So close... and yet so far

This is my last week of clinical rotations forever! What an amazing feeling. I finally feel like perhaps I am ready to be unleashed on patients on my own. After this week, I will have the Pregnancy Risk Line rotation and my research defense, and be finished in June. WOW!

On the home front, things are going well. Baby Sam is creeping and cruising, he's close to crawling but not so close to walking. Ryan graduated from the Institute of Religion this semester. Sammy and I are so proud of him.

We have successfully indoctrinated a new friend into the world of geocaching. Jennifer accompanied us and the Andersons on a cache trip on campus yesterday. It's so good to get outside and walk around. Geocaching is awesome.

Jessica pulling the cache from its hiding placeSammy trying unsuccessfully to steal the cache from MommyJennifer signing the logbook

On my mind today is the concept of seeking and receiving personal revelation from the Lord. I think it is so important to understand that everyone will receive revelation a little bit differently from everyone else. It is of paramount importance that we learn for ourselves how revelation feels to us as individuals. I understand the Lord's plan for me through my feelings; as I plan my life, He helps me to feel confident in the paths I choose (when correct), even if the world would say that I'm crazy for doing certain things. That's how it felt when we decided to be open to having a baby so early in our marriage. Our Sam is such a delight to us, and I know enough about genetics to know that he is one-of-a-kind; if we had waited another month to have children, we wouldn't have the same baby we have now. Sam is a gift, which we would never have had if we weren't open to revelation.

Happy Easter!

We had a very busy March. One weekend we went out to Delta, CO to visit Ryan's dad. It was a long drive, but once again Sam surprised us and did very well. The next weekend we went to the East Coast for some job interviews, and we also visited my family!

Sammy is a very popular guy. We were afraid we wouldn't get him back once the family got to hug him!

General Conference and Easter weekend coincided this year, which made both extra special to me. We made our tent Saturday morning, and for breakfast Ryan made a new treat called cinnamon roll cheesecake. Yum!

Elisa and Heidi joined us for Easter dinner- steak, funeral potatoes, asparagus, and delicious strawberry shortcake courtesy of Elisa!

We love using our china for special occasions. Ryan even took a daffodil from the Village flower bed so I could use my vase. What a sweetheart.

Happy Easter from The Reynolds Tribe

Nertz

Less than a month since my last post, uh-thank-yuh. We miss watching the Olympics every night, though I admit I am getting more homework done. My parents came to visit us, a short 2 day trip that was great fun. Dad and Ryan went go-karting, and all of us went to the Planetarium. There are lots of neat, free things to do at the Planetarium, I highly recommend it. I need to have my mum send me the pictures they took so I can put them on here. I do have a picture of Sammy on our last geocache to put up.

Sammy is still not crawling. We're trying to teach him how to do finger foods. Honestly, he is the weirdest kid. He will put everything in his mouth EXCEPT food. We give him Cheerios, corn, black beans, you name it- he won't eat it unless Mommy or Daddy put it in his mouth.

Lately I have been listening to Focus on the Family's Radio Theatre version of the Chronicles of Narnia. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe was the first "chapter book" I ever read, so I am very fond of the series. The Radio Theatre version is fantastic. I tried to get into the audiobook versions of Harry Potter, but it was rough. No offense, Jim Dale, but you just can't bring the books to life with the same guy's voice for 16 hours. The Radio Theatre is great because they have different actors for all the main characters, sound effects, and music. Plus, they are abridged, so while you get the whole idea of the story, it doesn't take overly long to listen to. I love listening to it on the bus, and being transported to Narnia on my way to clinic. When I was a little kid I used to desperately wish Narnia was real, and I would look all over my grandparents' house and big backyard for a way to get there.

Nostalgia aside for the time being, I would like to direct your attention to my new album of Sammy picture on Facebook. You don't need to sign up for an account, just click here.

We Love the Olympics!

I haven't really watched the Olympics since 2002, so this year I was determined that we would be an Olympic-watching family. Ryan and I have had a blast following the athletes, and even Sammy likes having the TV on all the time. It's very distracting to him. Right now I'm watching Men's halfpipe finals and have just finished up some homework. Ryan just got home from the gym. Hooray!Since our last post, we had a visit from Cassi. It's so nice to have family visit. We had a good time with Aunt Cassi, going to the zoo and tasting Cafe Rio, a Utah original. Ryan made a special cake for me for my birthday, and Sammy got to taste french fries! We had a nice Valentine's Day. Sammy asked me to be his Valentine, and of course I said yes! I have been sick twice in the past month, which is ridiculous. I rarely get sick. We took our friends Elisa and Heidi geocaching for Presidents' Day. It was our first time using our GPS here in Utah. We did a picture puzzle cache around Presidents' Circle (appropriate for the holiday, we thought). Now that Sammy is old enough to appreciate being outside, we will probably go geocaching more often.

My parents are coming to visit on Sunday. We feel lucky to have so many visitors!

Our little boy is 8 months old now! We can hardly believe it! He likes to buzz his lips with his fingers and say "momomomomom" when he is sad. He doesn't eat in the middle of the night anymore (hooray!), although he still wakes up. No crawling yet, so our apartment is still not baby proofed. We love our baby Sam!

Back to School

New year, new semester, new life... gotta love changes!

We had a wonderful Christmas at home in Alaska. Ryan and I really needed a break. Grad school is stressful, for both students and their families. Hanging out with my parents and Cassi was so fun and relaxing. We can't wait for Cassi's visit this weekend, and Mom and Dad's next month!

Sam is 7 months old now. He has two teeth! We think he's getting his top teeth now, because he's been super fussy the past couple days. Poor little guy. I think he is starting to understand that Mommy and Daddy don't always know what he needs. He also knows when it is bedtime, and he freaks out when he knows he's about to be put to bed. Once he's asleep he's good, thank goodness!

This is my last semester in grad school. I'm feeling the weight of the research project. It seems like such an insurmountable task. I really doubt I'll get 50 participants, and that scares me because I am very intimidated by the Research Oversight Committee. Facing them gives me nightmares. Ryan is an amazing stay-at-home dad. He gives me the freedom to work hard in my clinical responsibilities and my research. I love and appreciate him so much!

While in Anchorage, Aunt Cassi had the brilliant idea of dressing Sam up as "Baby New Year" to ring in 2010. Here's a picture of our (not-so) little guy!

It's the MOST WONDERFUL TIME.......... of the year!

I do love Christmas time, and when I think about it that song always gets stuck in my head... but only that part because I don't know the rest of it. Sad.

I feel bad that I haven't updated our blog in so long. I can Facebook for an hour, but spend 15 minutes to update my blog? Apparently not. So...

Last month I went to Atlanta for the National Society of Genetic Counselors annual conference. It was wonderful. Spending time with my family and having them love Sammy so much was fantastic!

For Thanksgiving, we drove out to Colorado to spend time with Ryan's family. It was the first time for them to meet Sammy, which of course was very exciting all around. Rusty and Chrissy are so great, letting us all stay at their house. My nieces Falon and Rebecca are absolutely adorable! Falon loooooooved her new cousin! She always wanted to be around him, even when his diaper was being changed! Very cute. It was great to hang out with Richard again, I miss having him around all the time, like when we all lived in Fort Collins. And of course, we were so happy that Grandma Penny finally got to see Sammy. It is so sweet how much she loves her family.

I finished my rotation at Huntsman Cancer Institute, and am now back in a prenatal setting at Intermountain Health Care. I really like it. I get to travel between their different MFM clinics, which is great because I get a look at how different clinics operate. I really think that I want to end up working in an MFM clinic, though I would also pretty much take any job I can get right now :0)

Sammy is learning all kinds of new skills. He rolls over all the time now to reach toys and other "fun" things he sees. He can even sit up on his own! He's still kind of wobbly, so we don't let him sit up without supervision or the Boppy pillow. Next week he will be 6 months old, and we are going to start feeding him vegetables. He's been doing really well with the rice and oatmeal cereal, so we think he'll love some new flavors.

Ryan and I went ice skating with our ward last week. It was Ryan's first time ice skating. He picked it up quickly, although he did hockey-check me into the wall a few times "because he lost his balance." Riiiiiiiiiight.

And now for our token picture of Sammy!

For our next adventure, we will fly up to Anchorage for Christmas with my family. Stay tuned!

Halloween and Other Scary Stories

For Halloween, we decided to theme our costumes. Ryan was a farmer, Sammy was the scarecrow, and I was the crow!

We went out to a corn maze on Halloween. We love corn mazes. Definitely a favorite fall tradition. Sam loved seeing new things. What a good baby he is!

Sammy has recently discovered his toes. It's really cute. He loves grabbing his feet when he's on his back and rolling on his side. Unfortunately, we didn't cut his nails until a few days after he made this find, so his ankles have all these nasty cuts on them. I'm pretty sure he can't feel pain in his feet, however, because he smacks his feet really hard into the ground all the time and it doesn't seem to bother him at all.

On Thursday I'm going to the National Society of Genetic Counselors conference in Atlanta. Sammy is coming with me, and we're meeting my mom, her mom, and Aunt Dori down there for the weekend! It's going to be a lot of fun- I get to hang out with a thousand other genetics geeks and my family!

October 17th was the 5 year anniversary of my baptism into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This Friday was Ryan's 10 year anniversary. We got together with the two missionaries who taught him, the girl who was baptized the same day, and the ward missionary who helped them both. It was great- all 5 families had kids, and the 5 reunion-ees all had such a good time reminiscing. Sammy got to hang out with Amber and Tyler's son Josh, who is only a few weeks younger than him.