Valentines Day

This year we had fun making Valentines to give to the grandparents and Dan. Jax and Addy made cards with their hands that had a heart shape in the middle. It was so cute and they had fun doing it. Jaxon kept telling me he loved me and he was excited for Valentines Day. Valentines morning, me, Jax, and Addy (Addy pulled out pots and pans while Jax and I cooked) make breakfast for Dan. We made French toast and cut them into heart shapes. Then Jax and Addy gave Dan their Valentines before we took him to school.

That night the missionaries stopped by and it was nice having a spiritual thought and we watched a short video clip about revelation. After they left our friend Lydia came over to sit at the house while the kids slept so we could go out.

I had gotten a free $20.00 gift card to a Mexican restaurant in DC that we decided to try on Valentine’s Day. We had never heard of it or been there before so we were hoping it would be good. We drove by and I'm not going to lie... I was pretty scared to try it. It was a total hole in the wall place. It looked like a house converted into a restaurant. They just had a little sign with the name of the restaurant on it and I kind of wanted to turn around and go somewhere safe like Olive Garden lol. But I was brave, we circled the block a few times trying to find parking (got to love DC) - found a spot we didn't think we would get towed from (thought it would have been better to take the metro), and walked to the restaurant. We went in and it was really small. There were probably a total of 12 small tables that people could sit at. We were lucky that there was a table open and we sat down. Lots of people were coming in and getting takeout orders so we knew it must be good. We ordered the food and I kid you not... it was the BEST Mexican I have ever had! AMAZING! After dinner we walked around DC and admired the old houses, got back in our car that didn't get towed THANK GOODNESS, gave each other our gifts which was just candy and cards this year since we are trying to be very frugal, and went home. It was fun to get to not just focus on Dan for Valentines, but also on our kids - I made Jax and Addy little Valentine and Jax still carries it around and wants me to give him treats with it all the time LOL.

Not only do I love my little family - but I love and am so grateful for our extended family. I was blessed to marry into and be born into amazing families. We have also been so blessed to have made some truly wonderful friends throughout our lives. A lot of people don't like Valentine’s Day because it makes them aware of their lack of relationship to a significant other - but Valentines is about the love that is in our lives in all different forms. Parents, siblings, friends, kids… I have been blessed with so many people and relationships to get to celebrate on Valentine’s Day! Yeah for Love!

Addison Turns One

January 18, 2012 our sweet Addison came into our lives! A year later and we love her even more than we did that day!

My mom flew into DC to spend some time with us and was able to be here for her birthday. We decorated with butterflies and balloons! I made her a butterfly cake and we had family on Google chat to sing with us and watch her eat her cake.

It was a fun day! She didn't dive into her cake, she was more cautious and would just scoop the frosting off and lick her finger. She got a little braver later and started grabbing a little, but it was cute how dainty she was about it.

Addy - we love you so much! You have such a sweet spirit and bring so much joy to our lives.

Right now you are

Walking
Getting into everything
Dancing
babbling
You have 3 top teeth and 4 bottom
you LOVE baths
you put EVERYTHING (including dirt) into your mouth
you love to have necklaces on
you like to play with whatever Jaxon is playing with
you can hold your own with your rough older brother
you love water
you hate wearing socks and always pull them off
if you don't have socks on - you will pull them off other peoples feet
you love to clap and play peek-a-boo
you use sign language to tell us more and all done
you are sweet and love to smile at everyone

Everywhere we go people ohh and awww over you. You are a beautiful girl and have such a happy sweet spirit. So many people have made the comment that you make their day. We love you and the joy you bring into our lives.

The Holidays

For Thanksgiving 2012 we decided to have it be with our little family. We could have done a group thing with some members of our ward - or we could have done dinner with our friends the Strait's, but we figured since this was probably the last time we would be away from family during this holiday, we would take advantage and have it be a close and intimate thing with us 4. We had fun playing together, cooking, and we went and saw the movie Wreck It Ralph. We made sure we talked about what we were grateful for and I loved having the 4 of us be together. I remember having such an overwhelming feeling of gratitude for my family. I am so glad we had little Addy with us, our family felt more complete with her here and it was such a wonderful feeling. During the Christmas holidays we tried to do some new traditions and ones we had always done. We got to go see the Christmas tree at the Capitol, Jax and Addy saw Santa (Jax loved it - Addy was scared) - we had a fun ward party where we went on the "polar express". We were all in PJ’s and Santa and Mrs. Clause came and read all the kids a story.

Christmas our kids got spoiled for sure! We are so lucky to have such wonderful grandparents for our children. They sent lots of gifts and it was so fun to see the kids get so many wonderful things from loved ones. We ate good food, watched new movies, played with new toys, and enjoyed each other and Dan's time off of school!

New years Eve, we went out to eat and Johnny Rockets for dinner and then we had an early family party since they kids would not be staying up until midnight. Dan and I had fun waiting for the ball to drop and then laughed when we realized that our friends in Texas wouldn't be celebrating for another hour, our family and friends in Utah wouldn't be for another 2 hours and our CA family and friends would need to wait 3! It was kind of funny to be celebrating New Years from the "future".

We have/had some fun things to celebrate this year - Addy's first birthday, Dan will graduate Law School, and we will probably be moving back to Utah. Lots of things to be excited for!

September 4, 2012

***This is detailed because I don't want to forget the details. As hard as this was for me to write and read, I wanted to make sure I have this in my records***

We arrived in Virginia on August 23 - we were getting settled and into the grove of things - and then On September 4 at 3:01pm I got this text from my mom "D went to the hospital last night. He had some bleeding. He had a procedure this morning. We are losing him... I can't call each of you.... we are still in the crisis." My brother Trevor responded "Grandpa Koch?" Then a few mins later she wrote back "We just lost Grandpa Koch. We are still in the ICU. All the kids are still coming. The sons and daughters. I will call you when I can."

I was so confused - maybe because I didn't want to understand because the text is pretty clear, but I called my mom and she told me he had just passed away and that she was in the hospital room with him and my aunts and uncles and she would call me later. I couldn't believe it. We had just seen him at Whitney's wedding and right before we moved and he was doing great.

We found out that he had a bleeding ulcer which he has had before. Last time it happened he went to the hospital, they did a quick procedure and he was fine and left the next day. So late on September 3rd after he put my grandma to bed, he realized he had a bleeding ulcer again and that he would need to go to the hospital. He contacted my Uncle Dan to have him go be at the house with Grandma, and he called my mom and dad to meet him at the hospital. It was confirmed that night he had a bleeding ulcer but his blood pressure was kind of low so they were going to do some things to get it up and wait until the morning to do the procedure. My parents checked on him the morning of September 4th and he was doing great - blood pressure was up and he was doing and looking great. The doctors said they would do the quick procedure and he would get to go home the next day.

My aunt Cheri works at the hospital my grandpa was at so she decided to go check on him during the procedure since none of the family was there right then. She could tell things were not going well so she called her husband James and said he needed to hurry and get down there - he then frantically called his brothers and sisters and told them to get to the hospital immediately. My uncle Brent and my aunt Susan live in California so they booked the next flight out of there and hurried to Utah. They all started showing up as fast as they could get there, my parents, James and Cheri, and Kris and Dan were there when the doctors told them what was going on. They went in to do the procedure and one of the things they do is give the patient a medication to thicken the blood so they can stop the bleeding. Well that put strain on grandpa’s heart which was weak. They tried to save him but it was time for him to go. The doctors stopped working on him and left the room and the kids that were there went in and were there when he passed on. They stayed there until all the other kids showed up so they could say their goodbyes. It was a crazy thing and something they needed to do to help him live, was the thing that ended up killing him.

The funeral was planned for Monday September 10th so we flew into Salt Lake on Friday September 7th. Saturday we all met at the Temple and did a sealing session with all the brothers and sisters and grandkids that could do it. The grandkids that were not old enough to do that did baptisms so we could all be in the temple together. It was a very special, sacred moment for our family. One I will cherish and never forget. Sunday we had a special family get together before the viewing where all of us grandkids could share our memories about grandpa. It was so wonderful to listen to people’s memories about him. Then Monday was his funeral and we had all of us grandkids sing a song and me and my mom and 2 of my cousins and an aunt sang "I know that my redeemer lives". I had a very hard time not crying during the song – so when I sat down - I lost it. It was a beautiful funeral and we had a wonderful time talking and spending time together. We were lucky that Mike and Brittney watched Jax and Addy for us so we could enjoy the funeral and not have to try and handle our wiggly kids.

Early Tuesday morning - September 11th we flew home. I was a little worried about flying into DC on Sep 11 (it is considered the most dangerous airport to fly into) but we were told there were extra air marshals on board and that there were other things being done to make sure it was safe. They were also doing random carry on checks and all this other stuff for people flying to DC. It was fine though - we obviously made it alive haha. And really it is probably the safest day to fly because of all those extra things they do LOL.

Jax and Addy did good on the flights and when we got home - it was hard to get back into the swing of things.

I love my Grandpa so much and miss him A LOT! Our annual family trip to St. George in May will not be the same. It is hard knowing that we won't see him on this earth anymore, but I am so grateful for the knowledge I have that I will get to see him again.

Love and miss you Grandpa!

Move to VA

Our move to Virginia went pretty smoothly considering we were moving across the country. First - we drove from Utah to Texas, which takes 15 hours. We got there late Saturday night. Sunday we spent the day recouping from the drive and packing up the last few things for the house that we needed to. Monday morning Dan got the truck, (SIDE NOTE - the truck we reserved was going to be a perfect size for our stuff, when Dan got there - the only truck they had available was the biggest one! They didn't make us pay more for it - but it was huge - we had so much extra room and it probably cost us so much more in gas so I was very irritated, but oh well - side not over) and I went and met with people that were going to be taking over the property management job I was doing... we were basically just finishing up everything we needed to. We had people come over and help us load up the truck and then that afternoon we started our drive.

We only drove to Dallas since we were getting a late start, and also because Dan's dad Rob was flying into the Dallas airport Tuesday afternoon to help us drive the rest of the way. WE WERE SO GRATEFUL HE DID THIS! This allowed Dan and I to be in the same car with the kids so I wouldn't have to do it alone. Tuesday we drove from Dallas Texas to Memphis Tennessee, Wednesday we drove from Memphis to Johnson City Tennessee, and that left Thursday with Johnson City Tennessee to Alexandria VA. We had planned it out so we were doing about 9 hours a day after the Lubbock to Dallas drive. The total driving time from Utah to Virginia was 45 hours - so it was pretty rough. Luckily the kids did GREAT considering. They would get restless for a little while, but we could usually break and let them run around for a bit and they would be fine. Thank GOODNESS for the little DVD player, and my iphone. I don't know how people did it before! Jax watched movies pretty much the entire time and I was able to use the iphone, for GPS and so we could look up hotels and decide where to stay at night and where to eat and all that good stuff. Thursday we thought we were totally fine on time, because all we had to do was get to Alexandria before 5 before the office at our apartment closed so we could sign the lease and get the keys and all that good stuff. I had contacted the elders quorum president of the ward we would be moving into before and asked if they could have people help us move in. On Thursday he called to check in with me and told me to expect traffic - so we ended going from having what we thought would be a 2 hour cushion into rushing and just making it before they closed. HAHA. Once we got to our apartment, we were met by ONE PERSON - the EQ President was the only one that showed up! BOO! But luckily Lydia Strait (the one member that lives in the same apartment complex as us) took Jaxon and Addy and watched them so we could focus on getting the truck unloaded. She also brought us dinner when we were done and gave us a box of starter groceries like milk, eggs, cereal, bread, flour, sugar.... that kind of stuff so we would have stuff to eat without having to run to the store that night. What a huge help and blessing it was to have her help us out like that! Oh - one little hiccup that happened. So I was in the apartment with Jax and Addy waiting for Dan and Rob to bring the truck around. Lydia called and said I could take the kids over so I called Dan, told him I was leaving - unlocked the door and left. A few mins later he called asking where the keys were because the door was locked. Well the keys they had just given us were still sitting on the counter, I didn't worry about it because I had unlocked the door. Apparently the lock on our door sticks so even though you turn it to unlock it... it actually doesn't unlock. So here we are - its now almost 6:00pm - the office is already closed, all of our keys are locking in our apartment, and Dan, Rob, and Rory (the EQ Pres.) are waiting to move stuff in. AHHHHH! I tried calling the afterhours number, but it just goes to voicemail. I obviously felt awful and sick inside. I said LOTS of desperate prayers and luckily Dan saw a maintenance worker walking out of another building so he flagged him down and was able to get into the apartment. PHEW! Our prayers were answered and we were able to continue with what we needed to do.

The next day we spent getting the apartment set up and unpacked. We learned that first night that none of the bedrooms have lights in them..... I know WEIRD! We also have no real pantry for food and the dining room has carpet so I went and got some lamps to put in the rooms, a rug for under our table (which is a card table by the way since we sold our dining room table before we came here) since we have 2 young children that would stain the carpet every time we eat I'm sure - and a few other things we needed.

The next day we explored. We drove to the law school and took a tour, walked to the capitol and around that area, ate at a delicious Irish pub and drove around looking for some of the big things like the Whitehouse. (It had started raining so we figured driving would be best!)

The next day was Sunday and Rob was leaving that afternoon but before he did we made sure we went to the Smithsonian Air and Space museum, and the botanical gardens because those were things Rob really wanted to see. Then we dropped him off at the airport and said our goodbyes.

It was good to finally be at our new home and start to settle into our new life in Virginia/DC.