Elder McGrath

Last week we went to Utah for a few reasons: 1) to visit my mom and dad, 2) to see my brother off to basic training for the Army (the he's off to OCS after that), and 3) to surprise my youngest brother, Colin, at the airport when he came home from his mission in Chile.

Seeing Tristan off on Monday (and then again that night...and then again on Tuesday!) was sad because he was leaving behind his beautiful, pregnant wife, Ana. He is supposed to graduate from OCS the week she is due. I am hoping since this is her first that she will go over her due date, just to be sure Tristan is there for the birth. But, if not, she is staying with Mom and Dad and I know they will take good care of her.

Wednesday was so fun. We got to the airport early and rolled out our banner for Colin. He was expecting my mom and dad, Ana, and maybe my oldest sister and her family. BUT, my second oldest brother was also there, along with our family, and my youngest sister and her family. We had quite a group! He was so surprised to see us all there!

It was so nice to see Colin and hear his stories and feel the Spirit. He was/is such a wonderful missionary and I know that the people in his mission were sad to see him go.

Friday was fun. I almost died several times, but it was fun. My dad and brother took Jeremy and I skiing up at Sundance. Neither of us have been, and we really needed a lesson, but we decided since we were going with such skilled skiers they could just instruct us. So I made it off the lift just fine (which oddly enough was the SCARIEST thing about skiing). After that, well, let's just say it wasn't pretty. I didn't know how to turn or how to slow myself and stop. They kept yelling, "Wedge! Wedge!", at me. I would point my skis together and nothing. I think I started going faster. I would get going so fast that I thought if I did fall and crash I was surely going to break something, so then I would just make myself fall. I was an excellent butt skier though. I would just bend down to where my butt was almost touching my skis and just go. If butt skiing were an Olympic sport I would medal for sure.

Now that we are home, Shelby is having some major cousin and grandparent withdrawals. When the plane was taking off yesterday Shelby yelled, "Bye Me-tah! Hope to see you in a month!". She begged me this morning to be the Shavy Gravy Monster. I don't think anyone can play that game as well as my dad though.

I am too tired to go through and put any pictures in order, but here they are (the airport pics are blurry. I think the camera was on the wrong setting.).

Happy Valentine's Day!

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Hooray!

After two weeks of being cooped up in the house (one week due to the ice storm and one week due to sickness), we are finally all back to normal. Jeremy and I felt like after all that we deserved a date night on Friday. We went to our very first hockey game and saw the Stars play the Blackhawks (defending Stanley Cup champs). It was a great game to go to for our first hockey game. The Stars won in overtime. I was definitely more into it than I thought I would be. On the way home we had an opportunity to do some service. On the Dart on the way back a woman and her three small kids got on. The mom was only wearing a short sleeve shirt and the kids had only thin jackets on. It was in the 30s outside so I know they had to be freezing. I could hear the mom ask a woman behind us if there was a bus stop at the next Dart stop. There wasn't one. The mom and her kids stayed on and then got off on our stop. They just kind of stood on the platform for a minute looking around. We asked if they needed a ride somewhere and they hesitantly accepted. We drove them to their apartment about 10 miles away. The mom was so thankful and tried to pay us, but of course we refused. It was just nice to be able to help someone in need and I was so thankful that we left the game a couple minutes early so that we could catch the earlier Dart and ended up on that same train as them.

The only picture I have of the night is this silly one of the two of us on the Dart. Hooray for date nights!

The weekend weather was AWESOME. It was sunny and in the 60s. Beautiful. The next few days are supposed to be just as nice. It is amazing what good weather can do for your mood. We went to the park, played outside, washed the cars, and just tried to soak up some of the good weather. Hooray for good weather!

This little one will be 10 months old tomorrow! AND....her first tooth FINALLY popped through today! You can see it on the bottom. I tried to get a picture but she was too quick for me. We just love this girl. You can't help but smile at every single little thing she does. She can say mama, dada, baby, and she tries to say bye-bye when she waves but it ends up sounding like baby. She loves to wave at everyone and blow kisses. She really loves her baby dolls right now. She will pick them up and hug them and pat them on the back. It's adorable. She also really loves music. She will press her little ipod or Shelby's little CD player and just bop her head. She also really loves water right now. Instead of me wiping her hands off with wipes, she loves it if I run the water and let her just run her hands through there. I can't wait til it's really warm and we take her swimming for the first time. I just know she'll love it. Hooray for 10 months!

Rough Patch

We've hit a bit of a rough patch in our house lately. It just seems to be one thing after another lately. It started with Joey's fall down the stairs a month ago. We hadn't installed the baby gate at the top of the stairs yet, and apparently I hadn't moved the playhouse that was blocking the staircase completely against the wall. Joey found a way in between while I was on the phone and the next thing I knew she was tumbling down the stairs. She was fine- in fact I was more traumatized than her. Then I weaned Joey. Talk about pain. I could barely even lift Joey for about two weeks. Then last week Joey had her second flu shot on Monday. Tuesday she started running a fever. We didn't know if it was a reaction to her shot, teething, or both. Then she started with a runny nose and cough, but I never did take her to the doctor because they were closed all week because of the ice storm, and even if they had been open I figured they'd just tell me it was a cold and there wasn't much we could do since she's a baby and can't really take cold meds. Last Wednesday Jeremy went to put sand on the driveway because we couldn't get the car back up due to the ice. He ended up falling and thought he had broken his arm and had to go to the ER. It wasn't broken, thank goodness, but he did have to have his arm in a sling for a few days. Last night when Jeremy got home Shelby started screaming in pain that her ear hurt. She's never had an ear infection before (I am not counting the SLIGHT one she had once because the doctor only caught it when at her well check and said it was the very, very beginning). Anyway, we went over to the insta care and Shelby, Joey, and I all got checked out. (I started not feeling great on Saturday, but again, thought it was only a cold.) We all tested positive for the flu. We stopped by Walgreens and picked up our super expensive Tamiflu and came home. Jeremy woke up this morning with fever and chills so he stayed home from work. To top all of this off, Joey just crawled into Shelby's room where the vacuum was sitting (I left it there because I got stopped in the middle of vacuuming) and pulled the vacuum on top of herself. She now has a nice huge bruise on the side of her head/face. Uuuuuuugggghhhhhhhhhhh!

I am really trying to stay positive and hope that NOTHING ELSE can/will happen to us. We are trying to just not go anywhere and stay in and rest so that we can get all better for our trip to Utah. We are definitely in need of a good vacation!