365 Days: Week 19

I spent this week at my sister Andrea's in Bountiful, Utah. We mostly just hung out and tried to spend as much time with as many of my sisters as possible. I also finally got my family to watch Downton Abbey and they are hooked - even Adam!

As a Mother's Day surprise we bought the grandkids matching outfits. When we pulled into Andi's driveway from picking Lincoln and I up from the airport everyone was waiting outside. It took my mom a minute to figure it out, but it was really sweet. Lincoln was pretty overwhelmed by all of the people fawning over him. He is used to it being pretty quiet around here with just Scooter and I. 

I did a lot of snuggling with this little guy. When I saw my sisters' new babies I was so surprised at how tiny they were. That was only seven months ago for me - it is funny how quickly you forget. I also went down to Provo to spend some more time with my sister, Rachelle, and her new baby Avery. Somehow we didn't take a single picture...

Staying with Andi was pretty crazy sometimes because we had three kids under two. I seriously don't know how people that actually have that situation cope because we thought it was hard and we usually had at least three adults there. We were proud when all the nap schedules aligned so that we could go get Jamba juices and go to the park. Adam met us there on the way home from work. I love this picture for so many reasons - I think it perfectly captures so many things about these family members. 

One funny thing that Eli kept doing was copying whatever Lincoln was doing. Even if it was something that Eli never does. If Lincoln was crawling, Eli would get down and crawl as well. If Lincoln was chewing on his toys, Eli would chew on his toys too. If Lincoln was drinking something, Eli also wanted something to drink. If Lincoln was sucking his fingers, Eli would look over at him then suck his fingers as well. 

We were all really impressed with how Lincoln handled all the changes. He is used to having pretty quiet days at home alone with me, and suddenly he was in this loud house with all these people and toys and a crying newborn and a two-year-old cousin in his face trying to play with him. The only major difference was that he was quieter than usual - maybe he didn't want to compete with everyone else's talking?

Another trip down to Provo. This time to get something huge laminated for my upcoming 10-year high school reunion. BYU was one of the only places around that could accommodate it (and they did it for a fraction of the cost). Getting to see these girls again was a big bonus. I'm just sure that there isn't a campus with a lovelier location anywhere - those mountains are so gorgeous.

More Oliver snuggling and more Downton Abbey watching. 

365 Days: Week 18

This week Scooter's mom came into town for a visit and I prepared to leave on a three week visit to Utah.

We started the week off with the long-anticipated dedication of our Kansas City temple. We attended the dedication from our stake center via satellite. In true Kansas fashion a giant thunderstorm blew in during the dedication and knocked out the satellite so we missed about half of the dedicatory prayer. Honestly, we haven't seen rain like that in a long time. It was pretty scary to drive home in it. 

Lots of people don't know that Kansas City is on the border of Kansas and Missouri. Half the city is in each state. The med school/hospital is on State Line Road. We like to cross over to Missouri, when it is convenient, to buy our gas because it is cheaper there.

I saw this recipe for personalized baked oatmeal. It sounded intriguing so I tweaked the recipe a bit and tried it. We liked them although they had a different texture than I thought they would. I made probably ten different varieties. My favorites were the raspberry with chocolate chips and the coconut with granola.

I found these sticking out of the mailbox when I drove up to the house. They were part of my birthday gift. We also attended Scooter's induction into the Alpha Omega Alpha society, which is for all the super smart med students. Only the top seven percent of his class was invited to join the society. It is kinda a big deal. I wish I had pictures of it, but a huge camera doesn't really match a cocktail dress, so I didn't bring it. It was nice that Jody could be here for it.

Lincoln is usually too busy to snuggle, but he cuddled with his Grandma Jody for a full five minutes. I was completely surprised and kept tiptoeing around so I wouldn't distract him. 

Lincoln has had a mystery rash on his back for about a week. It wasn't getting better on it's own so I thought I'd go have someone look at it before I went to Utah and took him away from his doctor for a month. He sure loves playing in that exam table paper. He's fine, by the way. The rash is still a mystery, but it is gone now.

I was trying to pack and Lincoln kept crawling away from me or towards non-Lincoln-approved items so we came up with this system. He was actually very happy in there. Jody was also really nice to babysit so we could go on a date before i left. We ate at the incredibly delicious Room 39 and saw our first imax 3D movie - Avengers. Thanks Jody!

Sorry for my absence

I've been visiting family in Utah for over three weeks - meeting my new niece and nephew, hanging out with my family, throwing my 10 year high school reunion, and soaking up the sun and dry heat.

I just got back to Kansas and will try to start posting again as soon as I can get my pictures downloaded and some food in my fridge.

365 Days: Week 17

This was a really busy week for the rest of my (Doxey) family, but it was pretty quiet around here between exciting baby updates. 

We fed Lincoln a solid that wasn't a mush for the first time. We were really confused about what to start him on, but we tried rice rusks because it seems like they would be tricky to choke on. He immediately put it into his mouth (where everything else he gets his hands on goes) but was surprised to find that it had a taste.

We had been suspicious that Lincoln had an ear infection for a few days, but finally decided to find out for sure. Lincoln's favorite thing about the doctor's office is the paper on the examination table. I figure that since they are throwing it away anyway no one will care if he plays with it, so I let him do whatever he wants with it. Kids should have one fun memory of the doctor's office, right? He crumples it, smashes it, tears it, pulls it, and rolls himself in it. He couldn't be happier. While we were waiting he got it twisted around himself a few times and had to be extracted by me. Just as a request, Lincoln, don't pull on your ears constantly if you don't have an ear infection - it just confuses your mama. 

We try to go outside every evening for a few minutes of outdoor family time. Even if it just onto the back deck. Lincoln absolutely loves being taken outside and it is a surefire way to calm him down if he is ever really upset.

We haven't really set Lincoln down in the grass before because we've heard horror stories about the chiggers around here. He seemed more confused about the texture than anything else. Don't you love his onesie? When I saw a monkey wearing a tool belt I had to get it. 

I raised the garage door after coming home from visiting teaching to find this happening in my garage... This picture kinda perfectly portrays Scooter's life - scrubs, measuring tape, saw, and the baby monitor in his pocket. On a side note, doesn't our garage look shamefully awful?

Lincoln loves to sit outside and watch his daddy do yard work. You should have seen how filthy his little socks were after this!

We finally got started on the tile in the master bathroom. I was set on this pattern from the conception stages of this project. It took a lot of convincing before Scooter was on board, because it is a lot more work than other patterns, but now he is so glad we did it. We think it looks really great and it is such a relief to finally have the bathroom start resembling, well, a bathroom.

I didn't take my camera, but I also attended the cultural celebration in conjunction with our new Kansas City temple being dedicated this weekend. For those that are unfamiliar with the custom, the night before a new temple is dedicated the youth from the temple district get together and put on a performance that reflects the culture of the area. Our beloved prophet was there and his spirit just filled the entire arena. I really didn't know what to expect and when I entered the arena I was feeling underwhelmed by everything, but as the performance started I started feeling overwhelmed by what an amazing job the youth from our temple district did. I can't imagine how much work it must have been to organize 3,000 youth from so many towns. They only had one chance to practice all together in the arena before the performance. It was really impressive - they had an orchestra and a choir. One of my favorites was the Polynesian number (who knew that they have a HUGE Polynesian population in the Independence, MO area? I live here and I didn't know.) My favorite was the number that was done by the youth from Joplin, MO that were affected by the tornado that caused so much damage and death bout a year ago. 25% of the town was leveled (including one of their church buildings) and over 160 people were killed. Kenneth Cope was there and sang a beautiful song while the youth reenacted the rebuilding that went on in the aftermath. Overall it was an amazing and spiritual evening. Even though the performances were definitely not professional quality by any stretch of the imagination, that wasn't the point. The point was that the youth got to spend time together, be with others that have their standards, and have a wonderful experience to remember. I was so blessed to be able to be there - there were a limited number of tickets. Thanks to my friend Stephanie who invited me and to her husband that gave up his ticket to me.

You can read more about it here.
You can watch some clips of it here and here and here and here

Big Happenings

Last week was a pretty big one for the Doxey family.

On Tuesday, Rachelle kicked it off with a very successful and uncomplicated induction which resulted in her...

On Wednesday, my dad, one of the nation's newest pilots, flew himself in his plane to Provo, thus successfully flying the first leg of his first purpose-filled trip by plane.

On Friday night , Lauren graduated from the University of Utah. We are so proud of her!

Later on Friday night, Andrea decided she couldn't keep her baby inside any longer, so we welcomed him...

A big week right?

 I am so proud of my amazing family! 

Lincoln Babbling

This one is for you, Lauren!

This was in the middle of the intense master bathroom remodel phase, so try to ignore the remodel paraphernalia on the floor. 

365 Days: Week 16

This past week Scooter was on Spring Break. Something you should know about my husband is that he has trouble taking "breaks." The only way to get him to relax is to physically take him out of town to a relaxing place that is preferably warm and has a beach. If you can't get him out of town you might as well accept the fact that he is going to do a house project -it is just inevitable. This time I got lucky and he agreed to tackle our master bathroom. It is the biggest project we have ever under taken, but it has been so much fun and really rewarding. I think we really like doing house projects so much because it is a constant exercise in problem-solving. Every time an issue is resolved there is a sense of victory. It is a little intoxicating and (obviously for us) a bit addicting.

All the pictures this week are pretty much of the bathroom. It might be boring for you folks, but for us they are really exciting. We've been looking forward to doing this project for two years. We haven't felt like we had enough skills to tackle it until now.

We kicked off the week with Scooter's birthday. We kept it really low-key again this year. I made my mom's famous lemon dessert for him - it's one of his favorites. I think Scooter's favorite part of the day was the two hour snuggle that Lincoln gave him while he was on the phone with various birthday well-wishers. Our Lincoln is not a snuggler, so it was a rare treat. 

Monday morning bright and early we continued to demo and finally removed the hated gross shower pan. It was definitely the original and was super heavy. I should mention at this point that Scooter has probable broken ribs that he got a few days before this while diving during a racquetball match. Broken (or even severely bruised) ribs make it really hurt to lift heavy things which we obviously needed him to be able to do all week. We had already started the demo and there was basically no turning back so he just worked through it. Consequently, I had to do more of the physical stuff than Scooter would have liked me to do, but it was really fun and empowering. I ripped out all of the subfloor with a crowbar and Scooter replaced it. Then we tore out the ceiling.  To give you an idea, the blue tape on the floor is roughly where the new enlarged shower will be in relation to the old shower.

This is the following day after we had been working on the shower. It is going to be about twice the size of the original shower and will have two shower heads. We had the shower drain  moved (one of the only things we didn't tackle ourselves) and after we framed the shower in we mixed concrete and poured it into the new shower to make the first layer of the new shower floor. You have to pour the concrete so it slopes gently toward the drain so you won't have any pooling water. Not easy, especially if you've never done it before. Scooter was, as usual, able to figure it out and it looks great. Unfortunately, he cut his thumb really deeply while cleaning one of his tools so he ended up rounding out his day with a quick trip to the emergency room for three stitches (after my insistence - why do men always try to minimize their injuries?). They X-rayed his ribs and confirmed that they probably are broken, but since there is nothing they can do for that injury they sent him home. The splint and stitches aren't helping the work situation, but as usual, Scooter just keeps on working.

This might look really boring to some, but it looks great to us because it means there is now plumbing for two sinks! We won't have to share anymore! Oh yeah, the wall that used to be to the right of the vanity is also gone now. I tore it down all by myself - Towanda style (if you click the link fast-forward to 4:26, unless of course you want to watch all of it - it's a bunch of great clips from Fried Green Tomatoes). There was even some kicking through the wall. Seriously. Scooter did all of the electrical work on this day as well. He added an extra light and rewired some things.

The first layer of cement dried and we were ready for the next steps. We put the waterproof membrane on top of the cement pre-slope and then mixed and poured another layer of cement on top - again, making sure it sloped toward the drain. This time we had some plastic spokes to help us. It was really tricky because the shower is  an odd shape, but Scooter did a great job. We also put the ceiling back up.

This day we re-leveled the floor, put backerboard on the floor so it is ready to receive tile, and framed in the new pocket door. My favorite part was the giant cabinet that we built. See! It's taller than Scooter. Now I'll have plenty of storage.

We framed the cabinet into the wall and hung the new pocket door. We bought a new fan and Scooter wired that into the shower room and we finished that part of the ceiling. We drywalled the main areas of the bathroom and removed the medicine cabinet. We also built a soffit in the shower room to match the one on the vanity area so the rooms look more unified plus there was some weird stuff going on the attic that we were correcting for. Now it is really starting to look more like a finished bathroom.

I am really so lucky that I have such a hard-working husband. My dad has often said that Scooter is the hardest worker he has ever known and I also think that is true. I think that often if people are left alone on projects they kinda peter out and don't accomplish much, but I frequently will leave Scooter to take care of Lincoln and will come back to find that he's worked himself into a sweat in my absence. He never takes shortcuts and always does things the "right" way. I'm so grateful for him.

Lest you think we abandoned Lincoln this week I thought I'd give you a couple bonus pictures of him.

In Home Depot - one of his favorite places to go.  

Sitting in the shower before the second layer of concrete went down. See how big the shower is now?

Playing near us while we worked. This activity jumper has been a lifesaver this week.