Nightmare becomes Reality

I have been reassured that this happens at least once in every family, and I'm not totally convinced. After about three hours of balling my eyes out, I came to the realization that maybe Heavenly Father is trying to teach me something. Everyone who really knows me well knows about my obsession with hair and maybe this experience is trying to teach me that there is more to life than hair. It was a blessing that my visiting teachers were there otherwise I probably would have killed the boy otherwise known as my son. They must have been playing barber shop and Dominic reassured Riah that he was making her look like a princess. If she only knew. She came down the stair looking like this....






After balling my eyes out with my visiting teachers right there, they laughed and told me to take photos and said that I would laugh about this one day. I sure hope so cause I'm pretty far from laughter even now as I write this at 1 in the morning. I went up stairs to find this horror....

EVERY ounce of her hair and femininity was lying there on my bathroom floor. One of my visiting teachers was very sweet and took her to the beauty shop to see if any of her hair could be salvageable or if a miracle could occur. She came home looking like this with lots of cute bows and headbands.

Look at her, happy as a lark with sucker in hand....if she only knew what she really looked like. I'm debating whether or not to call her a boy or a cancer survivor, what do you think? Hopefully she will be as mad as me when she looks back on pictures to see how her loving brother lied to her when he said she looked like a beautiful princess!!!! Forgive me I am trying to recover.... on a lighter note.... here is our sweet little stuffed turkey for Thanksgiving. These are for you Megg.


I'm almost in tears again as I see Riah with her pretty hair just days earlier...

A Late Halloweenie

We went ward hoppin' this year to two different trunk-or-treats, and got way too much candy so we gave it out to our trick or treaters on Halloween day. I don't think we have ever had that many trick or treaters before and honestly I think that the kids had more fun giving out the candy than getting it. Dom was Peter Pan this year and Riah was none other than his side kid Tinkerbell. My plan was to be Tigerlilly and JJ Captain Hook, but my energy just wasn't there being 9 months prego so I resorted to being a pregnant hippy, that makes since right?



Don't mind the belly just hanging out everywhere...that's just not too cute, but made for a funny pic.

Noah Justin Bell Has Finally Arrived!!!

It was a long day and night of contracting on and off on November 1st and 2nd. The Open House at the office was November 2nd and I was just praying and praying that I would make it. My prayers were answered because my contractions stayed 12 minutes apart until right after we left the open house. Everyone there thought I was absolutely crazy to still go. I would be in the middle of a conversation with someone and then I would stop, close my eyes, and breath through them. Yeah I would have thought that girl was a nut ball too! I brought my bag to the open house because I was pretty sure we would have to go straight from there. When the contractions got too intense I changed in the back massage room and we left for the hospital. It was a nice excuse to avoid the clean-up :)

Me smiling in between contractions.


I decided that I needed Steph there to rub my back while the hubby breathed and walked me through the contractions. They were a great labor team for me. Noah Justin Bell arrived at 1:21am just four hours after arriving at the hospital. The doc said he wasn't a small baby but he was my smallest weighing in at 8lbs 2oz and 20inches long. When he came out I couldn't see him and the nurse said, "okay dad, tell everyone what it is!" When JJ said "A BOY!!" I was so so happy. It was exactly what I wanted. He is such a sweet little boy and barely cries....so far. He is such a blessing to our family! Dom and Riah are so excited to do things for their little brother, especially shoving the binky down the back of his throat!


Noah Justin Bell
8lbs 2oz, 20inches long, born 1:21am November 3rd, 2010



First family photo



The Labor Team

No signs yet folks.......

Well Dom came two days before his due date, Riah came a day after....I'm officially due tomorrow and so far no clear signs of labor anytime soon. Although I have heard things could happen rather fast with the third. Doc says I'm dilated to a 2 and this weekend would be a good weekend because he's on-call. Honestly I could really care less if he delivers me cause I'm not really a fan of him. I will keep you all posted as to any progression. Possibly my next post will read "He/She Has Arrived!" because I know you all are in such suspense as to the gender of our baby....even if your not I can pretend you all are.

Things with the business are picking up and we are having an Open House to welcome Dr. Bell to the community on November 2nd. Hopefully by then I will be slinging my newborn. JJ has decided to change the name of the practice. Kind of his own fresh start. He likes, "Muscle and Joint Chiropractic." I like, "Back-In Action Chiropractic." But we still can't decide. Which one do you like or please tell me a better name. We have to decide quick to get the business license stuff going. Any help in this area is greatly appreciated!

In Shock!

Recently I came across this cute blog and I just happened to win this cute Halloween countdown!!! I have never won anything before! I am so excited for it!!

Hey, it's my birthday I can cry if I want to!!!

Ever since joining the church I have had the pleasure of sharing my birthday with General Conference. Which don't get me wrong, I love general conference because your with family or friends typically eating good food, but I would like to just have that be a separate time and my birthday be a separate time. And since my birthday fell on a Saturday this year I had to give up my husband to go to priesthood. Okay....I love priesthood too, the guys always come back better, but honestly I was a little bummed. JJ knew how I felt and tried the whole day to make it special before he had to leave me. I woke up to a fresh cut pineapple boat in bed and donuts (he knows the way to my heart) and he got me the most beautiful nativity set for Christmas that I have ever seen. He knew that I wanted one, but not just any one, I was looking for the perfect one. He surprised me with the most beautiful one that I have ever seen in my life. I just love all the colors in it, and can't wait to display it for Christmas. And of course he gave me a full body massage. I just couldn't ask for more, but he says he still has more planned for this coming weekend, so we will see!

Had a doctors appointment today and I am actually almost 38 weeks. Doc said I could go anytime now and honestly, I am wanting it to stay in. I feel bad even saying that, but I haven't had much time to even anticipate this baby coming because both JJ and I have been so stressed, as we are in the process of buying a chiropractic business. So many things to consider...hiring accountants, lawyers...and so on and so forth. It has been two weeks now that JJ has worked there and he has loved every minute of it. He says he loves being "the big man" and the existing patients seem to love him and are rescheduling, which is a good sign. I am needing to train myself with the office stuff and insurance stuff and, with a new baby, I am wondering how I will find the time. Fortunately the front desk girl in there now is great and we will keep her, but I figure I need to know this stuff just in case.

I'm excited for the surprise of not knowing the gender, but now I'm feeling even more unprepared because I can't get all the clothes out yet or get too many things ready. Things are crazy for us right now and it doesn't help that Riah has had a fever the past few days and the fact that I feel like a 25 year old hag! Three kids at 25, I must be OUT.SIDE.MY.MIND!...pretty much....

Okay venting over....

September Happenings

A couple of sweet girls in our ward offered to pick up my crazy children and drop them back off once a week for preschool. It's so nice to get a couple of hours to myself in the morning once a week! I am so grateful, but I think they are just starting to realize what they got themselves into! It's not a joy school curriculum, but rather focuses on the sounds of letters which has been said to work faster with learning to read then just learning the letters. Then they learn cute little actions or songs that go with that letter and draw pictures. The kids were so excited to finally go to school, and frankly so was I. This past Sunday was Dominic's first Primary performance in sacrament meeting. He had known his line for THREE weeks prior "I can follow the prophet by saying my prayers," which when he finally got up to the pulpit, came out like this, " I du da de da du da la la." Yup, he's my spiritual child! The neat thing was though, that my mom actually came to see it! This was quite a first, considering she didn't even go to his baby blessing. We loved having grandma there, and I think she enjoyed it too! The power of invitation from a child...that's all I gotta say.

Bust A Move

Well for the past week I have been on strict bed rest due to an infection causing pre-term labor, so needless to say I have had plenty of time to get all our family photos organized, backed up on disks, and blog! I came across this cute video of the kids a couple of weeks ago when we went to a Micheal Jackson memorial concert in the park, followed by the movie "This is it." The kids had a blast dancing to the music while waiting for the movie to start. They got so carried away that they attracted a small audience, then of course Dom got shy and stopped showing off his moves as much. Sorry it's such a dark picture.

Summer Happenings

This summer has been full of family, friends, and fun in the sun. We have spent most of our summer days relaxing by our pool with the cousins. Can I just say that being by cousins has been so much fun. The kids play all day and my sister in law and I just complain about our prego pains back and forth to each other and sit on our towels like beached whales eating watermelon. Seriously if that gave you a mental picture that exactly what we look like. She is due mid September and they just bumped up my due date to October 22 and said that my baby is measuring really big already....not really a fan of pushing out a twelve pounder so I'm trying to cut back on the late night ice cream socials.

We have managed to do a few things besides being lazy by our pool all summer. A few weeks ago just our little family took a trip to Pine Mountain Lake Resort and Yosemite. It was just what the doctor ordered. So relaxing...besides the contractions that started up as I began to hike. But the kids loved being in the mountains.






and this is the closest we will come to prego pics of myself.....

For one whole week grandma took just Dominic to the mountains and he had a blast just having his special time with grandma, meanwhile I was missing my baby horribly.

So Riah and I just swam to keep our minds off of it.


For 4th of July our friends The Owens came and stayed with us. We love their cute little family and their little daughter who barely makes a peep! Seriously we barely knew she was there( I keep praying for one of those). We know the Owens because Richard was JJ's favorite missionary companion on the mission and the only one we have stayed in contact with. It was fun getting together with them to watch fireworks and sneaking out with Lindsey to see a midnight showing of Eclipse. Thanks Lindsey for being my only friend that I have to go with....


Oh, and did I mention that we laid the big red banana boat to rest? Yes oh yes we finally said good bye to her and all the H.E. (double hokey sticks) that she has put us through.....

Goodbye! We won't miss you

and said hello to a big silver banana boat...Meet the dreadful Honda minivan...very ugly, yet very practical. Fits all our babies and all our junk.

Does having a minivan make me a REAL mom now?!....unfortunately I think so....

UPDATE!!!

I'm thinking it is finally time to update the blog because I was beginning to feel like a blog stalker without any contributions. Well JJ made it!! he graduated chiropractic school!!! Just in time, my camera broke so pictures are to come after I go old school and get them developed. Then we made the long trek across the US to California with a big Budget truck. Dom still talks about the "big truck" with daddy. It was a very long exhausting trip. We were fortunate enough to be able to stay with my brother and sister in law in their big house until we found a place that we liked. JJ started his job a few days after we arrived and he LOVES IT!!! He comes home so happy every day from work. We feel very fortunate to have such a job in these hard economic times. JJ passed the state board a while back so we are waiting for his license to come any day now so he can get a big bust in pay and actually call himself a chiropractor. California is so slow on these things!!! We found ourselves a very nice townhouse four miles from the family with a swimming pool that we have been living at lately with this hot weather. I feel like I'm in a mansion compared to the trailer. We feel very fortunate to have found such a pretty place. It's so fun being close to family and having BBQs and get togethers, although the simple life of Missouri and all our great friends are so missed. I think my sister in law is sick of me saying, "oh its better in Missouri" because in so many ways...it is. We like our ward and already have a speaking assignment for fathers day (yikes) but is so missing the Rockwood ward. I'm about 18 weeks along and huge as a whale and this baby is so active already!!

Such a small update for so many things that have happened this past month and a half, but now that we have Internet in our new place I am hoping to have more updates and pictures to come!

Maria's Good Finds!!

Well she has finally done it! My very good friend Maria who I have always said is the luckiest person in the world, because she somehow finds the best deals ALL THE TIME!!! and I well....never do, so she finally created a blog in which maybe she can pass some of her luck onto me, thanks Maria!! Besides selling my couches for the same amount I bought them for today, this was my second most favorite thing of the day!! From free music downloads, to free shirts, she finds it all, you should check out her blog HERE. Steph and I will be claiming our free shirts tomorrow from Aeropostale!

Exciting full month

Things have been so crazy around here with all this packing/selling of furniture/ saying our goodbyes, that sadly my blogging has taken a hit, but a lot has happened. We celebrated two of my most favorite people's birthdays, sent out graduation pics, Easter, preparing for Auntie Steph to come in next week and found out that JJ's parents are coming in for the graduation which was such a wonderful surprise! Having people we love there to share such a big accomplishment means a lot to JJ and I.

JJ is such a good sport to have to share his birthday with Amariah. He told me that she was the greatest birthday gift I could give him....he's so sweet. So that night I made them a nice steak dinner because Riah and JJ both love their meat! Then I made her cupcakes and JJ got his very own German chocolate cake from SCRATCH!! I mean even down to the freshly grated coconut!! He got the whole cake to himself because the rest of us wont touch coconut with a ten foot pole! He was in heaven.


I'm so glad these two were born.

My handsome hubby is graduating in about two weeks, and these are the pics that my dear friend Meggan took of him and made into an invitation.




Easter was so great this year and falling on conference I think made it extra special. We woke up and had our annual Easter devotional outside, then the kids came inside and looked for their hidden Easter baskets.




So many sweet memories here in Missouri, we sure are going to miss it....

Free Udder Covers

So I got lucky and ran across this website for free booby covers for nursing! All you pay is shipping of $9.95, originally $32.00. They only have a select few patterns, but all of them are pretty cute. If you have one already, it would make a cute gift. So all you do is go HERE and type in the promotional code of: choice2. Just did it and it worked! There is a back order until April, so I just gave them my mom's address to ship it to because we wont be living here, but I thought it was a good deal. Can't beat a cute gift for 10 bucks! Let me know if you do it!

Pinewood Derby

The new Cubmaster Greg Bosshard in our ward was nice enough to give Dominic a derby car and let him race after the real scouts were done with their official races. Dom was so excited all week to race his car, that is all he would talk about. Him and JJ painted it silver, strapped silver dollars to it and even added a toy peacock to the driver's seat.



We couldn't believe it, his car actually won one of the races! It was an experience he is likely not to forget and will hopefully encourage him to want to be a cubscout.

creepy?------------------------------------------------------>

So does anyone else think this is a little creepy? I thought it would be fun to track the pregnancy as I saw this little icon on Alanna's blog and stole it, but I'm finding it a little creepy to see the baby in these early stages each and every time I check my blog. I'm thinking it's the tail? What do you think?

Well on a different note, things are going good I suppose, because sickness is in full force. I'm planning to start my packing this week. Can't believe we only have 5 weeks left in this good ole' state of Missouri. We will truly miss it here.

Get Ready Stork

Just wanting to let all my blogger buddies know that we are expecting NUMBER THREE!!! We are very excited and hoping for another boy but are going to keep the gender unknown until the birth. He or she will be due in mid November sometime. This baby will only be a month apart from its cousin. It will be fun to be prego with my sister-in-law! The only thing not too exciting will be the sickness I'm already feeling during the move....YIKES!

Trip to Cali

We returned home from a great trip to California. We figured things out and JJ found a job!!! yipee! Besides family drama, JJ's youngest brother opened his mission call to France, got to see JJ's middle brother Matt who we haven't seen in like three years because he had been on a mission in Spain. Overall a great trip besides this which happened.....

Our little boy turned into a little girl. This is what two weeks with three girl cousins will do. A little worried about this being a long term thing.....YIKES!!

Round TWO

Some of you may remember THIS POST not too long ago, well I guess with boys it's just what's to be expected. I means boys including JJ! I am ashamed at even saying how this happened as some weirdo might report us, I mean JJ, but what the hay, here it is.... so JJ was throwing Dom and flipping him in the air and having him land on the bed in our bedroom. JJ feels better about blaming it on the lowness of these trailer ceilings, but he went to flip him on the bed and hit his leg on the ceiling lamp, slicing Dom's knee almost to the bone. So we went in to have him stitched up, except this time wasn't as calm as the first. Took three nurses to hold him down. I think the only thing gettin' him through was the Popsicle at the end, that he somehow remembered.

Just when we thought we were in the clear, he hit his knee at church and two stitched busted open bleeding profusely. Back to urgent care we went. Thanks Cam for being so sweet and taking us.

WARNING: Graphic Photos


Not a happy camper

A boy after my own heart. All it takes is a little treat to cheer us up!

Amazing...thats all I can say

I have got to say, JJ and I just finished this book last night and we can not stop talking about it. This book had me feeling every single emotion, sadness, inspiration, anger, pity, gratitude. JJ even teared up! (and I only have seen him cry three times in my whole life) I would recommend this book to anyone both spiritual or not, this book will make anyone want to be better. I will not say too much, because I don't want to give too much away, but it is a true story about a young girl who finds herself in the middle of the Rwandan Holocaust. Her only means of survival is a Hutu Pastor from the opposing tribe who takes her into hiding into a small bathroom for three months with seven other ladies. Her renewed faith in God, and ultimately her ability to find forgiveness for the Hutu killers who wiped out most of her whole village is truly inspirational. This book is a MUST READ!!