Happy Birthday Princess Megan!!!!!

She did it!  Our little Princess turned 3!!!

A Transformation Is Happening

......and it's about darn time!!!  Less than a year ago Brian posted this video up from Christmas of last year and I about died when I realized that he posted it.  Here I am a little less than a year later I find myself posting it again!  It was me at my absolute heaviest weight I've ever been.  It took me watching that video to realize how bad my weight had gotten.  I was put on a medication in May of last year that caused me (with my help of course) to gain nearly 40 lbs over the course of just a few months.  I was on it for a year and am now off of it and am finally able to shed some of that weight.  At my heaviest I was about 158 lbs (maybe a little more, but I wasn't exactly a fan of weighing myself then).  Gradually after that Christmas video was taken I started losing a pound here and there naturally without any much effort on my part.  I lost about 10 lbs that way.  I finally started really focusing on my diet at the end of September and have lost an additional 11 lbs making me now 137 lbs as of this morning.  That's a 21 lb difference from less than a year ago and to celebrate I'm posting an "after" picture.  I still would need to lose about 18 more pounds before I'd be at my ideal BMI, but for now I'm celebrating a half way mark.  :)

And without further adieu, my before "video." (I didn't have a picture that really captured it as well)

This is me down probably about 5 lbs at Jeffrey's b-day party in May...............

AND.......TODAY!

Zoey Plays In The Water

A New Addition To The Family!!!!!!

Meet our new baby.......................her name is Zoey! :)

AND....she LOVES water!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here are some details about her.  We think she's a Golden/German Shepherd mix.  Her previous owners got her from the pound about a month ago and LOVED her, but the mom had to go back to work and didn't want to leave the dog alone in the house all day.  She's been fixed, has all of her shots (just needs one more heart-worm treatment), has been micro-chipped, and is potty trained!  She's between 5 and 6 months old.  After doggy sitting a couple of dogs for some friends we decided that we needed a dog with a little more energy that wouldn't lose interest in the kids and thought it would be nice to have a younger dog for that purpose.  She's a very sweet mannered dog and still has a lot of puppy habbits that she will grow out of soon enough I'm sure.  I didn't care how old she was, as long as she was house trained, and the previous owners did a great job of that, so Mommy is VERY happy.  :)  As you can see, she's VERY adorable and she likes to snuggle too.  Whenever she hears one of the kids crying she immediately goes and sits by them.  Unfortunately on our hour ride home from Lebanon where we got her from, Megan was crying because she was afraid of the puppy and she wouldn't leave her side.  A little counter-intuitive, but Megan eventually adjusted and now loves the doggy. The kids keep calling her "Chase" because that's what our friend's dog is named.  It doesn't help that she kind of looks like him too.  I think we'll just be naming her Zoey Chase Nyberg.  They're finally catching on to Zoey.  When we went to pick her up, we just told the kids that some nice people invited us over to play with their dog, so they had no clue.  We didn't want to get their hopes up if it didn't work out, or we didn't feel like she would be a right fit with our family.  Of course our kids were misbehaving and the dog went crazy with three screaming children, but we felt like we got to see the dog at her absolute worst and it still wasn't bad, so at her best, she had to be REALLY good, and once we got her home and calmed down, she was GREAT.  We absolutely love our little Zoey and now officially consider ourselves dog people.  And of course, to top it off, we went and rented "Marley and Me" last night and bawled our eyes out.  It's a good thing she's a puppy and we'll have MANY years with her before her "movie" ends.  Well there ya have it.  That's the end....or rather the beginning, of our adventure.

Update On Our Little Jeffrey

Back in May we announced that our little Jeffrey had a diagnosis of either Asperger's Syndrome or High Functioning Autism and that the Doctor wanted to wait another year to see how his language came along before distinguishing between the two.  Well, this morning I took Jeffrey to see a specialist down at the Dayton Children's Medical Center for a follow up/second opinion.  I immediately liked the doctor, she was so nice and Jeffrey didn't even need time to warm up to her or the 4th year resident she had with her.  The resident was able to play with Jeffrey while she and I talked and she was watching his behavior all at the same time.  We discussed his history and whatever concerns I had.  The first thing that came up was his speech delay.  She told me that a speech delay automatically ruled out an Asperger's diagnosis.  She also told me that when you walk in a room, you immediately know if a kid is "Autistic."  Jeffrey was just too social and responsive for that diagnosis, however, she still believed him to be on the "autism spectrum," just listed as Pervasive Development Disorder (PDD) not otherwise specified.  Pretty much meaning our little Jeffrey is just too original to be put into a more specific category. :)  I am very happy with the diagnosis and feel that it is the right one.  We were in there for 2 1/2 hours and I believe she had all of the tools and time she needed to make an accurate diagnosis.  A main concern that I, as well as other parents have had about this diagnosis process is they feel the doctor doesn't spend enough time with the child for the full diagnosis and I felt a little like that with our doc in Tennessee, but I'm so happy to say that that isn't the case this time and we feel very fortunate.  I recommend anyone get second opinions if they aren't entirely certain about the first one, especially in this ever growing field of study.  Thanks to everyone who is so patient and loving with our little Jeffrey, he is one in a million. :)

p.s. the tooth-fairy visited our house for the first time ever last night!

The 'REAL' Heaton Family Reunion Post

I started out my last post thinking I was going to put all of the reunion photos on it, but ended up putting other ones up instead, so alas, this is the "official" reunion post.  I had to limit the photos to just the ones with my family in it (there were over a hundred total!), but I e-mailed all of the other photos taken with my camera to everyone else that was in them.  Without further adeau (I am absolutely positive I spelled that wrong), pictures!!!

 Janice and Sharice were in charge of games and crafts and on the FIRST day they made KAZOOS.  The noise level in the house (6 beds 1 loft with 31 people in it!) got pretty up there.  :)  They were a hit and the kids loved them!

 Jeffrey especially loved his.

 Grandpa Heaton helping out with the Kazoos.

 Ben with Uncle Jon.  Out of all of my kids, I always thought I could see Jon in Ben the most (without his glasses on).

 Megan and cousin Eli chilling on the couch with Aunt Jill.

 Ben all dressed up for church in Show Low, Arizona. (Who me??)  :)

 Yayyyy!!!  Daddy surprised everyone by showing up the second day!!  Brian was able to get 5 days  plus 2 weekends off of work last minute to fly out and meet us and then drove back with us across the country.  Such a miracle!!!

 Relaxing and just having a great time.

 This is pretty typical of how we sit on the couch.  Me with me legs up on Brian.  :)  And yes, I'm wearing Brian's socks (socks were required in the house and mine were dirty)

 I have no idea what she's holding, but it sure looks like she's trying to hide it from everyone!

 I almost didn't post this one because it was blurry, but then thought about how fitting it was considering all of the older boy cousins' vision probably was like this after playing on the Wii for hours and hours and hours.

 Photos by Ben Nyberg.  If you'd like to schedule an appointment let me know. ;)  Ben snapped this one while we were walking to the pool.

I'm only now realizing that the only picture we got of my family at the pool was of me waving hi.  Oh well. :)

 After swimming, a few of us went outside to dry off instead of going straight into a chilly air conditioned locker room to do it.

Megan coloring on Grandma Heaton's pillow case that everyone drew their nice hand prints on.

Okay, so you really can't capture the reunion with just pictures of my family, so I selected a few of the other good ones that didn't just have us in them. :)

 Mr. Regan's semi-drunk face. :)

 Cassandra

Rebekah

Aunt Janice helping make all of the kids their own individual cups......and looking a little scary with the HUGE scissors!  :P

Grandpa Heaton helping Kael put some stickers on his cup.

 Cutie Pie Eden waiting for what else? Food of course!!

 Cassandra playing with toys.

This is what the sippy cups looked like that all of the Grandkids got to make.  Cute huh?

 Dan busy in the play kitchen.

Cousin Jacob

Aunt Nicole

Cousin Eli

Aunt Jill and Cousin Eli

Cousin Sarah

Uncle Jake!

Smiley Uncle Jerris :)

Cousin Emma

I had to post this, this is my absolute FAVORITE picture of Uncle Derek! :)

Cousin Kael getting ready to go night night.

Grandpa Heaton getting to the pool with cousins Nater Tater and Ike.

Aunt Shannon with Cousin Cassandra waiting in line for the slide.

Cousin Kael getting excited for the slide!

Grandpa Heaton with Cousins Nathan and Isaac and Sarah waiting for the slide. 

I don't know who had more fun on the slide, Grandpa, or the grandkids?

Uncle Jerris with Cousin Eli.

Grandma Heaton swimming at the pool.

The kids got to bring their "light sabers" to the pool to swim with.

Uncle Jake with Cousins Kael, Sarah, Rebekah, and I think that might be Jacob, not sure.

Aunt Janice helping Emma trace her hand for Grandma's pillow case.

Aunts Nicole, Shannon, and Jill put together the pinata for the kids.

All of the pretty houses Grandma helped the kids paint hanging in the wind to dry.

Aunt Nicole playing Mouse Trap with Cousins Emma, Jacob, and Rebekah.

FAMILY PICTURES!!!

The Boys!  In order, youngest to oldest:

Jon, Jerris, Jake, Josh, and The Grandpaaaaaaa!

The Girls, Younest to Oldest:

Sharice, Shell (me), Shannon, and Grandma Heaton

The Nyberg Family Pic. (expect this in your Christmas card this year)

THE WHOLE GROUP!!! (all 31 of us!)