Great Tidings of Joy!!!

Scott and I found out today that we are going to have another baby boy and we are thrilled. We had our ultrasound today and the baby is healthy, moving a lot, and just simply as perfect as can be. Our little bundle of joy is due in the beginning of May. I can't believe I'm going to have two little boys. We are really counting our blessings today.

MY JOB

So this is me heading out the door to go to work. My, seemingly, endless education finally paid off. I got a job at the local hospital on a surgical unit. I work night shift (three nights per week), so it's been a little bit of an adjustment. The nights that I work I completely loose track of time or day. I think it's a Wednesday when it's really a Friday. It's messing with my head. Other than that, I really like working nights. It's been a lot easier than I thought it would be. I think I have some serious help from above, because I'm the most awake person on the unit and the only one who doesn't drink coffee to try to stay awake. My bright turquoise scrubs is not my choice (in case you're wondering), it's my unit's dress code. I think it's the only hospital in Las Vegas that has a dress code. Lame, but what do you do?

I'm afraid to say it out loud, but so far...I love my job.

I am grateful for little children

Today has been one of those days when Ben had definitely pushed me to my limits. He had tested and exploited every little bit of my patience. It was a hard day and I wasn’t sure if I was going to make it before I ended up with a nervous breakdown. I was angry, annoyed, short-tempered, and on the verge of tears. I did not feel the Spirit. I questioned how other mothers do it… how they deal with their children when they are completely out of control…how they manage to stay sane… As I was contemplating this, my out-of-control little boy came and asked for some food. I put some food on his plate, handed him a fork, and continued on with cleaning up the mess he had made earlier in the kitchen. A couple seconds later I saw Ben put down his plate and fork, fold his little arms, look at me with his sweet and innocent face and say “bless the food”. I had forgotten to bless the food and he was reminding me. I couldn’t hold back the tears of both shame and gratitude: shame for letting myself get carried away in negative feelings that drew away the Spirit, and gratitude for the sweet little boy who reminds me of what’s really important in this life.

So today, I am grateful for little children.

HAPPY 18 MONTHS

My little boy turned 18 months today. It is usually a big deal for a LDS parent because their kid finally gets to go to nursery. But since I am the nursery leader in our Ward, Ben's been in the nursery since he was about 7 months old. He absolutely loves nursery. A couple of weeks ago, our 2nd and 3rd hours of church got canceled and as we were leaving the building after the Sacrament meeting, he started crying and saying "nursery".

It's so fun watching your kids grow and learn new things every day. Every little milestone seems like such a huge accomplishment and make you the proudest parent.

As a little tribute to my big boy, here's 18 fun facts about Ben:

1. He loves music and dancing. He starts dancing whenever he hears music or sees anyone dance. He asks for music to be turned on when we are in the car. He will even tell you "no" if he doesn't like the song, or "yes" if that's the one he wants to listen to. No joke, he picks the songs he wants to listen to.

2. He loves going to the park. If I dare to try to skip our ritual trip to the park, he will always remind me with "go to park".

3. He LOVES water in any shape or form. He loves baths, swimming pools, lake, rain, puddles, playing with the hose, playing in the toilet water... you name it.

4. He talks A LOT. His latest language accomplishments are "brush teeff", " wa hands", "brush hair", "drink of water", "piece of bread", "get me out", "watch Nemo", "thank you, you're welcome", "real hot", "bunk the head", "read the book", "dig dirt", "go to park", "grandpa here", "I yove you", "don't do it", "no touch"... the list goes on. He really has no problem communicating. He talks all the time, our house is never quiet unless Ben is asleep.

5. He can count till ten.

6. He loves the "Old McDonald song" and sings along with it.

7. He can recognize most of the animals, he knows their names and the sounds they make.

8. He wakes up really grumpy after his afternoon nap.

9. He is Mamma's boy. He asks for mamma all the time, whether he is hungry, tired, hurt, needs someone to play with or just needs help.

10. He has Scott's laugh. If you ever heard Scott laugh, really laugh... it's this deep laugh that sounds like it comes from the bottom of his stomach or something. Ben laughs the exact same way. It's hilarious.

11. He loves books. We have tons of books and he carries them around and says "read the book".

12. He loves chips and salsa. He will dip his chip no matter how hot the salsa is. He's eaten salsa that was way too hot for me. He kind of pants and blows a little but then asks for more. I guess you can't be a Hardy and not love salsa, it must run in the genes.

13. Ben's favorite thing in the morning is to brush his teeth. He goes to the sink and says "brush teeff", then he makes sure I put toothpaste on it. He won't brush unless there is toothpaste. I think he just likes the taste of it, it's the kiddie one so it's flavored.

14. He loves when daddy chases him. In fact, as soon as he sees Scott he starts running away laughing and screaming "get ya".

15. He likes playing with the ball, throwing it, kicking it, whatever. He really gets a kick out of it.

16. He has 2 favorite blankets and, lately, he has to have both of them in his bed.

17. He loves his bed. We had so much trouble with his crib, he kept climbing out of it. Since then we converted his crib into a toddler bed and Ben absolutely loves it. I just tell him that it's time for sleep and he goes and climbs right into his bed. Going to sleep has never been easier.

18. He has the most contagious smile.

I LOVE YOU

So the cutest thing happened this morning. As Scott was leaving to go to work, he picked up Ben and said "I love you, Benjamin". Ben responded with "I yove you, mama". He quickly corrected himself with "I yove you, Daddy". It was so cute. He's said I love you before, but he never before attached a name to it. Moments like this melt a mother's (or father's) heart. Moments like this make all the sleepless nights, all the dirty diapers, all of the broken things, and all the chaos in the house completely worth it. I am so grateful for the blessing of being a mother and having such a sweet little boy as part of our family. I love you, Ben.

Jaxon's baby blessing

This last weekend we went up to Utah for Jamie and Matt's little boy's baby blessing. It was a really neat experience. Jaxon is such a sweet little baby. As I was holding him during sacrament meeting I couldn't help but think how weird it must feel for this huge spirit to be stuck in this tiny little body. It was a special day for everyone involved. I feel so blessed to have such a great family.

That Saturday we took Ben to Cornbellys at Thanksgiving Point. Here's a few highlights...

Benjamin A. Hardy, M.D.

Ben was a doctor for Halloween. He loves my stethoscope, so we got him some scrubs and he got to play a doctor. It was cute. He would put the stethoscope in his ears and try to listen to his own heart or belly. I guess he remembered Mommy doing that to him :o)

Today we had our Ward Trunk-or-Treat party. I’m not sure what Ben thought of it. He got really excited when we got there and he saw all the people and his little buddies from church. But when we went around trick-or-treating he got all quite and was just holding out his baggy to collect the candy. He did say “trick-o-treat” a couple of times. Most of the time he was just staring at everyone and everything. I haven't quite introduced him to the scary side of Halloween. I think he was in a little bit of a shock.

Here are some pics...

Our little M.D.

Ben and his girlfriends

Trick-0r-Treating

Stuffing as much candy as possible in his mouth. I think he was worried I would take it away, which usually I would. But hey, it's Halloween...let the kid have fun, right?

California trip

This last weekend we went to California where Scott had to take his 8-hour Professional Engineer test. We decided to make a little vacation out of it. Scott's parents came along and we all had a lot of fun going to the LA zoo and going for train rides while poor Scott was stuck in a testing center for the entire Friday. We spent Saturday hanging out with Scott's aunt and uncle who live there. They took us tide pooling, which was way cool. We got to see all kinds of sea life. There were star fish, Hermit crabs, some other crabs, anemones, huge snails, and other sea creatures whose names I don't know. Ben had a lot of fun and wanted to touch everything and even tried to put it in his mouth...eww... gotta keep a close eye on that kid. We all had a lot of fun. It was a little smoky when we got there on Thursday but then it seemed to clear up quite a bit.

It's nice to have Scott done with his test, though he won't know the results for about three months from now. It's been consuming all his time lately, which means virtually no time for me and Ben. So we're very excited to have Daddy back.

Fitted Sheet Fairy

So this is kinda silly, but I’ve always had a hard time folding fitted sheets. They just don’t come out nice and neat no matter how long I spend folding it. I came across this video and I think it’s great. Finally someone has figured it out. A man too, of all the people :o). I have tried it out and it works great. You can barely tell the difference between a regular sheet and the fitted sheet. So, if you’re as OCD as I am, you’ll appreciate it.

BYU vs UNLV

We went to the BYU vs UNLV football game this last Saturday. It was a pretty good game. I was glad BYU won, even though I was wearing a red UNLV shirt. I guess there is still some blue in my blood.

Wow, there's a close up of my braces.
I think the final score actually was 24:14. BYU rocks!!!

Catching up

It seems like a long time since I’ve posted anything. I’ve been studding for my big nursing board exam, which I took last week and successfully passed. What a relief to have that over with. I guess I’m officially an RN now. Job search begins…

This last weekend we went up to Utah for a very short trip to visit my best friend Kristina from Ukraine who happened to come to Utah for the conference. I hadn’t seen her in over 7 years. It was so fun to see her, talk about good old times in Ukraine and catch up with everything that has happened in between. Stupid me forgot the camera, so I don’t have any pictures. We also hung out with Matt and Jaime and their cute little boy Jaxon. He really is the second cutest baby ever (after Ben, of course). Ben loves his little cousin, he calls him Jaxies and wants to give him kisses all the time.

This is Jaxon, I stole this picture from Matt & Jaime's blog.

Well, since I don’t have any more school and have all this free time on my hands…Yea, right… anyone who knows Ben know that that’s only in my dreams. However, I am looking for some good books to read. I just finished the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyers (I had to occupy my mind with something while waiting for my test results). I’m a big fan. It was so nice to read something other than boring textbooks. But I need some help with what's good out there to read. Any suggestions?

Greasy Fun

This morning I woke up a little later than usual, which is rare since Ben wakes me up every morning at around 6:30 or 7:00 AM. I though he must have slept in this morning and was pretty excited about just lying in bed and not having to jump out because of the baby who will not get quiet until you come and get him. So as I enjoyed the peaceful morning I heard him talking in his room. I went to see what he was up to and to my surprise, or should I say horror, this is what I found…

He had climbed out of his crib (this is after we had taken the base out and had put the mattress on the floor to make the crib taller after the first incident), found a Vaseline container and had rubbed the entire container on his face and hair. I wasn’t sure if I should cry or laugh when I saw him. He did look pretty silly. I stuck him in the tub to get all that mess cleaned up, but the Vaseline didn’t come out. After about a dozen times of me washing his hair, I still can’t get it all out. I’m not laughing any longer. I have even considered shaving all his hair off. Does anyone have any ideas on how to get Vaseline out of hair?

ALOHA

We just got back from Hawaii and had the most amazing time ever. Hawaii is truly a paradise. Here’s a quick recap of what we did.

Monday: We arrived at Honolulu late at night on Sunday and checked in our hotel. Since there is a 3 hour difference between Hawaii and Las Vegas, we were up super early and went for a little walk at Waikiki beach, which is only a 5-10 minutes away from our hotel. The weather was great, especially compared to Vegas. Scott’s cousin Merlin lives on Oahu so we met up with him and went snorkeling at Sharks Cove on the North shore. It is a beautiful place for snorkeling. The water is really clear and there is a ton of fish and even some turtles. It’s a small rocky bay with coral reefs that form ledges and caves for the fish to hide and for Scott to swim through. Merlin had his digital underwater camera that took these amazing pictures.

Scott swimming through one of the tunnels.

On our way back we drove through little town called Haleiwa, which is considered to be the Surfing Capital of the world. It’s full of surfing shops and surfing dudes everywhere. We also stopped by the Dole pineapple plantation. Fresh, just picked pineapple is so good. Yum. They also have the world’s largest maze there, which we decided not to go through – I’m not a big fan of mazes. Later that evening we went to the airport to pick up our friends Eric and Camille. We had planned our trip together but they were flying in one day later. We all went out to dinner at the Hilton hotel’s little beach café that was right on the beach and had some live band playing. It was a perfect relaxing end of our day. We were all exhausted, Scott and I from the hot Hawaiian sun, Eric and Camille from a long 12-hour flight.

Tuesday: The entire Tuesday was pretty much devoted to the Polynesian Cultural Center. But since it doesn’t open till noon, we took the scenic route on our way there and drove around the South and East coast. We stopped by the Blowhole. The blowhole is a natural occurrence formed by molten lava tubes from volcanic eruptions thousands of years ago. The lava tubes run to the ocean and, when the surf is right, the blowhole shoots water, supposedly, up to 30 feet in the air. The larger the waves, the larger the spray. This picture really doesn’t do it justice but it was pretty cool.

Our next stop was Pali Lookout, the lookout overlooks the 985-foot cliffs of the Koolau Mountain Range (translated, "pali" means "cliffs"). To give a little history, the Pali Lookout is the site of King Kamahameha’s victory over Oahu’s chief Kalanikupule, forcing the opponent off the rocky cliff to their deaths below and making the Pali site one of most important and bloodiest battles in Hawaiian history. Kamehameha’s victory began the process of the islands’ unification. Here're some pics... It is crazy windy there.




We then stopped by the Temple and the visitors’ center. It is one of the most beautiful temples I had ever seen. It seriously takes your breath away.

Polynesian Cultural Center is right there by the temple and by BYU Hawaii. It is a nonprofit institution founded by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and dedicated to helping provide educational opportunities for students at BUY Hawaii.
They had shows and activities for different Polynesian islands, Canoe Pageant, big Luau dinner, and the infamous Night Show. It was a lot of fun. The only bad thing is that it was a very hot day with no breeze. The night show was by far my favorite part, we absolutely loved the Samoan fire dancers. I think Scott’s favorite was the Tahitian girl dancers with their insane hip dances. It was pretty impressive, I have to admit. I found this video on youtube of the Tahiti dance, it was part of our night show, it’s pretty cool

http://youtube.com/watch?v=bPN3UH9fRE0&mode=related&search

We are showing off our freshly painted tatooes.

At the Luau dinner.

Wednesday: Wednesday was our beach day. We went swimming at Waikiki beach in the morning and then rented snorkeling gear and boogie boards and headed for the North Shore. On our way to the North Shore we stopped by the Dole Plantation to get their famous pineapple ice cream. For all of you “Lost” lovers, we drove by the Mokuleia Beach, where “Lost” plane wreckage scenes were filmed. We couldn’t get anywhere close, because it is a private area and is blocked off. However, Scott’s cousin Merlin was hiking in the area some time ago and saw the plane wreckage props. He said it looked pretty real and it took them a few minutes to realize that it must be staged for a movie. We finally made it to Sharks Cove and went snorkeling again. We then headed for the Hukilau Park Beach to go boogie boarding. The waves weren’t the greatest, but we had a lot of fun anyway.

Sharks Cove

Hukilau Beach

On our way back to our hotel we stopped by the Sunset beach. I’m guessing it was named for its beautiful sunset views.
That night we ate dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. So good!!! My mouth is starting to salivate just thinking about it.

Thursday: In the morning we headed for the Pearl Harbor and took the Arizona Memorial Tour. The USS Arizona Memorial is the final resting place for many of the battleship's 1177 crew members who lost their lives on December 7, 1941. The Memorial commemorates the site where World War II began for the United States. It was a really sad but humbling experience. We were literally standing over a grave site where 1177 men lost their lives.

Parts of the ship are sticking up above the water.

The names of those who died on the ship.
Afterwards we went back to Cheesecake Factory for some lunch. We really wanted some of their cheesecakes but just couldn’t make ourselves eat it the night before so we went back the next day. After a yummy lunch, we caught a flight to go visit our friends Nic & Heidi on the island of Kauai. Kauai is a beautiful island. It is a lot less touristy than Oahu, it rains a lot there so it is really green. Most of the developed areas are around the coast. The center of the islands is undeveloped and just has the most beautiful mountains and forests. I had never seen anything more beautiful. The words or even pictures just don’t do it any justice. There are roosters just walking around on the roads everywhere like they belong there. I think Scott even tried to chase one down for dinner but lucky for the roosters, they’re too quick. Scott and Eric found a mango tree by Nic and Heidi’s house, knocked some mangos down and enjoyed fresh, off the tree mangoes. We spent that evenining relaxing, eating dinner, and watching Blades of Glory (weird, that’s all I gotta say about that movie).

Friday: Kauai has some of the most beautiful beaches, so we rented some snorkel gear and went to the Tunnels beach to check out their sea life. It was pretty amazing. The water wasn’t as clear that day but we still saw a ton of fish and a couple turtles. I always thought of turtles as really slow creatures, but in the water they’re impossible to catch up with.

Heidi’s family was also in town and were renting a beach house, so we went to visit. They were super nice and let us hang out there and eat their food. We then, together with the Murray clan (there were like nineteen of them), went boogie boarding. They waves were a lot bigger this time.

For dinner we headed back to the Murray’s beach house. Scott found a coconut tree in their backyard and him and Heidi’s little nephew Colton managed to knock a coconut off the coconut tree and then spent the next hour trying to crack it open. They had finally succeeded and we all had some coconut milk and fresh coconut. Life is great in Kauai, I don’t think you’ll ever go hungry there, fruit grows everywhere and you can even have some meat if you can run as fast as those darn chickens.

Saturday: Saturday was a sad day because Scott and I were going home. Before it was time to go to the airport Heidi and I snuck in some shopping time while the rest of us were still asleep. We then went to the Secret Beach. I’m not sure why it’s called secret but it’s a really pretty beach with some lava pools. The waves were huge there; sometimes when they’re big enough they crash over the rocks into the lava pools. There is a short but very steep hike to get to that beach. The way down wasn't so bad, just a lot of sliding on the dirt. The way up kills, though. Very pretty there.

Lava pool
That was pretty much the end of our Hawaii adventure. We cleaned up, went to the airport and flew to Honolulu and then Las Vegas. We were sad to leave Hawaii but so excited to go home and see our little boy whom we left home with the grandparents. It was hard being away from Ben so it’s really nice to be home now.

Thank you, Nic and Heidi for letting us stay with you guys and for showing us a great time. Thanks to Heidi’s family for adopting us into the family for the few days that we were there. Thanks to Eric and Camille for sharing the awesome Hawaii adventure with us. And, of course, thanks to Alan, Elaine, and Zina for taking such good care of Ben while we were away.