theme song- xx vcr (michael douglas remix)

a vintage bib collar necklace i found at an estate sale in my neighborhoodtrudy running from the scary monster "aka daddy"

all ready for church in her gold ruffle-y dress

on our road trip, at mavericks, trying some chocolate ice cream waiting to see blake for the first time in 2 years!love him so mucha shot taken for #photoaday "what i wore"hanging out and dancing at the riverwoodstrudy's first time on the trampoline. so. much. fun.playing in grandma's toy roomlots of stops for trudy. teething + diarrhea + diaper rash + throwing up + busy body= hellish road tripping.but i love her so much!p.s. here is my favorite song right now.  wash dishes? go running? change a poopy diaper? i can do it with this playing.

family pictures 2011

a few months ago we had our pictures taken. we were able to squeeze them in one of our short trips to utah. grant's friend kristopher took them and did an amazing job. i've wanted him to take our pics forever. i love the feeling his pictures have, he only shoots in film. you can see his work here. while i knew we were going to get them done, i was rushed when packing and i feel like grant and i both just threw in a bunch of stuff and hoped we could pull something together. looking back i wish i would have put more thought into our outfits but oh well. on top of that, we were actually a bit bummed after we had them taken because trudy was just not herself. she was cold and drooling everywhere and trying to chomp on anything she could get her hands on. it seemed that was the only thing on her mind. we wish we could see more of her personality in these but i guess it's okay since i have a photo shoot with her every day;) at one point during the shoot she was trying to latch on and convinced herself she needed to eat (even though she just had). we tried ignoring it and just playing with her but she wasn't having it. so i had to go sit and feed her. i was somewhat stressed because there is only a short window of time for good lighting, especially when you aren't doing digital pics! kristopher took a few of her and i during this and i think they turned out to be my favorite. there were things that didn't go the way we thought but the pictures still turned out. i guess that's how you know you have a good photographer! oh and utah is so pretty in the fall.

blessing

trudy had her blessing on sunday july 24th. we were in utah for about three days for a family reunion and figured that was the best and most convenient time. we had a smaller and more intimate setting with some family and a few close friends. my mom had always planned on making trudy's dress and so earlier on i sent her this picture. the dress turned out perfectly... i couldn't have been more pleased. trudy looked like a little angel.

unfortunately trudy was pretty fussy during the blessing. we were quite surprised because she is always pretty content. later that night we found a very sore bum and yucky diaper rash and knew that was why. poor girl. her pooh is starting to not be as liquid-y so that is good. i feel weird talking about pooh in the same post as her baby blessing. anyway we love our little trudy baby. grant did a great job and loves her so much. she is our little blessing.

p.s. i see tutorials on how to use photoshop and get rid of things like stork bites, discoloration and even veins. why would i contribute to that? does anyone else think that is silly? it's like changing my baby's appearance to make her look "perfect" already? no thank you. she is perfect the way she is. amen.

she's basically my idol. n.b.d.

names are hard. you can have favorites all growing up but then when you actually have to pick one and then write it down to make it official... it's serious business. i think secretly "trudy" was probably my favorite name on our list. but then we did really have some other cute ones too and hopefully we'll be able to use them some day. typically when your throwing out names that you might possibly use for your child, if you know anyone with that particular name... you think of that person. and that can be a good or bad thing. this picture below is of my dear sweet friend trudy. we were ambassadors at snow college together and i loved her the moment i met her. i remember thinking that she had the cutest name in the world. but after getting to know her, i think i ended up liking her and her personality even more. i don't really feel i can put into words how i feel about her. especially without sounding like a lesbian. but basically she is someone that i want to be just like. she smiles at everyone, no matter where she is. she is very smart and can take in a lot of information at once. a great listener too. she is extreeeemely thoughtful and very selfless. anyone who knows her would most likely say the same things. everybody loves her, i mean she really is everyone's favorite. long ago when i thought of naming a girl trudy (was not pregnant at the time) i wanted to run it by her to see what she thought. since we both hit the baby hungry phase at the same time, we would talk names constantly. i remember the conversation exactly...

me: "wanna know what name i think is super cute, a little old fashioned and not very popular?"
trudy: being VERY concerned and wanting to know really bad... "WHAT?!?!"
me: "trudy"
trudy: "oh my gosh, I KNOW!"

can you see why i love her so much?

both grant and i feel we would be the luckiest parents if our daughter grew up to be like her auntie trudy. oh and trudy... did you see how many people love your name?

goodbye is the saddest word

yesterday was the last day that i will see my brother blake for two years. he will be serving an lds mission in lima, peru. grant and i drove up to orem for an extremely short trip. way too short. i didn't get to see everyone that i wanted to and i definitely didn't get to spend as much time with blake as i wanted to. sometimes i really wish i could turn all of my four younger brothers into girls. that way i wouldn't have to send one off on a mission every time i turn around. blake is such a cutie. i just love love love him. he is so mature and smart and he just makes me so proud. his testimony is so beautiful. i love being around him. he is always so collected and composed. i love to hear his opinions and sometimes when listening to him... i can't believe that he is 19 years old. i will miss him so much. i hope that the next two years go by fast. i know he will do fabulous with people. he is such a little sweetie. 

chloe ashby and why i love her

i just wanted to do a quick post on a girl who continues to make me smile. chloe and i went to high school together but unfortunately did not know each other near as well as we do now. i feel like i really missed out on not being closer to her sooner because she is such a great person. i love reading her blog, she inspires me to be better and most of all helps me to accept myself for who i am. which i am very grateful for. you will know what i mean if you read her blog... she is so real and i really really love it (and sometimes i feel like i'm reading about my own life when i read some of her posts). she is such a down to earth girl, very humble, absolutely HILARIOUS, gorgeous... seriously- she is flawless, she is accepting of everyone and she can always pull herself out of an annoying, frustrating or just yucky experience with a fabulous outlook on life. i really just love having her as my friend.

i love people

we have 48 hrs before we leave. again we just want to sincerely thank everyone who has donated, as most of our donations have come through the blog. there just aren't words to express our gratitude! our expectations were definitely exceeded and we've all but reached our weight limit. that being said, if anyone is still wanting to help, the following items are more weight conscious and are definitely needed:

infant tylenol drops
medical tape (the kind you use to secure bandages, not athletic tape)
band aids

we're asking that donations be dropped off by midnight tomorrow night (Wednesday February 3rd). checks can still be made out to childrens hope.

amongst all the donations, we received letters written by some students to the children in haiti. they also each brought one thing to donate. precious.

haiti here we come.

well there has been a big decision to make in our home these last two days. we've pondered and prayed... and pondered and prayed. this coming friday grant and i will be joining leisa and paul (and grant's brothers- jordan and caleb) to haiti. i don't really know how to express my emotions about this. i had an ice cream date with my bff's trudy and jess, they helped to comfort and excite me. i think i'm excited, anxious, nervous, happy, determined, worried, (i could keep going, really) all at the same time. i feel very blessed for this opportunity, it's actually overwhelming (my eyes water up every time i think about it). most of all i can't wait to experience this with my husband. i love him so much.

there is a huge demand for medical supplies, as i'm sure all of you know. the earthquake left many children parentless and parent's childrenless. for the next week, we are working in coalition with children's hope (leisa's organization), and trying to collect as much as we can to bring down with us. sometimes in disaster situations, it's so easy to feel emotion about it. we feel sad for the people and have a desire to do something but all too often we sit back and wait for someone else to do the work. or we simply don't know what to do. but this is it. this is your chance to help. you hear it all the time but EVERY BIT HELPS. please help to spread the word. tell your family and friends. make announcements in your ward. post something on your blog. we will be collecting supplies until thursday. here is a list of things we need.

powdered baby formula

costco (bulk) advil (ibuprofen)

costco (bulk) tylenol (acetaminophen)

children's vitamins

prenatal vitamins

if you're willing to donate any of these, please email, call or text and we will send you our address. for those of you who aren't local you can email a pledge to childrenshope@live.com. we're also accepting checks made out to children's hope.

grant: 916.801.3488
brittany: 801.380.2519

granttany@gmail.com

p.s. for those of you who wanted more journal entries, leisa has posted them all here. unfortunately with how busy she has been since she returned home, the last one is #5. i'm sure there will be more to come.

carrying babies out

today i woke up and started cleaning. i've been doing laundry, dusting and organizing in a quiet apartment. i keep thinking about all that we have and how blessed we are. this inspired me to post another one of leisa's haiti journals. i just figure they help to make everyone more aware of the situation. i love looking through her pictures to find some to post. if anyone is interested in more of her journals, just leave your email.

pictures from recent haiti trips

2010 Haiti Journal #5 January 20, 2010 Carrying Babies Out

Ft. Lauderdale, Florida (layover)

Dear Friends and Family,

There is so much to tell...latest news first:

We aren't sure we are coming home yet.

Not five minutes off the small plane last night from the Dominican Republic (story next time), we were asked to go back into Haiti to hand-carry out babies that need transport. Paul turned to me ans said, "I guess you want to go do that".

I nodded. He said he couldn't let me go back alone. We are waiting for details now.

We are emotionally on over-load. As Doctor Jim Morgan confided in me yesterday in Cite Soleil, the transition between depression and manic doesn't seem to happen in these conditions, they just exist together. He had seen between 45-50 amputations in two days at the bigger hospitals where he pulls two and three shifts. Dr Joey said that yesterday was the first 24 hour period without "after-shocks". Everything is a shock in Haiti, even for those of us who have been going in for years.

We stood still for a moment (rare for Dr.'s in Haiti) as we waited at the back of the "Lamp for Haiti" clinic for our traditional flat tire to be replaced (we have never gone a day in Haiti without a car breaking down - making schedule keeping a trick). We stood at the back of the “Lamp for Haiti” clinic in Cite Soleil. We had finished putting away piles of medical supplies that we had re-packed into four bulging bags. A flood of images flashed by.

On our way to the clinic yesterday morning we had passed the same neglected dead bodies on the road that we had the day before, photographed the same growing camps of people without shelter, watched small women with heavy loads pat other women in affection as they pass by other women friends who may be boiling plantain in hot oil, or dusting off used shoes they lay on the sidewalk for sale. Haitian women work every hour of the day...and usually can be seen by tiny oil lamp selling bits of candy or other treats at night. They seem to wake before dawn, because at daybreak I usually catch them scrubbing down a child or two with strong determined hands.

At the clinic yesterday I soothed and they sewed up a young man with a six day old gaping wound that wrapped his wrist and threatened to take his hand. Dr. Joey managed to do what I call a miracle. I only wish I had brought more lidocane...what I did bring wore off quickly as the teenage boy writhed in pain at each miraculous stitch (no one I know at the larger clinics would dare to sew a days-old wound) but he was determined. The teenage boy squeezed my hand tighter. Later, I told Mimi, the clinic manager, that it was a miracle, and she said, “Well, that's what we do here, we save things, we don't cut them off.”

While we waited for the tire, Paul and I followed the sound of a basketball into the next yard to watch a teenage boy play basketball without a net and re-committed to making a backboard happen, when we heard screams. I caught sight of a woman in full regal African dress wailing and running through the tight maze of crumbling homemade cinder block after rushing home to Haiti to discover the local priest was killed. Her friends couldn't contain her or her grief.

A few minutes later, two boys old enough to be in school, if there were one, had just given up teaching me the game they play with BB-size charcoal (as chalk) and 6 stones, and I followed a “baby” in to see Dr. Jim. Babies are so soothing to the soul...they make you stop thinking about yourself. I played my little hand game with him, but he didn't respond like most babies. After the mother and child stepped aside, he lowered his voice and confided...that is a 5 year old child she is carrying. I looked again...how could I have missed it? Jim said he couldn't believe it at first either. Then I noticed in the “baby's” mouth were six year old rotten molars. His pencil legs lay resigned around his mother's hips. This time we had brought the medicine he needed...but I noticed only two bottles children's vitamins left in the chest of the dozens we brought in last time...so doctor prescribed a weeks worth...it is the best we can do for now. The infection threatens him more right now.

Manic and depressed are blended...we cry and laugh and work all at the same time. Those who know me know that I am a pushover. I cry when I laugh, and when I see baby powder commercials. Yet, I find myself laughing at Mimi's or Paul's jokes, involuntarily sometimes. Then in a quiet moment the images comeback with the tears.

I will have to tell you the story of the Dominican Republic trip and the basketball hoop in another journal. We are waiting to hear if we go back in to carry babies out of Haiti. We had only stood on U.S. soil for a few minutes when we heard we may be needed to go back into Haiti. How can we say no?

My goal in the next few hours is to try to find medical supply donations in Ft Lauderdale to re-pack our bags with. I took a bath with my clothes last night so they would have most of the dirt off them.

Please know that your messages of support and pledges for Children's Hope really help, not only the work in Haiti, but my spirits. I am sorry I don't have time to respond personally to each of you. But I wish I could hug each one of you and give the traditional Haitian kiss.

peace, leisa

PS.

Last night we were again gifted by connection with “Clean The World” to have them arrange to have one of the few private planes donating free passage in and out of Haiti for emergency patients, aid going in, and for people like us who had delivered supplies. Thank you to Bob for giving us a seat on his plane last night. We have tickets to fly home from Florida tonight, so were trying to leave Port au Prince yesterday to make that connection. Don't really know where we are going now.

In Haiti, the need is everywhere...and it will be a very long recovery. Please know how very much every dollar counts. It is not that there is no food in Haiti, but that the people are so very poor, and now there is clearly no work. For folks that live on less than $2 a day, when costs are as high as the US, then to be grieving, injured and out of work...is a desperate situation. We are staying in touch with donation pledges remotely, so please spread the word, share a journal or bit of story...every bit helps.

Also, I am sorry to be out of contact so often, but the conditions in Haiti did not allow for electricity for communication (don't worry Dr. Ben – the laptop held power). Many satellite towers are down, and without electricity then many routers won't work. peace.

a day of miracles

photos from previous haiti trips

with the recent events, we can't really get haiti off our minds. some of you may know that grant's mom has been quite active with humanitarian aide in haiti for the last five years or so. she has created special relationships with the haitians as she's visited every six months. leisa has been successful in taking them everything from medical supplies, personal hygiene kits, children's school supplies to even laptops and cell phones. needless to say as soon as she heard the devastating news, she booked a flight. unfortunately the airport in port au prince is a single runway airport. it's been flooded with worldwide response, which is a good thing... it just made it extremely difficult for her to get in. so through a number of amazing charitable events she was able to get down there. here is an excerpt from her haiti journal documenting some of the miracles along the way....

2010 Haiti Journal #3             January 16, 2010

Saturday. 11:30 p.m. In route to Boca Raton, Florida.

A day of miracles.

Miracle #1

When we tumbled into bed this morning around 2am it was the first time since Wednesday that we had been in a bed. We hardly embraced a 7:30 a.m. wake up call. But Anthony Bone was on the job, so off we went. We met him the night before as he “pulled a double” by working the bell hop station. He normally supervises in housekeeping. He convinced his boss to have us speak to the staff this morning. After Paul gave a little explanation of how Children's Hope regularly goes into Haiti with medical and school supplies, I spoke for a minute. Since most of the staff are from Haiti originally, I used my very limited Creole which made them laugh, I told them the phone service in Haiti is picking back up, which made them smile, but when we spoke of the tragedy and mentioned the Hatian saying that through solidarity many hands make the burden lighter...they cried. Then, one by one this staff of 100 of the most underpaid, undervalued in our society came up and kissed my check while they each pressed a few dollars into my hand...some with more, some with less...after I had cred, hugged and kissed more than I ever had we floated up to our room.We didn't expect one dollar, and we ended up with a total of $1,359.85. I think the 85 cents were my favorite.

Miracle #2

Back home, when we heard the news of the earthquake, we knew we had to cancel our vacation plans and book a flight on a commercial liner for Haiti. Then we heard the airport closed, then our tickets were canceled by the airline. We were offered a free ticket on a private jet going to Haiti...we headed out to Florida. Then our private jet fell through, but another miracle: “Clean the World” founder Shawn Siepler offered us not only free nights stay in two hotels, but also free passage for our shipment of supplies but two free seats on a small 4 passenger flight to Port au Prince tomorrow morning. Again, we are off. Right now we are in the back sear of a truck headed to Boca Raton tonight, and plan on flying out tomorrow on what Paul calls the Roberto Clemente Airlines. Which got a chuckle from the folks who volunteered to drive us five hours tonight to get us to the airport (and wouldn't even take gas money).

Little Miracle #3

Later that day we were standing on the street of Orlando, and a car honked at us and pulled in...a tiny shy woman in a maid's uniform came over, hugged me and slipped nine crumpled dollars into my hand, smiled a bit, and silently slipped back into her car.

We won't get to Port au Prince, Haiti until noon tomorrow, and yet miracles are happening already. If anyone was ever tempted to give up on humanity, they should remember another Haitian saying told to me by Junior Mesamours, “God will never give up on us, even if we give up on ourselves”.

peace, leisa