Sophie Sophie Sophie

It is hard to believe that Sophie is now 17 months, it honestly feels like it was just a few days ago that we brought her home from the hospital. She sure is a joy in our lives and we feel extremely blessed to be her parents. Here are some fun pictures of Sophie, so you can see just a little bit about why we love this girl so much. 

Rocking out to... nothing, she is playing with Stewart's headphones that's all.

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In the laundry basket with all the warm jeans we just took out of the dryer. 

Looking at all flowers that have bloomed in this warm weather we have had over here. 

For Nancy

We had our Young Women New Beginnings last Wednesday and I wanted to post a little about our evening for Stewart’s (and my) Aunt Nancy who is the YW President in her ward. I put a lot of thought and work into this program; I am grateful for my wonderful counselors who stepped up and helped me pull all my written thoughts off the paper and make them into reality.

Since the theme for the youth this year is “Arise and Shine Forth” found in D&C 115:5, we decorated the tables with sources of lights.  

We used things such as lamps or flash lights, candles and so on. For refreshments we served Skittles and Starbursts along with fruit pizza. I also froze Kool Aid into ice cubes and served them with 7UP (believe it or not that was the biggest hit). 

As an YW Presidency we wanted to encourage our YW to read the Book of Mormon this year, so we gave all our YW a Book of Mormon. Because we wanted to do something a little more to dress the books up, I made book covers with their names on them and fastened them with a red pen, I think they turned out good. I also gave the YW a charge to look for examples of people in the Book of Mormon who exemplified the theme this year of Arise and Shine. I really hope they take our invitation to read the Book of Mormon seriously, I know if they do they will be blessed. 

All in all the program went well, although we did not have as many people there as we had planned for.  

Family Hike

A few weeks ago Stewart heard of a trail that took you out to the New River George with a great view of the New River George Bridge. We went and looked at the bridge back in August if you want to know a little more about the bridge and why it is special you can click here to go back to the first time I blogged about it. Anyway, we decided to take a hike as a family and go see bridge again and the George. I am glad we did, the view was amazing and will be even more spectacular in the summer or fall when all the trees have leaves. Here are a few pictures from our adventure. I have some videos as well, but since blogger changed it wont let me upload any videos so if anyone has any tips send them my way please. 

 Here is the bridge in all it's splendor 

 Stewart, Sophie and I standing on a cliff overhang. Yep that's right, there was no fence just an out cropping of the cliff where you could stand and view the scenery.

Sophie and I posing for a picture after our hike. 

Reading

We moved Sophie out of her crib and into a ‘Big Girl Bed’ a few weeks ago in hopes that it would help her sleep better thru the night… it worked! She LOVES her bed and I find her in her room playing on her bed several times during the day. One of her favorite things to do on her bed is read, I catch her reading all the time, and it makes my heart smile. 

Sophie sleeping in her bed the first night... she is in there I promise.  

I went to get Sophie, after her nap and this is what I found... I don't know if she even took a nap.  

Here she is again.... reading, on her bed :)

2011 Newsletter

Dear Family and Friends,

2011 has had its ups and downs. When it started we were still living in Lewisburg, WV. Sophie was 3 months old and couldn't do a whole lot besides sit there and look cute, which she still does very well by the way, she's just added a lot of other skills to her repertoire. Stewart was half way through his second year of medical school and serving as the Young Men President in our ward. Becky was enjoying the whole stay-at-home routine and serving as the secretary in the Relief Society at church. January through the first of April felt pretty routine. Stewart studied for tests, Becky kept things running smooth at the house, and Sophie grew and changed every day. In the early part of April things got very exciting very quickly. Stewart got very sick and spent four days in the hospital. He was diagnosed with Crohn's disease. Crohn's disease is an autoimmune disorder in which the immune system attacks the digestive track as if it were an infection. There is currently no cure, medications can help manage the disease, but that's all.

In May Becky and Sophie took a two week trip to Idaho to visit our families. This was Sophie's first chance to meet most of her aunts, uncles, cousin, and grandparents. They had a wonderful time out there, but we missed not being together as a family. Stewart took advantage of the alone time and studied for the first part of his board exam. In June Stewart got sick again and went to the emergency room. This time they knew the cause and knew there was not much they could do, so they sent him home with something for the pain and nausea. Two days later he took his big test. Needless to say our family was praying a lot that day. After his test we spent a few days packing our belongings, loaded up the moving truck, and moved one hour West to Beckley, West Virginia. We are renting a house from one of Becky's previous co-workers. We love the house, love the yard, love the location, and love everything about it. This is our first time living in a house in our married life and we really enjoy the privacy. Our house sits on a double lot, so there's plenty of yard space. We even got permission to put in a garden. Stewart mows the lawn, which, although he hates to admit it, is relaxing for him. Becky spent much of the summer canning. She filled our pantry with salsa, grape juice, grape jelly, apple sauce, apple pie filling, blue berry syrup, and peaches.

In July Stewart started his 3rd year rotations. He really enjoys being out of the classroom and into the clinic. He likes working with people instead of text books. He still has to do plenty of studying, but at least he gets to pretend like he's a doctor during the day. So far he has completed rotations in family medicine, psychiatry, internal medicine, OB/GYN (delivering babies), and OMT (kind of like what a chiropractor does).

We like our new ward at church. It is smaller than our previous ward because there are no other medical students here. Stewart is serving now as the ward mission leader. That means he serves as kind of a go-between for the full-time missionaries and the local members. In October there was a big festival about an hour North of here called Bridge Day. People come from all over to jump off the New River Gorge Bridge (with parachutes of course). A large crowd gathers to watch them. Stewart helped run a booth at the event for our Church. It was a lot of work, but it was rewarding. Becky is now serving as the Young Women President. She plans activities and lessons for the teenage girls in the congregation. She was very nervous when she was first called, but she has lots of good ideas and is having a lot of fun. The young women love her and look up to her.

Sophie is no longer the three month old who just sits and watches us. She is now walking and running, playing, and even talking. For a long time she called Stewart, Becky, and herself "Dada." Then just before Christmas she started calling Becky "Mommy." Becky was happy to finally be known as Mommy. Stewart was disappointed to see that instead of adding Mommy to her vocabulary she just switched, so now he was also Mommy. Oh well. She will figure it out eventually. Sophie is very social. She smiles a lot and likes to say hi to people we meet. She is very expressive with her face and her voice. She loves people.

We were able to fly to Idaho and visit our families for Christmas. We had a wonderful time playing games, talking, socializing, and rekindling relationships. We are grateful for airplanes that allow us to travel such great distances in a matter of hours.

2011 has been a challenging year. We hope that 2012 is a little more gentle on us. We are grateful for our blessings. We hope that you and your families had a good year, and that the year ahead is even better!

Love the North family
Stewart, Becky & Sophie

Christmas in Idaho

We had a lovely Christmas this year, because my family had only seen Sophie once before when she was 7 months old they decided to fly us to Idaho as a Christmas present. So for the first time since moving to West Virginia we were able to spend Christmas in Idaho with our families! Yea for technology that makes that possible.

We had to take a later flight out of Charleston WV, then we wanted so that put us arriving in Boise after midnight. Needless to say we were tired by the time we got there since it was past 2am back in WV. So the first day we were in Idaho was recuperating from our flight, and a nice brisk walk around the farm to show Sophie the baby calves and for us to stretch our legs and exercises.
After our day of recuperating we took off the next day to drive to the Rexburg/ Pocatello area so we could visit with Stewart’s family. It was good to see them and for Sophie to play with Blaz and Sam her only cousins. It was fun to watch Blaz and Sophie play together and laugh, it really is too bad we don’t live closer together so they could play with each other more often. While we were in Rexburg Stewart and I took the opportunity to go to the Rexburg Temple and do a session. We left Sophie with her Grandpa/ma North and Aunt Tasia, when we got back she was taking a nap and from what I could tell she had a fun time. It was so nice to go the temple again as a couple, it has been since before Sophie was born that Stewart and I have been to the temple together. I loved being there so much I had a hard time leaving. For those of you who live close to the temple don’t take it for granted it, because one day you could live 4.5 hours from five different temples and not be able to go as much as you would like.

We enjoyed seeing as many of Stewarts family as we could while we were in the area, it was a quick trip but we were glad to took the time to come say hi, and capture some pictures for Sophie.

Sophie, Sammy, and Blaz

All the grandkids with thier Grandpa & Grandma North

Sophie with Stewart's Aunt Barbara and Grandma North

Sophie with Great Grandma North

Sophie with Great Grandpa/ma Hudson

When we got back to Bruneau after our trip to Rexburg my sisters were all home, yippy! For the first time in a long time all of us were together including Stewart so my mom arranged for us to take some family pictures, I got to see them before we left to come back to WV and I think they turned out nice. Anyway, we spent the reminder of our vacation with my family playing games and celebrating Christmas. I really liked having Christmas fall on a Sunday this year; it helped me keep a good perspective of the true meaning of Christmas. I suggested that as a family this year we wait until after Church to open gifts, so we woke up and went to church and enjoyed remembering our Savior and all he did for us by coming into this world.

When we got around to opening gifts Sophie was taking a nap so we did not get a whole lot of pictures of her opening gifts and the ones we did get ended up being blurry. Sophie received lots of books and a few clothes from her grandparents along with the stuff I made her. It was a real simple Christmas for us since money was/is tight. It was just fun to be with family and to enjoy our time together.

One of the perks of being around so much family who only have one niece is that they all adored her (and who wouldn’t) so they all wanted to take her here or there and play with her, so I truly was on vacation. I think Sophie enjoyed all the attention as well.

Sophie on the Tractor steps

Sophie in the Tractor Tire

Sophie with Aunts Emily and Margie

Sophie by the baby calves

Sophie and I jumping on the trapoline

Saying goodbye to Grandpa Hegerhorst at the airport

Saying goodbye to Grandma Hegerhorst at the airport

Our time in Idaho seemed to go fast, and it was sad to say goodbye but we were glad we got to be with family over the Christmas holiday. Thanks for the fun time in Idaho everyone we loved seeing those we could and had a great time re-kindling our relationships. We hope you loved seeing us too *SMILE*.