Emery Rose Welker

Emery Rose Welker

October 5, 2011

7:43 am

8 lbs 2 oz

19.5 inches

Absolutely perfect and healthy in every possible way. We are so in love! More pictures to come soon!

General Conference and Forget-Me-Nots

One of my favorite quotes was said by Elder Jeffery R. Holland at a BYU devotional. 

He said, "I hope no one stayed home that day. Perhaps there was a ball game on, or the gardening needed to be done, or some very legitimate work in the basement. But if anybody stayed home from the general conference that is just concluding in 3 Nephi 17, I can promise you that he must have surely missed what has to be, for me, one of the greatest moments ever recorded in scripture anywhere. What would it have been like to hear the Savior pray?...What did they see? I don't know. It cannot be written. No one has ever been able to record what this group both saw and heard Jesus speak unto the Father. Surely no basement, no garden, no ball game was worth missing that. I don't know any more about it than what I read here, but I am confident it was glorious to those in attendance."

In the weeks leading up to conference I always get so excited. It's like I started running out of "spiritual gas" after about 5 months of no conference and I just get so excited to here what the Prophet and Apostles have prepared for us. I get so anxious to see what the topics are that they pick, it seems every conference has a "theme" that they are all inspired to address, hoping we will listen. I can't wait for this weekend. 

October tends to be my favorite conference because of the Relief Society General Broadcast. We get to here our leaders address just us women, it's amazing. This year we were lucky enough to have President Utchdorf address us. His talk was perfect for me. He gave 5 things not to ever forget and related them to the 5 petals of a forget-me-not. I would just like to write down a little what stuck out to me. If you would like to read the whole talk go here. 

1) Forget not to be patient with yourself. 

When we compare ourselves to others, we are usually comparing our weakness to their strengths. This creates unrealistic expectations for ourselves! We are all given strengths and weaknesses it is not fair to us to take a weakness that we have been given to work on and compare it to someone who was given that a strength. "Remember to be compassionate and patient with yourself".

2) Forget not the difference between a good sacrifice and a foolish sacrifice.

Ask yourself, "Am I committing my time and energies to the things that matter most?"

3) Forget not to be happy NOW!

The parable of the chocolate bar. We've all heard the story of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Wonka hides golden tickets in his candy bars for 5 lucky people to win a tour of his factory and a lifetime supply of chocolate! These people got so caught up in finding their "golden ticket" they stopped enjoying the chocolate bar that they used to love. He counsels us not to wait for our "golden ticket" to be happy. To find joy in the small daily things.  If we spend our days looking for the roses, we will miss the tiny forget-me-nots. 

4) Forget not the "WHY" of the gospel

We get so caught up in the "what" and the "how" of the gospel that we forget the "why". We turn the gospel into a list of "To-Dos" instead of focusing on why we live the gospel. He focused mostly on the gospel perspective but I think we do this in all aspects of our life. For me, Why am I a wife? Why am I (going to be) a mother? He said, 

"The what and how of obedience marks the way, yes, it keeps us on the right path. But the why of obedience sanctifies our actions transforming the mundane into the majestic."

5) Forget not that the Lord loves you. 

This sums itself up. You are not forgotten, allow His divine love in your life.

I am so excited to hear from more spiritual giants like President Utchdorf for 2 whole days this weekend. 

I hope you are all able to tune in with me. 

The Nursery

The nursery is *finally* (almost) done! It is actually completely done other than a few empty picture frames waiting to be filled with shots of our little girl. But since she is taking her sweet time in joining us, we are just patiently waiting...Well some more patiently than others. There is something about an aching back, Braxton-Hicks contractions, 12-13 hour shifts, and not being able to see your toes or even roll over in bed, that makes you a little more anxious than most for your little one to arrive...But it's all part of the experience right? One I wouldn't trade for the world! It all just makes me love and appreciate my little girl more, I'm sure I'll need it once she hits those teenage years. For now let's focus on the years when she still thinks we are the greatest things ever though :) Anyway....our little one will hopefully be joining us soon. I can definitely tell my body is getting ready! We'll have to see what the doctor thinks on Monday though, I am really hoping that within the next week she will be here though! I think that 38 weeks is a pretty sufficient amount of time :)

Anyway, here is a little peek at the little Miss's room. It has been a lot of work, but we had a lot of fun doing it too! 

We started off with the Changing Table. We still hadn't cleaned out and organized our office, hence all the desk and papers in the background... 

I LOVE being married to a handyman...seriously.  

 The classic, dad putting together the crib. It's funny for me I would get SO excited to sew something new, or put the bedding on the bed. But Jake gets so excited every time we buy a new baby item and he gets to put it together. He was so excited to put the crib together. I love it. 

Ta Da. We decided to go with Lavender and Green. Not too "girly". Jake very against too girly. I am loving how it turned out. 

Next we have all of my projects...I did a lot while Jake was in China, since then I have just done stuff here and there on my days off. These are burp cloths that I made, I think I got a little carried away, we have 13. Oh well. I am sure we will find uses for every single one. 

This is the project that kept me busy while Jake was in China, well it was supposed to anyway...I finished it before he even flew out of Seattle haha. I love how it turned out though, I had a lot of fun with it. 

Her bow holder, some can't really be clipped on here, but it has been nice to organize most of them. 

Next is the nursery! I love how it turned out. I would have really loved to paint the walls and stuff, but since a) we live in an apartment b) we are moving a just a few months. It wasn't really very realistic...haha. Jake's project was the topper for the changing table, it turned out perfect! Exactly what I wanted and were able to find paint that matched it perfectly. Once again, so glad to be married to a handyman. 

There are the sad, empty picture frames...eventually those will hold pictures of our sweetie, but until then they just hang there bare. 

So there is the tour of the life of the nursery. The whole house is really scattered with baby stuff, missing from these pictures is the stroller in the corner, the bouncer, the swing in the living room, the bassinet in our bedroom, the bottles, the bath stuff, etc...it truly is crazy everything you need for one little tiny person! Our house is all baby ready! And we can hardly wait....now if only she could sense our excitement and come! Here's to hoping my next blog post is announcing our little girl! Wish us luck!

Playing catch up...

Wow. I cannot believe it has been almost 2 months since I blogged! It makes me sad because I don't want to get out of the habit of blogging, I love reading other people's blogs, I've just been too lazy to update my own! But here is an update of what's happened with us since last time....

At the end of July Jake ran a half marathon with my cousin Jeremy, and my sister. It was the 1st annual Marathon/Half Marathon in Morgan. It was his first one and he liked it. He didn't really train much...but he still did really well!

My cousin Jeremy.

The race went right past my house so we waited and cheered for them there, then when they passed we jumped in the car to meet them at the finish line.  

Jake did really well, especially for not training...He ran the whole thing in an hour and 40 minutes, 2nd place in his age group. Jeremy finished about 3 minutes before Jake did. 

 He was beat.

They did all get massages afterwards though! He loved that, his muscles didn't get too sore after since they got these. He did have a hard time walking most the rest of the day though, haha. His legs were just too tired to hold himself up!

Jake's birthday followed the next week. I took pictures, but I accidently deleted them all! I'm so sad :( I spent so much time on his cake and now every picture is gone...oh well. We started celebrating the Sunday before our very good friends Chance and Anna came over and had cake with us. Jake wanted an ice cream cake this year so I made a Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream Cake with Whipped Cream Frosting and a Chocolate Ganache. It was de-lish. (When it wasn't melting...:)) On Jake's actual birthday he wanted to go to his favorite, Red Robin. 

The only picture of Jake's birthday that didn't get deleted...Any of Jake's closest friends will know how much he loves the "old cartoons". Especially Looney Tunes. So I got him all 5 volumes. I also got him a new Hand Sander. He got a few Home Depot gift cards and he used those to get a new Router. He is very pleased with his new tool selection. 

For his birthday my parents bought us tickets to The Sound of Music up at Sundance. It was SOOO good. We loved it. We went with them, my grandparents, and some good family friends the Rose's. We had so much fun. Thanks Mom and Dad!

The next week I had my first baby shower, thrown by my cousin, aunt, and mom. It was a blast. We had a breakfast shower and my cousin made this really awesome Quiche. We all still need the recipe. I'm not kidding, this stuff was to die for. We played games, opened presents, and did a lot of visiting. The picture above is one (of the million) outfits/gifts given to us from my mom. It is so cute. I love the little cowgirl boots. Cannot wait to take her to her first rodeo in this! 

 The amazing afghan my grandma made for us. I LOVE LOVE it so much. It is so pretty.

 Afghan from my mom. 

 Some of our gifts hanging up. We got so many really really cute things. I can't wait! Thanks everyone who came! We appreciate it so much!

 The following week 2 of my very best friends, who happen to also be my coworkers, threw me a shower. Unfortunately I didn't get as many pictures at this shower. It was really cute though! We had crepes and chocolate fountains. It was delicious. Thanks every who came! And to Jess and Sharly for throwing it :) I love you two :)

Jake started school again a few weeks ago. He got a whole 2 weeks off! It was much needed though. And this is his LAST SEMESTER (of undergrad at least...) But oh are we so excited about that! It'll be a tough semester, 2 of his engineering classes this semester are grad level, so they'll be tough. He is all registered for the FE (Fundementals of Engineering) Exam so all he needs to do is pass that, and finish this semester and he can start working as a civil engineer. YAY! He has started applying for jobs, at this point we have absolutely no idea where we are going to end up. It seems like most of the jobs are in Texas so it is looking like it may be there, but who knows. Come January we really could be anywhere. Yeah I'm thrilled about moving across the country with a 3 month old :) It'll be awesome. haha

Other than all this we have been spending lots and lots of time getting ready for this baby! We hadn't really bought anything because we wanted to wait until the showers were over so that we could know what we needed. So the last month it has just been back and forth to Babies 'R Us. It has been so crazy. Every time we leave I tell Jake, ok I think we have everything. By the time we get home we have another list of things that we need. It really is nuts how much you need for one very tiny person! We have so many adorable things that we are so excited to use/see her wear! Jake loves setting up all of the swings, bouncers, pack and play, etc. It is cute. He is so excited. 

Baby could really be coming any day now...The Dr. says almost definitely not this week. But we go back on Monday and we'll see what happens then! He says she will more than likely be coming early though. I am most than ok with that! It is coming fast though I can't believe it! I'm 37 weeks now so anytime would really be ok! We cannot wait, we are sooo ready to meet our little girl! I promise to be a better blogger after she is born. It'll all just be pictures of her though I'm sure. I'm ok with that though, haha.