Almost 35 weeks!!!

Saturday I will be 35 weeks along!!  I can finally see an end in sight.  I have been having some painful contractions this past week so they decided to check me at my doctors appointment today.  I am dilated to a 1 1/2 and 50% effaced.  I now will be going in every week until baby McBride (since he STILL doesn't have a name) arrives.
These next 2 weeks will be crazy.  School is finishing up for the year.  End of the year testing will be finishing up next week.  I have started cleaning out and boxing up my classroom.  Next year is still up in the air some but there is a possibility that I could be teaching 1/2 time as an ESL teacher.  We will see in the coming days whether it will work out or not.  I am excited to have the school year coming to an end but I am sad at the same time.

Feeling a little sad

Today I was told that my teaching position will not be available next school year.  With all the budget cuts, my school only received 1 half time FTE (teaching position).  Because the school really needs to have 3 full time 4th grade teachers for next year, they are taking my half time teaching position and combining it with the new one they just received.  It makes me happy to know that if they were able to keep the math job, they would invite me back to teach it.  With all the trials and hardships of teaching this kind of class, it makes me feel good to hear the positive comments.  It has been a great learning experience for me.  Pretty much inventing my own job and trying to figure out how to make it work trying to collaborate with so many teachers and working with so many different grades.  I love how I was able to work with most of the same students I had last year.  I really got to know them.  It has been a difficult job but I will truly miss all my students that I have had these past two years.

I love my 2nd grade class.  They love to leave me notes on my white board.  This will probably be the hardest class to leave behind.  (picture was taken just before Christmas)

A new nephew

My little sister Kristin had her baby just before Easter.  She went in to her doctor for her 39 week appointment and he lightly stripped her membranes.  She came and hung out at my house that morning and helped me st up the crib and move Hunter's bed and dresser around.  She was contracting like crazy.  She went to my mom's where she washed her car.  At 4 my mom took her up to the hospital.

Congrats on this little guy.  Check out how much hair he has!!!

AIDEN JEREL NIELSEN

April 4, 2012

8 lbs 1 oz

21 inches

Easter Traditions

***Pictures to be posted later***

The American West Heritage Center

I haven't taken the kids to Baby Animal Days for a few years.  Brian convinced me to take the kids so he could get some sleep (working nights and spring break do not mix very well)  So I decided to try going by myself with 3 kids.  It was super busy, but the kids loved seeing all the animals.  Autumn loves the horses, we held the bunnies and even rode the train.  Autumn wanted to do the mutten bustin' but we didn't get signed up in time.

I can say it was an interesting experience taking all the kids by my self.  I am so grateful that I ran into some old ward members Chelsea Adamson and Precilla Newbold.  (they only live right behind me, but because they go to church at a different time, I don't see them very often)  They stood in line with me while we waited for the pony rides.  I handed Hunter a piece of candy and turned and was talking to the girls for a minute.  When I turned around realized Hunter was gone.  I couldn't find him anywhere.  Chelsea stayed with the kids and Precilla helped me look for him.  After what seemed like an eternity later, Precilla cam waling back with him crying.  Someone had found him crying and was walking to the lost child station.  I guess I am not the only person to loose my child there.  I asked him later where he had gone.  We were there a week earlier for a wedding reception so he thought I was at the livery stable.

I took the kids to the Nibley Easter Egg Hunt alone this year.  It's a little harder when you have a child in almost every age group.  We designated an meeting spot for after and sent the kids to their location.  I stayed with Hunter.  He found a gold egg and was able to do the bunny-sack race after.  He won first place in his age-group and won a giant inflatable bunny that is taller then I am.  I would have been happy with the second place stuffed bunny prize... oh well.  He had fun.  He actually hopped to the finish line and then turned around and hopped back.

On Easter Day we had out big egg-dying party at Grandma Achatz's house with Natalie and her family.  Then we took them to Old Main Hill to roll them down.  This is a tradition I remember doing when I was a kids.  The kids have a lot of fun chasing their eggs down the hill.  It is very a popular Easter tradition.  There were eggs ALL OVER the hill.  The seagulls love it.

Hunter turns 4!!!

My little man is now 4 years old.  Time flies so fast.  He is such a fun little boy with a huge personality.  The first thing he asked me when I got him up was "Am I 4?"

 Hunter loves to sing.  It doesn't matter if it is at home or in the car.  I love listening to him sing.  He runs around singing "skippity-do-dah, skippity A, my oh my what a wonderful day"

He is also getting a lot better at writing his own name.  He only needs to master the E and the R.  For a while his name was "HUT" because that is what he could write.  He amazes me with his number recognition.  He is now learning his double digit numbers.  For a while when he would see 11, 12 and 13 he would say one-teen, two-teen and three-teen because all the other numbers said the number with the word teen after it.  I love how little minds work :)

We celebrated Hunter's birthday April 1st, the Sunday after his birthday because Brian had to work nights on the 30th.  

Hunter is a little obsessed with Mario right now.  So I attempted to make Marioland

Hunter loved so that is all that mattered

I asked him how old he was.  What a cutie :)

Daddy takes the girls skiing

With Brian working 12 hour shifts he has 2 to 3 days off during the week.  We haven't been able to take Autumn up to Beaver to go skiing (though my dad did take her night skiing one night) Brian had a couple of tickets to use so he decided to try to take BOTH girls up alone.  Autumn had only skied twice and Brooklyn had never gone before.  To tell you the truth I was kind of nervous that he would not have the patience to have 2 new skiers on the mountain.  

We got the girls stuff ready to go on a Monday that Brian had off  but the weather was going to be really bad.  So instead they were going to go on a Tuesday.  The weather was the first BEAUTIFUL and sunny day we have had for a while.  It was a great day to go skiing!

The girls all ready to go skiing

They did get stuck once or twice :)

But after a while both girls were skiing like pros without any bungees to keep their skis together

One of their favorite places to go was in the tunnel

They did try some of the other trails

But really liked playing around the tunnel

They had a lot of fun :)

The kids got home that afternoon and I realized I had forgotten one important thing ... SUNBLOCK.  Everyone had gotten a little burned except for Autumn who ended getting badly burned.  Her eyes swelled shut and then her whole face swelled.  It was the hardest thing to see my little girl is such terrible shape.  She ended up missing a whole week of school.  We got her into the doctor and he gave us a steroid creme that we started Friday night.  I cannot believe how quickly her face improved. After the first crusted layer of skin came off (in only 3 days)  Her face never peeled and didn't even look like she had gotten a second degree burn. 

We are all very grateful that she healed so quickly.  She even said she wants to go skiing again (but next time with sunblock and eye protection)

BABY #4

We went in for our 20 week ultrasound.  The girls decided to go to a friends last minute so Hunter was the only one with us.  It was really cool because We got to see it in live 4D.  They also recorded it on a DVD.  I have a VHS video of both Autumn and Brooklyn's ultrasound.  I only got a CD of pictures when we had Hunter's 3D ultrasound.  So I was pretty excited to see how amazing technology changes over just a few years. 

We decided to go to the ultrasound and not find out what the baby was.  I wanted to have the last baby be a surprise.

side view of baby

I was excited to actually get a good face shot.

 When I had Hunter's #D ultrasound I was sad that we could never see his face.  He would snuggle into the placenta and we could only get and side view of him.

Almost smiling

The foot

Baby put it's hands up

 Well as much as you might plan on something, SOMETIMES the baby has other plans.  While the ultrasound tech was measuring the baby's leg.... The baby decided to reveal itself... So we decided to get the conformation pics...

That's not a third leg :)

Definitely a little BOY!!