Summer Here We Come

May 31. I'm leaving my goal to blog SOMETHING once a month right to the very end. SUMMER is here! Rosie and Evie only have 3 more days of school and we are ready for lots of pool days, camping trips, and being together. They have been fighting and tormenting each other like crazy the last couple weeks which has made me a little hesitant for all this togetherness but mostly I'm super excited. I want to enjoy every second with my girls before R & E start first grade and are gone so much of the day. noooooooooooooo. This year went too fast.

June is a busy, busy month for us (or for me mostly) with a lagoon camping trip, a Russia reunion, YW camps and youth conference, and heading to Newport for our yearly Enslin family trip. We decided to have Rose and Eve's 6th bday party a little early before things get crazy. They are having all their friends over for a summer kick off party this Friday evening and just playing games and having pizza and cake and doing a pinata. Keepin it simple.

As far as the baby business goes, I think I have finally laid to rest the idea of having any more of my own kids. I met with the doctor and he was all for doing the surgery but even with his extensive experience he said he had never done it before and only knew of one other similar case...where the woman did not go on to get pregnant. SO....that wasn't very encouraging. Plus I've been praying about it like crazy and I just feel so unsettled. I don't want that to be the answer but I think it is.

It has been a really interesting few months for me and while it has been disappointing and confusing and a little sad- it has also been amazing. I have felt so close to my Heavenly Father as I've really tried to find an answer to my prayers. I have learned a lot about personal revelation and am trying to trust it and have enough faith to stick with the answers and impressions I've felt.

We are looking into adoption. It is unbelievably expensive and that's scary for me. I have major anxiety about money but I do feel good about it. Ben and I went to the temple a couple weeks ago and had a very cool experience that felt like an answer. I'm not sure if it was an answer telling us to do it...or to explore it...or if we decide we really want another person in our family than this is the avenue. It's scary to trust an answer that was never part of your plan for yourself and is expensive and overwhelming and a process where so much feels out of your control. It certainly feels easier to move on and enjoy my sweet, happy family just the way it is. It's a huge decision and the last couple months have rocked my personal world and my "plan" so I've kind of put it on the back burner for now. We'll see.

In order to fill this void and in attempt to "reinvent"  myself with some new hobbies and distractions, we bought a camper. A good friend of mine and I took the kids camping up at Crystal Hot Springs and squished in her camper and that kind of got me thinking it would be a fun thing for our family and get us out there more. We took it out for the first time last weekend to Moab and went hiking in Arches National Park with Erin and some friends. It was gorgeous and we loved it. The camper was awesome and although it was a hasty purchase, I think it was a good one.

Also to fill my void, I've gotten back into running. Ben and I ran the SLC half marathon with his dad and my sister in April and it was such a fantastic race. We had such a great visit with Bob and Vickie and talking to Bob so much about running sparked my interest in pushing myself to do a longer race. I'm not signed up yet but I've been getting a lot of miles in (15 mile run last Saturday!) and plan on doing either the Huntsville or Big Cottonwood Marathon in September. I've also started running outside which I've never really done much of or enjoyed. We have had such a lovely, rainy, cool May and my early morning runs outside with all the flowers blooming and gray clouds swirling have been pretty spectacular and good for my soul. Not looking forward to the blazing hot runs of summer.

Temperatures in the 90s this weekend...it's here.

Disney and Baby Making

Well it has been over a year since my last sorry attempt of keeping up this family blog. I've been thinking about it lately and I'm going to try again. I am going to make no attempt to log everything we have been up to...I just want to write things down...anything down. Because something...anything... is better than nothing. It won't be polished or complete in any way but it will hopefully lessen my anxiety about time slipping away undocumented and maybe the writing will be a little therapeutic. I've been struggling.

So far 2016 has been a little low for me. We came off a failed IVF attempt in December and we were anxious (read me) to get right back on the wagon of trying again. But one problem after another has presented itself and now IF we are going to TRY again it is going to mean a fairly major surgery for me to correct my uterine scar that somehow came open after I had Gwena. 

I have spent an unreal amount of time on the phone with doctors and nurses here and in CA, with billing departments, hospitals, and our insurance company trying to get this all sorted. I still need to have a consultation with the doc that may agree to doing this controversial surgery but it is starting to feel like this is the end of our baby making road. I never thought it would be. I ALWAYS thought I would have at least 4 kids and I've been comforting my struggling heart over Gwena growing up with that fact ever since she was born. But life doesn't always work out the way you think it will....actually it hardly ever does. And I know many, many mothers end up having to compromise what they always envisioned for their family and what ends up being the reality. But it still hurts. It keeps me up at night. It makes me tear up with no warning. But I also know that I will and I need to move past the hurt and just focus all of my baby sentimentality and all my mothering energy on the three beautiful, bright, amazing little babes that I have. I'm working on it. 

The second week of March was the best of the year. We took the girls to Disneyland and seriously had the most incredible trip EVER. It was truly magical and seriously more fun than maybe I have ever had on any vacation. I'm dying to go back. It was glorious in and of itself but it was also so amazing to put all the baby debating and phone calls and discussion on hold. And since then I haven't had the same motivation towards it because I can't take all the ups and downs.

 We stopped in Vegas on the way down and then went Disneyland, CA Adventure, had a rest day at the beach, and then one more day at Disneyland. I wouldn't change a thing.