Funny story!

So, the other day I received a letter in the mail from Gardner Village. Weird I thought...but it only got weirder. I opened the envelope and inside was a check made out to me for $137.77. No explanation. Just the check. Now, I could really use $137 right now. Like bad. I know this cannot really be for me, because I haven't even been up to Gardner Village since the fall. I love that place, but haven't been able to go for a while. So I call the number on the check. This is how my conversation went.

Me: Hi, I received a check in the mail, and I don't think it is really for me.

GV: What's the number on the check? (I tell her the number). Is your name Brittani Evans?

Me: yes

GV: are you at such and such address?

Me: yes

GV: hmm...well, it shows that you have recently returned something at GV and you had written a check when you purchased it. Our policy if you return something after writing a check is that we send a refund check in the mail.

Me: I haven't returned anything to GV ever. I haven't even been up there since last fall.

GV: Are you sure?

Me: yes I think I would remember. Plus, I haven't ever spent that much money at once up there.

GV: Well, I guess could you just mail the check back?

Me: sure.

GV: Thankyou for your honesty.

Me: your welcome.

I have to admit that I was pretty bummed. I had hoped that by some weird twist of fate they just sent out money to people on their mailing list or something. I know, that's a stretch of the imagination, but I can dream, can't I?

Yesterday I got another letter in the mail from them. I thought they were going to be getting after me because I hadn't yet mailed the check. I just haven't had time. Of course, I'm not going to cash it! Sean is actually the one that opened the letter. He got a huge smile on his face. And read this to me: "We just wanted to say thank you for your honesty. We appreciate you calling us and telling us about the refund we accidentally sent to you. To thank you for your honesty we have included a $20 giftcard for Gardner Village. We hope you enjoy your time here. Thank you so much again. Sincerly, Gardner Village."

While it wasn't $137, I was pretty dang excited to have the $20 to spend up there! I thought that was SO nice of them! They didn't need to do that, but I'm super glad they did! So anyways, now I'm going to con Sean into taking me up there! I guess it does pay to be honest.

Actually quite a few things have happened like this lately. Nothing of this magnitute, but still. For example, at church we needed to pay our tithing, so Sean grabbed the envelope and slip. We found a $20 bill in the envelope. I have to admit my first thought was, "Yes! We could use 20 bucks!" but of course we knew we couldn't keep it. So Sean went and gave it to the Bishop. I think I'm being tested or something! If this continues I might get tempted to actually keep something! Just kidding, I won't. I do hope that it stops happening though.

My first baby

Two awesome things happened on Sunday. First, Mara slept from 9pm-9am! She woke up once for about five minutes and then went right back to sleep! Second, she rolled over for the first time! She did it 4 times in a row, but has refused to do it again...maybe it was just a fluke, but I figured since she did it 4 times that it was on purpose. I guess we'll just have to wait and see!

I stole this from Lana's blog. I think it was a cute idea!

Here you go mommies - a different kind of survey for a change - it's all about you and your first baby:
1. Were you married at the time? Yes. We had been married for six months

2. What were your reactions? "Oops..haha!!!" It wasn't planned, but it wasn't not planned either... if ya catch my drift.

3. How old were you? 21

4. How did you find out you were pregnant? I was at school and was bored out of my mind. I had been feeling pretty tired and sick and kept thinking I was pregnant so me and a couple of my friends left school on a break and bought a test. I took it at school. It says it's suppose to take three minutes to get the result but by the time I stood up it clearly read positive. I sat right back down! I couldn't beleive it!

5. Who did you tell first? I told myself that I absolutely had to tell Sean first so I was going to lie to my friends and tell them it was negative. When I came out of the bathroom and my friend asked me I couldn't lie! I immediately left school to go home and tell Sean.

6. Did you want to find out the sex? YES!

7. Due date? March 18th, 2008

8.Did you deliver early or late? Two weeks early. March 5, 2008

9. Did you have morning sickness? Yep

10. What did you crave? Apples and cheese. Not together though!

11. Who irritated you the most? I don't really remember being irritated...

12. What was your child's sex? Female

13. How many pounds did you gain throughout the pregnancy? 40 lbs. Still have 20 more to lose!

14. Did you have any complications during your pregnancy? Yes.

15.Where did you give birth? American Fork Hospital

16. How many hours were you in labor? 11 hours of labor, and one hour of pushing. I was induced.

17. Who drove you to the hospital? Sean

18.Who watched? Just Sean! I loved it that way!!

19.Was it natural or c-section? By natural, do you mean vaginally? Then yes.

20. Did you take medicine to ease the pain? You better believe it! Epidurals are amazing! Well that is, until it stopped working right in time for me to start pushing. That was wonderful.

21.How much did your child weigh? 6 lb. 2 oz.

22.Did your child have any complications? Yes. She stayed in the NICU for a while

23. What did you name baby? Mara Ann ( Mara after my mom, and Ann after my aunt Stacie)

24. How old is your first born today? 2 months and 3 weeks!!

Long Overdue Picture Updates

So I'm finally getting around to posting pictures. I have a feeling this is going to be a very long post! This is a picture of Mara's second hospital stay. Sean and I shared this bed! That was very snuggely! haha


This picture would not rotate! But it was too cute to not use. Mara smiles all the time, and I love it!! She's most smiley in the morning, which also explains her bedhead in the picture!

I took this picture because we were leaving on her very first roadtrip! Unfortunately I forgot to take anymore pictures during the trip...

This is Mara's first ponytail! It was so cute!

My sleeping beauty

Sean loves these bunny slippers!


This was during my cousin Talia's wedding reception. All the little girl cousins just love Sean!

Mara and daddy taking a nap during the reception

Isn't she beautiful?

I went to check on her during her nap and this is what I found! How funny!

I love this outfit of hers

I hate this picture...but I thought I should put in a family picture of her blessing day

the blessing day pictures were all blurry because I hadn't noticed that the camera was still on night shot from the night before...I was so bummed. Luckily a couple of pictures still turned out

This is her crib. My mom made her bedding, and I made the quilt that is hanging over the edge. I was pretty proud of myself for that!

She blinked while I was taking this picture, but isn't it cute? I love her smiles, and I love her hair! She is too much fun!

She's not very good at keeping her eyes open during a flash...

That's my baby sleeping in her crib in her own room!

She just loves her daddy!

This was the cage they keep babies in on the pediatrics unit..well they call it a bed, I called it a cage. Isn't that terrible?

She loves her grandma miller!

Snuggeling with daddy

The three above pictures were taken the day before we took her to the hospital. She was sick, and I thought it would make a cute scrapbook page for her "first sickness" I had no idea what a nightmare we were in for!

Doesn't she look so sad? I hated that!

I had to put this picture in so you could see just how curly her hair is when it's wet! It is too cute! When it looks like that, I call her my african american baby!

Well, there you go. I could've put in a million more pictures, but it took me about 12 years to upload these! My mom's computer is so darn slow! I cannot believe she's already two and a half months old!! Well, I hope you enjoy the pictures.

I know this is a little late...

I just wanted to wish my mom a Happy Mother's Day! I've always loved her, but ever since Mara came into my life, I've loved her more! She has taught me so many wonderful things, but I thought I'd list just a few:

*The importance of keeping your home clean and organized. I know Sean sure appreciates that I was taught that as well! Infact, when we finally brought Mara home from the hospital with a ton of stuff, Sean kept telling me I needed to ask my mom to come over and help us organize everything! Organization truly is a talent!

*I know that she has a testimony, and growing up I always leaned on it. I trusted her. Now that I have my own testimony I can thank her for helping build it.

*How to care for an infant. This is very important to me now! I'm grateful for all those years she made me babysit for the neightbors! I hated it at the time, but the things I've learned have really helped me!

I love you mom!



I've been very blessed to have many amazing women in my life. My Grandma Draper is one of these women. I just wanted to thank her for being such an amazing example to me! I love you Grandma!

I'm so grateful that I've been blessed to be a mom! I love Mara so much! I honestly can't remember my life without her!

it's been a while...

So what's new with us? Mara sleeps for 8 hours IN A ROW at night! Wahoooooo!!!! She's been doing it for the past week or so, and can I just say it is the most amazing feeling in the world to sleep that long! After eight hours, she eats and then falls right back to sleep for at least three more hours. I feel like a new person. She started doing that at 7 weeks. She randomly will only go 6 hours, but for the most part she will go 8.

Her colic has improved TONS! Which is nice to not hear screaming all the time, but mostly nice because I get to play with her! She is so much fun. She talks and talks (well coo's...but you get the picture). Now that she isn't crying all the time she is almost always smiling, which is the cuttest thing in the world! She started smiling at 5 weeks, but that was only in between screaming fits...now its all the time.

My favorite time of day with her is in the morning. She is so fun when she wakes up refreshed from an awesome nights sleep. And so are her parents! We just put her in bed with us and play for a little while until daddy has to get up and get ready for work.

She loves her little play gym. She bats at the toys hanging from the top. Although she doesn't know what she's totally doing yet with her hands, it's still super cute. She loves to look at herself in the mirror as well. She also loves her stroller. Which is awesome for me because I love to take her on walks! We try to go everyday weather permitting.

Mara was blessed on Sunday. It was a beautiful day. Sean did an awesome job. He was quite nervous about the whole thing, but he was amazing. Mara even slept through the whole thing! I was very suprised! We were very lucky to have lots of family there to support us. We thank them for coming so far to be with us! I'll post pictures of her in her super cute dress later. I don't have my camera with me and I'm at my mom's house.

I must say that I love being a mom. It was so hard at first, but the older she gets the funner it is. It was just a huge adjustment at first. Especially with all her hospital drama! I am so lucky to have such an awesome husband that works so hard so that I can stay at home with our little girl. I'm pretty sure Mara likes him the very most. The other day I was holding her on the couch and she was just starring at Sean (whenever he is in the room, her eyes are glued to him!) he started walking away and as soon as he was out of her line of sight she started screaming! He came right back and as soon as she saw him again she was fine! He left again, and she started crying again! He came and picked her up and she was all smiles! What a silly little girl.

Being the first grandchild on my side of the family, she is already terribly spoiled. She gets so excited when we come to grandma's house. Probably because she knows she's going to have all the attention she has ever wanted!

Well, I think that's enough for now. I promise I will post pictures soon!

Colic anyone?

Just wondering if anyone has any advice about what to do with a colicy baby. I don't even know if I'm spelling that right...anyways, if you have any advice send it my way! I'll try anything!

Are you serious?

That was my very first thought when the Doctor told us to head to the hospital on Saturday morning. My poor baby couldn't breathe. She's only a month old, and she already caught a nasty cold! Since she is so tiny, her body just couldn't handle it. We had to hook her up to oxygen and an IV because she was dehydrated. About every two hours the nurses would come in and deep suction her nose. I hope none of you ever have to see that! They thread this long tube down her nose and suction out all the gunk. She did not like that at all. After they'd done it a couple of times, she couldn't really scream anymore because she'd lost her voice! After a bunch of tests they determined that it wasn't RSV, but bronchiolitis. Basically a nasty cold for babies. I've really taken it for granted that I can just blow my nose when I'm sick. The Doctor said that on top of her being so congested she just has tiny little passage ways. So all the suctioning started to make the problem worse because it was making her already tiny passage ways swollen. She got a couple of breathing treatments while we were there as well. We came home Monday afternoon, she is still sick, but she isn't dependent on the oxygen anymore, so there was no reason to stay beyond getting her suctioned every couple of hours. We opted to go home, and can return as an outpatient to get her suctioned when she needs it. Geez, my poor baby! I've been SO careful with her because I've been paranoid about her getting sick. I haven't gone anywhere! Sean and I have been sick though, so it's not like we can't be around her!

Change of subject: we got her pictures back from her first "photo shoot" so I thought I'd share some with you. These are my two favorites. I love the one of her screaming, don't ask me why cause it's not a pleasant sound, but the picture is just too cute!