Surprise, Surprise!

Today we were given a notice about a surprise inspection for our townhouse building. We were surprised and of course had to clean our house (mainly the carpet and outside). It was exhausting, but hopefully everything will be ok for them.

I fit into more old clothes today and it makes me so happy!

Jaren and I are budgeting a ton and we are creating a plan to be consumer debt free in a year! We will, of course, have our student loan debt still but it will be so much easier just to manage that debt instead of so many debts!! It will be such a relief to be so much closer to debt free.

Time Marches On

For Pioneer Day I made a Rocky Road cake that didn't quite work out because it was so hot and the Stake activity was outside. Jaren said it was good, but not to my standards lol!


I decided to chop my hair off to donate to Locks of Love!! I love it!



Devlin's new favorite thing is to go to the park and swing! He laughs so much and doesn't like to leave.


Jaren and I started a thing called The Fat Flush last week and we've been on it for 5 days. I've lost 3-4 pounds so far and a little over an inch on my waist. I can fit back into clothes that I haven't worn since last year!! I'm so excited, but I realize that I have an addiction to sugar. After I cut it out, I find that I crave it ALL THE TIME! I've given in a couple times, but only a little bit because I want to keep losing weight! Also, along with the new sensible diet, I've been running 2 miles every day and doing Pilates. I have so much more energy now. I've been on a weight loss plateau for about 6-7 months and it's sucked so much, so I'm glad that I'm seeing results finally.

Well, life goes on and I'm trying to get our house organized. I want to put a path in and I'm looking around to find cheap sod to put in. It's fun to research prices and put together a wish list!

Also, I'm almost finished with my Mom's inventory and that is exciting!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

There has been so much going on and the biggest is that my baby boy turned 1 on Sunday!!

I had so much fun making him his cake. Here are some pictures of my fun adventures in cake making leading up to his!


Last year for Jaren's 24th birthday! A Fun-fetti cake and frosting.


My first adventure into homemade marshmallow fondant. Jaren was playing a tank game, so I decided to make a tank. I used Fun-fetti and white fondant.


This time Jaren and I made a cake together. We had fun sculpting the roses and fairy and just experimenting with how we could make cool things with fondant.


I surprised Jaren with this chocolate covered strawberry with frosting cake for Valentine's Day.


Since we had tried fun things with fondant we decided to do a cool Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter Cake for Spencer's 23rd birthday. For the figures we used Crispy Rice with fondant. Crumbled cookies for dirt, Brown Sugar for sand. It was a blast. I made Yellow cake and Devil's Food cake with Lemon Cream Filling.


For our Friend Blake's 26th birthday we made a Liger cake for him. I made Devil's food cake with a peanut butter cream cheese filling and bits of Reese's in and on it.


For Sarabeth's 15th birthday we decided to do a fairy swim party cake and later added on Gnomeo and Juliet figures also. I made a Devil's Food Cake and Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Filling. We used crushed up Butterfingers for the tree trunk.


For Jaren's 25th birthday I made him a Mustafar cake with an epic Jedi/Sith battle. I did a Chocolate Cake and poured red jello in it and it melted the cake. I also made a cream cheese filling and colored it orange. I put some of the filling in the cake while it cooked and it made the cake fall in to look like a planet. It turned out so cool!


And finally Devlin's 1st birthday cake! We did a Teddy Bear Picnic birthday so I decided to make a picnic blanket with a Crispy Rice Bear and picnic basket. I made a Fun-fetti Cake with Raspberry Cream Cheese Filling.

I love making these cakes and I'm excited to do more. I already have my sister's baby shower cake to look forward to!!!

Flu flu go away

Oh the stomach flu. It loves me, but I definitely do not love it! I got hit with it on Thursday night and then all General Conference weekend I was feeling sick, but luckily I wasn't dead and having to be in bed 24-7. Also, Jaren and Devlin didn't get sick along with me!! Anyway I am feeling so much better now :)

So news..

We are moving again (as long as our application goes through all right, which I don't see why it wouldn't). Monday night I found this nice place online. It's about 150 MORE square feet than where we are now. It has 1 1/2 bathrooms, the place is also 2 stories which is so awesome. It has a fireplace, a really good sized yard and a kitchen that I know I will love so much. We looked at it today and then went and turned in applications. Now in the next few days I should get a call saying if things went through ok or not and if they did (which they should) then we will be moving the beginning of November!!

We've been at this place for a year in November. We've had a lot of problems, not with the place, but with the neighbors. I've been feeling for a while that we needed to move, but nothing felt right until today. It will be so nice living in a place that does not smell like smoke all of the time. I will actually be able to open my windows (they don't allow smoking!)

So I'm excited and ready to get packing.

That's pretty much all for now since it's so late, but I really just wanted to put that up here! Nighty Night all :)

Life can be so hectic

I can't believe it's been more than a month since I last posted! I'm not sure if I'll even be able to catch up on everything that's gone on! But I'll try :)

August 11 - 15: We went to Steamboat Springs for a choir performance for Jaren and the Chamber Choir. We had a lot of fun until the night of the 14th. Jaren got my ticket and asked to make sure it was ok that we had Devlin and the lady said ok. But of course when I got there, I was rudely told that I couldn't bring him in. I was really upset, but luckily one of the ladies in charge came and watched him so I could actually see the performance I came all the way for!

August 23: School started. Jaren is able to take Devlin to his classes in the mornings and I have him in the afternoons. Then on Fridays we have Jaren's brother watch him for a couple hours.

So far school has been going really good for me and Jaren. I've been getting good grades and studying a lot. Jaren has been lucky and has only just this week really had homework for the first time! Lucky duck. Basically our lives right now are school, work, and Devlin.

On Wednesday September 8, I put Devlin on his back and went to use the bathroom. When I came back, he was on his tummy!! So I decided to put him back on his back and a little bit later, he rolled over again. Now he loves to roll over, and I caught him rolling over in his sleep the other day (guessing for a different position lol) He is getting so big!

Devlin now can stand up and sit up, with support of course. He coos all the time and he does the sign for milk that I taught him when he's hungry. He loves to look at his hands and he loves to watch my hands as I do sign language for him. He loves to smile and laugh. I love just watching him :) He loves doing tummy time and looking up at things. He also now will put him legs under him and push out when there's something in front of him that he wants! He's going to be crawling a lot sooner than I'm sure I'll be ready for. Devlin likes to play with toys and he is getting so good at grasping things.

Devlin is also teething right now and it's been hard on him, because he hasn't felt too good and he's been hurting. Also, this last week we all had colds that we are just now getting over luckily.

I can't believe my baby is already 3 1/2 months!!

2 Months last Thursday!

I really cannot believe that two months have flown by. Many things have happened and our baby boy is growing and learning more and more every day.

Devlin has been trying to roll over a lot lately and has learned to smile! And he slept in his crib at night for the first time on Sunday night. We had planned on transitioning him into the crib from the bassinet before school started and decided just to do it and it worked for us :)

We have our next appointment for Devlin on Thursday, where he gets all of his shots :( Not really looking forward to that, but I am looking forward to what we have planned for after! Jaren has a choir trip to Steamboat Springs from Thursday - Saturday and we decided that it would be fun if Devlin and I went too, just a nice little get-away trip before school starts.

Our little man is getting so big and I'm excited to see how much he has grown since our last appointment!

School is starting in about two weeks Yikes!! I feel ready for school, but I'm kind of nervous about re-auditioning for the music program. I was mis-informed that if I took time off that I could just come back, but later learned that I would have to re-audition. So I've been working on a few pieces and trying to get mentally/emotionally ready for it. I realized when Jaren and I sang in church, that it was first time that I had sung in public (besides choir) since my Mom's funeral. I know I need to keep singing and make her proud, but some days I find it very difficult to get through a song, especially if it's a sentimental one. But I keep on moving ahead and learning each day.

Jaren has been working a bunch and we miss him a lot. I created his schedule for him for this semester of school (because I had the free time :D) He is going to be swamped with being in school full time and also working full time, but we know that it will be worth it!

I'm not sure what else to say, there's just been too much going on to keep straight!

Devlin's Birth Story

Here is my birth story:

I began having regular contractions on June 9, my due date. I had a doctor’s appointment that day and was dilated to 2 cm! The doctor told me that he thought I might end up having the baby that night and he wanted to deliver him. So he told me I either had to have the baby that night or Friday – Sunday, since he was on call each of those days, except Thursday. We thought it was funny that he was wanting to deliver our baby so much, but we equally wanted him to deliver since he was our favorite doctor of the 4.

Wednesday night I kept contracting and they continued to be consistent all Thursday also. It was a very hard few days, but then on Friday morning around 5 am I heard a pop and thought my water had broken, so I stood up and nothing. Then I realized that I needed to go to the bathroom (yet again). I got to the bathroom and gush! My water had broken, and I was lucky enough to be able to make it to the bathroom! ☺ I yelled for Jaren and told him I thought my water had broken and he said it didn’t look like it, but then with the next gush he changed his mind and called the doctor. We then got our hospital bag and headed out.

We got to the hospital around 5:30 am and I was admitted since my water had broken. I was in a bit of pain and was expecting to be dilated pretty far, but when they checked me I was only at 3 cm. I was trying to go pain med free, and jumped in the Jacuzzi tub for pain relief, and it sure did help a ton! After quite some time, I needed to change positions and get out of the tub so I did. I got back in bed to be monitored again and was having a really hard time getting through contractions, a TON of back labor was the reason. It’d been about 6 hours at the hospital of the bad labor, and I finally gave in to an epidural because I’d only progressed to 3 ½ cm in all that time.

I was seriously scared out of my mind to get an epidural and I was upset that I got one, but I know if I hadn’t, then it would have been so much harder. The epidural was perfect – I could move my legs and lift myself up and I could still feel some, but not all of the pain. About an hour to an hour and a half later I was at 4 ½ cm. By 4:30 pm I was 6 cm. At 7 pm I was 8 ½ cm. It was then that I started hurting really bad because the epidural was wearing off. I told my nurse this and she called the guy back to fix it. He told me that I could push the button for more if it started to wear off again. (Apparently, the nurse told Jaren that she hid the button and didn’t tell me about it before, because she preferred to be there whenever I pushed it.) If I had known about it, there never would have been a problem.

The sucky part about it, was that now the epidural was too strong and I couldn’t feel a thing! At 8:45 pm I was fully dilated! We decided to rest for a little while, trying to have the epidural wear off a bit so I could push. I started pushing around 10 pm and was having a lot of trouble. The baby wasn’t moving down very fast and the doctor started talking about c-section. I really really did not want a c-section and I guess the baby didn’t either, because he started coming down and by 11:30 pm we could see the head.

I kept pushing and then got stuck again. The doctor came in again and said I must have a huge baby in there and started talking about doing an episiotomy (again I really did not want one). So I kept pushing and my baby was ready to be born! After pushing for a bit, I got the head out and was about to push again and the doctor told me to stop, my uterus was doing the rest and pushing the baby out without me having to do a thing! He came out very fast and I was told that the doctor almost dropped him!!

I was very disappointed because Jaren didn’t get to cut the cord and I didn’t get to hold him because he had pooped inside me (before my water even broke), so they rushed him away to clear his lungs. The doctor immediately started to get the placenta out. I didn’t hear a thing in the room and after a minute or two asked why I couldn’t hear my baby. One nurse said that it was normal for them to not make noise for a few minutes, but my dad who was there is a respiratory therapist, said it was not normal. My baby wasn’t breathing for 5 minutes and was gray. They had tubes down his throat and everything, but everyone was trying not to let me know what was going on. Finally I heard my baby cry and they told me it was a boy!

Devlin James Allred was born at 12:35 am on June 12, 2010. He weighed 7 lbs 6 oz and was 20 in long.

I was able to hold him finally and began to feed him and he latched on perfectly the first time. He was perfect and healthy after the first scare and luckily he has had great health ever since!

I was told later that the reason I was having such a hard time pushing him out was that he was diagonal and was facing my side! So it made sense later, since he definitely was not a big boy ☺ It was certainly a fun ride and lots of bumps along the way, but we got through them all.


Here are some pictures that my sister-in-law, Lorajean, took for us!