Some call it seepage, we call it flooding...

So here is what we have been up to these past 2 weeks...

We came down to the basement two weeks ago today to find 1-2 inches of water in our food storage room, half the hallway, holiday decoration area under the stairs, Colby's spare computer parts closet and 1/3 of his office. I guess with all of the rain/snow and melt off, it was too much for our soil to hold, and therefore decided that our home needed to take some responsibility for it. It seeped up through the concrete. We cleared out all the wet areas, borrowed a wet vac and got to work with that and about a million towels. A friend came over when it was dry and sealed the concrete for us, and we are slowly working on getting everything organized and back into place.

(This was all in between our couch and TV downstairs. We made it a priority to clear an area to watch Biggest Loser and Heroes.)

Luckily, none of our food storage was ruined, and nothing in Colby's office was affected by the incident. I did finally get the food rotation system that I have been asking for out of this, so...wahoo!

It's that time of Year again...

Hey girls! (You know who you are.) You better go and eat some Mongolian BBQ at Wok 'n' South and have a slice of Dulce de Leche Cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory for me tomorrow. I miss all of you that would celebrate this day of the year with me. For those of you who know me, you've heard that Colby is not that into Birthdays. And I whine and complain each year about it, so I started celebrating it with the ladies who put up with me whining. Thanks to all of you, and thanks to those who are going out with me this year. Tomorrow it's the big "29", watch out "30" here I come. Sorry, I'm not usually one to be quiet about my birthday, the day should be celebrated and not hidden from others.

A Visit to Chuck E. Cheese.

So, I think that we can finally say that IT IS DONE! Gabe is potty trained! And only 1 month shy of a year in the making. He has kept his pants dry 2-3 nights/naps now. And during the day has been accident free for a couple of months. We are very excited about this. I thought Braxton was hard, but Gabe was much harder. I don't blame it all on his stubbornness, some of it was both of his parents not keeping on top of asking him to go on time. Well, we have been telling him that we will renew our Dinosaur Park pass when he kept his pants dry while sleeping. So, sometime this week we will do that. But I had been wanting to take the boys to the new Layton Chuck E. Cheese for some time now. However it's never much fun for me to struggle with my three boys alone in an overly crowded area. So, I excused Braxton from school today and we went down and played. Now, I am usually one who doesn't like to take my kids out of school for anything: no vacations, and they have to be really sick for me to keep them home, no faking! But, lately Colby has been trying to convince me to relax and enjoy the time with my boys while they are young. When they are teenagers they might now want to do things with me/us. Also, Braxton has been getting burnt out on homework, and routines and schedules, complaining he doesn't have enough time to play what he wants to play and get enough sleep. Seriously, he told me I kept waking him up too early for school(7:30am), so I told him to go to bed earlier the next night(bedtime is at 8pm). Also, my parents just arrived home last night from a 17 day Book of Mormon Tour in Guatemala and Mexico. So, we wanted to meet up with her and visit with Aunt Heidi (my younger sister). So, again here's the rundown: Gabe needed a reward, Braxton needed a break from school and routine, we needed a visit with Aunt Heidi and Grandma Miller, and Tristan had a great time as well as I. I don't know why I feel that I have to explain myself to you all, but I was trained that the kids don't stay home from school unless they are sick with something worse than a cold. So there you are, we had a lot of fun. I had a ton of different coupons to use there, so we got drinks, pizza, salad bar, dessert pizza, and a bazillion tokens. We came home with prizes, full tummies, 2 sleeping boys and smiles on Braxton and my faces. It was a pretty clean place, but about 1/3 of the games were already broken. That was frustrating since that place hasn't been open too long. All in all, our tokens all got spent, and we had a lot of fun together.

Gabe and I trying to pop all of the bubbles on the screen.


Tristan playing a broken Whack-a-mole.

Tristan, Aunt Heidi and Braxton riding his favorite ride/game there.

Mmm... lunch!

I think Gabe spent his entire load of tokens on this bowling game. People were still playing it when we left, because it has about 39 games in it.

They rode this for about 2 seconds, enough for a picture. Neither liked the way it rode.

All out of tokens, but he can pretend it's moving.


We earned 500 tickets as a family. Wahoo!

Hello 2009!

Happy New Year! Colby and I took the boys to the mall for some lunch and playtime. We were going to attend the "Countdown to Noon" at the Treehouse Museum. But it seems that everyone else in Weber County had the same plan. So we opted out of that idea. They still got some well needed jumping and running around time in the mall.

We actually did something this year in the evening. Usually all of our friends are busy with other people's parties, and we would rather stay home than bother looking for a babysitter. But this year, people came to us. I'll tell you something, it's so much easier celebrating holidays with kids when you can do it in your own home. You just put them to bed like normal and keep partying. I don't know how long we will be able to pull that off. Our friends through Colby are now getting to the point in life of starting families, soon they will be in the same place we have been for years. It was nice because Braxton slept over at his cousin Xavier's house, so as late as Gabe and Tristan stayed up, there was very minimal arguing. We munched on many goodies, and even had a game and movie set aside to entertain us, but we all just ended up visiting from 7pm to 3:30 am.

We had the opportunity to have our friends baby girl join us. Hopefully, I got my fill of cuddles in with her, and it will keep the yearning for a daughter at bay. Colby wanted to hold her so bad, but he is getting over a cold. Because she was such an early preemie, she is too prone to RSV and other illnesses. We enjoyed her latest antics, then setup the port-a-crib downstairs for her.

We hope you all spent New Year's doing something fun. And wish the best for you in 2009. Happy January!

When the 3rd gets forgotton...

Okay, so does this happen to anyone else? My third child gets forgotten in his highchair quite often. I usually sit at the computer while they eat breakfast or lunch, mostly because I do not eat what they eat. Anyway, so I just sit and carouse the Internet and get up and help them if they need anything. Well, most of my kids rock in the highchairs while eating. Don't ask me why, I always try to stop them for fear of choking. They do it on the couch too, when listening to catchy music or during an intense part of a movie. We never taught them, but all three have ended up doing it on their own. Or, at least Braxton did, maybe Gabe learned it from him, and Tristan from Gabe. Back to the subject...I only find that he is asleep when I finally notice that the rocking has stopped and it's too quiet. Well, today I caught him in action. He was too tired to even finish his first chicken nugget.

Christmas '08

The kids actually let us sleep in until 8:30am. It was amazing, and wonderful! They are usually up the latest 7am. I was so excited for them to get up, I woke up about every 1/2 hour after 6am, listening for them to wake without success. Finally Braxton came out to use the bathroom at 8:30, and I told him to go wake the others so we could get started. We usually put up the child gate at the top of the stairs so there is no sneaking downstairs throughout the night/morning without us knowing. So I ran down to get the video camera setup, while Colby stay upstairs with them waiting for the okay. I got them coming down together and finding what Santa brought them, in fact I think we taped our whole morning in that room. However, I was so busy enjoying watching my kids open gifts, that I forgot to take pictures until the end. Oh well, at least we have it on video. We (Santa) get them a 50's Diner. You have to understand that my boys gravitate to "kitchen" type playthings where ever they go. So, I knew they would get a lot of play time with this. It took a LOT of convincing Colby and my mother-in-law that this very gender neutral kitchen would not turn our boys to the "softer" side of life. They played with that diner for 15 minutes before they even noticed that they had other things waiting for them. Score! Great idea. Tristan received an Elmo Live, to Colby's delight, which we all love to play with. Gabe got a Color Wonder Magic Light Brush, for all of his artistic abilities to be put to better and cleaner use. Braxton was excited for yet another Lego set from his dad and a Nintendo DS accessory kit from me. He lost all of his stylus' (plural?) this past August and has been using the tip of a pen lid as a stylus. I thought ahead on this gift, it came with 3 replacements, a Star Wars stick-on cover, car charger, and headphones all wrapped up in a "Sweet" Star Wars lunch box. He loved it. They all received a nice new Christmas sweater and movies, along with a new tooth tunes tooth brush and their very own cereal that they do not have to share. Colby got two Blu-Rays: The Dark Knight and Prince Caspian, the game Spore for his PC and the hilarious Shamwow! which he has been raving about after watching late night TV. (Gabe and I used it today, since I came home from the gym to 3 different cleaning soaps all over my kitchen. He says, "Dad you got a Shamwow? Oh, its great!" as we are cleaning up his mess and Colby is changing T's diaper.) Colby and the boys got me a purple Ipod Nano, I have been using Colby's old big Ipod, and wanted my own. I also got an arm band to go with it, and the book "Eat This, Not That" which I have been searching for. It's a great diet book to compare your favorite restaurant foods to make smarter eating out choices. Some have you might have seen it on "The Biggest Loser", "The Rachael Ray Show", and "Ellen". That's where I saw it, but I have heard that it has been talked about on other TV shows as well. For breakfast I made Pumpkin pancakes with Apple Cider Syrup, bacon and juice. Either I'm a terrible cook (this is extremely likely) or they are just not anyone in this house's favorite thing to eat. But, I tried to make a hot Christmas breakfast, and that's all that counts. It doesn't happen any other time of the year.

At 11:30 we headed over to Colby's parents' home for more gifts and food. Finally Gabe got his Nintendo DS, he won't have to steal Braxton's any longer. And then we could give him a final gift from us, his own DS accessory kit. Braxton received Lego Batman for the Wii, and another game for his DS. We unwrapped some new Sunday clothes for Tristan while he was napping. Colby received a new weed eater/lawn edger, he has been begging to go buy a new one. Unfortunately we cannot test it out until the late spring. I received a new Sunday coat that I helped pick out. After munching on snacks and working on the puzzle some more while the kids played we headed out for our next stop. I forgot to take pictures at both places, sheesh!

At 3pm we were expected at my parents' home for a family dinner and more gifts. Who can say no to food and gifts? Not us. Colby and I received gift cards and cash, sweet! Tristan got a movie and a toddler toy. Gabe got a coveted Nerf gun and a movie. Braxton got a movie and alien action figure. Did I mention that Braxton received 2 Nerf guns for his birthday, and both Gabe and Braxton got Nerf guns at parties before Christmas. It has been the year of Nerf guns, and a bit crazy with soft bullets flying throughout my home. But with a house full of boys, I can't complain, better that than wrestling in my book. We ate a wonderful turkey dinner, and enjoyed some fun family games that Heidi created. The kids all played with cousins for hours. We tried to soak up all of the parent time we could get, since they would be gone on a Book of Mormon tour to Mexico for 17 days starting the next day.

After a long day, we finally got home and played with the new toys and gadgets for a couple of hours before putting the kids to bed. They needed some quiet down time alone after all of the relative-ness. We were fortunate again to have friends stop by and visit for a bit before we called it a night. Unfortunately the kids did not sleep in the next day, but they did on Saturday. The busyness finally caught up to them.

Thank you so much to our family and friends for all the wonderful treats, cards and gifts given throughout the season. We are more blessed to have you in our lives, than to receive something from you, but we thank you none the less. Sorry for the list of gifts in this post, but I need to keep a record for our thank you list. We hope you all have a safe end of year, and we will talk to you again in 2009.

Christmas Eve.

We had a nice Christmas Eve. We did our traditional "open one present" at our home. It always new new pajamas and sometime new slippers for the next year. Next we usually head over to my parents home, but they were on their way home from Salt Lake, so we headed over to Colby's parents' home for the remainder of the evening. We always have finger food, a puzzle to put together and one gift for everyone to open there as well. But, this year the boys got to open 6 small presents, and Tristan 3. They played Polar Express with Geo Trax. Grumpa made a track with 4 different train stations to stop at. When it was your turn, you chose a station to drive to, and stopped for the train to pick up coal, wood, or a package. And each item had one of the boys' names on it. Then that person got to pick a small "stocking stuffer" sized present to open. Braxton and Xavier didn't have the attention span to last the entire game. But Gabe loved it. And Tristan almost always took his turn with Colby's help. We got home around 9pm, and had friends waiting for us in our basement. We got the kids in bed, then we relaxed while Santa went to work. We played games, watched basketball and snacked. What a great evening it was.

Happy Birthday Braxton!

Braxton Ty Koch became the first child of our family on December 21st, 2001 at 8:01 pm at Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks, CA after 24 hours of labor. Length at 21 inches and weighing 8 lbs. 1 oz. (Funny how it worked out that way, huh?) He was originally due the 18th, but there was no way I was waiting for him to come naturally and risk being in the hospital over Christmas. His birthday is close enough to the holiday as is. We had a scheduled induction at 8pm on the 20th, if he hadn't come before then. Well, Colby, my mom and I went to the hospital and I got checked in and all hooked up to things, and we waited. I was having very mild contractions all night long. Enough to not get any sleep, whilst my mom and Colby slept on the hardwood floor because the reclining chair was way too uncomfortable. By 7am I had not even dilated to 2cm. My doctor came into the room exclaiming that it looked like a bunch of dead bodies were in there, and then proceeded to break my water. If you have ever seen how they do that, you might be able to understand why Colby almost passed out when waking up to a guy jamming a hook into his wife, while she gasped in pain. He stepped out of the room, while the nurses told him to sit on the floor and put his head between his legs. Anyway back to the birth. I had gone all night and morning without any pain medication, but by noon I was exhausted. They gave me a half dose of something to take the edge off, and I pass into a nice nap right away. Finally by about 6pm there was still no progress with dilation or any of that other good stuff, so they talked me into an epidural and emergency C-section since it had been almost 12 hours since they broke my water. Colby held my hand while the epidural was put in, that was the most scary part of the entire day. They then prepped me and wheeled my into the OR. More prep work while Colby and my mom were getting dressed and ready to come in. Finally, everyone is ready and waiting, Colby by my head, and my mom with the camera to record the event for me. A slice with the laser, and lots of tugging. Colby later told me that the doctor put my guts and stuff up on my belly, while he knelt on me tugging on Braxton, because he was lodged in my pelvis. And again he had to turn away, because he almost passed out again. It was painful even with the epidural, although the anesthesiologist was assuring me that it didn't hurt, it was just a lot of pressure. How would he know? Has he ever had a child? No! Braxton came out pretty messy and peed all over my doctor (Braxton loves telling everyone that part of the story). My blood pressure had gone crazy, so I wasn't allowed to hold him for most of the night until it stabilized. I had trouble feeding him, we didn't get the hang of it until he had been home for about a week. (That's probably why he still doesn't like to eat, and is my skinny little stick boy.) I should have stayed in the hospital another day, but I asked to be released on Christmas eve, I did NOT want to be in the hospital during my first Christmas as a mom. Besides, I did have the baby blues, I hadn't made that many friends yet, so not many visitors came in. And, Colby hates hospitals, so he and my mom went to a movie and dinner without me. Yeah, that didn't help the postpartum depression. I also shared a room almost the entire recovery with a woman who had a normal birth, and tons of visitors. She was also always in the bathroom. And when you really have had a C-section it's not the most fun thing to get up and walk over to the bathroom, you put it off as long as possible. (It may sound weird, but thank goodness for catheters.) So, picture this, you've held your bladder as long as you can to avoid the pain, then when you finally manage to painfully get out of bed, there is someone in your bathroom. You figured they would be out by the time you got out of bed. Nope, then she starts the shower up.....let's just say that was not a fun night. I am so grateful for my mom, she helped Colby and I so much with that first week of transition. Because she had 6 C-sections, she understood the pain of recovery and coached Colby and I with diaper changes and bathing the baby. She also took some night shifts to help us out, since she was sleeping on the couch and awake because of the crying anyway. We finally got to week 3, and my mom was back in Utah, we new parents were getting the hang of things, and I was moving around a lot better. From then on, Braxton was such a good baby. We could take him everywhere, and we did. He went to San Diego at 3 weeks old to see my brother Seth graduate from Marine training. We then flew to Utah and had him blessed in my old ward. He and I flew to Utah again in February to meet Colby's family. We took him to movies, and dinner, to friends houses and other functions. We took our first family vacation when he was 3 months old, to San Fransisco. He went to the beach (Warning: Very unflattering picture of me coming up.)and to Disneyland. Then we drove to the family ranch in Utah for the Fourth of July. He was just a great traveler. He has become a normal, not always easy and happy child, now. We love him so much! He was so excited to become a big brother with Gabe and Tristan, and he is such a huge help to me. He loves video games and basketball like his dad. He loves movies and music like me. Last Wednesday, we had a birthday party for him. Thanks to all his friends who came, we had so much fun. And he got some great loot! Sunday, his actual birthday, we celebrated with grandparents, one uncle, one cousin, one aunt and a partridge in a pear tree. Who doesn't love ice cream cake?! We love you Braxton, and I can't believe you will already be 8 years old next year. Time flies when you have kids, whether you are having fun or not. But we love each and every one.

More snow.

Yesterday we received more snow, so it was back to shoveling the driveway, sidewalks and mailbox for Colby and I. The kids got all dressed in their snow clothes and played with the kids in the neighborhood while all of the parents were clearing off snow. It was quite a sight to see, our entire side of the street out shoveling/snow blowing at the same time. When we were through with our home, we would help our neighbors, and vice versa. I fashioned a double sled pulling system that you could attach to yourself like a horse or sled dog. Gabe and Tristan had a blast! Braxton and the neighbor kids tried it out with each other as well, they used their friend Colten as the horse. These are good times, I'm glad I had Colby run in to grab the camera. We didn't hardly play in the snow last year because we weren't very prepared with the warmest of winter wear for each child. Also, we were sick a LOT. This year, I have been making it a point to get the kids playing out in the snow at least once a day. That way there is less fighting, wrestling and annoying mom, and more physical exercise. Looks like we will be shoveling again this afternoon before our Koch Family Christmas Party. Would someone please convince Colby that it IS worth buying a snow blower now that we live here.

This past January. Right now as I type.

Forts and fun.

Last week, I took time out of house work to sit down and play with Gabe and Tristan. I admit that I am not the most fun mom, because this rarely happens. Usually I do housework, fiddle on the computer or read, while they just play alone or together. They were bouncing off the walls and begging for my attention. So, we put the couch cushions on the floor, and played some music, and they had to jump from cushion to cushion like lily pads. Gabe had a blast, and Tristan was copying him and laughing. Next, we built a fun fort with the love seat, a blanket, some cushions, and a couple of glow stick swords. The boys' loved it, and Skitterz kept climbing in their with them, to their delight. I must have worn them out, because we had lunch and Tristan went down for a nap. I got on the computer, and then wondered where Gabe had gone to. Here I found Skitterz resting in front of a heater vent........and HERE I found Gabe asleep on top of a bathroom heater vent.