Catching up with the Wrays...Nevada...and other shenanigans

Long time, no post. I feel like there has been a lot going on, but at the same time as I sit down to write this I realize we really don't have THAT much going on. So here's a composite post of a few little things to catch everyone up to speed.

We were able to go spend some time in Nevada for a week. Everyone kept telling us that we visited during the wrong time of the year. However, I REALLY enjoyed being home...even during the summer. Growing up I always wanted out of that small town, but now I just can't help but love it. We spent some much much MUCH needed time with all of my family! Our trip lined up with my brothers trip to Nevada as well so my whole family was together for a weekend. We got to see all of our cute nieces and nephews and catch up with everyone. It was an awesome week and I'm homesick already.

Our boys are growing up way too fast! Maddox is getting bigger everyday and getting such a personality. He LOVED playing in Nevada with all of his cousins. I love how much he loves being around them. Sawyer is getting cuter and sweeter every hour of every day. He's all smiles and lovies. I also noticed this week that Sawyer has the cutest little dimples on his cheeks! I am a huge sucker for dimples.

4th of July...
4th of July was a pretty laid back day. We went to the parade that morning and then me and the boys hung out at home while Josh worked. We even got a glorious 2 hour nap in (that's a rare occurrence). Then that evening we went to Idaho Falls to watch the fireworks on the river. Maddox loved the fireworks and he had a blast watching them. We had an awesome evening as a family!

Anyway, like I said. Not THAT much going on. But enough noteworthy things to write a quick little post and a few cute pics :)
I love our little family so much and feel so blessed to have these 3 awesome guys in my life! <3

 ( waiting for fireworks to start)

I'M LOSING IT!

Ok...So although this has been something that I have been super proud of for a few months now, it's still a little embarrassing to write. But i'm to the point that i'm just so proud and I really want to document my progress.
Let's all take a moment and remember I have literally been pregnant for 2 years...with like a 3 month break in between. If you have never had a baby...just pretend you swallowed a beach ball for 2 years. Then you took it out and you probably wouldn't be super fit...right?
Well that's how I felt. 2 years of pregnancy with no recovery time in the middle. We can all imagine. Well, I was determined to do something about it and get my body back since it will be a good 4 years (hopefully) before we are blessed with another baby.
I started going to the gym every night and running on a treadmill and doing the stair climber...but I wasn't seeing any progress. I was starting to feel discouraged and actually had to quit for a few weeks (doctors orders). As soon as I was able to work out again I hired a babysitter and made Josh take me to the gym and show me how I can burn fat and tone the areas that I wanted. He introduced me to the wonderful world of weightlifting. At first I was a little weirded out. I felt like weight lifting was for dudes, but as soon as I started working out and perfected what I was doing I felt amazing. The first week that I went to the gym I stared at myself in the mirror and thought "I look like one of 'those' people that you know is seeing the inside of a gym for the first time in 5 years" and I was super self conscious about what I was doing. Yesterday, I got in front of the mirror to lift weights and actually looked at myself and thought "You look like someone who knows what they are doing, and someone that is getting amazing results!" I feel AH-MAH-ZING! I can't say it enough. My baby fat is melting away. I have been working out for about 5 weeks now and I have lost 20 pounds since I started lifting. This is the embarrassing part...it's sad that I actually had that much to lose. But it's awesome that i'm actually losing it. And I feel like it's coming off quick! I step on the scale at the end of every week and i'm seeing almost 4 pounds gone every week.
Here's the other awesome part. I eat healthy during the week, but Sunday is cheat day. And cheat day you can eat WHATEVER you want! I had to implement this into my diet because I knew I would feel like a failure when I said no sugar or goodies whatsoever, and then when I snuck some I would tell myself "well, you already cheated so just eat another cookie anyway". With cheat day I get some goodies for the week and I feel like i'm not completely deprived. Plus it gets me through the week with eating healthy and not feeling like cheating on my diet. Cheat day we eat cake, cookies, desserts, waffles for breakfast..all sorts of goods. And yes, even with cheat day i'm still losing 4 pounds a week. That is what I most absolutely love!
Working out is becoming a huge addiction for me. I look forward to it every day. I am absolutely loving the results that i'm seeing and it makes me feel so good physically and emotionally. It recharges me, it energizes me, it makes me feel accomplished, and it's so good for me. I am finally in the habit and now I have a hard time skipping a day of not working out. This is one habit I am definitely not letting go :D

Happy Birthday Maddox!

This post is so be-lated! 2 months to be exact. Keeping up with 2 boys and keeping them out of trouble is a lot of work, but more on that later.
April 24th, 2014 was Maddox's 1st birthday! He had such an exciting first year of life! He learned how to sit, crawl, stand, walk, and talk. He had a lot of fun visits to the doctor, a few fun visits to the hospital, one surgery, one concussion, and a baby brother. Typing this I sound like a horrible mom. I promise we love and protect our kids. Don't go calling social services :)
This is the sweetest boy you will ever meet. He steals the hearts of everyone he meets. He loves everyone, you can tell he is just the sweetest soul, and he is just flat out adorable.
At 1 year old he weighs a whopping 20 pounds! He's 29 inches tall! He has adorable green eyes, reddish/brownish/blondish hair, and the longest eyelashes I have ever seen on a little boy! (I'm super jealous!)
His favorite toys are his Buzz Lightyear (which he got for his birthday), cars, and the piano. His favorite movie is Wreck it Ralph. We have watched this movie 100+ times. I can quote this whole movie for you start to finish. I used to like it, now I feel like if I have to listen to Ralph complain about being the bad guy one more time IM going to become the bad guy! Anyway...
He LOVES to be outside and is currently figuring out how to open and escape out the front door. He is extremely intrigued by dirt, rocks, mud....basically everything boys love. He loves to play "daredevil" with daddy and let daddy throw him around and toss him in the air (despite what you may be thinking, no this is not how he got his concussion), and he thinks driving our car is the coolest thing ever.
He loves his baby brother Sawyer and is always looking for him and when he finds him Maddox loves to give him hugs and kisses and share his toys and rock him in his carseat or his swing.
Bathtime is one of the favorite parts of the day...and he needs it! By the end of the day this boy is covered in dirt from head to toe!
He loves puppies and he likes to pull on cats tails. He thinks daddy's fish tanks are pretty awesome as well! He thinks the word "No" is hilarious, no matter how firm I say it (this is a current dilemma i'm working on) and he loves to play with kids his age. He gets so excited when he sees other little kids, i'm so convinced they should let him into nursery ;)
Anyway, I could go on and on and on and on about how amazing my little boy is. He has brought me so much joy and happiness and he melts my heart when he calls me "momma". We're so blessed to have this little boy in our home and we look forward to many many many more birthdays to celebrate with him!
Happy Birthday son! We love you!!!

Surviving this crazy thing called "Life"

I'm sure that as time goes on things will get easier. We will fall into a schedule and our life will finally have some consistency. Right now things are just crazy, but we are loving it. Having another baby is like going from having 1 kid to 10. The laundry somehow seemed to quadruple, even though I have two hands and two arms I still can't seem to help both kids at once, and both our boys are going through a little bit of a rough patch right now.
Thankfully I have a saving grace. This saving grace is the best thing to ever happen to me. He is my better half. He has grace under pressure. He has patience far beyond my own. He has a special connection with the boys and he works harder than any other man under 30 years old that I know!
This amazing person is my awesome husband. I have always loved him with all of my heart and I always will, but lately I could not be more thankful for him. He has worked so hard running around taking care of all 3 of us, taking finals (and getting A's in his classes! Woot woot!!) and working. This man doesn't get a second for himself to sit down and do anything for himself. He's always doing things for us, and guess what....HE NEVER COMPLAINS! Not once do I hear anything negative from him. This guy is awesome. Every day I feel luckier that I got such an amazing catch. I couldn't have asked for anyone better. So here it is. My mushy, mushy, lovey, lovey, post for the month <3

I did it! I did it! I did it! Yay!

I'm currently singing that little Dora the Explorer song in my head "I (we) did it! I did it! I did it! Yay!!!" because I am as happy as a bird with a french fry right now! I have survived the semester! I feel so amazing accomplished right now it's not even funny. Let me break this down for ya. Between January and April I...

• Worked part time (from home)
• Was a full time mommy to Maddox
• Was pregnant and was restricted from doing much of anything
• I took 11 credits/4 classes 
• Had a baby
• Was a full time mommy to both Maddox and Sawyer, while still working, and 2 weeks before finals!
• I survived!
• And I got all straight A's in each and every one of my classes!!!!!!!! (Can you tell I am just so stoked that I pulled off all A's?) 

Holy Hannah I feel good! Can you see why? Now it's time for me and my sweet husband and amazing boys to take the next 6 months before school starts up again and enjoy the perfect Idaho summer weather and make memories. 

The Family of Four!

I cant believe it! We are now a family of 4! I'm finally getting around to writing about our sweet baby boy Sawyer!
I had been having contractions for weeks and my Dr kept telling me "any day now". I either wanted something to happen or just have the contractions stop. I was getting so exhausted. Finally last Friday my contractions started getting closer together and by 9pm they were close enough for me to go to the hospital. Josh kept trying to have me go to the hospital, but I kept refusing. I think I was pretty terrified to have a second baby and I thought "As long as I don't go to the hospital our lives won't be changed forever". I was just so scared to finally be having a second baby. Also, I was only 37 weeks and would have been ok holding off one more week for the babes health and so I could get through a hard week at school. We weren't able to sleep and as the night dragged on my contractions kept getting worse. Finally at 2:30am Josh called our friends Mike and Lacey and they came over to stay with Maddox. Once Mike was here I knew I couldn't stall any longer and Josh finally dragged me out the door to the hospital. As soon as we got there the nurse admitted me and the fun began. The night seemed to pass so quickly and time was nothing. Labor was going really well and I actually felt like I was rocking labor this time around. I guess having a baby only 11 months ago left me pretty prepared for labor this time around. I didn't sleep at all through the night so I was running on over 30 hours of no sleep by the time he was born. My labor slowed for a while but then once it picked up again it was only an hour before we were holding our baby. Sawyer Matthew Wray was born at 1:01 pm weighing exactly 7 pounds and measuring 19.5 inches. He is perfect in every single way. We spent an extra day in the hospital because they were worried about his breathing, especially where he was born a little bit pre-term. We had a few scary experiences with him not breathing, especially the first day. The first night after he was born he stayed in our room until 2am when the nurse came in and she ended up taking him down to the NICU for the night to be evaluated. But we had him back by the next morning and after one or two more quick trips to the NICU his Dr finally felt good about his breathing and we were able to go home!
We feel so blessed to have little Sawyer in our family. This pregnancy has been an emotional roller coaster. For the first two trimesters I only had a 50/50 chance of giving birth to him. We heard the words "miscarriage" and "stillborn" more times than we would like to recall. I was on strict bed rest for weeks. So many tears were shed and prayers were said and we now have a perfect son here safe and sound. I can honestly testify that prayer works. I know for a fact that this baby is only here because of all the prayers that were said for him and me, and Im so thankful for everyone that prayed for us and helped us in our times of need. Our ward has been amazing and has done a ton to help us, and my mom has been a heaven sent. She has completely dropped her schedule multiple times to come up here and take care of us, and she never complains. We couldn't be more thankful for all the amazing people in our lives.
As soon as they put this baby on my chest and he cried for the first time I knew he was a miracle and I felt beyond blessed to be able to carry him and be his momma.
I love this perfect little boy and me and Josh are so blessed to have two amazing sons. We are now, proudly, a family of four!

Day 11

I am officially on day #11 of the early stages of labor....and I am tired. I wish I could call these braxton hicks contractions, but unfortunately they are all to consistent and painful! I just wish they would either go away or do something. I don't feel like I can sit like this for another 3-4 weeks!
I felt like I was getting through the first week or so pretty sane, now i'm starting to lose it. After 10 nights of 3 hours of sleep (if i'm lucky) I feel like a complete mental patient. You could tell me something and 5 minutes later ask me what you just told me, and I probably wouldn't be able to recall one word you said. Multiple times will I be looking for something and getting so frustrated because I can't find it, and I was holding it the whole time. Small things like that every day add up and make me feel like i'm totally losing it. I feel completely exhausted 2 hours after I wake up in the morning and I could honestly probably take 4-5 naps a day at this point haha. I'm in so much pain and so stiff that doing things like picking up the house or vacuuming are major chores for me. It's horrible. I feel like a fat lazy whale these days.
FORTUNATELY my Dr has told me that i'm allowed to start walking again! Hallelujah! For the past 3 months I have been restricted from going on walks, walking around the track, etc. But now i'm back baby! This is the only thing I really enjoy doing these days. Some days I want to go walking at the track 2 or 3 times in the same day. It gives me some energy that I desperately need, it gets me out of the house which is a huge bonus! (being cooped up in the house during the winter = no bueno). Maddox LOVES to go walking and he smiles and yells at all the runners and old people passing us up (yes, with my pregnant lady waddle old people pass us up). But I just love that it makes me feel good, it's the only thing that gives me that boost right now. So every day me, Josh and Maddox all pile in the car and drive up to the school and walk till we can't walk no more!
I feel like labor is getting progressively worse, but idk if that's just because it's been so long it's starting to just feel worse, or if i'm progressing towards active labor. We will find out sooner or later I guess ;)
So with all of this i'm still trying to get things ready for the baby, but I have NO energy. Seriously, my house could use a good scrubbing, but by the time I fill up the bucket with soap and water, pull out the mop, and get ready to rumble i'm completely exhausted. I am seriously considering hiring someone to come over for like 2 hours this week and just scrub my house from top to bottom. I can't find the energy to do it ( I know i'm so lazy) and when I do go into labor I don't want people in and out of our house taking care of Maddox or picking stuff up for us and thinking "Holy cow! Ever heard of a Swiffer, lady?!"
I'll debate it for the next day or two and decide if it's worth it. If I do it, it will just have to be some cleaning service or some student cleaning houses to get through college, there's no way I could hire someone I know to come over. I would be mortified (Our house really isn't THAT bad, but having someone you know clean your house...wouldn't you be embarrassed too?!)
Have you ever hired a cleaning lady or cleaning service? Was it worth it? Any tips?