The Wilhelmsen Botanical Blog

So, we are in Arizona visiting Brandon’s family and this morning when I was pretending to sleep in his hopes to encourage Aiden to fall back to sleep Aiden was repeating over and over, “Mommy, turn the fan on.”  After persisting for about five minutes he then said, “Mommy, turn the fan on, mommy turn the light on too.”  What the?  What nearly two year old can accurately string 11 words together in a sentence?  I have a feeling this one will be an orator.  🙂

So last night was our usual family festivities at my grandma and grandpa’s house.  It was a lot of fun and the company is always good.  Despite starting at six and my indicating that I was ready to leave about 8:45, we didn’t end up getting home until about 10:00.  This is an hour past Aiden’s bedtime.  We quickly did all of the bedtime routine (brushing teeth, using the potty, praying, and I rocked him and sang to him) then I laid him down thinking that he would fall right to sleep.  WRONG.  He jabbered in there to himself (no doubt about all of the intense excitement that he had just been a part of) until 10:30 or 10:45.  I laid down to go to sleep shortly after that but was having trouble falling asleep.  At 11:20ish as I was still tossing and turning I heard Aiden start to cry and then I got up to listen if he would fall back to sleep.  When he called out for Brandon and then me I decided to forgo our usual treatment of such situations (which is to let him fall back to sleep without interference) and went in there to find he had tossed his cookies.  I picked him up to find that it was down both sides of his face and all over the back of his head.  Once I got into the bathroom with him I noticed that he was wiping his eyes and that he couldn’t see because it was there too.  Not really sure where to start in the cleaning process I called to Brandon to please change the sheets on the bed and plopped Aiden into a shallow bath to clean him up.  I could tell that Aiden was shaken up and had no idea what was going on or why this was happening to him (incidentally this is the first time he has been sick like this, he spit up a lot as a baby but this it completely different).  Unfortunately he proceeded to toss his cookies 4 more times.  The last finally being mostly clear.  During this whole process Aiden would start to get upset when he could tell that he was going to toss his cookies again and he kept telling me, “Put in the bed.  Tired.  Sleepy.”  He was very cuddly too and I could tell he was having a difficult time getting comfortable in my lap.  We decided to try having me sleep in my dad’s overstuffed chair with Brandon on the futon but even still Aiden was having a hard time getting comfy and by that time had tossed his cookies for times and could hardly keep his eyes open.  When he finally tossed his cookies the 5th time and I saw that it was mostly clear I knew that he had completely emptied his stomach contents and both Brandon and I felt certain he was done with the process so we put him into bed and he slept the rest of the night.  Of course by then it was nearly 1:00 in the morning.  I had high hopes that Aiden would sleep until 10:00 to make up for getting to bed so late and then being up for an hour and a half of sickness but he was up at 8:45.  That is still sleeping in though so that was good.  Today he seemed to be back to normal except that he drank extra fluids and ate only a fraction of his normal food intake.  We don’t know what caused the cookie tossing we have a few theories from him eating WAY TOO MUCH (highly likely), to there being too much gelatin in our raspberry ice cream pie and perhaps upsetting his stomach, to the possibility that because the apple I gave him was with nuts (even though they are shelled) that it may have cause an allergic reaction.  My mom said that it was good for him to eat less today simply because his tummy was probably still a bit sensitive from last night.  I must say that this being my first experience of this kind of illness in my son that I didn’t know that I had taken care of things in the 100% best way possible but that I did take things one step at a time, did things the best that I knew how and Aiden ended up getting through it unscathed.  You certainly learn the true meaning of love when caring for a sick child in the middle of the night when you are exhausted.  🙂  Despite the long night though, Aiden had a good Christmas today and really enjoys all of his new toys.  He took turns playing with each one today from a set of Disney Cars, to musical instruments, to a set of tools, to a new bike!  (Plus more small items that he enjoyed equally as well.)  It was nice to just take it easy today and we were grateful that my mom could come and visit.  I hope that everyone else had as wonderful of a day as we did.  Merry Christmas!

First of all, the other day while I was cuddling Aiden in his room he pointed in the direction of his radio and said, “Children up there.”  Now I for one was slightly confused, first of all, when did he learn the word children, and second of all, there were nothing even remotely resembling children in that general direction.  While relating this story to my mom she mentioned that maybe he was “seeing” his brothers and sisters through a veil into Heaven that hasn’t completely closed yet.  On that same topic, he also said, ” Daddy up there.”  The other day and I of course started worrying about Brandon and had he been seriously hurt while subbing (I was thinking school shooting, because that seems to have been in the news a lot in these more recent years).  After texting Brandon and receiving an all is well, I just shrugged it off.  But again when I mentioned it to my mom she said that perhaps Aiden was talking about his Heavenly Father rather then his earthly father.

Lastly, once in awhile Aiden while playing here at home, Aiden will say, “Go home?”  I always just tell him that we are home.  When I told my mom this strange occurance she said that I used to do that too and that being so new from Heaven we probably remember our “other” home and how wonderful it was and that we maybe miss it a little bit.  How special to have those Heavenly memories lingering in a young child’s mind for a little while and how unfortunate when those beautiful memories finally fade and all we have left are the things we learn about Heaven, the nature of our Heavenly Parents and Brother Jesus, and the spirit that tries to help us to recognize these things as 100% true.  Please don’t get me wrong though, these few things are precious to have in a tumultuous world such as this, but oh what I wouldn’t give for a brief glimpse into Heaven every once in awhile.

Now for a brief story about Lucas (I know crazy, he isn’t even born yet.) the other day I was attempting to listen for Lucas’ heartbeat through a stethoscope (you are supposed to be able to around 6 months preggo) and when I was pushing down on my stomach with it he pushed against it with precision and force.  It made me giggle how apparent it was that he did not appreciate me invading his space.

Lastly, my mom told that I should write down some of the mischief that Aiden get’s into so that he can read it years from now and say to me, “I didn’t really do that did I.”  So here goes, on the 18th of December we had one of those days where Aiden was getting into everything.  First he got into the box of tissues that we keep near the couch and pulled out about 10 of them.  After I cleaned that up I found him a little while later with a manila envelope full of papers that are my dad’s.  Shortly after that I came into the room to discover that he had gotten one of his snowboots from our “keep out of Aiden’s reach” location and had put it on and was tromping around the living room in it.  *sigh*  In the afternoon during his nap he managed to reach a roll of tape that I had been keeping on top of his dresser and pulled out 2-3 feet of it and had it all tangled and then threw it on the floor.  All in one day, when it rains it pours I guess.

Also, some of the new things we have gotten Aiden to say are, “paddywhack (you know like knick knack paddywhack, give a dog a bone), cockledoodledoo, and yesterday when I spilled some crackers I said, “Oh my goodness.” and Aiden chimed back, “Oh goodness.”  LOL.  Well, I hope that you have enjoyed my stories.  Have a good Christmas Eve everyone and an even more wonderful Christmas Day.

I can not believe how quickly this year has gone by.  In just a few short weeks Aiden will be two years old and a few weeks after that we welcome the second addition to our family.  Kids really grow far too quickly for my liking.  Our week wasn’t incredibly eventful.  Brandon substitute taught and we waited to hear from a lady about a town home in Farmington.  She called us Tuesday evening as we were watching G-Force and said that because Brandon was only making $72.00 a day they didn’t think that we could afford the town home and when he asked if we could contest that she told him that they had already given it to someone else.  THANKS A LOT FOR WARNING US (or even giving us a chance to explain the situation).  Psh.  As a result I called my friend in Sandy who had a basement apartment that they have been trying to rent for a few months now and thankfully it is still available.  We have put down a deposit on it and will be moving January 9th.  It will be nice to be close to places like Wal-mart, the library, various parks, various grocery stores, and etc. again.  Brandon will also be working about 5 mins. away from there in mid January to beginning February.  We have begun the preparations to pack and I have even packed a couple of boxes but the major moving is going to wait until we are back from our trip to visit Brandon’s family.

Thursday was my 24 week appointment with the obgyn.  It went well my blood pressure was good, the babies heartbeat was good, and my sugar levels were normal.  I am now measuring 26 weeks when I ought to be measuring 24.5.  This is not due to weight gain because I have only gained 7 pounds thus far.  We will see how things go but in order to avoid a c-section I may end up inducing a week or so early like I did with Aiden.  This is unfortunate because I was going to wait a little bit longer before asking for a mercy induction to see if Lucas would come on his own.

Last night was my friend Christmas party like I mentioned before.  It was fun the food was delicious and the decorations were nice.  Thank you to my friends for the generous and tasty gifts.

Yesterday Aiden also got into the bathroom when we got home from running an errand and after flushing the toilet walked around in the bath tub while wearing his wet and dirty shoes.  The result of this mischieviousness can be viewed below.

Today we had a scare when we got home from church.  As you know we have diligently kept Aiden away from any and all nut products.  This is because he has a 50% chance of being allergic himself thanks to my allergies to them.  Our plan was to take him to an allergist again between ages 2 & 3 to be re-tested and then to wait to feed him peanut butter/peanuts until he is 4.  Anyway today when we got home Aiden got into my dad’s room while Brandon and I were getting lunch ready, shut the door behind himself, found my dad’s big bag of peanut M & M’s and started picking up handfuls and shoving them into his mouth like a squirrel gathers nuts for winter.  Brandon was the one who found him when I mentioned that it was far too quiet and that Aiden must be up to something.  Anyway, Brandon made Aiden spit out as much as he could coax him too but Aiden immediately swallowed when Brandon said to spit (the stinker).  Then Brandon brought him down to me and I started to panic and washed around Aiden’s mouth.  I also gave him some water to drink to further wash things out.  I had Brandon grab the epi-pen and then we watched Aiden.  I knew that if he was going to show symptoms of a reaction that it would happen fairly quickly.  So we both watched Aiden for trouble breathing, swollen lips, a rash, dialated eyes, or just him acting out of the ordinary.  Thankfully none of that happened and he is now napping in his room.  I am of course a worry wart so I am still a little worried about him and won’t be fully reassured until he awakens healthy and happy from his nap but there were no symptoms of being allergic so I need to just calm down.  Anyway, the other thing is that I was told that allergic reactions don’t always show up when a person is first exposed to a new allergen.  This means that now he has been exposed to it it will be the next event of exposure that will tell all.  I plan to have Aiden re-tested for allergies in February or March for a more accurate test.

When I was putting Aiden down for nap and rocking him he was drinking from his sippy and he said, “That my water, put in mouth.”  and then he said, “Put it in the mouth.”  He understanding of language and the world around him astounds me.

Lastly, is a controversial topic to many people and I will do my best to be respectful and unnoffensive.  I have struggled with whether or not those who are in the gay and lesbian community have come to same gender attraction due to nature or nurture.  This has plagued me for years as I knew on the one hand that spirit children of Heavenly Father are not attracted to the same gender and that “Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”  I also know that, “God has commanded that the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.”  God’s children in the world before this life do not have to contend with the natural man and the desires of the flesh.  Thus I can feel confident in saying and knowing that they were not and are not attracted to spirits of the same gender.

This only today occurred to me as they read the line, “Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny” from, “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” at church.  I hope that I am accurately portraying my feelings.  What I know is that these bodies of ours are imperfect, they are full of desire and the natural man and could be attracted to anyone, male or female.  As a result our spirits are subject to the desires of our bodies and the power that we give to our bodies can overpower our spiritual nature.  God’s plan is for men and women to come together and to procreate.  That is how it is and how it has been for generations past.  I know that is how it is in Heaven without our bodies, desires, and the world to confuse us.  So the answer to my question of nature vs. nurture is that it is not the nature of our spirits, but the nature of our bodies that causes some men or women to be attracted to those of the same gender.  We are all God’s children, we all deserve basic rights, we should stop bringing each other down and making judgments.  We should be praying about and serving each other.  Everything else will be worked out in Heaven.

For those of you who do not yet know.  Brandon will be starting a job working on the US Census in mid-January to early February.  He has been subbing steadily since middle of October and because of both of these events we will be moving into our very own basement apartment the week of Jan. 5-9.  Our first night sleeping in our new place will be Jan. 9th.  It will be great.  Aiden will have a backyard to play in, there is shopping, parks, and the library near by and my mom will be right down the road.  We are excited to move and get settled in before Lucas is born but we want my dad to know that he has been a gracious and generous host and we love him.  It is just time that we moved on up and got out of the nest.  Hooray!

Hey just a couple of Aiden things.  First of all we were watching Sesame Street yesterday and they were talking about the word crunchy and what it means.  Then last night Aiden bit into a french fry at dinner time and said, “Crunchy.”  The fries were in fact crunchy and it surprised me that he had actually learned the word from Sesame Street and used it correctly.

Second of all today Aiden was playing in his room.  He was pretending to mix something with a container and whisk and after having me help mix and then talking about making the cake a few times he said, “Put it in the freezer.” and went and put his container on a shelf of his changing table.  He picks up on things so fast.

Then a little bit later we ran a quick trip to our storage unit and I let Aiden take his baby Armadillo with him.  (We have a plush armadillo that has a velcro stomach that opens to reveal a baby armadillo.)  So when Brandon was putting Aiden in the car he said, “Daddy have some baby ‘dillo.”  (We also like to pretend to eat random things like toes, fingers, ears, and apparently baby ‘dillo’s)

So this past week we got to spend time with Erica and Matt because they flew in from Florida.  We love seeing them and visiting with them and it is always sad when someone has to go home.  Aiden really love Matt and Erica and has been asking me about them since they left on Saturday.  I think he still expects to see them in later today or maybe tomorrow.  In fact, when we were saying goodbye I was doing really good not crying or being sad, until Aiden said to Matt, “See you morrow.”  I just have really struggled having all the family so spread apart, especially since I am used to seeing all my cousins every holiday and during the long days of summer.  I have really been blessed to have such a close relationship with my extended family that I have come to terms with the fact that it will always be hard for me to have my sister, as well as pretty much all of Brandon’s family (awesome aunts, kind and friendly siblings, doting grandmas and parents, quickly growing cousins and adorable nieces and nephews) so far away.  It seems to be more difficult around the holidays.

Anyway, while they were here we had some fun sledding in my dad’s backyard then going out to eat.

Having “Christmas” at my mom’s.

Going to see the lights.

And then a farewell breakfast at Ihop.

The week was far too short.  In the evening after they left on Saturday Brandon, Aiden, and I went to the craft store.  While we were waiting to check out Aiden was pointing out Santa Claus to a lady in front of us.  She asked Aiden, “What does Santa say?” and Aiden pause a moment before saying emphatically, “Ribbit.”  That got a chuckle out of us.  Also a little bit earlier my dad was sitting in his chair and he asked, “Who moved my t.v.? ”  I replied that it was the little troublemaker running around the living room.  At which point Aiden went over, fixed the t.v. positioning and said,”T.V. all better.”  If he knows what things are bad choices and what are not then how come he keeps making the bad choices?  Toddlers I tell ya.  🙂

As I sit here to write little Aiden is still sleeping and it is 8:40.  When I woke up this morning and saw all of the beautiful snow and that it was still snowing I felt like a kid at Christmas.  I even keep getting slightly choked up at being privileged to show this wonder and awe to my son.  Now I know plenty of people who don’t really care for snow.  This is mostly due to the danger of having to drive in it.  Perhaps you have to see the snow through a child’s eyes to truly capture the beauty and magic of it.  Thus lessening your fear of it.  Now I am as scared as the next guy to feel that lack of control as your car slides over a patch of ice but still can’t get enough of it in the winter each year.

One other thing before I go into our family news.  Being without a job since April has been really hard and stressful.  There have been many prayers, many tears, and much frustration, as application after application has seemed to fall to blind eyes and deaf ears.  During all of it I have wondered where our help in finding a job has been.  What is Heavenly Father’s plan for us, and why haven’t we gotten a job yet?  Even jobs that Brandon seems a shoe in’ to get have been given to someone else.  Thankfully my dad finally suggested that Brandon start subbing.  The pay is minimal and only comes once a month, it doesn’t have benefits, but every day he has sought out to work he has been able to.  Despite it’s small wages we will be able to get into our own place before the baby comes.  Things will be tight but they will be doable.  Brandon may have to take on a second job for awhile but he is willing to do so.  Anyway, through all of this stress I have wondered what the point of it all is, what am I supposed to be learning, or who are we helping by continuing to be here and without a job.  I simply felt like we were trodding this trial alone despite the miracle that we continue to pray for.  Well this morning as I looked out on the snowy world I realized, despite having no job we have been fortunate to not have any emergencies come up that would have cost us our savings.  We almost had to buy a car battery but that ended up being ok and we have all maintained steady health.  We have had no crashes, no car break downs, and even our windshield is still amazingly crack free.  On top of all of this my dad has been generous enough to continue to buy groceries for all of us as well us let us skip some bills we owe.  Oh and we have been allowed to live here rent free.  Thank you dad.  So I guess my realization is just that even though we have had no job, we have been watched over and kept safe.

So my typing was interrupted by Aiden waking up.  He has now been laid down for nap and has been jabbering away in his crib for a good 20 mins.  Go to sleep I tell you!  🙂  Anyway, when I took him downstairs to see the snow we looked out the front window.  I said to Aiden, “Look at all that snow, oh my goodness.” to which he replied, “Oh my goodness, cute snow.”  LOL.  What a cute kid.

Ok now our news.  These first two pictures are silly I know but I got swollen during my last pregnancy and forgot what my hands and feet looked like skinny.  Therefore I decided that this time I would document them before they started to swell.

Tuesday evening I attended the ward Relief Society dinner.  It was tasty and I enjoyed the holiday tunes by the choir.  Wednesday we went to the Anniversary Inn open house.  We were bummed that they did not offer their usual delicious chocolate chip cookies but enjoyed our time.  We love the great deals you can get on a room during the open house and this time we even won a few prizes from Kosy 106.5.  Below is our picture of Aiden with Santa.  He did NOT want to sit on his lap.

Thursday morning my sister came into town.  My grandma, Aiden, and I picked her up from the airport.  She then hung out with Aiden and I all day.  In the evening Brandon and I attended Glenn Beck’s the Christmas Sweater: revisited with two of his friends, while my dad, mom, and sister took Aiden to dinner.  It was a nice evening.

Saturday Matt came into town and mom, Erica, and Matt all stopped by briefly during Aiden’s nap time.

Sunday was our Thanksiving #2.  Sadly I had gotten the stomach flu and everything I ate came back up.  I was feeling like death and mainly focused on sitting still.  Thanks to everyone who chased Aiden around and kept him entertained.  Everything looked beautiful mom.

Lastly, here are my saltine’s and graham crackers from Thanksgiving week and my felt breakfast items from last week.  I will be making four slices of bread this week.    Thanks for reading!

So tonight we went to the Anniversary Inn open house and in one of the rooms that we were touring there was a fish tank.  We turned Aiden towards it so that he could see them and he said, “Hi Dorothy.”  Just in case you don’t understand why that is so cute and funny, it is because Aiden enjoys watching Elmo’s World and Elmo’s pet fish is named Dorothy.  Oh the correlations that children make.  🙂

Well, what can I say about last week.  Potty training is still a work in progress.  It is still a hit or miss when we set him on his little potty.  I think he understands what he is supposed to do on the potty but it is still a novel thing to be allowed into the bathroom where there are so many distractions.

Thanksgiving was tasty.  We ate at my aunt’s home where there was a small group of us.  It was an “in-law” year so there will be a bigger crowd next year.

The only other thing to highlight is that we put our tree up yesterday.  It turned out ok but our green strand of white lights went kaput and all we had were a white strand of white lights so the wiring sticks out like a sore thumb instead of “hiding” in the tree like usual.  It was fun to have Aiden help though and we used our Disney decor once again.  While digging through our Christmas stuff for what we would need I pulled out our box of Christmas ornaments that we had received over the years.  Brandon told me that when we have the room we will have to have a second tree of “misfit” ornaments.  I agreed because that is what I had planned all along.  🙂  Well have a good week and as always, thanks for reading…