybody. So while I was in the school I talked to the secretary, the principal, and both of the Kindergarten teachers and we arranged it so she could be in the class with the other girls from the neighborhood. So now she feels much better.

The other hard part is changes in the neighborhood. We knew it would happen with where we are living, but at the same time it is very hard for the kids. A few weeks ago, we looked out the window and saw a moving truck in front of one of the house where both of the two older girls had good friends living. They hadn't told anyone that they were leaving. So it was really hard for Grace especially to lose one of her best friends. Luckily the family that moved into the house is really cool. They have three boys who are around the same ages as my girls. Plus Mike and I get along really well with the parents. We had them over for dinner and game night and we had a blast. We have another set of friends that will be moving out f the neighborhood in a week or two. That is the really hard one. They have all girls, with the right ages for all of my girls to have a best friend. We hardly see a day where they are not playing together. In fact Grace and their 5 year old are almost like twins. We have to remember what each of them was wearing to tell them apart from a distance. It will be really hard to see them go, but luckily they aren't going far, so we will be able to plan play dates for them.

So all in all we are all growing in our own little world. However I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for me and for my family. I figure as long as I am doing what I need to be doing, the Lord will take care of the rest. He will guide me to the job that I am supposed to be at. I still think that he knew I needed to be able to have this summer to spend with my family and spend time appreciating being a mommy and the work that Mike has done with our girls to turn them into the little angels they have become.

An Update

So once again I am here in the wee hours of morning, 3:30 am to be precise. I have been sleeping like a rock for a few months, and I truly mean like a rock for 12, sometimes 14 hours a night. But for the last three nights I have only gotten around 5-6 hours if I am lucky. I was actually able to fall asleep tonight, (last night) not sure what to call it at this point.
But now that I am up I felt like this was a good time to go to my "journal" and update what has been going on in my life since I last wrote. The new year began and everything was looking great. We were even playing the responsible game with our tax return for the first time in years. We prepaid our rent for a year, little did we know how much we would appreciate and be grateful that we did. On March 22nd, I was told that I would be part of the group that was being Furloughed from Continental on April 11th. At first I was really upset, but I have come to the realization that my Heavenly Father knows me better than I know myself and he knew that I needed to be able to spend some time with my kids. So I was able to spend all summer with them and just have fun with them. The only difference being we had a lot less money to work with. I started going back to the temple and it has been great to have the free time to be able to do that. I have been able to spend more time with Mike and strengthen our own relationship with each other. I am not sure if it would be appropriate or not, but sometimes I feel like I should send CO a Thank You card for including me in on the furlough.
I have continued to look for new work, but I am only applying for positions that I would really want if I got them. I have had a few interviews, but I don't think that the right job has come into view yet. I think that I am supposed to be able to send Elizabeth and Grace off to their first days at school. Then go on a trip with my mom before my flight benefits run out. I think that after doing things for myself and for my family I will be able to find that perfect job.
Speaking of school, I can't believe how grown up my babies have become. Elizabeth will be starting 2nd grade and Grace will start Kindergarten all before the month ends. It's amazing how fast they grow up. It will also be nice to spend some one on one time with Megan. She is becoming very grown up and so smart. It is just amazing to see my miracle babies grow up.
the other good thing about being laid off was that I have been able to take some time for myself. I started walking one morning to be alone with my thoughts and I ended up finding it really relaxing. I know go walking / jogging 6.5 miles almost every night. My lungs are starting to function better, I can even do a strait out run for short distances now. The best news of all is that since the beginning of July when I started this, I have lost a total of 26 lbs. It probably has to do with a lot of factors, (stress, loss of appetite, etc) but I like to chalk it up to my hard work on walking.
I wish that I could convey the worries that I do have for my family, which is what I believe is currently what is keeping me up. But to be honest, I don't know how to put them into words. I worry about being a good mom, as well as a good wife. There are moments that I feel like I am exceeding at one but not the other, times where I feel like I have exceeded expectations in both areas, and then there are time where I feel like I have failed all together. I guess I will try once again to sleep on that one and hopefully be able to explain it at the very least when I ocme back.

The best made plans

Why is it that the best of plans all end in a horrible crash. Luckily it wasn't a physical crash for us this week, but it so easily could have been. Let me start at the beginning. We wanted to surprise the girls for Grace's Birthday. So we had planned on flying to Houston, going to dinner, and then flying home. Or at least it seemed to be a good plan. We got on the flight going to Houston, but when we looked at flight home and found that we were screwed. We could get going in any direction going towards home for at least three days. I was supposed to be back at work the next day.

So I had a full on anxiety attack realizing what has about to happen. Then I realized that I had to buck up and make the most of this situation. It was a birthday trip, and I first and foremost wanted to have fun. So we re-rented the car rental and hit the road. So we drove from Houston to Dallas. We stopped in Dallas to give my mom a chance to see her Sister and my kids to have a break and play with some other kids for a little while. When we left Dallas, we headed to Oklahoma City, the next place that we would lay our heads. We slept well (especially the kids), and the next day we drove all the way through the rest of Oklahoma, into Kansas, got to the middle, and turned west. We made it to Denver for the stop of the night. Rogers house. It's a great little house, the only downside is that Roger has a Dog, and Grace is very allergic. Even after a dose of benedryl before entering the house, and Roger vacuuming the area numerous times, we still had to give her another dose and make her stay in the room with no carpet and the dog doesn't go near. She finally fell asleep breathing easier.

We woke in Denver and knew that by the time we go to bed tonight, it will be in our own beds. All I could say is that I am incredibly grateful that it was only my mom and my two older girls were with us. The girls were great, the first actual fight between them wasn't until we dropped off the car and were on our way home. Which after 1666 miles and three days in a car I consider this to be a miracle

So our trip that we planned on being a maximum of 18 hrs, turned into 4 days. All of the best made plans can always go wrong

On the plus side I think that my girls had fun, and we all learned a lot.
1.Never fly standby near Christmas time.
2.Even if you only plan on being there less than one day, pack for a few days
3.If you have children under the age of 10 have games and other entertainment
4.Kansas has a museum for everything, there are at least 3 per exit.

On a last note of the best made plans, I am sick myself, and have a very sick 2 year old. So I am going to go and attend to her.

I will return soon to go over Christmas.

Randomness (is that a word)

My girls at Gardner Village October 2009

So... I realized tonight that it has been well over a year since I have even come near my blog. I guess it isn't working quite as I thought that it would. Although if you read the first post you will see that I really didn't have a reason to create the blog. Well unless you count me being tired and not having anything better to do. (Mainly because sleeping was evading me.) Sleep still evades me and I wonder why I even take medication to help with Insomnia. It's obviously not working. But I digress...(or do I sense I named this Randomness?)

As an update it is now December of 2009 and we are almost to the end of birthday season. When I initially got pregnant with my first I remember thinking how great my due date was. February 2nd. It is still in winter (because summer is a horrible time to be hugely pregnant, as well as being a horrible season) and it is after Christmas. But then come to find out, my body apparently doesn't like the third trimester. It's either deliver the baby early or have a stroke. I choose to deliver the baby. I here I was thinking that I was going to have my baby come in February and now here she is on December 8th. 6 days after my husbands birthday. The same thing happened with the next two except now I know that they will come early. So in the end I planned on having one child born in February, and two born in January , but ended up having 2 in December and 1 in November. So now on Halloween (my birthday) we begin birthday season. My Baby Megan is November 16th (due January 1st), My husband on December 2nd, my oldest Elizabeth is December 8th (due February 2nd) then we wrap up birthday season with Grace (the middle one) on December 17 (due January 9th). Once all of that is done we can finally start wo worry about Christmas.

I am getting ready to have the big girls birthday party this saturday. Since their birthdays are 9 days apart they are forced (for now) to have a shared birthday party. I don't know if you can call this party a princess theme. But it's what I am calling it, even if there isn't much princess stuff involved. The organized former wanna be teacher in me thought that doing centers would be the best way to contain 10 little girls ranging from 4 - 8 yrs old in a small house. Their will be one center that will allow each girl to decorate her own cupcake. (yes I know it may be a disaster in the making.) Another center will be getting their nails done. The final one will have this game that I found where you get to try and shoot Gus-Gus into Cinderella's Coach. The girl who get's the most of her Gus-Guses into the carriage wins. Hopefully it will turn out OK.

While typing I realized that to me ths really isn't a blog in the typical sense. It almost seems more like a journal to me. Although thinking about it in that sense kinda makes me think, cause why on earth would I ever have a journal that was online. If we were to look back at the Journals that I kept back in high school, there is no way that I would want to have any of that information available to anyone. Which makes me wonder again where they are and if my husband has read them. I really hope not, cause the journal of a high school girl contains what you think it would contain. Every happy buzz that I had (mostly about boys), as well as the entries that tell about my saddest moments (mostly concerning boys once again). I started this blog thinking that I could get a good record of my husband and my story, but I think that I need to rethink this and consider this my story which includes him. Cause let's face it... he's never going to blog, I don't even think he knows that I have set this up.

I warned you that I was in a random thinking mode.

You know it's kinda funny looking back even as far as this small journal (it is no longer a blog to me) goes. Life goes on and you think that everything is changing so fast that you can't keep up, but then you realize that it all is pretty much the same. I still work in the same job that I was complaining about a year ago, I haven't gone anywhere and the stress is still just as high. I still can't sleep. I still lay awake at night wondering where my life is going and if I made the right choices. My husband drives me nuts, but I still love him more than anything. My kids are growing up everyday and I feel like I am missing everything. I still have all the same problems that I did when I originally started this. It seems like this year has been full of changes, but looking back, it hasn't changed at all.

Mike want me to come to bed, where I will attempt to sleep and most likely fail. So I am done rambling... I am not sure when I will return, but now that this is my journal I may think to come back more often.

Our Story (the condensed version)

We are the Stewarts, I am Ann and My Husband is Mike. I work at Continental Airlines, and Mike is going to school online and stays at home with our girls. We have been married for 6 ½ years, and have three beautiful girls. The story of our marriage is not exactly typical however. In fact I think we almost gave both of our parents a heart attack everyday for a month straight.

Mike and I met while working at Maceys in Provo. I worked in the bakery and Mike was the “cute meat department boy” as I described him to my friends. I had a crush on him for two months before our first date. Our dating relationship was a whirlwind, one of the reasons that we almost gave our parents a heart attack. On our forth date, only hours after holding hands for the first time. We were watching a movie together, and the spirit whispered to me “Tell him that you love him.” My first thought was “What?...I just met the guy, no way will I say that.” For the next half an hour I was told to tell him that I loved him, and was unwilling to say it. When I realized that it really was what I was supposed to do, I had to figure out how to say it without making Mike think that I was crazy. So I finally told him “I think that I may have fallen for you” He replied with “I think that I may have fallen for you too….In fact I think my search is over.” Before I even had a chance to think about what I was saying I replied, “Well I have known since Saturday,” which was the day of our first date. Mike’s response to that was, “So… do you want to get married?” “Sure” was al I said. We sat quietly for the next few minutes. Then I asked, “So does this mean we’re engaged?” “Yeah I think so.” And that is how my husband proposed to me.

We had planned on a nice long engagement, but our wedding date kept changing. With the very sudden engagement, there was more than the usual drama associated with a wedding. We had made the decision that since we weren’t exactly the most active at the time, we would have a civil wedding then be sealed later when we were ready, which only caused more drama. We moved our wedding date from June to April, and were being told that the marriage shouldn’t happen almost on a daily basis. We were sick of it. One day as we were talking we decided that we should go and get our marriage license and that way we had to get married in the next 30 days. So we did. On our way back we were going over our schedule and thinking what day seemed logical to get married. We then decided, tonight is the only good night. So at 4:00 in the afternoon we started planning our wedding that would happen later that night. . Mike went into work, and asked if he could have the night off, just in case he happened to get married that night. We started by telling my mom and dad. My mom is a teacher and it happened to be parent teacher conference night at the school where she taught. So we went to the school and while she was waiting for the next set of parents we told her that we wanted to get married sooner. She asked when we thought sooner would be, and we said tonight after she was done would be good. You could see another almost heart attack in the works. She told us that it wouldn’t work because we had to get a marriage license and that they were closed by now. I don’t think she was too happy when we told her that we already had it. She reluctantly agreed to it. Our next step was to get my bishop to agree to marry us, and to figure out where we would get married. After talking to my sister in law and my bishop, it was agreed that we would get married at my brother’s house at 9:30 that night. Nobody was overly excited about it, except for us. But everyone who could come from our families were there. So we were married in February, one month and 7 days after our first date. Since we had essentially eloped we kept our reception date in April and were sealed in the temple on our one year anniversary. Mike also redeemed himself for his overly casual proposal, by giving me an anniversary ring. As he gave it to me, he whispered “Ann will you join me in eternity now?”

It seems that any big events in our lives happen with very short notice. Even the births of our children were not when we had planned. As it turns out my body really doesn’t like it when I am pregnant. I had morning sickness for the first 6 months of each pregnancy, and then when it finally went away I am put on bed rest for the remainder of the pregnancy with pre-eclampsia. Elizabeth, who is now 5, was born 8 weeks early, and spent her first 5 weeks in the Newborn ICU. She was our smallest at 3lbs 1oz. It’s hard to believe that our little peanut has grown so much and is about to start kindergarten this week. Grace, who is now 3, was only 4 weeks early and was able to come home with us, since she was over 5lbs. Bubbles as we called her, is by far my silliest she always wants to make you laugh. And Megan, who is 9 months, was born 7 weeks early and spent 5 weeks and two days in the NICU. My little Caboose-a-moose, since she is our final child, is the chunkiest baby we have had, and is currently getting into everything.