Doctor Appointment

While I was typing in the last blog post I started having contractions. The real kind! Then I ate lunch with Hans and Arlee. Hans and put up Christmas lights and decorations outside. I was still having them at this point. We went in for my scheduled doctor appointment and she checked me. I am at a 1 and softened. She told us that she probably wouldn't need to start me the week early as planned (so my mom could be here by a planned time) I would probably go on my own. I am guessing she thinks that means I am going to go before the week ahead. Anyway, that is the latest update and now we wait.

I am still having the contractions, just less frequently.

Operation Harvest

In past years I have put up fruit with my mom. We have dried and made apple sauce mostly. This year was a little different. We are in Washington this year and a 12 hour drive is just a little too long to be putting up fruit. While Hans was at work the opportunity came up from a co-worker to go and pick fruit at her friend's orchard.  They said come and pick them on Sunday, but we made arrangements to go on the next Saturday instead.
I have to say this is a lot different than picking apples at my parents. They had picking sacks- which are great and so helpful to get a lot of fruit picked at one time. The trees are only about 10 feet tall and rather skinny. This worked great for me and Arlee. Hans was the one up on the ladder, but we were still able to help out a lot since there were a fair amount within reach for us. In the trees the apples were clumped together, which made for easy yet productive picking. Just to give you a better picture two of these picking sacks would over flow a repack box.  I really don't think that I will go back to picking apples the same way ever again. I hope we keep getting the opportunity to pick apples every year so we can keep up our dried apples and apple sauce supply. They make for a delicious treat. Not to mention healthy too. : )

Here are some pictures: The one above is Hans with the trees, picking sack and a huge smile on his face. The one below is the same kind of thing, but you can see the apples in the sack.

 This is how the day started. Arlee didn't want to go and pick apples, but as you can see she changed her mind once we were out and about.  The orchard was in a town called, Tieton. It is about a half hour away and it very rural. We didn't get a picture of it, but looking out from above the town looked so pretty in the fall colors with the leaves changing.

 Arlee showing off all the apples.

 Here are the fruits of our labors. HAHA. We were going to stop at about box three because we brought Hans' car and we weren't going to be able to fit anymore in. Well, Hans went to put the box in and it tore and out came all the apples. So we decided that we would just load up his trunk and put them in boxes later. Livvy or Libby- Hans and I can't agree what her name is was telling the people in her house to come and look at our trunk. She told us to take all the apples that we would like so we did just that. Well it is more like what we thought we could handle. Since I knew that I would be putting up most of them and expecting Lydia I thought we better take it "easy". Hans would have kept going, but Arlee and I were done. The sack that you can see are Granny Smith Apples and we are hoping to make a pie out of them. Talk about delicious! We hope anyway.

 The apples that were picked for the most part were golden delicious with about 20 of red delicious and 20 granny smith. I have dried about seven- 1 gallon bags of apples and we still have about 4 boxes left to make apple sauce. This will be the first time making apple sauce with out my mom around telling me if I am doing right or not. She is only a phone call away, but it is not the same.

 Me and the apples.

 I have to say that this corer, peeler and slicer machine is probably the only reason one would want to dry apples. It makes it so much easier (I imagine- since I have never done it with out).

This is kind of a funny one. The string is from one apple and there is an apple in Hans' mouth. I have to say that Hans is such a trooper in posing for this picture. After I took the picture Hans said that he felt ridiculous. I told him that he looked pretty ridiculous too. Haha. Then he asked me why I made him do that. I told him I didn't think that he would! But you have to admit it makes a pretty funny looking picture. : P
I love that Hans will do stuff like this for me with out a fight. We have a great time together and enjoy spending his time off work drying apples.

We had to order an apple strainer and got that in the mail yesterday, but we are still waiting for the canner to come. The only thing that I had to put the apples up was the two dryers. One that I got from my mom's mom and the other from my dad's mom. These are great to get for free. It made our "Operation Harvest" a little less expensive. Thank you Grandmas for your donations. :)

*Operation Harvest- came from the signs around town here. When I first saw them I started laughing, because this is not something that I would have seen in Salt Lake. I have to say though. I love seeing the orchards and vineyards here. They are beautiful and even more so in the fall.

Until Part 2 of Operation Harvest... or some other event worth blogging... LATERS!

The Hoges

Why is it so quiet?

I took her to the dentist yesterday. Last time, I took her she at least let the assistant look in her mouth and now she is obsessed with brushing her teeth. I have to say that this is not a bad thing, but I find it interesting. 

Arlee was excited to go to the dentist. She had a lot of fun talking to me about what was in the waiting room, the bathroom-had to go while I was filling out paper work. She was even very friendly to the dental assistant. She was excited to see that Nemo was on the flat screen tv and to sit in the chair. It all went south when they put these glasses on her. She shut right down and didn't say a word. She wasn't even talking to me. We tried telling her how cool her new tooth brush was to see if we could get her use to the idea of being there with the cool shades on, but no. She was not having it. Then the dentist came in. He was telling us about his family and then it came to when he would try and look in her mouth. This was a no go. She was clinging onto me for dear life. Much like the stories that I have heard of me when I was little- we just don't respond well to guys. After a while we will warm up (a couple months or so), but that would be a really long time to keep going back. Right?

I know that she is really young and is probably not going to be comfortable with any of it for a long time or if at all. I know that when she is older she will get that she has to open her mouth or they can't help her. For now they just make sure that she has the right amount of teeth. Mostly, it was a getting comfortable visit. Or uncomfortable, whichever she is in the mood for. 

So today, I was doing some stuff on the computer when I realized that it was a little too quite since Arlee was making so much noise just moments before. Of course, that makes one wonder and they have to go investigate.

Me: Arlee?!

Arlee: WHAT?

Me: Where are you? As I am following her voice

Arlee: Um...

Me:  Why are you in my bathroom?

Arlee: BRUSHING MY TEETH!

I walked into the bathroom and she is up on the counter with the toothpaste cap off and brushing those little teeth of hers.

Me: Why are you brushing your teeth? 

Arlee: Because, they are all soggy... (High pitched ...Giggle giggle giggle)

Arlee is getting so big and has changed so much in the last 4 months that we have lived in Washington. It is truly amazing how she has grown up. She loves to do everything herself, but thankfully still lets me help with the important things (brushing her teeth- when she doesn't go and do it all by herself, going to the bathroom- wipe factor, getting her something out of the fridge- only because it now has a lock on it since she'll try and bring me stuff up the stairs or where ever I am. Such as, grape juice and spilling it all over the carpet. ETC.)

Now she is brushing her own teeth without saying a word to me about it. I wonder what is next. Maybe she will be able to do her own hair...? 

 

Lydia Update...#2

Here is what we found out from the doctor.

Are you ready?

1. Abdominal Circumference- Some what small!

2. Overall Growth- Normal! 

They can only do ultrasounds every 3 to 4 weeks since they don't change that much to make it worth having them frequently.

3. Doppler (Check blood flow)

Umbilical Doppler- Check for placenta stiffness- This was normal!

MCA dopplers- shunting blood up to brain- This was normal!

4. Amniotic Fluid- This was normal! However they would like to see it higher. I was measuring at a 10 and they like to see you around 15.

They are going to do scans to check me weekly. However, with measuring the fluid it can change a lot. You have 4 quadrants. Each of those should have some fluid around the baby. They measure the depth of the fluid in each. But say that they took a measurement in one and then the baby moved then that measurement that they just took is now going to be different and so on. The doctor was telling us that they could measure it 4 times in a minute and the numbers can be completely different. As long as the number is around 10 they are not going to induce labor. They will let me stay pregnant. They really begin to worry when you are more around 5. So I am still in good shape in that regard.

5. Movement- As I am reporting it is normal. Lydia is a pretty active little girl and I feel her moving constantly throughout the day. They want me to do kick counters. At least 10 in an hour (when she is the most active) This is usually right before I go to bed or after I eat a meal.  I feel her a lot at night.

Just while we were talking to the doctor she moved 10 times in about 30 minutes. This is a great feeling. When we were getting the doppler reading she was moving all over the place.

6. NST (Non Stress Test) This was also normal.

Overall Lydia and I are doing great. I have great health and the doctors seem to be pleased with our progress. This visit was more of a caution than a need and wasn't meant to scare us, but I have to say it was still worry-some. I am glad that it is over and now I just have to relax, go to appointments and keep the kick counter going.

I am meant to have small babies. Arlee was perfect and I am sure that Lydia will be just so.

Thank you to all of you that prayed in our behalf. We are so grateful to have the spirit in our home. We have felt the Comforter and are so happy to feel the peace that we need to get on to the next step.  Prayers are welcome always. We will just keep chugging along and can't wait (really we can- only a little more than 5 weeks to go) to meet our other girl.

The Hoges.

Halloween!!!

Halloween! What a great time to get out the fall decor, carve pumpkins and go trick or treating. Here are some of our little moments caught on camera.

 Hans is great at getting out the lids and cleaning them up. I didn't have him make mine this year and I regretted it. I made mine too small and it was rather hard to get the guts out. Live and you learn right? I think Hans will be making mine from now on.

 This is after Arlee touched the guts.

 She later just tried the spoon. Because she is a lot like me and she doesn't like the feel of it at all.

 Arlee helping her dad get the design on there. Needless to say Hans is the one that did the carving. I told him maybe next year she could just paint hers. I think she would have enjoyed it a lot more.

Arlee wasn't exactly ready for going outside so we figured Hans' jacket was a great idea for her to wear. As you can tell it doesn't exactly fit.

 Arlee out with her pumpkin. Notice the shoes- being that there isn't any. Like I said not really ready to go outside, but we needed to make this quick since it was bed time.

 No guts no glory!

 Mine and Hans' pumpkins. I like this picture only because it is Halloween. Otherwise I wouldn't have put it on here at all.

 Arlee's, mine and Hans'. His is hard to see. Something was wrong with his candle, but it is a graveyard.

So this is the night of Halloween. We were in the car and I was trying to get a picture of Arlee while Hans was driving. I thought it took it and brought it back to look at it... WHAAAAM! Hello, Hansel I hope that you weren't needing your eye sight in the moon lit night drive. I was laughing pretty hard after this happened... as you can imagine.

 Now for the real picture that I was going for.

 Hans following Arlee while she runs up to the door. This is how it was pretty much the whole time. There was the last several houses that she didn't want us to go up with her. She wanted to go up by herself. This didn't come as a surprise to me. She is an independent little girl.

Story: Arlee and Hans went up to a house like they always did. I would be standing back a little so I would not crowd the door (with my pregnant self). Arlee was admiring all the decorations and saw a spider on the door. As she went to touch it; it then started moving and making all kinds of noise. Arlee lets out a huge scream. I on the other hand was laughing my butt off. Hans thinks that I am pretty cruel for finding it so funny. At the time, I was talking to my dad on the phone. He wanted to know what was going on, but I was laughing too hard. So hard that I was about to wet my pants. Not too hard for me and being pregnant on top of that it is hard too see why I didn't. When I was finally able to tell him he started laughing. This is a bit odd for my dad since this is not his kind of humor, but for me I was in heaven. Other than Arlee getting scared of course. Don't get me wrong Hans was laughing too, but not nearly as hard as I was or as long.

After I was calm enough so Hans could understand me, I asked him what happened. I know what I saw, but I was a little too far to get the whole story. We still are not really sure if the spider went off, because the people were coming out as she went to touch it or, if she was just too close. Either way, it was awesome.
Now when we talk to her about it she calls it a silly spider. Also that it tried to take her candy and it doesn't have hands like her. Silly spider.

I have to say that I was shocked she was not crying. When I have scared her she starts crying. I used to be able to scare her all the time and she would first scream and then just start laughing. But one time I got her really good, so we can't play that game anymore with out it ending in tears after the first scare.

Anyway, one of the last houses that we went to the guy told us that he has had so many kids come up to his door. He started with $38.00 worth of candy and only had about 5-10 pieces by the time we got to him around 8 PM. I have to say that I am not a bit surprised. There were so many people like us that drove to a neighborhood. We only did this because we live off a main road and we only have 8 units on our little street. Not really ideal if you would like any candy.
After we were done trick or treating we were going to go to the ones next to ours, but no one was handing out candy. This was understandable for sure. We bought candy, but no one came to our house- at least not while we were there. I wouldn't be stopping by our house either. Not enough places to make it worth it.

Arlee enjoying her one piece of candy before getting ready for bed.

We had a great time taking her around. She is too funny and for me it was perfect. Hans went up to the door with her and I got to see things from a distance depending on how many kids were there. All and all it is a great time for people watching and there was plenty to watch.

Now that Halloween is over with, we'll move on to a doctors appointment before going to see the specialist. After those we will have to see when Lydia is going to be joining our family and what may come with that. I am still hoping that she doesn't have to come early, but if it makes it better for her I am all for it. I have to say that I am ready for her. I got most of my Christmas shopping done. Not for her though- I am struggling what to get her. Any ideas? Everything is clean so she has a place to sleep and clothes to wear. OH.... I guess I SHOULD go and get some diapers... maybe after my appointments.
After the doctors appointments then we will move on to Thanksgiving and Lydia's due date along with Hans' birthday and Christmas. Christmas is the best time of year for me. It is going to be weird not running from house to house, but I think with a new baby I am going to really enjoy it. We will just have to Skype people instead.


Until the next update...
The Hoges

Ward Halloween Party

Hans was not able to go to the Halloween party since he was out of town, but lets just say that I have a great ward and if you are there with or with out your husband... They make you feel like you are not missing a thing. Not to say that I didn't miss having Hans there with us, but it was a great time. Here are some of our little moments.

 Lucy and Arlee. Lucy is a great friend of Arlee's and they getting along pretty well. We go to the park with them (a little less now that it is cold and we have been out of town) Sara- Lucy's mom and I help each other with baby sitting so it works out great they get along. :)

 At the party they had games for the little kids.

 Arlee picking out a prize. The lady asked her if she wanted to have a piece of candy or a duck. Arlee loves having toys in the tub and right now all she has is ducks, so she chose the duck. I am not really surprised, but other people were.

 Arlee, Lily and Lucy. Our ward has a lot of girls that are Arlee's age. We are missing a couple in this picture, but they looked so cute that we decided to take a picture anyway.

 Lucy, Zoey, Arlee and Lily. Still missing some, but these girls love each other. Actually, Arlee goes through little spurts on who she talks about throughout the day. I don't know if it is who she played more with in nursery or what. Either way, they are friends and so are their Mommas.

These last pictures were taken while waiting for the Spook Alley. We waited a long time. Sara (Lucy's mom) kept asking, "Is this okay for little kids?" The people kept saying that it was okay, its okay, they'll be okay. This was put on by the young men and before the people go in they tell them if it is a bunch of little kids. Well Lily, her mom, dad, older brother and little brother went in. They said that there were little kids and the next thing that you know they are out crying. I guess someone didn't get the memo. HAHAHAHA!!!!! This was pretty shocking and at the same time I am laughing, because now I know that we are not going in. When they came out Sara looked at me and I wish I had a camera, because it was priceless. Good times for sure.

After the Spook Alley we went outside to start the trunk or treating. Jana told me a day or two before that I could borrow someone from her family to pass out candy since Hans wasn't there. This worked out great. I wanted to be able to take Arlee around and at the same time be giving candy to the little kiddos. Well, I got to take her around and her aunt passed out my candy. I was so glad that they were willing to help me out. Arlee got a lot of candy and I got my candy out too.

Can't wait until next year to do it all over again... haha