Being a Mom

I just have to say that I am amazed by every mother in the world who gets anything done with a baby! I love being a mom and Abi is the best baby ever but it is so much work! She hasn’t learned that night time is for sleeping and day time is when she should be awake. We have tried everything to help her get things straightened out but it doesn’t seem to be working. I am hoping that I can master doing things with one hand.

I love to hold her and snuggle her up to me. She is starting to grin when we talk to her. She is growing like a weed! My Dr. asked me if I was feeding her cream! Lol!

I have had some complications with my c-section healing but I am happy to say that I am on the mend. My Dr. said that I am his favorite patient. I’m sure this is because I am making his house payment with all of my complications! lol

I started student teaching last week and even though I am so grateful for my placement at Cleveland Elementary and with Mrs. Sitterud, it is a lot of work. I have the greatest family that is helping me with Abi while I try and finish this last semester of school.

I am going to post some pictures of Abi as soon as I can. Thanks to everyone who left such sweet comments on my last post. We have received so many wonderful baby gifts and love from everyone. I am so grateful to live in this area with our wonderful families so close.

Abigail Ann O'Neil

She is finally here! Abigail Ann O’Neil joined us on January 1st, 2010 at 1:43 in the morning. She weighed 7lbs 4oz and is 20 inches long. We went to the hospital on Wednesday the 30th after my Dr.’s appointment and started some medicine to help me go into labor at 10am. The Dr. gave me more medication at 11pm that night. The next morning at 7:30am he came in and broke my water and started the Pitocin drip. By 4pm I was dilated far enough to have an epidural. After a long painful process of getting the epidural in I was finally able to relax. I started pushing around 9pm and pushed for a couple of hours. Dr. Nielsen talked to me after I had pushed for two hours. He said that they only allow first time mothers to push for three hours. The baby was not coming down far enough because she was facing my pelvis and couldn’t get past it. He gave me the option to push for another hour but recommended a c-section. I was really struggling with what to do and pushed for another 30 minutes. After pushing I started to throw up. This was my sign that the c-section was the best thing to do. We worked really hard to not have the New Year baby but ended up being the lucky ones after all. In the end holding her in my arms made all of the pain melt away. She is so perfect! We are so blessed to have her in our life!

Stick Horses

I just finished making some stick horses for Christmas. They are $20.00 if anybody is interested. I have them for boys or girls. My nieces and nephews love them. Email me at carli.o@aggiemail.usu.edu if you would like one before Christmas. Thanks

Pink, Pink and More Pink!

This week I had two baby showers. I am so blessed to have the kind of family and friends who are willing to not only throw a shower but give us wonderful gifts that will help us with our growing family.

Last Saturday Kathy Jensen and her girls threw me a shower in Elmo. It was so nice and many great friends and family came and showered me with their love. Unfortunately the camera that I brought stayed in the car the entire shower and nobody else thought to take pictures. You will have to take my word for it that Kathy did a wonderful job. Everything was perfect from the decorations to the refreshments. If you ever need to be humbled about how many people love you, this is the type of event to have. Thank you to everyone who came and supported me.

The second shower was thrown by my sister, my mother-in-law and all of my sister-in-laws. It was in Price last Tuesday. I was again overwhelmed with the love that was shown. An outpouring of love came from many friends and family members again. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much baby stuff. I had a pretty awful day at the school that day and was overwhelmed with how many loving and caring people I have in my life.

Thank you again to everyone who helped and came to both of the showers. I was feeling a bit nervous about all the stuff we need to get to be ready when this baby comes, but I am feeling a lot better now. It took some time to organize everything (it helped that my generous mom bought the baby a couple of really nice dressers) but now things seem to be falling into place.

I am getting really excited to meet our new addition especially because she is moving around like crazy! I am hoping we will get to see her before Christmas! Again I am so grateful for the wonderful, supportive friends and family that we have and know that I am truly blessed!

Just a Little Bit Crafty!

My mother-in-law, Lori, is a very talented tole painter and has helped me for the past few years to make some really cute projects. The first year I was married I made a cute pilgrim woman and started painting the pilgrim man that matches her. Needless to say I am a really slow painter (and because we usually only paint once a year) it took two more years before I finished painting the pilgrim boy! Well this year we were talking one day about a project that we would like to do. (Pudge cut the stuff out for me and my two sister-in-laws and Lori put all of the other supplies together.) I thought that this HO HO HO would be really cute. So last Saturday we went to Ferron and I actually started and finished my project in one day. I thought they turned out pretty cute. With the baby coming and finishing up the semester of school, they may be my only Christmas decorations I have out this year. Lol

End To A Successful Hunting Season!

This year was another successful hunting season for the O’Neil family. Brian shot a nice buck with his muzzleloader. I hunted with a muzzleloader for the first time this year and unfortunately didn’t get anything on the few days I was able to hunt. When it came time for Brian’s cow and spike elk hunts, he had to bear the cold weather and spend a lot of time hunting. This week he was only able to hunt for two days and that turned out to be enough. On Wednesday he shot a cow and then Friday (the last day of the hunt) he shot a spike. His family started calling him “Last Day Johnny” because he seems to always get a spike elk on the last day of the hunt. I think that his success is both luck from being in the right place at the right time and the fact that he is a really good shot. Brian shoots any weapon very accurately and rarely has stories about missing. I am really proud of him and glad that he is the hunter/gatherer of the family. Lori was the only other person in the family to get an elk. She shot this cow on Thursday and went through a lot less bullets and powder then she normally does! lol

Happy Halloween and Feeling Better!

This week has been busy at school as we are getting ready to switch from attending class all week to going into the schools and observing teachers at work. I finally started feeling better and hope to stay healthy for the rest of the winter. I am really excited to be going to a third grade class at Castle Heights Elementary in Price this semester. I am not really looking forward to all of the germs roaming around elementary schools but hopefully having the bug last week will be my only turn this year. It should be interesting to see me try and keep up with a classroom of third graders. I have never claimed to be a fast or energetic person but being this pregnant has definitely taken its toll on my motivation level. I am looking forward to testing out all of the theories’ that my professors have been teaching us and figuring out what is going to work for my classroom.
Halloween was a lot of fun now that everyone seemed to be feeling better. The weather was really nice and all of my nieces and nephews looked so cute! Brian was hunting elk this week so I went over to the Trunk-or-Treat in Elmo and handed out my candy. Halloween always gets me so excited for the rest of the holidays.
In Price they are already hanging the Christmas decorations throughout town. I know that some people get upset because it seems like they are skipping Halloween and Thanksgiving, but it just makes me happy that they have enough decorations that they have to start this early to get them all up. Most people who know me are not really surprised. My sister Cortni and I have put our Christmas tree up as early as the first of October before. I don’t think it takes away from the other holidays, it just lest the season last longer!

Sick of Being Sick!

I don’t know if anyone else is dealing with feeling sick this week, but I have to say that I am Sick of Being Sick! I have been dealing with some sinus issues for a few weeks now and last week it got worse. I went to the Dr. and she said that I had a cold virus and I needed to just stay home and rest to get better.

I have been a bit panicked about this whole swine flu outbreak and staying home seems to be making me more worried. I tend to watch the news a lot and all the different things that are being said are so confusing! Get the flu shot. Don’t get the swine flu mist but the shot is ok. Don’t get the shot because your baby might be autistic. Make sure your shot doesn’t have preservatives in it. The flu shot might make you sicker. What are we supposed to believe? There have been so many conflicting stories that I am left completely confused!

On top of all this confusion I have been really sick this weekend. I do have to say that I have the greatest family ever! Brian was on the mountain on Saturday and I was feeling horrible. My sister-in-law called me throughout the day to check on how I was feeling. (Her kids had the swine flu this week so we were avoiding being around them.) I also have the greatest mom! On Saturday evening she called and I still wasn’t doing very well so she drove to my house and packed up all of my cold medicine, extra pillows and took me to her house. She bought a new humidifier and put me in bed at her house. It was so nice to finally get some sleep! She made sure I had everything I needed and helped me feel better.

I’m still not feeling well today but Brian has set up everything at home so that I can hopefully get some rest. I guess this is going to be my practice of not getting much sleep that comes with motherhood!

It's a Girl

It’s a Girl! I haven’t posted my first ultrasound results because the baby was being shy and wouldn’t let us see. She told us that she was 70% sure that it was a girl. During the first ultrasound they couldn’t see the babies face so the tech thought that my Dr. would order another scan. I went to the Dr. this week and he said that I can do another one if I wanted to but he had enough information from the first one to see that everything looked good. With the $7000 deductible we have to pay, Brian and I decided that we didn’t want to do another ultrasound if the Dr. didn’t think we needed one. Because of all this and still wanting to know what the baby was for sure I went to the hospital and they said they would just look for the sex of the baby again because we couldn’t see it the first time without charging us for another scan. I was so excited! I went yesterday and we are defiantly having a girl! I’m grateful for professionally trained people that can tell because I am not able to identify anything on that screen or the picture.

I’ve heard the saying that a picture says a thousand words; well this picture leads to a thousand questions to me!

Unemployed!

Well I am officially unemployed! It is pretty scary but really exciting. My last day of work was Thursday and it went really well. The ladies I work with took me to lunch on Wednesday and gave me some really cute teacher decorations for my classroom. It was bittersweet going out to lunch with all of them because I have seen them almost every day for the last five years. I have developed some really great long lasting friendships with them and plan on keeping in touch will all of them. On Thursday Dr. Heiner had a surgery meeting so his wife Chris (who is one of the kindest people I have ever met) took us all to lunch. The girls had bought me a cake and hung up a banner that said “We will miss you Carli!” It was funny because all day the patients coming in the office were asking me where I was going and if I was coming back. I have come to know some of them really well and will miss seeing and helping them. It is going to be an adjustment for Brian and me because I have worked at least part time our whole marriage! I think I will adjust fast to not having to be somewhere at eight in the morning pretty easily! I am really excited to just focus on school for a few months and get ready to bring home a baby! I took some pictures with my cell phone on my last day so they are not the best quality but I wanted something to remind me.

All the Girls

Funny Faces

Liesel and Paola (Pretending to work! lol)

Kelli and Connie

Connie

Gina

The banner they put up for me

Back to School!

Well it’s back to school time and I don’t know if I will survive! I started back last week and it is pretty overwhelming. Between the six classes I’m in and training a new person at work it’s a lot. I am getting excited to be done working. I have worked for the last five and a half years at Dr. Heiner’s office and think it’s time to move on. Just being a full time student is going to be a change for me because I have been working full time for the last two years while attending school. Brian is getting busy with his taxidermy shop. He has had a few things brought in that will keep him pretty busy throughout the winter. We are both trying to stay afloat with all that is going on. Hopefully things will run smoother with school and being done with working will come soon.

Yellowstone

Our trip was so much fun! It was nice to get out of town with just Brian and me. We drove a lot so that we could see the entire park while we were there. It is one of the most beautiful places that I have ever seen.

It was amazing how the wildlife didn't get spooked easily if they did at all. These elk were only a few yards away from the hot pot that a lot of people stopped at.


You can’t see it very well in this picture but we saw a black bear on the first day in the park. After we saw this one, we went around another bend in the road and saw a mom black bear with two cubs. We saw five bears that day. It was really neat. Brian hasn’t ever seen a bear while in the park and we were lucky enough to see all of these.

It was rainy and cool the day that we went to see Old Faithful, but really fun anyway. We got there pretty early in the morning and didn’t have to wait very long for it to erupt.


The buffalo were amazing! They walked right on the road and didn’t seem to care about the hundreds of cars passing by. One wouldn’t even move off the road. We had to go around them. It was crazy!




Artist Point


Overall it was a great vacation! I think that the next time we go we are going to drag our families along. I think that Yellowstone is a place that everyone can enjoy and it’s close enough to where we live that we should take advantage of it. Now it’s back to work and school for me and work and hunting season for Brian. I’m really grateful that we were able to go and am blessed to have a husband who plans well and makes vacation more enjoyable!

Yellowstone here we come!

Brian and I decided to take a little vacation this summer. We realized that after four and a half years of being married and a baby coming this winter, this will probably be the last time we head out with just each other. (Even if we do something later we will have to make arrangements for a babysitter and all of that good stuff) Well anyway with my school starting back up in three weeks and hunting season starting again for Brian next week we decided this week would work great for a vacation. I have never been to Yellowstone and Brian hasn’t been since he was a kid so we decided to head up. We drove to Pocatello, Idaho yesterday and today we are driving the rest of the way to the park. Hopefully we will get to see some great wildlife and the fabulous Old Faithfull!

Wiki's and Pod Casts

In class last week we talked about using wiki's and pod casts. I like the idea of using pod casts in my classroom. I don't love the idea of using wiki's in the classroom because they seem so unreliable. I think that there are better types of technology out there.

Class for the week of July 7th

In class this week we looked into the credibility of a web site. I used a form from http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/evalelem.html to evaluate some educational web sites. It was interesting to see what makes a good web site and some of the ways you can tell if it is credible. This was an interesting thing to do and I found some great web sites that can be used in my future classroom.