The third time is a charm?????

PLEASE let the third time do the trick.

On April 2nd, Alexia had to go in for her third surgery on her nose. This time he just had to take the whole darn infected area out. We are still trying to keep the area infection free. Keep praying for us. We need all the help we can get. 9 months is along time to fight an infection.

April Foolin' 2010

The joke is on us. That is, the joke is on me Garrison and Hailey. Not because Conal pulled a good one over on us, but rather because he thwarted us, unwittingly, on every prank.

First, we decided to soak him with water on his way in the door when he got home from work. Unfortunately for us, Conal has cat-like reflexes

and most of the water ended up here:

instead of on Con.

Secondly, we tried to trick him by putting Chili powder on his french toast underneath the cinnamon.

Yeah, I promise that looked more appetizing in real life.

I put a ton of chili powder on that and he ate the whole thing. When he got to the last bite I started laughing and said "I can't believe you are eating that!" Apparently, he had a stuffy nose and didn't know anything was wrong with it until the second to the last bite. Even then, he didn't say a word. He just thought to himself "wow, this french toast has kind of a Southwestern flair."

Con, for future reference, french toast should NOT have a "southwestern flair". Thanks for eating it without complaining though. You really are the easiest person to cook for.

In case you were wondering, which I'm sure you weren't because it is only interesting to me, I did get my 13th April Fools Day call to see if I need a ride to the pharmacy. Still don't need a ride to the pharmacy...........but I could use a ride to my Obstetrician.

We have news!

Mandi said I should just put a big arrow like this

to point over to my baby ticker over there. (oh and by the way, I look EXACTLY like that pregnant barbie doll over there. NOT. I wish. She is so cute!)

Anyhow, if you need more proof since its April fools day:

If you look really close you can see the date (2/19/10) up to the right.

It's a girl! Due at the beginning of July!

The kids are as excited as can be. Conal and I are very happy and very grateful.

Hailey is already making lists of things we need to do before the baby comes. I'm kind of glad that we didn't tell them until I was about 20 weeks along. Otherwise we'd have to answer 30 weeks worth of questions instead of just 18 or 19 weeks.

Hailey did inform me that she is going to have more kids than me. She said that she is going to have 9. I really hope that she doesn't change her mind. Nothing would make me happier. Here's to hoping that she doesn't have to have c-sections like me!

Palmyra and Niagara Falls NY

What can I say. It's only 10 hours away. We've never lived with in driving distance before so we had to go. Right?

Along the way, we couldn't resist a quick trip off the highway to get another glimpse of the Kirtland Temple.

I really had a hard time not stopping to visit these places again



but we had other places we needed to be.

Our first stop in Palmyra was the Smith Family farm.

This is where Joseph Smith lived when he read this scripture:
and decided to do what it said.

Also, in his bedroom in this home,


the Angel Moroni came to visit him as depicted in this picture. This is the original and is hanging in the Hill Cumorah visitors' center.

We were also able to go inside the frame house where the Smiths moved a couple of years later. This is were they lived when Joseph received the plates.

He had several hiding places for the plates to keep them from falling into the wrong hands. One is here, under the brick by the fire place:
and another was in the loft in a tool box such as this:

The Sacred Grove was our next stop. Conal and I have been here before. It looked SO different because it was summer, and it was dusk. As a matter of fact, I saw my first firefly in the Sacred Grove. This time however, the leaves were gone from the trees and it was daylight.

Since we don't know exactly when in the spring of 1820 Joseph Smith had the first vision, I suppose it could have looked similar to this as it is technically spring. I have proof. ha ha!

Had I been there without 5 kids under the age of 9, I would have spent a long time right here:

But I'm glad my kids got to experience this with us.
The view of the Palmyra temple from the grove is amazing, as I'm sure is the view of the grove from the temple. Our next stop was the Book of Mormon print shop. How amazing it was in that day and age that they were able to get 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon printed here.


The kids were very interested in the printing process and even got to help a little bit.
Here is one of those 5,000.

We drove by the Martin Harris Farm. The original builing no longer exists and the land is not owned by the church but this is what it looks like now.

Off to Hill Cumorah. Glad we went to the Sacred Grove first because it started pooring rain.

Garrison and Hailey were very disappointed that they couldn't snoop around the hill because they were SURE that they could find where the golden plates were hidden. They weren't as disappointed when I told them that their Grandma Burton had the same idea when she visited Hill Cumorah at their age-----and she didn't find anything either.

The visitors center was of course beautiful and a welcome break for the kids.

Stay tuned for Niagara Falls and "just keeping it real", Cause its all fun and games until somebody gets their eye poked out.........or starts projectile vomitting. Which ever comes first. More to come soon.

Hailey's first date

I made an exception to our "no dating until you are 16 rule" because I REALLY like the guy who asked Hailey out on a date. He's a really nice guy and I fully trust him with my daughter. He's pretty darn cute too. Is it bad to say that about your 6 year old daughter's date? I bet you'll excuse me this time.

Conal and Hailey had a blast at the Daddy Daughter Dance at Hailey's school. I had to laugh because when they got home they were both all sweaty from dancing so much. Of course they were. Conal IS a Whetten after all. I should have figured that they'd dance the whole night. I'm glad they got to spend some great father/daughter time together. Hailey had a ball dancing with all of her friends.

Um, yeah, it was kinda dark and that was on a cell phone camera......but you get the idea.

I love this picture of Hailey and Mckenna (her only church friend that goes to her school). Too bad it was so dark and it was taken on a camera phone.

Hailey and I got to spend some great mother/daughter time together as well when we did her nails:

and hair.

I'm so glad they both had such a fun time.

St. Patrick's Day parade

A little bit of rain doesn't stop the Whettens from having a good time.

It wasn't even as bad as when we were waiting in line to get into Shedd Aquarium and we stuck that out. Maybe it is a Chicago thing. I can tell you that El Pasoans would have never stuck it out. First off they'd all be freezing to death (and it wasn't THAT cold) and secondly, people in El Paso are afraid of the rain. Many won't even drive in it. We aren't becoming Chicagoans are we??? I don't think so. You have to be ok with winter here to be a true Chicagoan..........and well.....need I say more? Oh well, it sure isn't going to stop me from enjoying all of the great things about the Chicago area.

We all had our favorites. Conal always loves the bag pipes:

the kids love all of the candy and free stuff (free kids meals to Chili's baby! Wahoo!) :

and that darn "fun bus" always gets our attention:

I don't know quite what to say about the belly dancers

but for some reason they cracked me up as did the hot pink model walking girls...........sorry, I don't get it:

We also got some great Halloween costume ideas for next year:

The "Star Wars" club guys were a crowd favorite. The little boy who yelled "Darth Vader!!!! I LOVE you!" Had all of the adults laughing.

Fun and games people. Fun and games.

From the Mouths of Babes: A blast from the past.

A couple of days ago I was getting rid of some clutter and I found a notebook that just had some random stuff in it. Glad I checked it before I threw it out because I found a couple of pages of quotes from Garrison and Hailey that Conal and I had written down in 2006. It would've been sad to have lost some of these.

****disclaimer**** Probably no one but me will think these are funny so feel free to skip the rest of the post.

Hailey: " Mommy, I really like your foot necklace" (my anklet) April 2006

Garrison had allergies so we gave him an allergy pill. He took it, swallowed it, waited for one second and then said "Well, so much for that. It didn't do anything!" April 2006

Hailey: "Mommy7, I'll let you go outside with me when I'm the mom and you are the kid." May 2006

Hailey said that we should name the baby (I was expecting Jackson at the time) "another GG". May 2006

August 2006 Garrison prayed that Hailey and Alexia would close their eyes during the prayer and that Alexia wouldn't go "WAH WAH" When we put her milk in the microwave.

August 2006 Garrison was dancing and saw his shadow and said "Hey! There is my little brother dancing too!"

August 2006 Haileys words to the "Hokey Pokey". "You put your right foot in, you take the WRONG foot out, you put the right foot in and you shake it all about. You do the OKEY DOKEY and turn yourself around. "

Hailey: "When I get to Heaven I will give Heavenly Father a big hug and then a kiss" October 2006.

Alexia was reading these over my shoulder and said "Hee Hee, Mom......... Garrison and Hailey are FUNNY!"