Cemetery

I did make it out to the cemetery on Emily's birthday but this is the first chance I have had time to post anything. When we got there we found these cute flowers and little Happy Birthday balloon. My mother in law had been out there and put them out it was so nice of her.

When we got her headstone put in it came with a vase but at the time there was a problem with people stealing the vases and taking them to scrap yards and selling them so I haven't had it out there until now. Monday at work I put something together so I had it ready to go.This is the first time Cameron has been out to the cemetery and he did really good. He loved playing in what is left of the grass even though he got hayfeaver from it. This is the cute little bow and flowers that I put together then I added the balloon and pink flowers that my mother in law got.It was funny because Ryan was standing by me one minuet and the next I hear him saying "wait mom I have to get something" He went to the truck and got this little car. "He said now that is better." I asked him if he was going to leave it there and he said yes. What a sweet little man I love him so much. I had my camera with me so I go some pretty cute pictures of the boys.The end product of all the cute little things that where left for my sweet angels birthday.Look at that happy baby.Look at how happy Cameron looks that Ryan is putting leafs and grass in his hair.

Two Years Ago

Two years ago today we didn't know if I was going to live or die. Two years ago today we knew that our baby was sick and was making me sick but didn't know what to do about it. I started to crash so they took me to the CICU so they could put a central line to my heart. My poor husband was given that horrible choice of "who would you LIKE us to save? We don't know if we can save either of them but we will work hard to save the one you choose." That is a conversation I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. I am having a lot harder of a time this year for Emily's birthday. Last year I had her on my mind all day I even went out to the cemetery but I was still miserable and prego with Cameron so I think my mind was focused on something else. This year its like I can't catch a break. Ryan's birthday was harder than ever maybe because it was his 25th birthday don't know. I am happy and I love Cameron and wouldn't trade him for anything I just wish I could have them both. Yes I know that sounds selfish but it is the truth. I am so jealous of other people and there baby girls. I am happy for them but how I wish that was me. I teach a hairbow class usually once a week and I work in a ribbon store where I help people all day long pick out cute ribbon for there baby girls. People say to me all the time while I am teaching my class "I can't believe that you don't have any girls that must really stink." I do have a girl but she was to perfect to come to this world and I usually don't say anything because it's to hard to explain and then you get the your pitiful look.
I am so thankful for the knowledge of the gospel that I have and to know that I will have the opportunity to raise my little one just not during this lifetime. I have the comforting thought that my little brother Ryan is taking care of her for me as well as my other children who have not yet come. I have this feeling that Ryan and Cameron both know her. There little spirits are so much closer to the veil then mine is. I know she is in a good place but I miss her so much it hurts. I have been trying to keep myself insanely busy today but I did my normal blogstocking this morning and check on my friend Anjane's blog and totally fell apart. She lost her little baby Jackson and in her post pretty much said everything that I was thinking. I have gotten so many little thinking of you things today I can't tell you all how much I have appreciated it. Happy Birthday Little Angel Baby

Happy Birthday Little Brother

This is one of the very last pictures of my brother today would have been my little brothers 25th birthday. It's interesting to see how if affects me differently every year. This year I have almost been dreading this month. With my brother's birthday and the 2nd anniversary of Emily going to be our little angel. My goal was to have today be a happy day and just to think that yep it is Ryan's birthday but I hasn't worked out that way. I have been having a really hard time with it. I just thought all night about him and it was good but I was still struggling. My brother and I where so insanely close. We truly where the best friends ever he always made me happy and we had such big plans for when we grew up and had our own families. I miss him so much it hurts sometimes. I get so jealous everyone once in a while of my husband and the fact that he has all of his siblings even if they don't always get along. When we where first dating they showed me all the old family videos trying to embarrass Blaine and don't get me wrong there where some funny parts but the thing that it made me think of more than anything is how I wish that I could have memories like that with my own brother. Enough with the pity party this isn't what this post is about. I can see so much of my brother Ryan in my son Ryan. They are so much alike that sometimes that it is scary. It has been so fun to see my Ryan sing the same primary songs that Ryan and I use to love and sing. I still get teary eyed when Ryan is singing Families Can Be Together Forever when we are in the car driving. I am very thankful for all the things that my little brother has taught me. The one thing that he always said was that he wanted to be a missionary and I know that now he is getting that opportunity. I know that my little brother Ryan doesn't look like the six year old in this photo. I know he is a handsome young man who is in heaven taking care of my angel baby Emily. I couldn't ask for anyone better to take care of my baby until I will be able to. I know that he is always taking care of me even though I may not always know it. I love you little brother and miss you more than I can ever express. Happy Birthday.I don't have my pictures here in my apartment and I need to get most of them scanned into my computer but this is one of Ryan and I in my dad's helicopter at one of the air shows Ryan loved that his dad flew in helicopters.This is a Christmas on the farm. Grandpa Bird gave him this wooden flute that is from Peru I think. Ryan loved to play that thing and it annoyed us all. Also if you look at his feet he lived in cowboy boots. Since my dad always wore them he had to have them and be just like my dad. He would even sleep in them.

Still playing that dumb fluteThis is Ryan and I at that same air show looking at the firetruck. We liked those to since my dad was a fireman. Ryan said that he was going to be a fireman when he grew up.
This is Ryan and I on our very long train ride from El Paso TX to Eugene OR. We had fun though.

I was able to go to his grave last year. Since it is in Texas we don't get there as often as we would like. No you are not seeing things that is gravel. They have taken all the grass out of the cemetery because thy can't keep it green. We where there when all my family was down last summer because we took Grandpop Morgans ashes to his resting place that happens to be right across the little street from where Ryan is . His head stone looks a little darker in some spots because we took a sharpie to darken it and the workers came and kept looking at us so we didn't want to get in trouble. The yellow flowers are from my parents and the red roses are from me. Ryan and I loved the same flower that happened to be red roses.
I love you little bro Happy Birthday

Just some fun pictures

This is Ryan's new pride and joy. He LOVES stop signs. He got this wow wow wubzzy doll for Christmas that I new he wasn't going to like it gave him nightmares so we got the receipt from Gma M and went to Toys R Us to get something else. He found this stop sign and now it goes everywhere with us. He loves to ride his bike and pretend that he is at RR crossings and stop signs so this was a perfect $10.00 gift I think for his birthday we may go and get the other two or three that they have.

Cameron didn't like how loud Ryan's bike was so he kept yelling at him.

Going down the slide

My baby is getting so bigI can't believe that Ryan let me take this picture. I told him to slide down the slide and I that I would take a picture of him and Cameron and he agreed. That is a huge step for him.I love this picture of Blaine and his little mini me.See Ryan likes Cameron every once in a while.Cameron loves Ryan so much. He is starting to get a little mobile and Ryan is having a hard time with it because Cameron wants to play cars with his brother but Ryan doesn't share that wish. So I love little moments like this.This is Cameron and his cousin Luke they are 19 days apart even though Luke is younger he is crawling and almost walking. They for the most part get along as long as they both don't want the same toy. So we try and keep them on opposite sides of the blanket with toys to keep them happy. It doesn't work all the time.This is what a Sunday afternoon at the Matthews house looks like although they are both awake but the only reason for that is there was a Cardinals game on other wise they would both be sleeping. Like father like son right:)Cameron playing with his aunt Ellen

Gymnastics

Ryan has Gymnastics every Thursday night thanks to my mother in law. So here is the back story of how this happens. My sister in law has three little girls and my bother in law use to be a personal trainer at Desert Devils Gym so needless to say my mother in law has a membership their and goes and works out once a week. She started this whole gymnastics thing when Cassie turned 4. So of course each grand kid wanted to do it but the rule is they had to wait till they are four. This only works for the grand kids that live in the valley. (sorry Kenny, Madison, and Buddy) So as each grand kid has turned 4 they get to go to they gym with grandma and do Gymnastics. Cassie and Desiree have been in the same class for a while and Ryan and Audry have been in the same class. As of last week Audry got to move up so Ryan is in his class without his cousin and thank goodness he seems to be okay with that.
Around Christmas time they had a couple of makeup sessions because of the way the holiday fell. The first time I went with Ryan to gymnastics it did not go over well at all. He knew I wasn't suppose to be there and totally freaked out and shut down. This time we talked about it a few weeks in advance and he seemed excited for me to come and watch him. He did AW SOME! I can't believe all the things they have him doing. It has helped that they do some of the same things in OT but there are a lot more kids and it is loud and crazy. I am so grateful that my mother in law is doing this for the kids. I was going to do something like this during the summer through the Mesa Time Out program but this one at they gym is so much better. He looks forward to Thursdays. Here are some pictures.
This is Ryan and Audry getting ready for there class.This day they went out to the big room first where all the big stuff is. Ryan is waiting for his turn on the balance beam.They call these rolls now days so Ryan is doing his forward rolls on the balance beam. There is no way that I could do that. Ryan's teacher is Ms. Beth she is so good with these kids.

This is Ryan jumping into the big foam pit. Above his head are some monkey bars
sorry this one is kind of dark but this is why she has them jump in like the picture before then they climb up on the monkey bars and fall about 10 feet into the foam pit. He loves it.
Nice landingRyan loves to do headstands Ms Beth helps him get up but Ryan held so we where all excited.

Christmas 2009 Part 1

So this is a little late but at least it is up. Christmas this year was good for our family. Christmas eve we spent with my grandparents having dinner. Then Christmas morning we said that after Ryan woke up that we would call them because they wanted to come over and see the boys open there presents. Cameron woke up at 7 so we figured Ryan would not be to far behind well around 8:30 Ryan decided to roll out of bed.

Back up a little bit I asked Ryan if Santa came to his school(and he did) but Ryan said no Santa is sick. We where at the mall and walked by the Santa and he asked me what all of those kids where doing. I said they are waiting to take a picture with Santa so I asked him if he wanted to do it. "No not today mommy". Christmas eve I was lying down with Ryan and I said you have to go to sleep so Santa can come and bring us presents. Once again" No Santa can't come to our house he is Sick." Fine Santa isn't coming to our house. I guess the good thing in all of this Ryan not wanting to have anything to do with Santa is that we won't ever have to have "The Talk" with him. I saw on one of my friends blog that Santa brings them there stockings and everything else was from the family. I think that is a great idea as of right now Ryan doesn't care who they came from just what it is.This is Cameron waiting for his big brother to wake up on Christmas morning.

Back to Christmas it's 8:30 and my Gparents got here around 9 so we could open gifts. Now last year Christmas wasn't so fun for Ryan. He didn't want to have anything to do with opening gifts. I opened them all for him and just gave him them and he was good with that. This year I wasn't sure how he was going to take it but he loved it. He got right in and started digging.Ryan before we started opening our gifts.the anticipation is killing memonster truck racing game AWESOME. ( you can tell daddy got and wrapped this one because the price tag is still on it.)Cameron getting in on the action
this is something Ryan had been looking at in the Toys R Us big book. He loves to play restaurant so we got him a kitchen and some food to go with it. He got so excited when he realized what it was he started trying to open it faster and faster.
so excitedI love this picture Ryan is helping Cameron with his toyafter spending all morning putting toys together and taking them out of there boxes we headed to my gparents house for brunch. We had biscuits and gravy super yummy and my favorite.
We told Ryan that we had to go to gma & gpa Birds house because they had a big surprise for him. It's about 10:30 10:45ish and it was only 39 outside when we pulled into there driveway. We live in Arizona so of course we all have flip flops on and we go to the back yard and Ryan's eyes get huge and he said a Trampoline for me? He was super excited he took off his shoes and went and jumped on. There was still frost on the tramp from the night before so it was a little cold on his feet and he wasn't very happy.
We told him to come in and eat and then by the time he was done the sun should have warmed up the tramp then he could go back out and play.
That didn't last long we all came into eat and then five minuets later he was outside again. He would go out for a couple minuets at a time then come back in and get warm.
it did eventually get warm and Ryan wanted everyone to come out with him.
Ryan even got his Great Grandma Bird to get on and play with him.

Christmas 2009 Part 2

After spending the morning with my family we headed over to Blaine's parents house for round two of Christmas. We where all meeting at 4 for dinner and then we would open presents. It was nice all of Blaine's siblings where here. His sister Janna and her family from Flagstaff came even the newlyweds Kaylee and Ben came down. Dinner was enough to feed an army like normal. Ham, Turkey and Beef tons of salad's and fruit and then cheesecake for after we where ready for more food. The food never ended. We did take a break to go and open all the gifts and having 26 people all in one room at one time to open gifts is a task in itself.Cassie and Ryan waiting for everyone to come so they can dig in to all of the presents.I stole the next two pictures of Shelley and Roberts blog I didn't really get any pictures here because I was the one handing out the gifts. All the kids did really good by the time we where half way done you couldn't see the floor anymore and I think all the paper just about covered the kids that where sitting on the floor.This was an after shot when you could see the floor again and before the wrapping paper ball wars started.I had to get a picture of our family stockings and Linda's I wish I would have gotten one of all of them but I will get it next year. Shelley and Linda have made all of these stockings they take so much work but are so beautiful.

Christmas Part 3
My dad came down the day after Christmas from Colorado to bring there gifts down. My entire family was suppose to come down the weekend before Christmas but do to a family crisis they couldn't come but we where happy that at least my dad was able to come even though it was only for a day. We are hoping that the rest of them can come down in February. My family remembered how hard it was for Ryan last year with opening stuff so they where smart and put all of his gifts in one HUGE bag. The only thing was Ryan kept asking for more since he only opened one. He got a fun bag of stuff Real Cowboy boots a john deer tractor new pj's a cool firetruck blanket I am sure I am forgetting something in the bag but he still made out good. Christmas for three days great for him.
Cameron loved all of his stuff to he also got some cowboy boots but he real ones will come when his feet aren't a different size every week.
So all in all we had a wonderful Christmas this year. Thank you for all of the gifts and cards.