This stinks....

I went to go check my blogs that i read today and BAM they were all gone I was given a NICE note saying that I am not following any blogs!!!!!!!!!!!

This is why Summer is so hard.........

Lets see so far this summer ......

The kids and i went to Michigan for way to long... 23 days. It was fun but i would not want to do it again without my husband. That was to long to be with out my help mate. I got to see my grandma and grandpa and the whole family got to meet Abbiella-Grace.
Then when I got back i desided that we needed to have a 4th of July BBQ. oh i was not thinking because the house was a mess because while i was gone Rich was working any wheres from 50-60+ hours a week, Needless to say he did not get much house cleaning done. So rush to get house clean CHECK. Get food CHECK Time for fellowship CHECK..... However the rain also CHECKED in during this whole thing and Rich ended up grilling in the rain.... what a trooper.
Then the week following the 4th I helped some good friends Matt and Katie, out process thier house on base. THAT WAS A JOB!!! I think the military should not worry so much about the little bit of stuff left on the burners and the blinds and just be thankful that we have troops in the houses serving the military.... Sorry for that little bunny trail. That week was a Tues-Friday job but we passed!!! and they are on to Wyoming. In helping them we gained a King size bedroom set which leads me to my next adventure.............
Saturday July 11th Rich and I cleaned out our room with the queen bed and two mismatched dressers in to the living room and then Andrew reset up the bed frame down stairs and we moved the dressers in to Abbiella's room for tempoary storage.... they are still there making her room very very cluttered because I am in the middle of going threw her clothes because she is not in 0-3 mo. anymore and is still in 3-6 so i have been going and sorting them, I do have a trip to Once Upon A Child planed but it has not happened yet because.....
We have had a few days of rest if you call it that it has been busy still with silly stuff like me locking my keys in the van last Thursday causing me NOT to be able to go pay bills and other running around. And then this weekend we went to a few garage sales and had some fun at the base pool with my mom and one of her friends Jill. It was Abbiella's first time in a pool and SHE LOVED IT. I think she maybe part frog or fish but i have not determined what yet. Then today.....
Our ladies mininstry had the summer garden party tonight... we had a Cholat. Cake contest. there were many entries and they were all good but my cake did win the 1st loser position. or the 1st runner up. My cake was a 4 layer cholt. with homemade coconut buttercream frosting and inbetween each layer there was toasted coconut and almond mixture, This was also on the top and side of the cake. It was pretty good to eat and to look at. I was happy about that, however it was quite the adventure getting the frosting made today... I will spare you the details but it involved one dozen eggs *the reciepe only called for 6, one pan of burnt simple syurp, and somehow 2 burnt fingers I do not even know how that happened... but it was all worth it.
So now I sit here at the computer typing this blog very tired and you maybe asking yourself why I am up so late, so i will not keep you wondering anymore... My WONDERFUL daughter desided that tonight she needed to stay up very very late like 3 hours pasted her bed time so she did not go to sleep until after midnight and well I needed to unwind so here I am ...

You will never guess what has been going on....

Hey everybody
We have had alot going on so far this year.... For starters are baby GIRL ABBIELLA-GRACE DIANE was born on January 7th 6 pounds 12 ounces 18 3/4 inches long....labor and delivery was GREAT!!!! Adjusting to a new baby has been hard and quite an adjustment but we are all doing very well.
This is her at 8 weeks.
In March Andrew-Michael turned 8 we had a bowling party and he had 8 friends there fun was had for all. That night he went to the Guns and Hoses hockey game and had a blast as well.

Rich has been working hard because the company only has two drivers at the current time, down from four so he is getting plenty of hours any where from 40 -60 hours a week it is hard but we are very grateful for the wonderful blessing his job is. Our total bill for having Abbiella-Grace was close to $15,000 and we did not have to pay a penny.... the health insurance is GRAND!!! We do have some time to do some fun stuff......

<-- Richs gift to his mother on her 58th Birthday on April19. In April, keeping with tradition we had a massive snow storm, but the temp out side was nice so Rich and Andrew-Michael along with my parents got to have some fun.....by the way it is illegal to snowmobile in city parks!!!

Here is Abbiella-Grace in her Easter dress on Easter Sunday!!

Long time no type...

Sorry it has been so long since I have written, ALOT has been going on. As stated in the last post I miscarried at the end of Feb. beginning of March, it was a tough thing to go thru but we are doing well with it. Then around the beginning of May I thought that I maybe pregnant again and I found out May 17th that I was. We went to the doctor on May 21 to do the "yep it is true ultrasound" and we were unable to see the baby, so two weeks of praying and emotions I went back for another ultrasound on June 4th and got to see the baby and the heart flutters. YEAY!!! We are due January 15,2009. So then everything is going well I have not had any bleeding or anything however I have forgotten how MUCH that a womans body goes thru when she is pregnant. To date I have lost over 20 pounds and have just recently got my appitite back. My brain is out to lunch almost all the time and well i can pretty much write a book on how and where to get sick in the city of Great Falls!!! I am now 23 weeks along and still doing well. We had our 20 week ultrasound on August 28th and the ultrasound clearly showed that we are having a GIRL!!! WE are very excited including Andrew-Michael.I have also joined MOPS thru GFCC and also a new thing in our church called Girlfriend Encounters this is a once a month meeting of ladies to fellowship and to go thru the word of God. We are starting tonight with Titus and it will be our main study for the whole year. I am excited.
Andrew-Michael has started another school year and he is now in first grade. He is liking his teach and classmates. His teacher is a first year teacher and she is doing well. Last week I signed him up for indoor soccer through the Heisey youth center, he starts on Oct 11 can't wait.
Rich has also been very busy as he is now the lead driver for his company and all together go to person for what ever the bosses need. God has really got him a position that we can count on for a long time... we are still struggling with our paydays but rumor has it that he may be getting a pay raise at thee end of this month!!! Heres to hoping! He is also starting a class thru our churches college THE FORGE he is very excited about this as a matter of fact his first class is tonight.
Because our money is tight we have shut off out internet for now which also means that we have shut off our home phone. It was kinda silly to have a house phone for $200 a year and we both have cell phones. So we are down to just cell phones. It is working out rather well. The internet is another thing we have had internet for 9 years and now we do not, it is kinda hard but way worth it at $55 a month it was just to much with gas prices and what not all going up up up up.
I hope to be keeping up on his better than I have and will try and post some pictures of the ultrasound soon.

Sad but true.... Anna Grace has gone to heaven.

Yesterday during church i decided to go to the hospital and get checked out because I had feared in my heart that I had lost the baby, now rewind back to Saturday night Rich and i had went out on a date to the black diamond supper club in Belt (it rocked!!) while we were waiting for for our steak I went to the bathroom and passed a very large clot and the blood flow had GREATLY increased and I had been cramping in my back and abdominal area all day. I knew in my heart that the baby had gone to heaven to be with God. Lucky her sad on us but we will meet someday. Ok so that all happened on Sat. night so Sunday we went to church and and there was no stopping my tears one of the older sisters in the church stopped and talked with Rich and I and we went to the ER they gave me a bag of fluid and did blood work and determined that my HCG levels had gone down to 110 which is barley pregnant. So now we wait and wait til the bleeding stops and then we get to start again.
I just wanted to say thank you all who have prayed for us and those who still are, we are just hopeful that God will provide another blessing soon....
Love
Cristen

So i thought it would be easy.... here is an update!!

Well many times I look at other peoples blogs and get kinda upset that there is not an update I use to think that it is not that hard to do..... I guess i was wrong... sorry.
Well alot has gone on in the last few weeks here at the Cochran household first off one of the guys at Riches' work has quit so Rich is working different shifts he schedual is more like "work as much as you can with out getting to burned out, and by that we mean 5days a week 14 hours a day", fun that translates to go to work come home eat and shower and bed. kinda stinky but it is only for a season. RIGHT?
Andrew is doing well in school he has FINALLY started to get his work done the first time that he is asked to do it and is doing well in his reading I guess i would have never thought that my baby was going to be reading by the time he was out of kindergarten, it is pretty neat but it is getting harder to S-p-e-l-l things around him, I guess we will have to start platen or something.
My sister in law has found out that she is pregnant after having a miscarriage on Thanksgiving they are due August 25thish very exciting. That news was revealed to us about 3-4 weeks ago. That means I will be and Aunty and Rich an uncle we are very excited.
Ok all that being said I also have had some news personally... for those of you who do not know Rich and I have been trying for quite a few years to get pregnant and on Wed Feb 6 i had cramping and some bleeding but it was not like my cycle I called the doctor and told her what was going on and she told me "have you taken a test to see if you are pregnant? you very well could be and if not you are most likely just going to be starting your cycle." So on Thursday morning the 7th I took a pregnancy test and low and behold guess what.... YES it was really really positive!! I was very excited called Rich and told him cause of course he was at work his first words were "REALLY,you need to go get a blood test done..." I called the doctor and told her and she told me bleeding can be normal, and that she thought that I was 5 weeks and 2 days We told everyone so that they could pray for us.... because we were still bleeding and that is a scarry thing. So i made a new baby apt for yesterday and was VERY nervous went through everything "you need to know" and then it was time to do the ultra sound I was scared. It was and is very hard for me to trust God I have to I know but I kept taking the problem back back.... anyway they did a vaginal ultrasound and there was no heart beat nothing that resembled a baby( i was to be about 6wks and2 days) EXCEPT there was a little spot more like a speck and doctor said that it could be a baby.... so to be sure and to find out what was going on I did a blood test to find out my level of HCG and I got the results back and my levels indicate that I am only about 4-5 week along and that is the reason that nothing could be seen or heard... the baby is to young to be giving us noise or measurements....
So now we wait I am still bleeding but it is ok I go back in on Monday for another blood test to make sure my levels are going up so I will update then...
Love you all
Cristen

Workout<---- that is a funny word!

Well we did not make a new years resoulution but we did want to get a gym membership and so yesterday in the midst of grocery shopping we went to SNAP fitness
it is only 49.95 a month for the family which is not bad and there was no enrollment fee or anything. http://snapfitness.com/
That said Rich was more excited than I was to get started so we came home put groceries away, made dinner and off we went to the GYM!!! I have never had a gym membership before i have worked out at the base gym from time to time but never this kind of work out. I have already learned DO NOT EAT AND THEN WORK OUT it doesn't workout so well. The first time there we did well we did not realize that we had been there for 2 hours so we wrapped it up and came home.
On a separate note... my husband and son FINALLY got me to watch the Transformers movie, and I have to say that it a very cool movie, SO Ali I did watch it and yes you were right!!