Good-bye Flyn

Dear Flyn,
You were a good puppy that we enjoyed having.  You were very cute and fun to have around (Eden).  I loved to pet you (Emma).  I liked it when you chased the ball (Isaac).  Gog (Ammon).  While your time with us was cut short, we're glad we got to know you for a while! 
Love,
Eden, Isaac, Emma, Ammon
PS-For those who don't know, Flyn passed away in the middle of November.  It turns out that he had an enlarged heart and a strangulated testicle.  The vet wasn't sure which of the two did it, but one of them did, and possibly a combo of both!

Halloween

We got to dress up a lot this year for Halloween.  We went to a trunk-or-treat at my parent's ward in Sandy with my side of the family.  We also went to Rob's sister's church for another trunk-or-treat, and we also dressed up the whole family on Halloween itself to go trick-or-treating!  The kids had fun dressing up so much, and it was fun spending time with family!

Random Catchup

I guess one good thing about getting the flu is I have a lot of down time to catch up on things!!  I wanted to post some random pictures from the last couple of months that I just haven't had time to do lately!

We went to Swiss Days in September, and the girls both got these cute tiara's.  They wanted to put their hair in curlers, so the next day, which was Sunday, they got all cute for church!  I love the picture with all the kids so happy except Isaac!  I can't remember why he was upset, but he was!

When we were at Bear Lake with Rob's sister, the condos we stayed at had a swimming pool that the kids had tons of fun playing at!  They loved the slide, and going off the diving board.  I wish I had taken better pictures, but at least there are a couple!

We have also enjoyed going to the zoo a few times this last year.  The kids have fun, and loved riding these wooden horses!

Finally, Ammon has really been growing these last few months!  He is turning from a baby to a little boy and thinks he is one of the big kids!  One of my favorite new things he says is when you do something he doesn't like, such as change the TV channel, or something like that, he says "Hey", but more in a "Heeeyyyyy" type of way!  It's so funny and cute!  He will also wave bye to me now when he is leaving to go upstairs!  He also likes to follow me around when I have to clean up after the puppy and say "Ka-ka" while I'm doing it!  He is so funny, and it has been so fun to see his little personality really showing itself these last couple of months!  This is a picture of him eating his very first ice-cream cone!

It's been a fun, busy last few months!

Birthday Catchup

I have been so far behind on posting lately!  I never finished posting about Eden and Emma's birthdays, and then there have been a few others since then, so this is one big birthday post to cover all of those!

These first ones are of the girls up at Bear Lake with Rob's sister and her family.

We also had a part for both of the girls and my mom at our house in August.

We enjoyed spending time out back for the party, and also had a big water slide and a few kiddie pools for the kids to play in!

We also had a pinata that was fun for the kids to do.

Overall, the girls had good birthdays and a lot of fun celebrating with everyone!

Also in August and the beginning of September were my brother's birthday, and my nephew's birthdays.  We went to my brother's house to celebrate each of those!

My youngest brother and sister also celebrated their birthdays in October, but I had lost my camera charger until just recently, and so I did not get any pictures from their parties since my camera was dead!:(  It was fun celebrating with them, though, and I hope they had good birthdays this year!

Flyn

Meet Flyn, the newest addition to our family!  He was born July 20, 2011 and is half King Charles Cavalier and half Shih-Tzu.  He has been a ton of fun to have, and we are happy to have him!

In other news, my part time job has become a little bigger because the lady I was splitting with got a new job and quit, so I now teach Monday thru Thursday!  Eden also has gone to school by herself!  The timing worked out great.  We decided we needed to try something new because we had gotten as far as my being able to leave, but that thought made Eden nervous again and we started going backwards.  So, Rob started taking her to school instead of me.  The first few times she only stayed half days, and the first day she spent the whole time in the Principle's office (who has been absolutely fabulous in helping us).  The second day she went to her own class.  Then, she was able to stay a whole day!  The first few times she did cry a little, especially at the first, but then she did pretty good.  It was a long week (even though it was over UEA, so it was only 3 days!), but by the next week, she was doing great!  I found out I would be working more the week after UEA, but she had that whole week to keep getting used to going before I was going to be there.  So, now Eden is going on her own just in time for me to start working there 4 days a week till noon!  As I mentioned before, it has been a long road, but I'm so grateful everything is finally working out!  I really feel like everything happened the way it did for a reason, and I'm grateful we have been able to work through this issue!  Eden is having a back-to-school party this Saturday with some of her new school friends now that she has been able to go on her own!

New Job

So, ever since school started, life has been flying by!  I have been going to school with Eden everyday since August 17 when school started, trying to help her overcome her separation anxiety disorder.  I am very happy to say that we have come a LONG way since school started, but it's still been very time consuming!  Eden's confidence has gone way up, and she is loving her teacher and her class!  We are on the last leg of this journey, and I actually spend most of my time outside the classroom, and volunteering for Isaac's class as well.

Just this last week another development has come up, which is that I was hired by the school to be a part time tutor.  The tutors help with what the school calls a guided reading program, and they spend an hour with groups of kids from each grade helping them with their reading skills.  They work Monday-Thursday from 8:30-12:00.  But, I actually am even more part time than that.  The tutors had actually all been hired when I expressed an interest in working for the school to the principle, but she ended up having one come up and tell her she wouldn't be able to work Mondays, but could work all the other days.  So, I got hired for just Mondays, and to be a general sub for any of the tutors.  I am also on the substitute teacher list, so could be doing some substitute teaching as well for the school!  I'm actually glad it is only one day a week right now.  It has been quite an adjustment having me gone for so long this last month and a half.  Thankfully, Rob is home to be Mr. Mom, and I'm grateful I've had the ability to help Eden overcome this problem, since it will help her so much the rest of her life.  If Rob wasn't home, there would be no way I could have put this much time in with Eden at school, not with three younger siblings! 

So, between being at the school with Eden, trying to catch up on home stuff when I get home, and trying to still do all the work of a full time student, you can see why I haven't been around much lately.  Eden really is getting to the point where I'm going to be able to be home more and she'll be able to be on her own, so hopefully sometime in the next couple of weeks I'll be able to finish catching up with pictures!

Summer Doings Part Two: Bear Lake

First of all, THANK YOU to everyone that shared stories or thoughts about Caydin!  I don't think I could even start to put into words how much those things mean to me!

In August, we had the opportunity to go to a condo in Bear Lake owned by Rob's sister's husband's family.  They just renovated it this last summer, so it was gorgeous, and we really enjoyed being there and being with family!  We were able to celebrate both Eden's and EmmaLee's birthdays while we were there, although I'll be posting pictures from that on my next post! 

 This is the view of the lake out of the big side bay window on the second floor.  The condo is the second and third levels of the unit.  The rooms we slept in were all on the third level, while Rob's sister and her family stayed in the rooms on the second level.

This is the view from our balcony in our bedroom.  I love how the place has so much grass to play on.  We spent some of our evenings out on the grass behind the unit blowing bubbles or playing games!  It was also fun to be able to have a short walk to the beach, which has sea shells, which the kids ended up collecting a whole bag of!

This is the room where Rob, Ammon, and I slept, and occasionally one of the other kids!

This room is right next to the room I stayed in.  Eden and Isaac slept on the two bottom bunks.  They wanted to sleep on the top, but we didn't want anyone falling off in the middle of the night!!

This was the "secret" room that was right next to the bunk bed room.  This is where EmmaLee slept.  What is nice is that all these rooms are right next to each other, so while we were spread in 3 rooms, they were all really closer than our rooms at home!  We ended up staying 3 nights, so it was nice to have some room to spread around in that was just for us!  Besides these 3 rooms, there was also a full bathroom upstairs that we used just with our family.

This is a view of the second floor, the level Rob's sister's family stayed in, and where the kitchen was.  The door at the end of the hall is bedroom, and the door frame halfway down the hall on the left is another room with double beds as well.  There are two full bathrooms on this level.  It is a really nice place, and we feel so grateful for the invitation to go up and use it!!

 This is a picture of the playground on the property, which the kids loved going to!

One of the nights we were there, a big storm blew through, and wrecked havoc!  It was kind of amazing to watch from the window as major winds whipped through the area!  We watched this big branch break off and come crashing down right next to the play ground and on top of an out structure!  All the fields were strewn with branches and leaves!  We also watched a pontoon boat out on the water trying to battle the waves and keep from tipping.  I was a bit anxious for it and was grateful when the wind did die down and it was still safe!

The wind did blow down this pine tree, right onto the top of a parked SUV!  It was nuts!  

 The car belonged to the little boy in the orange shirt's family.  Probably wasn't on their list of things they wanted to have happen on their vacation!!

I have more pictures to post from Bear Lake, so watch for those!

A Request

This Sunday is Caydin's Angel Day.  It's probably one of the hardest days for me because no matter how hard I try I tend to get hit with waves of bad memories of the accident, starting on the 27th first thing in the morning and all the way through till the 28th around 4:00 when he finally passed away.  I try to remember that it was his "graduation day" when he officially passed his test and I think about what an amazing spirit he really is, but it is still hard on these days to not think about "this is what I was doing at this time", or "this is when this happened".  Needless to say, it is a very emotional week for me.

And, I guess I have to be honest and say that I might not fight the memories or thoughts as much as I should because in a way, I actually want to have them.  It will be 6 years this year since Caydin passed away, and my memories of him seem to get more and more blurry and dreamlike with each passing year.  It is a bitter/sweet thing because it is how I am able to cope and survive what has happened, but it hurts to forget so much too.

So, that is where this request is going to come in.  I don't get to make new memories with my son at this time, and I feel I have relived and rehashed my own memories over and over.  I really would like to have some fresh views this year to remember Caydin with.  I would really love and appreciate stories from others about Caydin.  And, I don't mind if it's broad enough to even just be lessons learned from hearing about Caydin, or experiences you've had because of either him or knowing about him and his story.  Even if it's sad, I WANT to hear it!  One of the hardest things about loosing him is just how time seems to stop in regards to him!  I don't get to make new memories of him, good or bad, and sometimes I just miss him so much that even the sad stories of him are cherished because they are about HIM!  I have also heard stories in the last few months of family members experiences during his accident time that were very enlightening, and were very fascinating to hear!  I really do want to hear what others thought or experienced during any time period!

So, please, if you have any thoughts you wouldn't mind sharing with me, please send them!  If you would feel more comfortable emailing them to me, that is okay too!  My email is nanafischer@hotmail.com.

Summer Doings Part One

 The summer has flown by!  School starts tomorrow, so I thought I would try to at least get half of our summer pics up before then!  The above picture was taken at Cascade Springs.  Look close to see the fish!

 Eden celebrated her 7th birthday at the beginning of August!  I can't believe how old she is getting!  She is such a great sister to her siblings, and I enjoy doing things with her as well!  She loves to think deeply about things, and I'm so grateful everyday that I get to be her mother! (There will be more birthday stuff in a later post!)

 Eden lost another one of her front teeth, so she has a HUGE gap in her mouth at the moment!  I told her she'd better not try to wiggle anymore teeth for a while or we'll have to go get her some fake teeth till her real ones come in!

 We've gone lots of places this summer, including the Living Planet Aquarium in Sandy.  EmmaLee had to get a picture of her on the frog!

 At the end of July we went to a big family reunion for Rob's Dad's family.  You can see the German flag hanging under the hoop.  Rob's dad's family had to sneak out of Germany at the end of WWII when Rob's dad was only 5.  All of Rob's uncles still have major German accents!  It was a fun day, although we sure missed Helmut!  He is the first of his siblings to have passed away, even though he was the youngest by several years!

 Each of the brother's wore a specific color to the reunion, and Helmut's family color was green.  So, our niece, Hailey, made these shirts for our kids and for her little brother who is Ammon's age!  I thought they all looked super cute!

 This is a picture of all of Shirley and Helmut's grandchildren, except for Brad who is on a mission, Mason who had to work, Jayden, who was being a stinker and hiding in the bathroom, and Caydin who is with Helmut in heaven!  It's been several years since this many of the grandkids have been together at the same time!

 My sister Laurie spent a couple of days with us, so we went on some adventures!  This was at Smith

and Morehouse.  The spot we were at had some cool trials and "hideouts" for the kids to play in, which they loved!

 Our spot by the lake.

 We were also able to get together with my mom's side of the family in July as well.  It was fun to see how big our family is getting!  The kids on the tramp are my kids, my siblings kids, my cousins kids, and a couple of my youngest cousins and my sister!  It doesn't seem like it's been long enough to have so many little kids in the family again!

 Isaac was excited to catch some fish with dad on Deer Creek!

 We went up to Cottonwood Heights to watch the parade for Pioneer Day with my brother and his kids, and also my mom and my sister.  The kids love parades, and they quite enjoyed this one as well!  EmmaLee was so funny, too, because every time a float with some kind of royalty winner on it came by, she yelled out "Hello Princess!", and more than once they heard her and waved back!  She loved it!

 It didn't take the kids long to discover that the louder and more active they were, the more likely they would get candy thrown in their direction!

 This isn't the best picture, but this dragon came down the side and stood right behind EmmaLee, who was looking the other way.  She turned around and saw him, and kind of jumped and came over to the side, but while I was expecting her to cry, she started laughing and thought it was a great joke!

 We were also able to go to the train museum in Ogden this summer.  The kids really enjoyed the museums, especially the big trains outside.  You can actually climb up on them and all around, which was pretty cool!  I was surprised by how big the trains actually were!  I don't think I've been up close to a train before, and they are huge!

 Climbing on the engine.

 This was inside the museum.  That's one thing I liked about the museum was that it had a lot of hands on displays for kids to look at, climb on and into to!

 Outside on the train again!

 Eden barely made it to half of the wheel size! 

 This is the Upper Provo Falls.  It was gorgeous!  I didn't realize we had waterfalls like this in Utah that you didn't have to hike to, or look at from a major distance! 

This is the lower part of the river just beyond the waterfall.  Very beautiful!