A much needed update- 2017 so far

It'll be tough to choose pictures for this blog post because there are literally more than a thousand between now and the last time I posted.  I'm sad that I've missed blogging about all the adorable things my girls have been saying and doing the past several months.  Most of the funny little sayings they had or cute habits they were in have already come and gone.  I wish I could record every moment.

I really can't believe it's been so long since I blogged last!  As most people know we've had a new development for our family and we couldn't be happier!!!  Although we could all do without the nausea, vomiting, headaches, vertigo, and just general discomfort.  But it does mean the girls get to watch A LOT of movies so in some ways they're fine with me being sick all the time.  Those jerks.  Just kidding, just kidding.  They've actually been really helpful in their own little ways.  Audrey is helpful deliberately- bringing me saltines, getting things for Hannah, putting on movies I tell her to.  And Hannah is helpful in how independent she is and how good she is at entertaining herself for long periods of time- which is one of the most helpful things that could ever ever ever happen during pregnancy.  This has never been Audrey's strong point and being deliberately helpful is not Hannah's, so we've got a good little system going here right now.  It all seems to work and for some strange reason they really don't seem to mind watching about 90 movies every week.  Sometimes.  (Slight exaggeration there...it's probably about 4 or 5 movies a week.)

one of our announcement attempts

baby brother dobbins!

This pregnancy started out even harder than the others.  Every hard thing about pregnancy that I had felt prepared to experience over the 9 months- nausea and vomiting, Menieres episodes, migraines...- all happened at once right at the beginning.  Also an immediate and constant battle with food.  I learn more and more about Menieres as the years go on and this time around I've learned that if I don't eat, if I get anywhere near an empty stomach, I'm 100 times more likely to have a vertigo episode.  All you women who have had kids know how impossible it seems to keep yourself full during pregnancy.  And I feel so much panic when I feel myself getting close to an empty stomach (which is about every hour or less) and it seems impossible to take the time to make something good to eat so I end up eating crappy food just to fill up and then I feel crappy because of it- so it's just this vicious cycle that I can't get out of!  Any suggestions or tips on this subject are very welcomed! I've tried protein shakes and things like that.  But I don't know many other techniques to try and keep full and energized.  I've pretty much given up on the energy thing though.

Our ward and neighbors here have been great and have recently become even more amazing and helpful.  The vertigo gets so much more frequent during pregnancy and I've been sinking lower and lower emotionally because of it.  I've learned that a lot of people with Menieres also suffer from depression.  I definitely understand this.  It's hard to tell sometimes if I'm just pregnancy emotional or if it's something more.  It's really hard to take care of my family sometimes.  And that's where my church friends have stepped up in an amazing way.  They have taken to bringing meals, running errands for me, babysitting, taking me to appointments and grocery shopping (because of the frequency of vertigo episodes I'm terrified to drive anywhere right now), calling and texting randomly to ask how we're doing every day.  And more.  I'm emotional just thinking about it as I type this- happy emotional, grateful emotional.  And these are women who have kids of their own to take care of and things to do.  It's such true Christianity.  They're all walking the walk, not just talking the talk, of being a true disciple of Christ, without even thinking twice about it.  I can't possibly express the depth of my gratitude for how they are taking care of me and my family when I'm not as able to as I want to be.  I have so many feelings about it I wish I could express.  It's so hard being away from my family sometimes, and so it means a lot to have people I know I can rely on, without a doubt.  It gives me back a little bit of the peace that I feel like this illness has taken from me.  I could go on and on about these amazing women.  I'm so grateful to be a member of this Church, I don't know how I'd get along without it.

We've been thinking about our little boy non-stop.  Audrey and Hannah have taken to calling him Baby Brober- even though they can both say "brother" perfectly well...I think it's their way of baby talking to him.  Audrey especially is very attentive to him.  She loves to kiss my tummy and talk to him and tell everybody about him.  She's very interested in everything about it.  She sometimes brings me this magazine we have with the 3D images and detailed pictures of what the baby looks like at each stage of development inside the stomach.  She's not weirded out at all, just fascinated, and still saying how cute the babies are (even when they just look like little aliens)!  She has such an amazing sweetness about her that I can't ever get over.
Hannah is a little in denial about Baby Brother- sometimes she's being all sweet along with Audrey and other times she's yelling "NO!" at any mention of him or of Mama being sick or if we dare say the words "BIG SISTER" to her.  She's a funny kid.  I know she'll be okay once he's here.  She's very resilient, independent, and determined.  She'll be the big sister yelling at the bigger kids to, "LEAVE MY BROTHER ALONE!!"  She's already been that for Audrey sometimes.  We watched that movie about a horse called Spirit recently.  And I've decided that's kind of who Hannah is.  At the end the guy calls the horse "Spirit...Who Could Not Be Broken."  That's Hannah.  She feisty.  I'm proud to call her mine.

So here are pictures of our life the past several months- very few pictures compared to how many hundreds there are.  Some of our favorite things this new year so far have been family coming to visit, accompanying Andrew on his work trip to Arizona, and finding out the gender!  Although it's been difficult in some ways, 2017 has been good to us so far for the most part!  We're still here.

aprons i made for christmas presents.  i felt pretty good about them!

mermaid tail blankets!  christmas presents from hanaikes.  they want to wear them all the time!

look how deep that snow is on hannah!  she could barely walk

audrey and andrew playing in our snowy backyard.  we had some more snow pictures i just need to find them!

we just transitioned hannah to a toddler bed last week.
sadly she falls out a lot....she's obviously used to something being
there to stop her

our brief ER stay for hannah's stomach issues

pictures during sacrament meeting are probably frowned upon, but this is one of my favorites of these two.  he's the best dad to these girls.

in arizona hannah started getting creative with her yoga/dance moves.  she would do this position...and then just stay like that for several seconds before striking another interpretive pose.  it was pretty hilarious and adorable.

hannah randomly asked to sit with ray
and then sat there like this for a little while,
looking kind of nervous excited.  But not moving at all!

these two peas in a pod/troublemakers.
this was the day they decided to decorate the playhouse- with popcorn.

sunsets are just great anywhere aren't they? 

at a dobbins family get together andrew's grandma was giving out rides on her walker!   our girls each got a little moment of individual time with her that they will probably not have very much of throughout life.  so it was really cute and special.

hannah's turn!

the day hannah found a sharpie.  i turned the camera
so she could see herself as i took the pictures.
 i love the sequence of expressions as she
realizes what she's done!  first she's cheesing,
all ready and willing to be in a picture

then she sees it

tries to wipe it off

then just stares at herself wondering what could've gone wrong.
  i was cracking up as i was taking these.

oh how we loved being in a non-snowy place for a little while.  we tried to get out and enjoy the weather every chance we got

ray came home for lunch one day and
made himself  a steak.  it was pretty great hearing
 hadley explaining to audrey where steak comes from!
i thought audrey would be a little
apprehensive about it after their little conversation,
she wasn't at all and later was telling me
that cows taste really good!

hannah was into pretty quickly too

then ray had three little lunch companions
hovering around him until the steak was completely gone,
one tiny bite after another.  i think he got some too...but i can't be sure.

hannah and shelby- i wish i had more pictures of shelby.
her and hannah were definitely frenemies- with a little more
emphasis on the enemies side.  that'll change soon enough.

quick visit to the hoover dam!

here's a lovely picture of the back of andrew's
 head as he kind of geeked-out about the dam- he was just born to be an engineer. 

on our way home again

this is them laughing or yelling or something with auntie sam on FaceTime!  as you can she, she was very entertaining

hannah and this dog.  best friends forever.

a view near our apartment.  we like where we live.

we took a picture together right here right
after andrew's mission when we were both still
nervous and excited around each other and
hoping things would work out.  6 years and almost 3 kids
later....i think they did.

i can't even think of a caption for this one.
all i can do is laugh when i look at it.  s
he's always trying to make me laugh...and she usually succeeds.

hannah wearing my vintage baby dress from when i was a baby
 one more time before we pack it away.
it completely showed her diapered bum
but fit perfectly in the arms and waist.
my kids definitely have got some dobbins genes in them.

for some reason she thought this was
 the funniest thing in life- snow on a pinecone.
she kept dipping it in the snow and then showing it to me as
she just laughed and laughed.  what about it was so funny?  i have no idea.
sometimes i wish i could have the mind and eyes of a child.

they work so hard everyday.  it's tough being a kid.  us moms have the easy job, i guess. 😆😆

Part of the problem with Menieres right now is screen time.  It helps the vertigo along sometimes and causes a lot of general dizziness.  So while I would love to say that I'll be blogging more often, I honestly probably won't be.  Sadly.  It takes me a long time to write a post (this one took a month or two), so we will just have to see how often I commit to doing it.  But I want to post pictures!!!!!  So maybe I will have more posts of just pictures for a little while.  We'll see.  

I love my growing little family.