Settling into Eugene with a trip to the ER

Ava had a rough transition to life without structure in Oregon the first month. Here she is throwing a fit at dinner, refusing to sit in her chair. 

 My friend invited us to Public Works Day in Eugene where the city workers taught the kids about all of their trucks, vehicles, services, etc. they provide. They had cute activities for the kids and we even got to go on a trailer ride.

 New friends in the ward

 "Picking up trash"

 Afterward, I took Ava to a birthday party for a boy in the ward. She was so happy to play with friends and I had lots of fun getting to know the moms.

I worked extra these weeks in Oregon since I had the time while Brent watched the kids full time. 

 Coen being a flirt at the park and waving to girls.

 We had our friend and realtor, Maria and her husband over to dinner. I thought the kids looked so cute here.

 We celebrated our 7th anniversary! We decided to go for a drive around a reservoir by us. It was gorgeous and I kept taking pictures everywhere!

 Hahaha funniest anniversary picture ever!

 We brought a picnic lunch

 Isn't it so beautiful!?

 A few better anniversary pictures

 Still my favorite person in the world to be with.

 Then Ava got up on the picnic table and Coen followed, with Brent helping him by holding his hands. They were marching around on the table and we were enjoying the view.

 Then Coen jumped off the table part to the bench part and Brent caught him. A few seconds later, Coen jumped again, from the bench part but Brent couldn't hold on from just holding his hands. Coen fell on his side and cried hard, and I thought it was just because he bonked his head. He fell asleep in the car on the way home and after his nap we suspected that he had nursemaids elbow since he wasn't using his arm. When we took off his jacket though, we saw it was really swollen and was different than the time he had nursemaids elbow. Nooooo!

Long story short, we went to urgent care and found out it was broken, then transferred to an ER, and then transferred again to another ER. Luckily my friends let Ava sleep at their house and Brent and I spent our 7th wedding anniversary in the hospital with this little guy.

 In the morning (Sunday) he had surgery to put pins in his elbow since it wasn't a very clean break and the bones were out of place. True love was Brent being the one to do all the hard things that he knew were too much for me to handle like holding Coen for the x-rays, and holding Coen in the operating room as they put him under.

I was able to hold him when he was coming out of the anesthesia:

 I could feel the prayers of our family because really in this moment all I felt was grateful. I didn't feel mad about any of this, or play the "what ifs" through my mind like I normally would have. Things happen, and I was so grateful it was just an arm that can heal quickly.

The pediatric unit was on the 8th floor and this was the view from up there!

 We still had our friends over for dinner that evening when we got released from the hospital and it helped to be distracted. Ava and her little friend were cute!

 Coen was very sleepy on Sunday and pretty grumpy from the anesthesia. By the next evening, he was acting more like himself!

 We had more friends in our ward over to dinner and FHE on Monday. Brent is my social butterfly and in the first month that we were in Eugene, we had 8 families over to our house, 6 of which we fed dinner!

 On Wednesday we went to get his cast on and he was a good boy! He was interested in the process, and so was I! I had no idea that the cast was made from almost an ace bandage looking thing that you wrap around the arm, and it chemically reacts with water to harden.

 Here's 'a picture of this break, just above the elbow, and you can see the pins in his arm, which actually stuck out of his skin!

 Sweet boy just learned to play with one arm. One day we left his casted arm in the shirt like this and he liked it and kept it like this.

As I mentioned, Ava had some major moods in our first few weeks in Oregon. One night she was upset about us taking a walk. I took a couple pictures to document our pretty neighborhood and our nice family stroll. Then I saw her face. I laughed my head off. 

 I'll zoom in on the best one for you. Feel free to volunteer to watch this firecracker for us :)

 I took the kids to a park with my friend Diana and the trees were blooming and so gorgeous!

 Ava's happy mood was back on.

 Ice cream night on our porch!

 On Saturday friends from the ward invited us to go to the coast. We live a little over an hour from the nearest town on the coast. This day we drove further north to a city called Newport. We saw sea lions and they were loud barking at each other!

 We saw this cool ship that was in some movies including Pirates of the Caribbean.

I thought this was crazy- part of a Japanese dock that washed on shore in Oregon several months after the crazy tsunami a few years ago. This is only a part of the huge dock that floated across the entire ocean!

 We went to a science discovery center and this eel was so nasty looking!

 We watched the octopus get fed:

Then we played at the beach! Several families from the ward were there. 

 It was SO dang cold. The water hurt your feet.

 This little girl did not care at all and was in complete heaven digging in the sand and running from the waves.

 Mr Dude was a good boy and liked playing in the sand too.

 Brent made Ava into a mermaid.

 Memorial Day- Brent met his friend at the park to let the kids play.

 On Tuesday I flew to Denver for a work training. Brent handled the kids like a pro- nothing different since I'm usually working anyways.

I have to admit it was pretty fun to have a relaxing flight reading and watching movies, and then have my own nice hotel room all to myself.

 On Wednesday I had my meeting at work and then that evening I flew back home, but to Portland where Brent had driven with the kids to pick me up. They went to the temple before getting me:

We stayed with my mom's friend Heather in Portland and had a fun time with her. The next day she got us into the Oregon zoo! We had lots of fun there and great weather! 

 All the people were looking at the mandrills in the other side of the cage (out of this picture) and Coen spotted this one directly above our head - see it in the top right corner? He pointed and made a monkey sound- he's so observant!

 The setting for the zoo was so beautiful! The elephants are in the background there.

 Coen is so into animals right now and loves to make all the animal noises.

 A little too close for comfort- this guy was hanging out under the water like this:

 Ava said to these flamingos, "Hi mangos! Do you remember me?"

 After the zoo I did initiatories at the temple while Brent took the kids to eat.

 When I ask Coen what the bunny says he makes this face and breathes in and out of his nose:

This boy is just so much fun to have around:

 The park by our house has a large sand area with water which I'm guessing we're only going to be able to use like 2 months of the year. So here are the kids taking advantage:

After we had Ava run through our sprinklers to get the sand off. This is how big our front yard is! 30 second mowing job.

Ava has been playing with these princess clip-on dresses for hours every day. This day Brent caught her helping each of her princesses give primary talks. Here's a video snippet:

I curled Ava's hair for church and then she did Brent's hair. I love how Brent always humors Ava in things like this.

Coen thinks he needs to shut his eyes really tight in order to smile:

I took a break from working and we went as a family to a park and to have a little picnic snack. It's been so nice for Brent to have lots of free time and to spend time together as a family!