Herrin Twins Updates

2012-01-04T08:54:00.004-07:00

What an insane last year. I'm so glad that it's over. And am nervous for another year of unknowns. But will try to stay very positive. Right now I'm trying to figure out if I should continue school or take a semester off. I'm really close to being done, but these last several months have been very difficult. Most of last year was spent with one child being home sick, hospital stays, surgeries and an overwhelming feeling of what to do. I'm in the process of doing the pros and cons in returning to school or staying home. Courtney wants to take a lot more dance, the boys are starting basketball, and the girls want to do swimming lessons. Yes, even in the winter they have them. I'm sure today's blog will help me decide on what I should do. Just writing something down will help. Anyway now on to my incredible children and what they have been up to.

Everyone had a great Christmas,winter break and New Year's. We haven't been to see a doctor for several weeks now!! Makes me very happy!

The kids are still plugging along at school. Going back was really hard for all of them. They did really nothing over the break that they didn't want to, minus chorus or course. We were very lazy, and didn't feel guilty about it. This is just a quick update. So I hope all your holiday season was enjoyable.

Have a great day!
Love,
The Herrin's

2011-12-15T08:40:00.006-07:00

Been getting a lot of sweet emails from people wondering how Maliyah is doing. She is doing great, but she will have more blood work done tomorrow or Saturday.

The kids have school out next week until next year. Weird to think we have just gotten through another year. For the most part this year was great. We got to do a lot of fun things as a family. But most importantly we are still going strong as a family! We are very blessed to have Maliyah's kidney still working well.

This school year started out great for the kids. Kendra and Maliyah love school, Courtney is on the fence about if she likes it or not. She's had a lot of big changes this year. Austin is finally catching on and working really hard. Justin was having a very hard year, especially when Kendra or Maliyah are in the hospital. I have some pretty great kids. Regardless of the fighting and arguing I know that they love each other a lot!! Love this quote, "Having one child makes you a parent, but having two makes you a referee".. It's so true! Wonder what 5 make?!?!

The more time in the hospital we spend, the more I realize how grateful I am for modern medicine. Little things like IV fluid is a life saver. I'm getting a lot more careful about the medicine the doctors are allowed to give my children. Unless it's a must have. And the girls are feeling the same way. Every drug has a side effect that aren't very fun. Maliyah learned this again. She was put on a drug to help with her c-diff, and the medicine was causing extreme itching, just because we changed from the liquid to a pill form. Basically she scream for 3ish hours because it hurt so bad, she was even bleeding from where she was itching.

When we were struggling with Justin for so long, we learned that he has a hard time express how he is feeling so it would make him act out. Now we are handling that better. We just need to get him to eat more. He was playing at his friend Joe's house yesterday, he told Joe's mom that, "if you play to many video games you can get fat and die". He's so clever!! It's been really good for us to have him as one of the challenges. But we can really tell that he is growing up and slowing moving to another faze of his life.

Austin is one of the easiest children we have. He is also so sweet! This last weekend him and Courtney were sick with the stomach bug. Austin would setup throw up and tell us and go right back to sleep. He missed the bucket once and he profusely apologized. Broke my heart! That's just how he is.

Courtney is defiantly a tween with how sassy she can be, but she still loves to be with her family.

OH MY!! Kendra is just Kendra. We were driving to get the boys from their friends house, she was telling me how to drive. I just laughed. She is a self motivator and gets stuff done when she needs too. A great quality to have.

The worse part about being a parent is the discipline. Maliyah didn't do her book report, so she wasn't able to go to her best friends birthday party. Not sure who it was harder for, Jake and I or Maliyah. My bet would be us. When I was little my parents use to say the same thing to me, but I never understood it completely until this happened with Maliyah.

Jake and I had such a great year together. We go out on a date once a week. We both look forward to it. And it's not something big each time either. Maybe ice cream or a drive. Just being together. It's so great to have a great relationship with Jake. And to be a great example for our children. Eternity isn't long enough to be with him!!

Hope you all have a Merry Christmas and if I don't post before New Years. Have a Great New Year's as well.

Love,
The Herrin's

2011-12-06T19:21:00.001-07:00

What a FREAKIN' week/month we have had.

Started out not to bad, but by the end we've had enough. I swear whenever the kids get flu shots they all seem to get a lot more sick. I really hate them, but this year I let the doctor talk me into them. Oh Boy!! Was I wrong, and that never happens ;) (wink mean J/K ).

Let start with the easy little man first. Austin had been having strep a lot these last several months. His tonsils were very swollen they were almost touching and his airway was being obstructed. So he went in for surgery at PCMC. He is by far my easiest child, I thank God for him everyday, well for all of them. But he is such a sweet child. More to come about that later. Austin was very nervous about the surgery as anyone would be. He was sad most because he was giving up his title of the only person that has never had surgery in our family. He cried some before we left for the hospital. So we went a little early to visit Kendra and watch some TV with her. It was finally his turn to walk down to the 2ND floor, I HATE that floor so much!! This is where the ICU is and the OR rooms. Can't go around some parts of that place without having a flashback or something. We got Austin all registered for the surgery, Mary Anne the Child Life specialist came to do some hospital play with him. She was so sweet with him, calmed his nerves. And when she left he came over and told me "I like this place". I laughed and wondered if he would think that after the surgery was over. He still liked the place after. LOL Austin is recoving very well right now. Just praying he doesn't get the bug we are all coming down with.

We were all setting around playing with the dog last night and talking about what to give Jesus for Christmas. Austin comes over to give me a hug and says, mom I know what you want for Christmas, decorations for the house or a new house. Well he was telling me all that he was rubbing my shoulders. He is so sweet! But little does he know, I want nothing for Christmas but a healthy family. :) To much to ask for??

We had a great Thanksgiving with family. The day after Kendra was admitted to the hospital for dehydration. She ended up staying there for 6 days. She didn't mind one bit because she had everything she needed, a kitchen to bring her whatever her little heart desired, great nurses to help with whatever she needed, great techs that love her to pieces, but mostly the FOOD!! Kendra tested positive for a bowel infection, but now I just believe she had the same stomach bug as the rest of us were pleased to have. :) HURTS LIKE CRAZY!! Kendra got home on a Wednesday and was dying to go back to school the very next day. She gets sick VERY fast, but gets better fast, most of the time.

Jake was the next to get the nasty bug. He got sick Sunday night and Austin had surgery that Tuesday. It was a lot to handle trying to jungle everything, but once again my mother in-law helped me out. Can't even explain how lucky I am to have her. She even brought the kids dinner when I was at the hospital. Then I got sick and Jake got Kendra out of the hospital. What a crazy and hard week that was.

It was really funny because a volunteer had come to visit us when Kendra was in the hospital. I said to him that we'd be back very soon. He just laughed, thought I was kidding. Oh no!! I just know what's about to take place. LOL A "sick sense".

Well Maliyah got sick last night and was admitted to the hospital today. That is probably why I have time to update my blog. Doctors think maybe she is having an appendictis, but I'm not worried about that. The thing I'm most concerned about is her creatinine(more than doubled) and the damage the kidney may have because of this virus. Dehydration is extremely dangerous for her transplanted kidney. So we have to hurry up and wait. I tried to find the espisode about Sponge Bob's take on doctors but couldn't find it. That espisode when he gets sick and is scared to go to the doctor. Man, he is right on!!

Hope all of you are having a great holiday season.

Love,

The Herrin's :)

2011-11-09T10:40:00.006-07:00

So far I really HATE this winter, 6 out of 7 people in our family have been sick. Jake is very lucky that he is healthy.

So I have a lot to update. There's big things that have been going on.

Austin almost hung himself with the seat belt. I had just gotten the kids from school and was just coming up our hill. Everyone was really quiet and didn't think much of it. But then I pulled into the garage and no one jumped out like normal. I opened the door to help them and Austin was hanging with the seat belt around his neck and his hand blocking the belt from cutting off his oxygen. I'm surprised how calm I was. I cut the seat belt off. And all the kids were crying. I asked them why no one told me what was going on. They didn't really reply with great answers, they just shrugged their shoulders. That was very scary to say the least!! He had a deep marker around his neck.

Kendra and Maliyah had another surgery on the 10th of October. It went fairly well. We are just having problems with the pain meds, the side affects are getting worse. Not sure why. But we change to Tylenol, ice and a lot of distractions. Seems to work really well for Maliyah, but Kendra was a lot harder to help control her pain. But it was their decisions to not have anymore pain meds.

This last Sunday Kendra was playing outside with her friends riding her big wheel. She hit a large bump and got hurt. Took her for x-rays and nothing was broken. Maybe she is just being a drama queen, hard to tell. But before school she is crying and can't get around so of course she stays home from school, during school she is getting around just fine, and the cycle starts over the next day. She said that she couldn't stand all the way up. She missed several days of school, before I finally just told her she was going, got her a stroller to help her get around. And the very next day everything was great. What a stink!!

We have been worried about Maliyah's blood levels over the last month or so. I was very worried she was rejecting her kidney, her creatinine was slowly going up and her infections were out of control. We even took her to the urologist several times, he wasn't sure what to do. So I had a great idea, and guess what? It worked like a charm!! Boy, I'm so glad things are better with Maliyah. Her creatinine is even back to it's baseline, 0.4!! Love that number!!

Justin was having a lot of problems at school, he didn't want to do his work. So we decided that if he did all his work at school and then came home and did his homework quick we would get him a new video game. He's been doing great!! The tank game worked like a charm. I was really feeling bad about him having such a hard time at school, so I searched a little about different things. I came to a site about a little boy Justin's same age and his behaviors at school. I felt a hole lot better. I'll take my little problem over that mom's HUGE one. I felt horrible for her.

Courtney and I are becoming better friends the older she gets. She really tells me everything that is going on in her life. She is almost taller than me, in a week I'm sure she will be. The boys at school notice her a lot more. Courtney had her first dance and a boy perposed to her. She said that she just ran into the bathroom. We have a rule that none of our kids can have boyfriends or girlfriends. I hope that rule does last.

As you can tell this last month or so has been crazy to say the least.

Love,

The Herrin's

2011-09-12T09:25:00.002-06:00

What a great weekend Jake and I had!!

Jake's best friend got married this last weekend in LA, and Jake and I were able to go and witness the event.

We left Friday morning and we arrive about 9:30am. We rented a convertible Mustang that we spent most of the weekend in. We even have the sunburns to prove it. LOL We went from the airport to Venice Beach where we soon realized what a dive that place was. There were so many homeless people. I was also shocked by all the marijuana "pharmacy's". Ever so often you could get a small smell of the marijuana. Needless to say we didn't stay long. We went back to our car to find a parking ticket for $58, we had payed for parking but Jake miss read the number and put it in wrong. So he's working on getting that fixed. Our hotel was 20 minutes out of LA and we were so glad that it wasn't any closer, way to much traffic. We drove Sunset strip for awhile that night and saw the "Lemon Basket", from the show Famous Foods. I was even able to take a nap, and that never happens. :)

Saturday morning we went to Santa Monica Peir. It was really beautiful there. We walk down on the beach where we met some of Jake's friends that were there for the wedding as well. That night was the wedding. We've never been to a Catholic wedding before. I really enjoyed it and learned some interesting things about the religion. We just had a great night.

But SUNDAY TOPPED EVERYTHING!!!! I was driving down highway 1, up the coast of California when Jake said that he had a surprise for me. So he told me the way to go and we ended up at the BACHELORS MANSION!!!! I was so excited!! Jake was laughing because I was crying. The gate was open and they were setting up to start filming on September 17th. I got a picture right in front of the mansion that Jake took. and several other ones that I will upload here. HOLY COW!! It was the best day ever!! I was on cloud 100 the rest of the day and night. I haven't always watched the show. I just starting watching it in Jake Pavelka season and loved the show. I was hooked because of the villains on the show. Two have been from Utah so it's fun to watch.

I'll post picture of the weekend we had.

Have a great day!!

Love, The Herrin's

2011-08-18T09:23:00.003-06:00

WE JUST CELEBRATED OUR 5TH ANNIVERSARY SINCE THE SEPARATION SURGERY!!! I still can't believe that we got through all of that crazy, stressful and painful time. It's still hard to look back and remember that time in our life. We still have a lot to get through with the girls. The strength they show and the huge smiles on their faces melts my heart. They are so strong!! And their excitement for life is contagious. They are just as hard to handle as their brothers and sister, I'm so glad!! Even though the fighting can drive me crazy at times, the laughter makes up for it. We have such a great family. They are growing up so quick, and into the best young people.

Goodness!! I'm so glad that school has started. Thought I would be sad about missing my kids, but boy I get so much done during the day. But can't last to much longer, I start school again at the beginning of next week. I only got 2 weeks off from my summer semester. The best news is that I can go during the day instead of at night. And I can take a lot more classes than before because I have more time.

Courtney had a great first day of school, other than almost forgetting her schedule in her first period class. She is going to a secondary school, so she has 10 periods and an A and B day. Since she made the dance team we will be able to see her dance a lot more. Courtney will dance at different assemblies and also half times this year. Can't even wait to see all of them. I will post some videos of them as they happen.

Kendra and Maliyah were so excited for their new teacher. They came home saying how funny she is and how much they like her. MUSIC TO MY HEARS!!! It's amazing how much having a great teacher changes the child/children's outlook on learning. I want my kids to be excited about it. There were no surgeries this summer, just couldn't find time and we didn't want them to miss out on any of the fun. I don't think the girls really cared that much either. So unless they need a surgery their next one will be on their backs in October.

I took the kids over to my parents house yesterday. When we were leaving Justin says to Grandma Warren, "Take care grandma", then he looks at me and says, "ladies first" and holds open the door for me. I was laughing, it just made me so happy to hear him says that. Both my boys are turning into little gentleman. Which I think all men should be.

Yesterday Austin came home from school telling me that a kid in his class had taken off his shirt in class. He said the whole class was laughing, he said "it was just weird". They have such a great sense of humor.

Take care

The Herrin's

2011-07-17T18:37:00.002-06:00

What a slacker I am! :)

We have had a great Summer that is flying by.

We met with the doctors about the girls having surgery this summer. Jake and I are still debating on what we should do. Jake wants both of the girls to have the surgery and get it over with, I want Maliyah to go and enjoy transplant camp and just have Kendra's surgery this summer. So one of us has to give, won't be me though. :) Maliyah is very excited for 5 days of camping and being away from home. She will be staying in cabins, and they have great activities for the kids to do. Wonder if I will get a phone call from her begging us to come and get her because she is home sick. Either way, I just want her to try. I asked Kendra if she wanted me to find her a camp like Maliyah is going to, she was adamant that she wasn't going to go. Which doesn't surprise me, she has a hard time when Jake and I have a date night, so most Friday's are difficult for her. Kendra will call us several times when we are gone.

Justin and Austin are having so much fun with friends. They are outside playing on our trampoline and riding bikes. Justin mastered Super Mario Brothers and beat the whole game. He was so proud of himself.

Courtney just started babysitter a lot this summer, she even started a dance studio in our basement for some of the neighborhood kids. She is really great at making up dances and teaching them to others.

Have a great summer. :)

2011-05-31T13:24:00.006-06:00

Courtney worked so hard to make the school dance team. The Saturday right after try-outs she told Jake and I that she wanted us to go and look at the list to see if she made it. She had no desire to go and see it. So Jake and I headed to the school. We were so excited to see her name on the list. I decided that I couldn't just tell Courtney that she made it. I had Jake go to the store and get her a cake that read, "Congratulations Courtney you made it". So we just showed her the cake. Then we gave her a cellphone the we promised if she worked really hard she could earn. No matter if she made the team or not she was going to get one. She didn't know that. :) Jake and I were so proud!
Courtney wanted me to stay the whole 3 hours at the try-outs too. So I was so tired to say the least. Couldn't imagine how tired Courtney was, oh wait she wasn't at all. Right when she got home she went swimming with her friend Taylor. Guess I was tired enough for the both of us. Courtney will also be performing the play, The Mid-Summer Night's Dream tomorrow at school.
The girls FINALLY got their new legs! I'm so glad that is over! They fit perfectly for now and Fitwell is so easy to work with. This summer both of the girls will have major surgery. So we will probably have to get the bases to be refitted. Still waiting for the other stuff.
Maliyah has been doing OK. She's been having a hard time with infections because of her suppressed immune system. Even with all her infections she still goes to school. She has a great teacher, Mrs. Merrill, that has been so great with both of the girls. She is very understanding of Maliyah's and Kendra's needs. She is always trying to make them feel comfortable at school, which I love! I know that Mrs. Merrill loves my girls. They also have a great instructor Mr. Child. He is so great with the kids as well. It will be sad that he isn't coming back next year. Ms. Jess left to get a new job that had better hours since she is going to school. The girls sure do miss her, but their new aid Mrs. Kristi is great with the girls now and she has five kids too. The girls think that's cool.
Kendra is doing really well. I can't stress enough how much of a difference having an understanding teacher makes on the girls. She doesn't seem to have as much anxiety and she is excited to go to school. I'm sure the girls have missed less then 10 days of school this whole year.
Austin and Justin were the VIPs this month since their Birthday isn't until June. I had a great time making their poster with treats. Yesterday Austin had a tootsie pop, and Jake was teasing him with the song from the commercial . It goes, how many lick does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop. Jake didn't think Austin would know the end, but he replies, "the world may never know". We were laughing so hard. The commerical is probably from the 50s. Justin has a more sarcastic sense of humor. Which I love :) I'm not sure if I have posted this story on here. But I will now. Justin and Austin have to come with me to Maliyah's doctor appointments and they take several hours sometimes. Don't ask me why, I have NO IDEA!! Anyway, one of the doctors come in and they were talking to Justin and asking him some questions. He always says, "hahaha so funny", when she started laughing about something he said, "hahaha so funny." Justin just has his "lines" he says. Like "see ya suckers", he doesn't ever mean to be mean. It's just Justin.
I have to say thanks to each of my children's teachers for all your hard work with Courtney, Kendra, Maliyah, Justin and Austin. Being a teacher isn't the easiest job. But you all do such a great job!! It was great to have you all on our team this year. Because it really takes a village to raise kids. :)
3 more days of school after today!! Yea, SUMMER!! Hope the snow and rain will stop soon. :)
The Herrin's
P.S. This was a fast post so forgive the grammar. :) And I just posted new pictures today.

2011-05-05T08:37:00.004-06:00

WOW! What a horrible last several weeks that we have had.

The week after we got back from the Disney Cruise the girls went back into the hospital to have back surgery. Thought it would be just a normal surgery with a quick recovery, like most of the other ones. Well that wasn't the case. They didn't get any infections, which is excellent, but the pain Kendra had was really bad! She was on high doses of pain meds. I was getting very frustrated with the hospital because they refused to give her the right amount of pain meds. Kendra has had so many surgeries that she needs about 2-3 times, more than other kids her same age and weight. Took some bugging to get the stuff she needed. She was on pain meds for about 2 weeks straight and around the clock. I got very little sleep, she would wake-up screaming and needing more pain pills. I would give her what she needed and lay in bed with her to get her back to sleep. Kendra was getting very sick of staying home, so I took her back to school which was the very best thing for her. She started back doing physical therapy and the pain went away within a couple of days. Her incision is still healing and looks great!

Maliyah had surgery the same day as Kendra. She recovered very quickly. But was have a lot of pain over her kidney and bladder, so we just took her to the doctor. But this time it was so weird because it wasn't showing she had a UTI. But she was in so much pain we couldn't figure out what was going on. So I made an appointment with the urologist. He thought the best thing to do was scope her bladder to see what was causing the pain. He still could figure it out. He just decided to send her home on Tylenol because the surgery wasn't suppose to be painful. When I saw her she was crying in pain. I had them give her more pain medicine not just tylenol and that didn't help. She was still screaming. It had been more than an hour and half. I called Jake to come and help me, I was very upset but he couldn't. Jake had just taken off the week before. So I just went back into her room held her hand and tried not to cry. She got home and threw-up which is normal. But than the next day she couldn't stop throwing up. We tried everything. Jake took Maliyah to the ER and I had to take Courtney to her dance performance that was the same day. They admitted her after 8 hours in the ER and she stayed there through Easter, IV fluids are just the best thing in the world. She is doing so much better now and her kidney is recovering well too.

We are so glad that we went on vacation before all of this stuff happened because we were more relaxed.

The girls are both getting new "robot legs" done again. This time everything seems to be moving faster. The girls also have grown so much, they are getting new crutches and walkers. I have been working on getting the girls new equipment since October 2010, such a pain.

Courtney is doing well. She is trying out for the dance company this year. I'm sure she will do great! She has been begging for a cellphone for several months now. Not sure if she needs one yet, maybe when she makes the dance team she can have one. She will be away from home more and I would like her to be able to call me whenever. Courtney says that a lot of her friends already have them. She is only in 5th grade, blows my mind!

Justin and Austin are just great little gentleman! :) They are so kind to people, always holding the doors open for others, they are so helpful too. But boy do they give their teacher a run for her money. They are handfuls! But such cute ones. They have won everyone of their soccer games so far. I haven't seen one yet.

Austin is just sweet all the time. He knows how to get what he wants. If he walks into a room and sees me he will run over and give me a big hug, then is says," I haven't given you a hug in awhile".

I just finished up my finals for this semester. I'm glad to get a couple of weeks off before school starts for me this summer.

This last weekend Jake got a call from his work telling him that there had been a shooting at one of the branches of his work. A women's ex-husband walked into her work and shot his ex-wife 5-7 times with a shotgun killing her. They had just gotten divorced a coupe of months before this happened. It really scared everyone in his company. They found the man in North Vegas in a hotel room. He had shot myself with the same gun. She leaves behind two children and two grandchildren. Jake was the last person she had emailed an hour before she was killed. Jake didn't sleep much for several nights. The funeral is on Friday for the women and he haven't heard when the man's funeral will be. Jake doesn't think there will be one.

As you can tell there was more than little things happening over these last several weeks.

Have a great day. :)

The Herrin's

2011-04-12T13:42:00.003-06:00

Our family waited over a year for the Disney cruise. It seemed to have taken forever to get here. But I guess if you want a Disney cruise you have to book a year or two in advance. We left on Saturday early in the morning for Victorville. It would have been too hard on the kids to drive all the way to LA in one day. We got to California in record time. With even a lot of potty breaks. The kids were so excited for Sunday morning. We packed up and drove the 2 hours to the port terminal where we got on the Disney Wonder. It was so cool to see all of our hard work paying off. The departure was delayed some, so we didn't leave until after 5. The kids loved looking out the window and saying good bye to California. Then the "fun" started! We took the kids to the first dinner on the rocky boat. Well, needless to say all the kids got sea sick except Courtney. We got through dinner, but not dessert and went back to the room gave the kids sea sick meds. That seemed to help. Later the waiter said that the first day was overwhelming because we have so many kids. Had to laugh at that. On the Disney Wonder there are 4 different kids clubs the kids can go to. But it just depends on the age of the child. Courtney was in the Edge, but could go to the Oceaneer Lab and Oceaneer Club with the other kids. Courtney loved the Edge!! She would wake-up eat breakfast and head off to the Edge until dinner and the 8:30 pm show, then it was back to the Edge until 12:30 or 1 am. The other kids were in the Oceaneers club and Oceaneer lab. Maliyah and Austin loved going, But Justin and Kendra had a hard time staying. So we were always getting text messages on the cellphones the ship let you use from the two of them. The activities were so much fun on the ship. The kids made flubber, the characters would come into the clubs and play with the kids. It was very hands on from the characters. Jake went to get Justin and saw that Mickey was teaching the kids how to march around. They kids also told us that Pluto came and took a nap on the beanbag with the kids. Of course the kids didn't take naps, but Austin did fall asleep on the floor of the kids club. When that happened, the counselors would get them a mat, blanket and pillow. Then we would receive a text to come and get the one that was asleep. Jake and I didn't really get much alone time. We always had someone that needed something. Which was fine, but I expected more adult time. We were never able to go and hangout in the adult pool. They were three different pools: Goofy pool, Mickey pool and the adult pool. The Mickey pool had a huge tube slide. Courtney and Austin both did the slide. The shows were incredible!! Of course it's Disney, so we wouldn't have expected anything less than that. There were also a lot of 3-D movies that kids could go to. We decided that we didn't want to waste time watching movies we could rent later on, or ones we had seen. There were a couple of movies that were not released in the theatre or we would be able to rent later that I went too. I've never been to a movie alone so that was interesting. Jake was to tired and Kendra was texting and calling, so he took care of her. The game shows on the ship were just like the ones you see on TV with all the lights, sounds and buttons to answer questions. The players were picked out of the audience. Jake and Austin were picked to be on the game show called How Well Do You Know Your family. One of the question that was asked to Austin was, how old is your parent, Austin's answer was 61 years old. Very funny! Another question he was asked was, what band/singer is your favorite, Austin first answer was whatever my mom listens to, his second answer was no one. Another question was "who is the boss in your family?", Austin answer was "my mom of course". He is such a cute kid. He made that game show fun to watch. He also had a chocolate face because right before he was picked to go on stage he was eating a Mickey bar. We didn't get off the ship at Cabo because we really didn't like Cabo when Jake and I went. So when we got to Purueto Vallarta we thought that would be easier to get the kids off the ship there. We got a taxi and went to Krystal Resort. There is a beach and pool there. Shortly after we got there my battery in my camera died and so did the camcorder battery. I was so mad!! The kids had so much fun playing in the water and finding crabs and other animal life. When Austin was digging something for the water to go into the tide came and took him out with it. Courtney came running over to us yelling that Austin was in trouble. By the time we both ran over, some locals had grabbed him and pulled him out of the ocean. I thought he was going to cry and not want to go back. But just as fast as they pulled him out he wanted to go back in. I'm so glad he reacted that way. It's always a huge deal to get in and out of the elevators on the ship because they are so small and narrow. So someone would have to hold the button so that everyone could get in and out without the doors closing. Well Austin was waiting for Kendra and Maliyah to get out of the elevator when the doors shut on him, so he couldn't get out. Kendra and Maliyah both started crying and Justin was crying "my brother, my brother, I want my brother". They all freaked out! We could tell what floor the elevator was on from the other side, but by the time you got there it was already gone. The doors finally opened and he got out. Courtney was the first to him, he was crying. Weird thing was I realized how close and how much my kids love and care about each other. It was really neat! But also realized how bad they freak out if something scary happens. Jake and I were able to eat at Palo, which was fun looking out over the front of the ship. And we laid out by the pool for a couple of hours together listening to our Ipods, and got sunburned. We also got to go and see a comedic show. Jake got roasted by the comedian, I was laughing so hard. But then the comedian turned on one of Jake favorite songs from his favorite movie. The comedian didn't have a chance then. Jake took it home!! It was so much fun! Around the pool the next day people came up to tell us how funny the whole thing was. The pirate night was probably one of the best nights on the ship. I got all the people in the family customes for a great price, so that was a bonus. We were one of the only families all dressed up. When we got up to take pictures with Jack Sparrow he even said what an effort we put in. We ate dinner and then changed into pants to go and watch the show by the pool. The pool was covered and there was an interactive game that everyone was able to play. It was a lot of fun! Then the characters came out and danced. There was a short firework show too. The last day was crazy!! The ship was rocking and I got very sick. The girls and Austin went to the last show. Austin almost threw-up and had to run to the bathroom. We got almost all the way through the trip when, and the last breakfast Maliyah threw-up. We were so close! :) Needless to say we had a great trip and hope to do it again soon. Or in the next 10 years. LOL No, I'm sure we will go somewhere before that. Have a great day! The Herrin's

2011-03-11T12:23:00.002-07:00

Just posted some new pictures of the family. Looking through the pictures realizing that I'm hardly in any of them. Must be a mom thing. :)

2011-03-04T14:44:00.003-07:00

We have had a lot going on this last several months.

I went to parent teacher conference a couple of weeks ago. Courtney's teacher said she is very motivated to get everything done she needs to. The teacher also said that the boys in Courtney's class all have googly eyes at Courtney and she has no idea. That's my girl!! We have been watching the Bachelor together and she can see that boys/men just complicates life. She pointed that out. I know that she will have a good head on her shoulders as she gets older. She also told me that boy/girl dances start for her next year. OH BOY!! That is going to fun to hear about. I hope that she will let me go and chaperon the dance. I'm sure she will be happy if I go with her. She is growing into a beautiful young lady and she makes us so proud everyday!! :) It's hard to believe that she is 11 years old and will start Young Women's this year. What a big step!! Courtney has the best teacher, it's so great to see a teacher so excited about Courtney and her education.

Kendra is such a sweet spunky girl. She is so FUNNY and makes everything more fun. It's a lot of fun when Courtney, Kendra, Maliyah, and some friends of theirs all gather in the kitchen to talk about things that they have learned about. We always end up laughing. I love having such great girls. Kendra may need a big surgery coming up. The bones in her pelvis are so sharp making it difficult for Kendra to use her robot leg. Last time the girls were admitted to the hospital I ran into their plastic surgeon. I told him what the problem was, I asked if he could injected fat to better cover the bone. He said that wasn't possible because she didn't have any fat to take. I said that she could use some of mine, he just laughed and said I didn't have enough either. So now we need to find a plan that will work for Kendra. I wish there was a better way to fix this problem. The surgery would be very dangerous, so I don't really care to do it. I would rather look into different things and try those first.

Maliyah is doing very well without her feeding tube. It's incredible how much Kendra and Maliyah look alike again. She has to drink 40-50oz of water a day to keep her kidney well hydrated. She has had several bladder infections these last couple of months, they have been such a pain to get rid of. It's scary to think she only has one oral antibiotic that could work for her to fight off the different infections. So difficult to think about.

Each of the girls are getting new crutches, walkers and "robot" legs within the next couple of weeks. They are each doing very well with physical therapy and getting stronger every day.
We just celebrated their 9th Birthday. I had originally planned on having a vintage tea party for them. But they said that wasn't what they wanted. They both asked for an animal. I thought that it would be fun to have a turtle, but then started to think of something that no one really has. I thought it would be great to get a hedgehog. We named it Prickles and got a mansion for it. Coolest pet we have ever had. The kids feed it worms and they think that it's really neat. Alli has been a little sad since we got Prickles, so we have become better friends.

Austin and Justin are endlessly playing video games, namely Mario Brothers and Lego Star Wars. The boys started having a hard time focusing in school, and Justin was complaining of headaches, so I unplugged all video games consoles. They can learn to just play those on the weekends. They seem to be doing better, but Justin is still getting headaches, so I will be taking him into the doctor on Monday.

Jake and I are doing very well. I'm busying getting us ready for our cruise, being a mom and student. Which is a lot of work, but I'm always up for a great challenge, makes life more fun. Jake has been intent with watching BYU and the great season the basketball team has been having.

We are just so blessed with life right now. Everything going so well. There are some bumps in the road, but for the most part things are looking better everyday. Jake and I are enjoying the time with our family right now, and understand that it won't last forever, they are going to get older and move away. So we have to make as many lasting memories with them as we can. We are very lucky parent to have each of them in our life.

A lot to catch-up on. But hope you all are doing well.

Lots of the love from the Herrin's :)

2011-01-09T14:36:00.007-07:00

2011 is going to be even better than 2010!! We are so excited to see what this new year holds for us. So far the year has started off just right with Maliyah getting her feeding tube out. It's been a week, she had the feeding tube for about 8 years. It's so much easier getting her ready for bed now. So now all of the kids are even more independent and it makes Jake and I even more happy. Life just seems to get easier every year. :) Hope it stays that way as the kids start to get into their teenage years. Maliyah's friend Brooke came over and Maliyah was so excited to tell her all about her tube. Brooke was excited! She has a little brother with health issues and so she understands how big of a step it was for Maliyah.

All the kids are getting really excited for our family cruise to the Mexican Rivera. I'm going to be making a chain to count down the days until we leave for Los Angeles, California. I'm sure I will be talking more about it as the days get closer. Disney Cruise here we come!! I wasn't sure if it was going to be a good idea and was nervous about taking everyone, mostly because of how expensive it was going to be. But realized the kids are only little once and we need to take advantage of everything we can do with them now. These trips will make good memories, even when it put a huge hole in the bank account. We are going for Spring Break for a 7 day cruise, but we'll leave a couple days before so the drive isn't as long.

I'm taking school full time, so I hope that this trip doesn't interfere too much with my studies. I really need to keep up my grades, so I can get into the program I want. It's very competitive. Jake's very supportive with my decision, but hates the fact I'm gone 4 nights a week and Saturday mornings at school. I hope all the sacrifice will payoff in the long run, Jake's sure it will. He's incredible with how much he believes in me and my dreams.

Courtney is taking RAD kids at school, Ed Smart put this program together and it's taught at the kids school. We have to get Courtney's height and weight along with other information. She is 4ft 9 1/2 inches tall. Almost as tall as I am.

Justin and Austin really love playing video games. We have XBox 360 and the Wii. When they were playing it yesterday Justin was bouncing on the couch. Austin looks at him and says "you better stop that because you can get brain damage". I had to laugh. Austin has the best information. We have been working really hard on the sounds for letters. Austin is picking up on them really easily, but Justin is having a harder time. They have a great teacher, so I'm going to talk with her about what needs to be done.

Kendra is doing really well. She is turning into the boss of the family. I don't need to say anything to the kids because she beats me to it. Which is good and not so good.

Hope you all had a great start to the New Year!! :)

P.S. If I repeat myself in these blog entries just disregard it. ;) I don't reread what I've posted previously.

2010-12-08T18:31:00.003-07:00

So far our Holiday's have been really good. Maliyah has been sick for several days with a UTI, but is starting to feel better. She had a fever of 105.2, I couldn't even imagine how she felt.

We get Netflix and had gotten the newest Twilight movie in the mail. On the way home from school with the kids I told them that we were going to be watching a movie together. Especially because Jake doesn't like watching the Twilight movies a second time. He gets brownie points for taking me the first time. So Courtney had a friend that called to see if she could play. She told the friend that she couldn't play because she was watching a movie with her mom. I hope she feels that way when she's in high school. A parent can only hope. We are still waiting for the day when she is embarrassed of us. So far so good. Maybe it helps that I know most of her friends by name and they call me mom. I hope that is why.

Justin has been saying some pretty funny things lately. He loves to talk about the mice we had, he says they had gravy's, he means rabies. We also read as a family before bed and after each word he reads he adds "of". It's pretty fun, but takes a little longer to get through. He also says cause instead of pause.

Austin has come up with a phrase he says, easy peasy lemon squeezy. The first time we heard that was right after his wrestling match. We were laughing really hard. They are both such witty boys. I need to carry around a book and write down all there clever phrases.

Now about our kitchen fire. Yes, everyone is fine and no damage. Thought I would get that out of the way first. I was making steaks and baked potatoes for dinner. Jake and I were talking in the kitchen and teasing Kendra and Maliyah about the oven blowing up(we always tease the kids and they do the same to us). And while we were doing that I saw out of the corner of my eye a fire that had started in the oven because of the grease. I yelled fire and probably shouldn't of looking back, but I did. The girls freaked!!! Kendra went running out the garage door as fast as she could, it was 30ish outside. Maliyah took off downstairs with a mouth full of food, crying. Courtney ran up the stairs to see why she was crying. She spit out the food on the carpet. To tell her there was a fire. By this time the fire alarm was going off. I controlled everything why Jake was laughing. Brought Kendra back in the house screaming and crying. We always have such a great time! :) It's funny everything that happens on a daily bases here. Just wish I could remember all of it.

I have one final and a final paper due in school and I'm done for several weeks. I 'm doing more than full time next semester. I really want to get done with school soon, at least with my generals. I have along way to go for my degree. It's interesting trying to take care of everything and find time for school and studying. But it worth it to set a good example for my kids. I just hope they get through with college or whatever they need to before having a family. It's much easier.

Here hoping for a good rest in the coming weeks. Wishful thinking I'm sure. Hope you are all enjoying the holiday's. Be safe!

2010-11-19T08:58:00.005-07:00

The boys have one more meet and the wrestling will be over. I'm so glad!! I hated them doing it. But it was cheap and the boys wanted to try it. The last practice the boys went to a kids punched the boys in the stomach well wrestling. I had a feeling that was going to happen. Jake was the one that really wanted them to trying it. I wanted something more like karate that would teach them discipline, so they can learn at an early age to be driven.

We have had a lot of drama with mice in our house. Trying to figure out the best way to take care of them. The kids didn't want to kill them, so I thought we would see if that was possible. So the first day we just caught and released them. I didn't want the kids to see us kill something.

The day I found out we had mice was so funny now looking back. I was in the half bath and saw the stupid mouse run out from the corner where it was stealing Allie's food. I called Jake crying, which he thought was really funny. Later on he would figure out how unfunny it really was.

Jake woke-up to do his morning P90X and opened the pantry and saw something drop. He started pulling stuff out. And finally found the mouse. But it ran under the refrigerator. Jake pulled it out but was never able to find it. He also saw another one in our mud room. He woke-up Courtney because he knew I would be no help in him catching it. Courtney and Jake were trying to catch it, Jake said it was like playing hockey. He said it was really sick and scary to have this thing run at you. I told him he shouldn't have laughed when I called him crying about the mouse in the bathroom. :)

But after several days of doing this I decided it wasn't going to be possible. Mainly because of one incident.; I was doing Kendra's hair on the floor in the bathroom. Jake was taking care of some of the traps before he left for work. He was filling the nasty traps with food. All of the sudden he yelled mouse. And out of the corner of my eye I see this mouse run by my leg, it was so close. I FREAKED OUT!! I jumped on the toilet screaming and Kendra was grabbing the counter top screaming and trying to get up on it. I felt terrible leaving Kendra on the floor. I jump down grabbed her and held her on top of the toilet with me. I was very mad at Jake for letting the mouse out, of course he had no idea it was in there so I couldn't stay mad at him long. My dad came over when Jake was at work to help me setup the real traps, I had also gotten DCon, which is poison. I couldn't handle being scared and grossed out in my own home. So within 2 days we caught and killed all of them. The kids were so mad, they cried. Justin yelled at Jake for killing them. He said that "they help us live." I have no idea where he got that idea. So after they saw the first one dead, we decided it was better if we were really quiet about when we caught another one. We got a totally of 6 mice, 3 we let go and 3 that were killed. Glad that is over.

Kendra and Maliyah's physical therapist is incredible. This last Wednesday she talked about taking the girls to the swimming pool to better learn to use there legs. They are able to walk on the treadmill for 10 minutes without anything to hold on to. They are able to walk with their crutches on the floor with there "leg"as well. But the goal really is for them to walk unaided. They get closer everyday. Miss Jess at school is working really hard with them on walking and physical therapy. She is so good with them and they can't stop talking about her. She makes their day so much better. They had great teachers and instructors too. This year has been great so far.

Courtney dance and school is going very well. But the boy stuff is funny to listen to. The boys notice her more then I would like. She has a "friend" that has a crush on all the boys that either like her or she likes them. It makes me mad because this "friend" isn't a real friend. Hope Courtney will take my advice and stop talking to this "friend". I'm worried that when she starts middle school next year, this girl is going to be a nightmare. Girls are just weird!!

Jake has roped me into doing P90X with him. It's really not as hard as he and others have made it out to be. It's a great workout, but some of the classes I take at the gym are a lot harder then P90X. I love working out. Jake is liking it too. I weigh less than in high school and feel so good.

We are doing really well and everyone for the most part is healthy. Couldn't ask for anything better then that. We are also not sure if we are still going on the family cruise we had planned. We are still trying to figure that out. We have until January to figure that out.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

Just wanted to add I disinfected everything in the house. Also threw away a lot of stuff just in case the mice were in, by or touched it. Just SICK!!

2010-10-30T09:50:00.006-06:00

I had taken the kids to Carl's Jr for lunch and a play date with my friend Melissa and her kids. I had fed the kids before we went because they are never ending pits. I also got them chicken nuggets and fries with drinks when we got there. Kendra came up to ask me if she could have some more fries. I told her no because she has had enough to eat. Needless to say when I wasn't looking she got into my purse and took my credit card and ordered herself more french fries. I was SHOCKED!!! Not that Kendra would steal my credit card, but that Carl's Jr would accept it from a child. When kids want something they will do whatever they can to do it. I was really stern with Kendra at the time. But when she walked away from her timeout Melissa and I couldn't help but laugh. It was very funny!! Good thing it was only a couple of dollars. I think she learned her lesson.

Courtney had her MASSIVE birthday party. She was really worried about not inviting someone and hurting their feelings. So the list grew to around 32 kids. There was only one kiddo that didn't come. I was surprised that everyone came. I was counting on about half the kids not showing up. We normally do pizza, but Courtney hates pizza and our family was really into soup. So I suggested that we make homemade soup and tomato soup. Then we added more to that. The once small planned party slowly turned into a LARGE event. We couldn't just have soup for the soup we needed to have bread bowls. Then Courtney's favorite things I've been making a lot of is banana bread and pumpkin chocolate cookies. So we took two days of baking to make her favorites. She was in heaven baking with me. The kids were so excited for Courtney's birthday, they talked about it for weeks before it happened. It turned out so good for everyone and Courtney had a great time. Jake and I were exhausted. He was such a big help through the whole party. It was a group effort. I think he knew how much I needed his help and didn't even need to ask, he just jumped right in. He was even great about getting all Courtney's favorite music on an Ipod for dancing. After the party was over I asked Courtney if she had a good time and if she ate a lot of food. She said that she had a great time, but never ate anything. I was a bit mad about that, but knew she was busy with all of her friends.

The girls are slowly getting over their surgeries and getting stronger everyday. Their physical therapist is planning on taking the girls swimming in about 3 weeks. That will be when the girls incision can be submerged. The prosthetics can be submerged and that is the reason they are going to start with the swimming.

Justin and Austin just finished soccer, we were proud of how hard they tried, but they really weren't that into it. So we got a flier about a wrestling class they could take, so we thought why not have them do something they do everyday anyway, over and over and over and over. So they started wrestling this week. I don't think they knew how hard they were going to work. The coach had them do 100 pushups during practice, and showed them actual wrestling moves. They really liked it. Jake helped coach their little group. One of the kids in their group started hitting another one while they were wrestling, so Jake had to make sure he knew that was not allowed. We will try it for a month and see how well they like it.

Jake and I were also going to the BYU vs Wyoming football game the day after the party. It was freezing and there are two things I hate, being cold and football. So as you can understand I wasn't excited for this date. We dressed warm and headed off for the hour drive to Lavell Edwards Stadium. Jake has to get there an hour and a half before the game starts so that we don't hit traffic. I started getting sick in the car, I hadn't eaten and was so exhausted from the day before, things just weren't going my way. We finally get to Orem and I'm very sick. We stop to get some food because I'm sure that's why I wasn't feeling well. We got parked and ate in the car. The rain and wind was really heavy, but my stomach was feeling much better. We bundled up and started walking toward the stadium. Before every game there is an alumnus that will come and talk for the pre-game. It's just happened to be in a really warm room with nice bathrooms. We warmed-up and waited for the game to start. We had blankets that turned into ponchos, but really have never used them before. But this day we had to use them. Jake was so sweet!! We were sitting in the pre-game room and he wrapped me up with these blankets and making sure I was warm. He even told me how glad he was that I come with him to these games, and how he knows that I hate football. It was incredible to have such a great man making me feel like I'm his world. It was a great day to freeze. We had a great time.

We have also tried to have cheaper ways to have our date nights. We have a place called Hopekids that is a life saver for our family, but there was recently a event for the parents to go learn how to ballroom dance. Jake doesn't really enjoy dancing, but he knows how much I love it. So he RSVPed for this event. It was such a fun night with other adults that have children that are sick or dying. It was really fun to meet these neat parents. The parents of Ellie were there, and we learned about their challenges. They told us that there little girl was diagnosed with cancer when she was 2 months old and when she was 6 months old they found out that she has a bad heart and needs a transplant. Ellie is 2 years old now and they have been through so much with her. Many times almost loosing her. What an amazing couple that have stuck together through thick and thin. Ellie is unable to have chemotherapy or radiation because of her heart, so I'm not sure how they are going to help her. But the paren'ts faith will help them and their family through. It was neat to share our story with them and to hear theirs as well. Life is so short and hard at times, but if you have a strong enough support you can make it through anything. Thanks to Hopekids for making life easier and finding support through other parents.

2010-10-18T17:45:00.003-06:00

Tis' the season for everything to break! Everything seems to be going up in smoke. Jake's car really needs to be fixed. His car is 14 years old and we really want to have his car another 14 years. I HATE car payments!! My car needs new tires before the snow comes or I will never be able to make it up the hill. And of course the cars need to be registered. But there is always an upside to things. Hope that comes soon.

Kendra and Maliyah just had surgery on the 14Th of October. Maliyah seemed to just pop back to normal until we took her home from the hospital and she was doing too much playing. Kendra had some bleeding issues that seem to be getting worse with each back surgery she has. She was in a lot more pain than Maliyah was. Maliyah returned to school today and Kendra stayed home in bed. Both the girls are able to wear their 'legs' all day. They both are using their crutches more.

Justin and Austin are really needing to get their aggression out, so I'm putting them in karate or something that will work for them. Boys have such a hard time with their feelings, they can just hold everything in for so long. That can't be healthy.

Courtney is getting ready to celebrate her 11Th Birthday with a BIG party. I'm really excited to of planned this whole event for her. Should be really fun! The kids are excited to wear their Halloween costumes. I'm even going to dress-up for her party as a cowgirl. Easy and already have a shirt that will work.

2010-09-24T09:03:00.005-06:00

Sorry it's been such along time since my last update. No news is always good news. :)

Anyway, Justin is loving school and doing very well. I was worried that he wasn't ready for Kindergarten and he proved me wrong. The teacher has emailed me to say how well Justin is doing at school. Austin on the other hand I thought was more then ready to start, boy was I wrong. He doesn't enjoy school very much and says he only likes to go for recess. Austin cries when he was to do his sounds and handwriting, but he is getting better. I just remind him that if he gets his writing done on Monday he only has to do his sounds. I try and get those done in the car on the ride home from school. Makes it easier for me. But they are both catching on to everything, so I can handle the crying. :)

Kendra is doing so well with her "leg". I'm proud of the progress she is making. She is wearing her "leg" everyday for physical therapy. But started getting a sore on her hip, so we had a back off some until I can take her on Monday to get her leg refitted. That is one of the reasons that starting slow is the best way for using the legs. There can be skin breakdown and it needs to be caught early. Other then that Kendra is doing so well. The rod in her back is staying clean of all infections. At night I am helping her stretch on an exercise ball, that is helping with some back pain she is having. I got the ball for my ab workout and turned out to be great for her too.

Maliyah wore her "leg" for 3 hours yesterday. That was a HUGE thing for her. The girls have a great aide at school that is motivating the girls to do their very best. They get to pick out of a treasure box for working so hard. She has been getting sick with UTIs a lot lately because we were trying to get her off the antibiotics. We also tried again to get her off the feeding tube, that didn't go over very well. She got very weak without her feeds at night. She has finally hit 35 pounds, so now she weigh as much as Kendra.

Both of the girls are working on walking on their "legs" without any assistance. At the PT appointments they are doing something called "flying". They put a vest on the girls and they practice walking on the treadmill with a pulley that holds a lot of their weight. They were both very scared at first, but both LOVE flying now. They are getting so close to trying it without any vest. I never thought they would be making so much progress. It's helped a lot that they are healthy and have energy enough to work hard in PT.

Courtney just started back at dance. She changed dance studios so that she could take dance with her cousins. She loves it!! Her 11th Birthday is coming up and she is very excited. She wants a new bike. For her party this year I want to take her and some friends to a haunted house. Courtney is too scared for a haunted house yet.

I am doing very well at school and finally figured out the degree that I want to persue. I am looking to change schools to better match my degree. I volunteer at the kids school several days a week and am always busy. I lost weight over the summer and so on one of our dates we went shopping for new clothes. I went down 4 pant sizes!

Jake started doing the P90X workouts. He is getting up every morning at 4:30. He is enjoying it. He's traveling more with work.

We are getting ready for our Disney Cruise, which the kids are excited for. We were asked to go on a show in Greece, so we might taking the family there. It would be a lot of work, It would be a once in a life time opportunity.

Kendra and Maliyah's next surgery is scheduled for October 14Th. I just hope there is no complications so they can recover in time for Halloween. I will be updating more pictures today, so check those out. VERY CUTE!! Have a great day. :)

2010-08-25T11:33:00.002-06:00

How can the summer already be over? It went by to fast. All the kids are in school, Justin and Austin are in kindergarten, Kendra and Maliyah are in 3rd grade, and Courtney is in 5Th grade. They come home each day from school and tell me all about their day. I thought it would be lonely and boring being home alone, I am neither. It's a lot to still take care of her and school will be starting again for me tomorrow. I was going to take more then full time school, but realized that would be to much.

When Jake and I dropped Justin and Austin off on their first day of kindergarten, I thought there would be some tears. We were really glad that wasn't the case. They have a great teacher Mrs. Huber, so I know they will be in good hands. When Austin found his seat he was setting next to another boy. He is so outgoing and started talking to him. We were still in the back of the classroom when he ran over and said that he had a new friend. Austin had a huge smile on his face. Justin on the other hand was setting next to a girl. He is really quiet and shy, it takes him awhile to warm up. So he didn't talk to anyone. They even have some recesses with Kendra and Maliyah. So that makes it even more fun. I am glad my kids are so close in age.

This is going to be a great year for everyone!!

2010-08-10T23:23:00.003-06:00

We went to Uncle Jim's cabin over this last weekend. It was a great break from life, even though it was just overnight. I finished my summer semester and will get about 2 weeks off before starting again in the fall.

Now onto probably,the best night of our summer. Several months ago we were invited back for a reunion for Thursday Night Hero at BYU University. In 2007 our family was invited to BYU to meet the players and them to honor Kendra and Maliyah. It was a dream for Jake because BYU is his favorite team. And Kendra is a huge fan. So tonight we went back to not only meet the other Thursday Night Hero's but to meet the new team for 2010 season. It was so much better than expected. The players and coaches were amazing with the kids.

Austin was in charge of getting all the players and coaches to sign a BYU football. Jake has a BYU room in the basement. So when Austin would walk up to a player he would tell them, and that his mom isn't a fan but she cheers. He even got some of the players to race him around the field. After some of the players signed the ball they came up with an idea to have Justin and Austin tackle one of the lineman. So J & A run full speed into this huge man, knocking him down and his cellphone went flying out of his hand. I am sure he was just playing along with the boys. I don't think he knew how rough they can be. It was really cute!!

One of the other Thursday Night Hero moms Linda was talking to Kendra about school. Linda asked Kendra when school started. Kendra answered in a excited voice, one week and one day. The summer just flew by!

I put up a lot of new pictures as well.

On one of the pictures you see the boys on the backs of some of the players and Courtney in between them. I was joking with Courtney before I took that picture that she needs to marry a boy like them. She was really embarressed, I didn't say it loud enough for anyone else to hear.

For most of the night Maliyah played on the jumping toys, she had no interest in doing anything else.

All the way home the kids were so excited! Laughing and talking about the night they had. We just want to thank the BYU althetic department for putting this amazing program together.

2010-07-18T18:53:00.002-06:00

We just got back from a weekend of fun. We left on Friday and drove 8 hours to Sparks, Nevada. About half way there I realized that we forgot our camera. So the same night we arrived, Jake went to get us a new camera and save the day. :) I never leave home without one.
I was really sick of school and putting everything into it. So I talked Jake into getting some work done in Reno, Nevada since is company has branches there.

Jake went to work Friday. The kids and I headed to my cousin Kirsten's house to visit her family. It was neat to finally meet her family, Justice 2 and Kelsey 5 months. And then that night we went swimming. The Hotel Nugget has a outstanding pool. There is a huge hot tub several cold smaller pools and a swimming pool with a waterfall. We have stayed there before when Courtney, Kendra and Maliyah were small, but this time it was a lot more fun for everyone.

I am originally from Reno, so it was so much fun to show the kids where I used to live. My old childhood home, the parks I use to play at, and the old western town Virginia City where my Grandpa Warren has built and restored homes since the 1950s. Some of the pictures show the incredible craftsmanship of Grandpa Warren, the kids great grandfather. He loves to find old artifacts. Virgina City is the prefect place for him to live. Justin has a fascination with trains, so we took the kids on the train to the gold mines, about a 30 minute ride. And then spent the rest of the day playing with cousins. That night we got together with my uncle Greg and met his new wife Kay. The kids had a great time.

We just arrived home and the kids were excited to play outside with their friends. It was a lot of fun.

Jake realized that he is going to have to travel more. But we hope he can schedule some of his trips so we can all go. After going to Reno to visit family I realized that we need to go and visit Grandpa Warren more often. He is getting older and he has a lot to teach my children. It would be great to have him take my kids on treasure hunts like we did when I was young. I tried to get ahold of the kids great grandma, but couldn't. She is having a lot of health problems, so it would be nice to visit her in the next couple of months. I hope this will be possible. I am so glad my kids have great grandparents that they will remember. They will leave legacies that our family can be proud of.

2010-07-07T22:26:00.004-06:00

WOW!! Time has flown by this summer!! The kids have 6 more weeks of freedom before school starts for them. They really have had the best summer. I haven't been able to entertain them as much this summer, but they have done a great job of that themselves. I just uploaded several pictures of family reunions we have gone to this summer. In one picture there are 4 generations, Great Grandparents, Grandparents, Jake and I and then the kids. On my side, the kids still have 3 out of the 4 Great Grandparents still alive. On Jake's side they have all passed on. So it was neat to get that picture with them. It will be a great memory!

In the next week, Courtney will be starting violin lessons. She is very excited!! Jake ordered her violin several months ago. This will be Courtney's last year of elementary school. She is excited for junior high, but the other kids are going to miss her. I was talking to Kendra's about Courtney going to junior high, she said "that there are always rides over to the secondary school", Kendra just thinks she can go visit whenever she wants. What a sweet little girl.

The girls are doing so well!! I am so happy that we haven't had any surgeries or sicknesses since April. Kendra had a fever of 104.2 in June, but that has been it. :) I think this is the longest break we have had in years!! We feel so lucky for the girls.

Jake has been helping the boys learn how to play soccer and got them a soccer goal. They start in the fall. I really enjoy watching the three of them play together. We have such a great family!

2010-06-30T13:00:00.005-06:00

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? Your playing small doesn't serve the world.” (Marianne Williamson) My favorite quote that has been on my fridge for years. I know it's not exact, but still is very meaningful.

This summer has been one full of memories that the kids will never forget. And it's not because we spent thousands of dollars on trip and toys, it's because the 5 of them have become closer over this summer month. When I talk to other moms they say all their kids do is play video game most of the time in the summer. My kids are just the opposite, they play outside from morning until late night. We have so many kids on our street that they end up playing night games together.

They are also exploring the world around them. I was walking out to head to the grocery store and Courtney was walking up to the car holding a snake with a glove. It was a small snake, but it still scared me. Sometimes it would be a lot of fun to take the kids back to Alabama where Jake spent some of his childhood. Jake tells stories of the places and things he would do in the forest. The desert has some fun wildlife, but it's hard to find them, unless you are a Herrin kiddo. lol

The girls health has been up and down but manageable, they have stay out of the OR and hospital for several months now. They still need blood draws and doctors appointments, but better then staying in the hospital. Kendra's blood work is getting abnormal. So in the next week we will have to make a decision on rather or not a broviac will be in the near future. I sure hope not.

The separation anxiety is starting to not only effect the boys, but Kendra who has a hard time being away from us. I have setup some play dates in hope that she can become more confident and feel safe being away from me.

Melissa a friend and I had taken are kids to Carl's Jr to play. We were talking while the kids were playing. Courtney came over to me and said that Kendra had just used my credit card to buy food. I was very surprised to find out that Carl's Jr took a credit card from a little kid. It made me mad!! I had fed the kids before we went, bought them something there, yet Kendra was still hungry. The kids can eat a lot, but they do play hard and burn calories fast. :)

As you can probably read, we are doing so well. Everyone is so happy and healthy. We have been given a break with the girls health. Everyone needed that!! Hope you all are having a great, safe and happy summer.

2010-06-21T11:20:00.002-06:00

Wanted to share a new article that our family is in. They are on the front page of the Deseret News. http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700041931/Formerly-conjoined-Herrin-twins-always-connected-to-family.html?pg=2

Thought I would also update about last week. The week was so relaxing, for the most part. We had a great family week. We finally got the front yard to look amazing!! Jake had his 30th Birthday!! Jake and I went out to dinner and to a comedy club. We had a great time!! It's really nice to be married to my best friend! He also had a great Father's Day!! We spent a lot of the time at my parents house celebrating the kids Birthday's and Father's Day.

I will update more when I have time.

2010-06-13T19:34:00.004-06:00

The boys just celebrated their 5th Birthday!! We had the boys favorite food, pizza. They got a lot of water toys for the Summer. I can't believe my babies are that old. Their teacher at church asked them what they wanted to be when they grew-up; Austin said, "a soccer player" and Justin said, "a snowplow guy with a big fat belly". His answer came from a conversation I had with both the boys over the winter. After a snowstorm they would set by the window and watch for the snowplow to come by. Justin was dead set that he was going to be a snowplow driver when he grew-up. To deter Justin from that job, I said that they have big bellies and that he wouldn't want one of those. Thought I was pulling a fast one on him. But to my surprise he came up with wanting to be a snowplow guy with a fat belly. What a clever little man he is!! It goes to show that he will find away to be whatever he wants, just like me. I am proud to say that he is a mini me. :) He definitely has my strong will. The Mother's Day answers were even funnier. I will have to share those later.

Kendra and Maliyah have been working hard on their PT and walking. Wow, the strength they have is incredible!! Their "robot legs" are very heavy for them, so their core strength has to be very strong. The girls overall health is getting better. I was finally able to take Kendra off the antibiotics without her running a fever. That was a huge step in the right direction. Maliyah is starting to eat better as well. I hope we will be able to get her off her feeds at night, the goal is before our Disney Cruise. There has been a lot of problems with Maliyah anti-rejection meds. The levels in her blood have been low, but I am working with the doctors to get those back where they are suppose to be.

My summer school isn't going so well. I think my mind is focused too much on the fun of the days and studying isn't a priority to me. It should be since it was very expensive. But I will get things together now and still pass my classes. :)

Jake has the whole next week off of work. We are very excited!! He is also having a HUGE BIRTHDAY on Thursday!! So that will be fun. Nothing too exciting planned, just going to our favorite restaurant and hope someone will offer to take the kids for the night. But that is wishful thinking. For Jake's Birthday I saw that the UFC was coming, so we got tickets to that. That is probably the only sport that I really like.

Courtney has been a help this Summer. She has a knack for finding animals like a nest of baby birds and an injured mole. Courtney is a kid that loves to take care of animals and find them. She wants to be a vet when she grows-up.

2010-06-01T15:36:00.002-06:00

Today after school, I picked up the kids like always. We pulled into our street and I could tell there was something crawling across the street. It freaked me out for a moment, but then realized it was a turtle!! That is something that you will never see in Utah. And the turtle has a phone number taped to it. LOL So the owners will be coming later to pick him up. The kids are having fun playing with it. :)

2010-05-27T12:13:00.003-06:00

I can't believe that my baby boys are graduating from preschool. At the ceremony we realized that they will be graduating from high school in 2023. It just seems like such a short time away. Who knew that if you blinked everything could change this quick. It's such a bitter sweet moment for me. I want them to move forward and progress, but their is a big part of me that just wants them to stay little forever. I was on the Amanda Dickson Show and the other lady's on the show were talking about their children getting married and having children. On the way home I realized that it wasn't that far off for Courtney.

Maliyah had her Kidney clinic appointment this last Tuesday. Her liver enzymes are slowly rising, the doctors reassured me that everything was still okay. As a mother I can't help but worry about her health. Maliyah recently had a UTI and the doctors said that they are getting really worried about oral antibiotics even working for Maliyah anymore. So that is starting to be a concern for her. The plan for treatment for Maliyah will be changing if this becomes the case. I really am not worried at this point, but with be even more careful with her health.

Kendra's infection that she had over Christmas that nearly took her life ,is trying to come back. We tried several different times to remove her antibiotics, but the result was an instant fever. So ID is worried that she may need to return back to IV drugs. We all want the IV therapy to be in September, so we can have a fun Summer.

The girls are working very hard at school and making huge strides in their PT and also in their core strength. Their Robot Legs are taking a lot more time then I thought.

I can't wait for the Summer Time!! I am really getting sick of all the projects and homework the kids have. The girls have 5 more days of school. Which seems like it will never get here. I got some great advice from D Wright today. She said, don't over schedule your kids during the Summer because the best creativity comes from boredom. So I thought that was a great thing to take into account with the Summer coming. And it takes a lot less pressure off me to entertain the kids.

At the kids school they have a fitness goal. They are tested on different level of fitness. Courtney came home with a paper that said she had hit the National Goal in fitness. She was very excited about that. She worked very hard to achieve that goal.

I will update pictures later today. Have a great day!! :)

2010-05-21T13:39:00.000-06:00

I know your inbox is full. I know you get a lot of emails. Thanks for reading mine! : ) Let me share with you why I send this every day.

Here is a quote from Dave Dravecky, the major league baseball pitcher who lost his pitching arm in his battle with cancer:

"I'll never forget the feeling in the pit of my stomach and in the depths of my heart when I first heard the word 'cancer.' My world ground to a halt. I desperately needed information. I needed encouragement. I needed hope."

Dave's quote reflects my heart in sending you these HopeMinute emails. It is my prayer that they offer you and your child hope and encouragement when you need it most. That they remind you that God is still on the throne, that He loves you more than you can comprehend, that He wants a deep and personal relationship with you, and that He promises to either calm the storm or calm you in the midst of the storm.

Hope is indeed a very powerful medicine. I have seen it work miracles. And wherever there is life, there is hope. Always.

2010-05-20T09:10:00.002-06:00

Please join us for the first Annual Faces of Hope Event here in Utah. This Charity has given so much hope to our family.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/92141/hopekids/invite_resources/foh_invite.html

Thanks

2010-05-09T11:39:00.004-06:00

This past Friday Courtney's bird Shelly pasted away. It was a very bad time! All the kids cried, but it was worse for the girls. To make matters worse the bird didn't die of natural causes, so that made things harder because it could of been prevented. But on an upside, all of the kids are safe, so a bird can be replaced.

These last several weeks have been very nice and relaxing. I finished up the last of my finals last week. The girls have last minute school projects to finish and then it will be summer for everyone. Can't wait!!

The kids are going to be taking swimming lessons. The boys are getting signed up for soccer in the fall. Can't believe in a couple of weeks, my boys will be turning 5. Time goes by so fast.

2010-04-28T08:30:00.005-06:00

Maliyah's broviac broke and ended up taking her to the ER to get it fixed. It took 4 hours and then we were finally able to come home. When the tube broke there was blood everywhere and Maliyah was afriad all of her blood was going to come out. It broke my heart to see her like that. Courtney went with us to entertain and play with her. It was a fun night other then being at the hospital.

2010-04-24T17:07:00.003-06:00

I have been getting a lot emails from everyone, so thank you. The kids love reading them too. I had no idea our show was on Discovery Health, I just thought TLC was going to show it. The kids still enjoy watching it, I on the other hand never want to see it again, LOL. It's really weird to watch ourselves on TV.

I promised Courtney that she could earn some roller blades. She did so well these last several weeks, that we went out and got her some today. Courtney is having a great time.

I needed some new running shoes also. I try to run at least 4-7 miles several times a week. My shoes were getting torn up. I hope these shoes will help my feet from becoming numb. It's really a big pain, and it seems to happen around 3 miles. I am not really training for anything, just trying to stay healthy. I have even gotten Jake to get his butt out to exercise too. I am to the end of Spring Semester, finals week is the next 2 weeks.

Jake was outside getting the sprinklers up and running for this summer, he turned them on and was trying to fix different things. Austin walked up to Jake and said "what in the hell are you doing". Jake really tried not to laugh. He told Austin that hell was a bad word. He said he was sorry. Of course Jake blamed me for Austin's mishap. I do have to laugh about it. Kids really say the funniest things.

2010-04-21T20:38:00.003-06:00

This year has been extremely stressful. The girls have had many infections and surgeries. I can't even remember all of them. I like to block most of that stuff out.

I am finishing up my second semester of college. I have aced all of my classes so far. Even with all of the girls set backs I have been able to stay on top of my school work. I will be starting the summer semester. It's my escape for right now. Kendra and I were on the way to one of her surgeries and got into a car accident. That is her 2nd. She just cried for a second. The police officer that arrived at the accident was really helpful. He also knows Jake's cousin that is a highway patrol officer. He was so good to Kendra. We made it to her surgery on time. The doctor was a little mad that we were late, but I wait for them all the time so it's his turn to wait for me.

Jake just finished another part of his schooling. He is one smart man!! If only I can get him to figure out the yard that would be so great.

Courtney is doing very well in school and will be starting back up in her competition team in June. She is excited and has missed dance. I on the other hand am not excited!! It's a lot of work to get Courtney to all the practices and performances, she will start dancing 10 hours a week. We are hardly going to be able to see her. But she enjoys it and that is really all that matters. We got a new cage for her bird Shelly, she is so messy. Courtney got sick of vacuuming her room everyday. She also wants roller blades, so is trying to earn those through chores around the house. She only has one more year of elementary and then she is off to middle school. I can't believe how fast she is growing up. She gets prettier everyday. The boys are starting to notice too. A couple of them showed up at our house a couple of weekends ago. Jake wasn't happy about that. He is very protective of the girls.

Kendra is the life of the party. There is nothing that she can't do. We took the kids to Classic Skating and both of the girls put on roller skates and were able to get around very well. It was great to see both of them so brave. Kendra looks more like Courtney everyday, well all my girls look very much alike. She was also baptized in March. I took Kendra and Maliyah to get special white dresses for the occasion. It was the prefect day for her. Kendra recently got tested at school for next year and she is testing at a 5th grade level. She loves school!

Maliyah has had a really tough year so far. She has had far more surgeries this year then Kendra. She is on IV antibiotics for an infection. I just do them at home every 8 hours. It's really not bad. The medicines are making her throw-up, so we are working on getting them changed to something else. Regardless of the year Maliyah has had, she is still testing at a 5th grade level as well. We have tried several times to get her off of her feeding tube and she doesn't tolerate that very well. We need to make sure by this time next year she is done with it. She is getting stronger everyday with her Physical Therapy, she is getting faster on her walker and even able to take steps with her crutches. Both girls can wear their "robot leg" for about 10 minutes. I just hope they don't have to modify them anytime soon. Maliyah was baptized as well in March. She was excited at first and decided to go second right after Kendra. She got really scared, I told her everything was going to be ok and finally she agreed. I really didn't want to schedule a different baptisim for Maliyah. After Maliyah was done, she told me that it wasn't scary at all. I was so proud of her.

Justin and Austin attended their Kindergarten Orientation. I can't believe they are going to be 5 in June. They are the best little boys. Each day gets easier with them. It's nice to feel like I am on the down hill side with them. They already have gotten all their shots for Kindergarten. I really will miss all my kids. It's a bitter sweet moment having everyone in school. We got new carpet in our house last week, Justin had some friends over to play. When they walked in the house Justin ordered all of them to take off their shoes. It's really cute to see the kids taking pride in our home.

We recently found a good deal on the Internet for the Disney Cruise. They are cruising from California this next year, so we booked it. We are going to the same place Jake and I went for our 10 year anniversary last year. The kids are saving their money for the trip.

I think that is a great update for now.

I am also going to be posting new pictures, so check those out. :)

2010-01-30T19:36:00.003-07:00

Can't believe its been so long since posting to our site. There has been so much to update, just not a lot of time to do so. The girls will be turning 8 in February, can't believe how time has flown by.

Kendra had a very rough Christmas, to say the lest. She was in the PICU because of a large infection. She under went several surgeries to clean out the infection. She is home now on IV antibiotics. She is a very strong little girl! This infection was one of the more scary ones, that made us really reflect on how blessed we are to have our children with us. Kendra is doing very well in school. She is very social with her friends, lets just say she is very popular. It makes us very happy to know that she has so many great friends. Her PT is going quiet well. She is able to wear her "robot leg" for about 10 minutes. I am very proud of her strong efforts. She is growing into a beautiful young girl. In Primary the teacher asked the students, How do they know their parents love them? Kendra answer was because my mom tickles me all the time.

Courtney has stopped dance for this season. We needed her to focus on her education, but she will be returning next season. She is an amazing dancer! I hope you all were able to see the youtube video of her dancing in one of her competitions. Courtney is really enjoying making videos with her friends, brothers and sisters. She is very photogenic! She is always making up new things to keep her from being bored. Courtney is so beautiful and really growing up to be a great example for her brothers and sisters. We are proud of her!

Maliyah is doing great even after her many set backs this last year. Since I last updated she has had several more surgeries. She just keeps on being so strong! She is very happy despite all that she is going through. She struggles everyday with pain in her back and hip/leg, but with the great Aide the girls have at school they work through them. Its a tough road for her! Her kidney continues to go strong! We thank God everyday for that! She is growing into a beautiful, intelligent, young lady.

Austin is still in preschool and enjoys going to be with his friends not to learn. He is more then ready for Kindergarten and bored with preschool. He amazes us everyday with the words that he says and the sentences he is putting those words into. He is clever beyond his years! He looks more like his dad everyday! He reminds us greatly of Jake's father Lamar. He loves Star Wars and the Wii. He is very good at video games. Austin has a hard time giving kisses and hugs now. He tells me he is to big for them, so we just tickle him and tell him we love him. Its sad to see him grow-up so fast.

Justin is still going to preschool as well. He is a BIG challenge for me. He is head strong and isn't willing to listen to us very much. He loves preschool! For Christmas he received a snowplow that he hasn't let out of his sight since. He even takes it to school with him. Jake took Austin to a Jazz game with him and left Justin at home with me, it was amazing how much they missed each other. They talked on the phone a lot, and even had to leave the game early to see each other. They have a close bond to each other. They are lost without the other. I have always wanted my children to have a good relationship with each other, and I think so far they really do. I am glad that Justin is still the baby in the family and will give kisses and hugs. I hope he stays that way for awhile longer. He isn't very excited for Kindergarten because he will have to be gone from me everyday, but I am sure with his brother with him he will be fine.

Jake and I are still going strong! We are a great team and really love our jobs of raising these wonderful children. What more could parents want in life? They make us proud each of everyday. I am still continuing my education and will do so for years to come. I am enjoying going to school. Jake has been very supportive, he is such a great husband and father. He will turn the big 3-0 this year. I hope we can do something incredible to mark the day. I haven't come up with the perfect present or surprise for him yet. But I have until June to figure it out.

I hope that I don't go this long without updating again. I will love one day my kids reading all of these entries.

2009-10-01T20:28:00.002-06:00

The girls are going to be on the Oprah Show tomorrow. Its just an update show. Happy watching!

2009-09-30T22:30:00.000-06:00

We just updated a lot of new pictures. Take a look. :)

2009-09-30T21:37:00.003-06:00

It has been a while since we have updated. Maliyah had surgery again for the same thing. Her VEPTR made a hole in her skin again, so they took one of the rods out of her back. She was able to go home that same day. She is missing a lot of school this year so far, which makes me very nervous!
Kendra is doing very well with her 'robot' leg. She is getting around very well at school with it. I am so proud of all of her hard work. Both the girls started dance at the beginning of the school year, but decided that it was too hard for them. I went and visited their class and they were able to keep up with all the other kids.
Courtney decided that she wasn't going to take dance this year and is going to try gymnastics. It makes me pretty sad that we aren't going to be doing her Saturday competitions this year. She is taking a tutor by her Grandma and Grandpa's house. She is flying through her reading classes, so I wonder what we are going to put her in to keep things challenging for her. She has also been having a hard time hearing, so we are taking her to the ENT for tubes because she is getting so much fluid in her ears.
Justin and Austin are so dang cute!! I can't believe that they are going to start Kindergarten next year. I will miss my sweet boys so much. They are learning about safety this week at preschool. They came running out telling me about 911 and the fireman. I was laughing with another mom about my boys calling 911. And was just waiting until they made that phone call. Well that never happened, and at the field trip today the mom told me that her son had called 911 and the police showed up at her house. So funny! Austin's favorite thing to do right now is come up to me and tell me how pretty I look today. He is so sweet. Justin is probably going to be getting his tonsils out soon. He is having a hard time sleeping at night and he has been on a antibotics for 4 weeks now and nothing is happening. We are going to meet with the ENT soon.
Jake is enjoying the football season and I am too. It's nice to get someone to watch the kids and take off to the games together. I told Jake that we will have to start following the team around, if they go to places like Florida.
I enjoy school and am doing VERY well! It's great to be able to learn, but the classes I am taking right now are so easy that it's not very much work.
In Utah the Fall is over and the snow is starting. Our kids are very excited for that, but I dread the snow. I hope that we can get a truck or something for me to drive when it snows.

2009-08-27T08:43:00.002-06:00

I am really sorry I don't update this as much. Facebook is just easier and faster, but this is a lot more important because the kids will love this when they are older. :)

Maliyah just had another unexpected surgery on Monday. On Saturday she was having some back pain and noticed that some of her VEPTR was showing through her skin. Thankfully there was no infection to speak of, probably because I got it taking care of pretty quick. She missed just a couple days of school and is back in the swing of things again.
Kendra is working on her 'robot' leg, but its just so heavy for her little body.
Courtney is really bored! She has 2 weeks off of dance and she has no idea what to do with her extra time. There were times when I felt bad because she went to dance so often. Now I know that she needs that.
Justin and Austin are learning to ride their 2 wheel bikes. Its been fun running up and down the street with them. They still aren't ready to be competely off their training wheels, but in time. They also are so excited for winter. Justin keeps asking when the snows is coming. I wonder if he realizes that he won't be able to play outside for hours on end like he does now.
I just started school yesterday. It was really cool being in a class setting again. I really love to learn! The sad part was listening to the people around me whine about having to be there. I guess when you haven't waited 10 years to start school, you really don't know how to be grateful for the little things in life.
Jake is very excited for College Football. Can't say I feel the same way. Now back to being a single mom for the season. Which is fine because he does what he loves and so do I.

2009-08-23T14:48:00.003-06:00

The kids just started back to school last Wednesday. When we were leaving the school Justin turned around to the girls and yelled "see ya suckas". It was so cute! The girls had a great day at school. I wanted the girls to go back to school, but now I am so lonely for them to be at home with me. I miss them! I signed the girls up on Saturday for dance. Courtney is back on the competition team taking 5 classes. Kendra and Maliyah are starting with just 2 classes, they take a Jazz/Tap/Ballet class and a Jazz Technique class. They are so excited! I even signed myself up for Jazz Technique, which was probably a bad idea because we are going to be busy with the kids stuff. We will see how the first month goes. Justin and Austin are lost without the girls at home. They seem to fight more than before. Their pre-school starts in September. Jake is still plugging away at work and things are busier for him than ever. Then school starts for me on Wednesday. Jake isn't very excited for that, but he is still supporting me through it. He knows that it's been my dream for years.

2009-08-11T13:07:00.002-06:00

The summer is coming to an end. I can't believe how relaxing this summer has been. The older the kids get and easier things seem. Several years ago, if the girls got sick they would need to be in the hospital. Now they know what need to be done for them to stay at home. The last several years has been more then overwhelming at times. I think we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Thank Heavens! I really thought this would never happen for us. When you are in the thick of things its hard to see when the hard stuff will end. I know that things will be rocky at times, but I am glad that we are getting a break. I really think the vacation that Jake and I took was a big help to see the positive things in life.

Justin and Austin are starting their 2 year of preschool. Kendra and Maliyah are starting the 2nd grade and Courtney is starting the 4th grade

There is a cute girl Kiera that came from Canada to meet our family. She wrote on her blog that meeting the girls will be better than meeting Hannah Montana. I agree with her!

2009-07-29T17:10:00.003-06:00

The last several weeks have been so much fun. Kendra and Maliyah stayed with their grandma Patsy for all of last week. Then my Aunt Nikki from Provo took Courtney, Justin and Austin. Jake and I got a much needed break from all 5 kids. It was heaven on earth!! The summer is almost over for our children, it has flown by. The girls are done with summer school and are reading on a 3rd grade level.
We are planning on taking the kids camping before school starts. Maliyah is finally done with her PICC line. Kendra is working hard on her 'robot leg'. Courtney has a dance camp in the next couple of weeks. She will dance 19 hours in 2 days, she is so excited! I uploaded her dance video to youtube. Justin and Austin are doing very well and will start sports in the fall.
Life is so good right now. My children are healthy and things are going so well.

I would like to thank the people that look out for our family. Thank you!! And to the people that write nasty things on MY guestbook. Its really funny to read your notes, do you really think we care what you think. LOLOLOLOLOL!! You just make us laugh!

2009-07-17T16:23:00.002-06:00

Thanks for all of the guestbook entries. They are so wonderful to read... It nice to know that we have people around the world that pray for our family and that are excited to hear the good things happening to us. Things have been REALLY crazy!! Our family has been sick with the throwing up. Maliyah has gotten it a lot worse than the others. Thank goodness she has her PICC, so that I can give her IV fluids at home. On Tuesday she must of thrown up ever 10 minutes, all the way up until I started her fluid. She will have it pulled out on Monday when her lab work shows everything back to normal. She will have it pulled out on Monday when her lab work shows everything back to normal.

The girls have been working really hard on there legs. The work will be worth it when they are able to walk without there walkers and crutches.

The girls expansion went BETTER than I thought it was going to. We were able to go as a family to see the fireworks at the park by our house just 2 days later.

Austin favorite thing to say right now is "mom pay attention". He is so funny.

Justin just wants to play outside all day long with his best friend..

Courtney just made the Juniors dance team. One of the studio that is in our neighborhood is flying so professional dancing instructors to teach. So in 2 days Courtney will be taking 15 hours of dance. She is so excited!! Kendra and Maliyah are taking dance at the same studio as Courtney.

There isn't much to update about Kendra other than she is doing so great. I think that TLC show really showed how funny and happy she is. I loved all of her funny phrases in the show, like awesome, weird and it just like playin in the mud..

I loved that my children are always so happy and willing to show how brave they are with others. Its truly is amazing how far they have come and how far our family has come. We are still under a lot of stress, but we know as time goes on that it will get better. Things always do with time.

For those that have emailed me there stories about there families. Thank you so much!! You are such amazing families as well and your stories touched my heart!! We all have trials to get through in this life, but if we help lift each other things will get easier.

2009-07-08T10:39:00.002-06:00

I wanted to update and let you all know that our TLC show is airing this Sunday the 12th, 13th and 15th of July. Check your local listings for times.

The girls have their legs and are taking off with them. They also had a surgery this past week to lengthen their rods in their backs. Maliyah is still on IV meds for the infection she had in her back a month ago. She is still on a feeding tube as well.

Kendra is doing very well.

Both of the girls started dance this summer..

Sorry this post is really short but its going to be a very busy day today!

2009-06-10T19:05:00.002-06:00

Justin and Austin turned 4 years old today!! I can't believe how much they have grown. Its also very scary to think back and remember that me and the boys almost died together today. I love them so much!!

Happy Birthday My Boys, Justin and Austin!! I love you so much!!

2009-06-08T10:25:00.002-06:00

The kids are so excited because it summer time!! Part way.. The kids have tutoring that they will be doing this summer. They each have some catching up to do. So 3 days a week they will be working with a tutor until 12. Than we will make sure we do something fun in the afternoons.

I CAN'T believe that Justin and Austin are turning 4 on the 10th of June. How time flies!!! It makes me so happy that things are starting to get so much easier, than they have been in the past. Its days like this that makes me excited for the future and to see how well my kids are going to do.

Maliyah had an infection in her back, so she went in for another surgery. She was suppose to be in the hospital over night, but it ended up being several days. She is home on a PICC line. She is such a trooper!!

Kendra was sick for the last day of school, so she stayed at home with me.

On Sunday's we all like to take naps after church. So we all laid down and about an hour later I went to check on the kids. Justin and Austin had flour all over the kitchen. Kendra had gotten the keys to Jake's car and back it out of the garage. So at 6:00pm the three of them went to bed for the night. They were in big trouble! I still can't believe Kendra was able to touch the pedals and shift the car. She is an amazing little girls!

Courtney has several dance camps planned for this summer. She gets smaller breaks in between, but Courtney is dancing anyway at home. She loves to dance!!

Jake and I are trying to figure out if we will be able to take a vacation just the two of us. We need to see if its in the budget, even if its just something close to home for a couple of days. We need to just be alone together. Jake will be going to Wyoming for work, so I thought that would be a good idea and I would be cheap for us. Not a very romantic place, but we can't complain. We just have so much fun together, so it doesn't really matter where so go, just as long as we are alone together.

2009-05-17T18:53:00.002-06:00

We have been married for 10 years on May 15th!! I can't believe it has been that long. We have been together for 12 years!! We have the most wonderful children ever!! Jake surprised me with a rented Charger for our date, I LOVE fast cars. I don't think he realized how much I did until we started our date. We went to dinner and went dancing. It was very nice to just be together and forget that we have responsiblities, stresses and children. The children stayed with Jake's sister Amy for the night. We got home at 3am, it was nice to remember the reasons we got married in the first place.

On Saturday, Kendra and Maliyah had a birthday party at 11am, which you could imagine was hard for us because we had stayed up all night. The party theme was a Tea Party, so the girls wear very cute pink dresses. Courtney spent the rest of Saturday with her cousin Mariah. Justin and Austin stayed home and played with Dad while I got my hair done.

Things are going really well. There is a saying my Dad always says "it's a GREAT day to be alive".

2009-05-14T14:45:00.003-06:00

I am so excited because I am starting school this summer at BYU!! This will be such a great thing for me! I have been dreaming of this day for as such a long time...

The 3 girls had a performance at school on Monday. They did an amazing job! Yesterday I was able to see Courtney's dance pictures. They turned out so well. She is such a pretty little girl! She is very happy that dance is almost over for the summer, she is ready to be bored. The boys have their graduation from preschool on the 27th of May. They have one every year to graduate them to the next level. Kendra and Maliyah have a field trip tomorrow that I am going with them on. I HATE field trips. I know that they are only young once, but I still hate going on them. The school didn't have anyone to help Kendra and Maliyah, so I had to fill in. I just hate finding babysitters to watch the boys. I guess it will be a nice break from the boys, they are handfuls :).

I am doing several speaking engagements and really enjoy that. Some people think I am nuts because it really doesn't bother me to get in front of people and talk. I love the chance to share parts of our never ending story. Just because I am done writing that book doesn't mean the stories ends there. Life is always about the next trail and journey that we have to face, but we will be better for it. I hope that is always true for us! Its truly amazing to reread my book and see how far we have come, but than to realize we have a lot more to climb, and trying to figure out how to make it all the way to the top.

2009-05-06T19:07:00.000-06:00

We just uploaded new pictures!

2009-05-05T21:06:00.003-06:00

I was really upset today about the girls legs. Its so much work getting them fitted, more than I thought it would be. That is just our life, everything more work than we think. We are going back tomorrow for more fitting. I am so proud of the girls, well all of our children. They are all doing so well. We have so much planned for this summer, its very overwhelming. I will just take one day at a time and know I am not super women;).

Jake has been sick with strep throat the last couple of days. So I have been caring for him and keeping the kids away from him. That is all we need is the kids to get sick with this. I thought today that I was coming down with it, but I am just fine.

The boys and I are headed for another field trip on Thursday. I can't believe that they have almost finished their first year of preschool. Time flies!!

Courtney has her final competition on Saturday. I am really sad for those to be over because I enjoy watching her dance so much. At her last competition her team was so good even the judges her dancing. Its so much fun for Courtney! When Courtney isn't dancing its very boring because we wait for hours until her next performance.

Here is another neat post from the guestbook:
I have received and started reading your book and it is amazing. You are truely an amazing person with an amazing family. Even though I don't know you personally, I feel like I do. I spent 9 weeks on bedrest up at University Hospital with my twins before they were born at 32 weeks. In fact I went home the day before you were admitted from what I read in your book. I wish I would have had the chance to get to know you. I have followed your story since before the separation of the girls. They truely are miracles and I am so happy that they are doing well. You and your family are always in my thoughts and prayers and I wish you the best. Thank you for sharing your story.

Love The Herrin's

2009-05-04T15:43:00.003-06:00

There are many people in the world I admire for there strength and love towards others. But the ones I most admire are people that are real with the ones around them. Its a very difficult thing to stand up for something you believe in or something that you want so bad but wouldn't be good for your family. As I read your emails it touches my heart that some of you struggle through some of the things I write about in my book. I was at lunch with a friend of mine today, we both got pregnant at an early age. She talked about how she tried not to remember that time in her life, but when she was reading my book those emotions came flooding back to her. The best thing I have ever done in my life was marry Jake, have 5 beautiful children and than be able to write a book I know that my children will be so proud of when they are older. There are so many things we each face in our lives, but I know that I can get through mine because I have a great family.

I wanted to share this message that was left on our guestbook. Everyone has trails in life some more than others. I am just glad that people are willing to share them with me and my family.

Erin-I got your "heart in print" on Friday and read the entire book without stopping. I was touched by so many thoughts and feelings that you put to paper. You really shared your personal life with those of us who have been so impacted by your story. I feel like I know you and I wish I lived closer. I would love to do anything I can to help. Thank you for opening up your heart and life to us. I'm sure a lot of it was difficult to live through the first time and writing it had to bring back a flood of emotions. I had to have a box of tissues to get through the book. I, too, am a mom and respect and admire what you did. I would have chosen the same path. I have, also, struggled with my marriage and continue to do so now, and pray that the Lord gives me strength and direction. Thank you, again. I love you and your family. You are my inspiration!!

2009-05-03T11:33:00.002-06:00

Everyday I open my email and the guestbook to wonderful messages from people that really do care about our family. So thank you for making my days better. The best has been hearing how much you each LOVE my book. I hope you all don't mind, but I am going to be putting those up on our website. Its so wonderful that my dream of writing my story came true. I will not put the names up because some of you wouldn't like that. So keep the emails and guestbook entries coming :).

I received your book today and haven't been able to put it down! I'm just beginning Chapter 19. Having followed your website since the separation, I was surprised to see how much I'm reading for the first time in your book. It's so honest - even when it's so clear how difficult some of the issues were - and so beautifully written. I suggest everyone who is thinking about ordering the book do so. You will be glad you did.

Maliyah is sick today! I really don't want to take her to the hospital, so please say a prayer for her, that she will be good as new tomorrow.

Love
The Herrin's

2009-05-01T14:22:00.002-06:00

The girls didn't receive their legs yesterday, as planned. We have to wait until May 5th now. I also had to schedule the girls for surgery today. Each time it get worse for me to put the girls through another one. I just pray that they will not have to many complications like every other surgery. Our insurance refuses to pay for the hyper-bartic chamber, so I hope Kendra's belly will close. I really hate figuring out how to make insurance pay for things. I should write a book on jumping through hoops to get insurance help. Heaven knows I have done my share! I really want to get the kids signed up for swimming lessons, I am just nervous that something will happen and they won't be able to take them.

Courtney came home from school sick today. She has another competition tomorrow, so I hope that she can feel better soon. Justin and Austin had Pet Day yesterday, but Alli is still a puppy and so I decided that she didn't need to go. They took stuffed animals instead. Next year will be better for Alli to be around little kids.

Jake is pretty overwhelmed right now with stuff and I am overwhelmed with surgeries coming up. I told him we are a great time together so we can make sure the other one is doing OK. He always tries to do more than me. Thanks babe for taking care of me! :) I just got an invitation to my 10 year high school reunion, I am getting so old. I still feel 16.;)

2009-04-27T16:04:00.004-06:00

Everyone is doing great! Erin and the girls are going to be doing more media in the next 2 days than we think we've done since the separation. For those in Utah, they will appear on KUTV 2News today at 5:00pm, 10:00pm, tomorrow around 6:45am, and again at noon tomorrow. Then on the radio on 98.7FM at 7:40am, 93.3FM at 7:55am, and 107.5FM at 8:15am. Then on TV tomorrow on 4Utah and KSL5 at 5:00pm and 10:00pm. We'll try and post links for those not in Utah. We are having a reception to celebrate the book release tomorrow the 28th. You can see the invitation below for details, sorry for the late notice.

You and a friend are cordially invited to a very rare and special reception to meet the world famous Herrin Twins, hosted by #1 bestselling author Richard Paul Evans.

Come celebrate with the Herrins the release of their new book, WHEN HEARTS CONJOIN--the miraculous true story of the Herrin twins.

(The Herrin twins have been seen on Oprah, Good Morning America, Today Show, NBC News, Access Hollywood, 20/20, People Magazine, Glenn Beck and many other major media outlets worldwide.)

Who are the Herrin Twins?

On August 7th and 8th, 2006, the whole world watched as a team of doctors performed a miracle at Primary Children’s Medical Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. For the first time, four-year-old twins Maliyah and Kendra Herrin were having surgery in separate surgical suites. Born conjoined from mid-torso down, these two angels captured the hearts of millions of people around the world!

When Hearts Conjoin is the heart-warming (and heart-rending) story of Erin Herrin, her husband Jake, and Maliyah and Kendra. It is also a story of faith, hope and the power of a mother’s love.

Excerpt from the book:

At 5:45 a.m. we started getting ready for the big day. We awoke Kendra and Maliyah, wanting to hold them for the last time as conjoined twins.
“Is it Cut-Apart Day?” Kendra asked.
“Today is the day,” I said, hoping she wasn’t worried, like I was.
I’m not sure worried was a strong enough word to describe how I felt.
Terrified might be better. My nerves were raw, my emotions ready to erupt. I tried to stay positive so the girls wouldn’t see how upset I was and
become frightened themselves. If anything went wrong today - if I lost one or both of my precious daughters, I’d never be able to live with myself.

This is an extremely rare opportunity to meet these remarkable little girls, one you will likely never have again. Books are just $12.95 and not available at bookstores. Also available is a Special Editions signed by the girls. Author royalties from this book go to the girls’ special medical trust fund. Come support a fellow author. This beautiful book will make a great gift for your friends, family and loved ones.

Date: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 / 6:30 to 8:00 p.m.

Magnolia Grove Reception Center
1117 W. South Jordan Parkway (106th South) South Jordan, Utah

We will be limiting attendance. Please RSVP to Diane Glad at 801-676-3068 or email at info@richardpaulevans.com

Light refreshments
Media will be in attendance

2009-04-23T17:49:00.002-06:00

We started stamping the books yesterday!! It was so much FUN! We put the girls on our love sac and a small table in front of them. They watched their favorite show and laughed about being famous. They were so excited that people wanted their hand prints on their books. It was such a great day!! We had the local newspaper over to take pictures of the girls with our book.

Then today I went on a field trip with the boys. I am so tired and so are they. It shouldn't have been too bad, but we sat on a train and changed trains. I think it was the sitting that made us tired. When I am up and about I don't get tired very much. The boys loved it! The funny part was that I had made the boys go potty before we left the house. The drive was less than 15 minutes and they need to go again when we got there. Thankfully there was a bathroom on the train.

A mothers work is never done and we can never be to over prepared for what life brings.

Jake has been working so much lately. He seems to be overwhelmed with things, so my job is to step up and take his load off and do whatever I can to make things easier. We both aren't sleeping at night, so that is difficult on both of us. We need a magic sleeping pill :).

Courtney is finally at 5/4 in her math level at school. She was so excited!! When we left for St. George she was suppose to take the test for that and missed it. She was worried she wouldn't be able to move up in the class. She made a 80% and moved up to the next level and started at an accelerated rate. GO COURT!!

2009-04-22T21:54:00.002-06:00

I had a meeting with the girls teacher today and also the SE director. We updated some of the plans for Kendra and Maliyah. Kendra is up to grade level on all of her work, so we just added goals for PT. Maliyah, on the other hand, is struggling and is not 100% at grade level, but she is working very hard. I will be getting the kids tutors this summer, so they don't fall behind. In someways I can't wait for summer to come, but then I am worried we won't have enough things to entertain the kids. I think most moms worry about that with their kids. I plan on putting the kids in swimming lessons. I really wished I had help taking the kids to the zoo and things like that. I am very creative so I will find a way. The girls were so excited today about stamping their books. They watched TV and got the books done. They were laughing and having a great time. They want me to read the book to them. I have read that book hundreds of times and still can't make it through without crying. We will see if I am brave enough.:) We got the results of Courtney competitions: Jazz they got 1st place, Lyrical 1st and Show Hip Hop 2nd. Justin and Austin are doing very well. They have a field trip tomorrow that I am going on. It will be so much fun. We are riding a train.

2009-04-20T20:27:00.003-06:00

The Book is now available!!! We are so happy. I worked on this so hard and can't believe it is finally out. So please start ordering it. The girls are so excited to start signing books. You can order it at http://www.whenheartsconjoin.com . I really think you will enjoy it. And remember that the royalties go into trust funds for the girls. Thanks to everyone for all the support and prayers over the years, they were all a part of making this happen. I can't thank everyone enough. It was tough reliving some of those moments, but it was very therapeutic. Please everyone let me know what you think of it, I love hearing from you. And please sign the guestbook, it used to get so many comments, and we miss them.

We also have some new things that will make it so much easier to update the news and photos. We're going to try updating twitter, the blog and photos simultaneously so you can feel like you're a part of our outings. We are able to do it from our phones, so it makes it so easy when we're out and about to post. It was a lot of fun today to post pictures and update while the kids were swimming. They had so much fun swimming and posing for pictures.

2009-04-19T21:24:00.003-06:00

We had a great time in St George. Courtney's first 2 dances went really well. When they started the show routine things seem to be fine. When Courtney came out as the New York Yankees, she was swinging her bat and hit herself in the eye. Thankfully I was setting in the front row because she looked at me and she started tearing up. I mouth to Courtney that everything was OK and she started smiling really big to stop from crying. I was so proud of her. She was dancing and was having a really hard time seeing, but she finished out he dance. I told her after what a great job she did and than got her some cotton candy. She was happier after that. It was a really nice drive with just Courtney and I. We had some great chats.

Right when we got home we changed and jumped back in the car and drove to West Jordan, where Jake sister got married. (check out the pictures) It was a very small wedding, but that really doesn't matter because they are so happy. I got some really cute pictures of my family at the wedding.

Jake was great with the kids and I was impressed when the house was clean when I got home, well most of it anyway. The kids were even dressed for the wedding.

The Guestbook is back!!!

2009-04-15T14:07:00.003-06:00

We're excited to have the guestbook back, hopefully it will keep out the spammers. So please write us, we love to hear from you!

**UPDATE**

The guestbook is not working correctly, will put it back up once it is fixed.

**UPDATE**

Ok, it should be working now.

Disneyland Vacation

2009-04-12T21:06:00.002-06:00

WE never know what tomorrow brings, so we have to live for today! The last several months have been difficult as I am sure you all have read. It seemed to be one thing after the next. I decided that Kendra's hernia surgery could wait until this summer. They girls are both going to be having back surgery soon. I was trying to hold off until this summer, but we will see. Maliyah is doing AWESOME right now. I am so proud of her. She is one strong little girl. We just got back from Disneyland. It wasn't suppose to be a Disney trip, but turned into one. It was very tiring. The kids had such a good time, Jake and I were very tired from all the walking and pushing of strollers. The beach was just amazing and it felt so good to be away from the medical stuff for a week. I just hope we can extend the surgeries and hospital stays to this summer. Courtney and I are leaving for St. George on Friday. It will be a fast trip!! We are staying with Jake's brother it make things cheaper. Courtney's competition is on Saturday, I hope early in the morning so that we can get home. Jake's sister is getting married on the 18th of April and would love to go and see that. Justin and Austin are getting so big and talking so much. I am so excited for the all of you to see the documentary on TLC. The kids were so cute when we were filming. The fitting for the girls "robot legs" went very well. They were so brave and Kendra was excited for the new step in her life. Maliyah is a little nervous for her "leg". Everything in Maliyah's own time. We have so much work this summer to help them to use their legs and get them moving. I really hope they aren't discouraged with the difficulty of using their new legs. I really want things to go really easy for them. They really need a break!!!

Website Changes

2009-04-03T08:22:00.004-06:00

As you may have noticed, we're changing the website a little to intergrate with the book site. Also because of all the spam we were getting we moved the updates to blogspot format, so please comment on our posts because we have eleminated the guest book. We love hearing from everyone so please post your comments. We've also changed the photos page to make it much easier to post pictures more often. Check out the new pictures we just put up and also some photos of the girls in the NICU under 2002. Let us know what you think. Thanks again for all the support.

2009-03-30T21:31:00.001-06:00

Things are going REALLY great!! It is still snowing in Utah.. We are getting really sick of it! The kids are all so excited about our family vacation and are counting down the days. I am getting very excited about this book. WE got a mock up from the publisher the other day. I cried like a baby, because I have worked so hard on this project. The girls were so excited to see their faces on the cover. There are also a lot of never seen pictures in the book, some I had forgotten I had. We are in the mist of filming the TLC special right now. They are getting some really cute and funny shots of the kids. The TLC crew is very good to work with and my kids enjoy being around them. All I have today is just really good news!! THINGS ARE REALLY GOING WELL!!

2009-03-19T17:01:00.000-06:00

Maliyah has lost 3 of her top teeth. She looks like a vampire!! Good thing she loves them!! We have another appointment for the girls "robot" legs on April 1st. I hope this appointment goes better than the other one. The weather is getting better here, so the kids play outside more. Kendra has to have more surgery, but I am going to put it off until the summer, so she doesn't have to miss school. Austin and Justin are still hard work. They have so much energy! Last night when I pulled Maliyah's tooth out, Justin held her hand. Maliyah was so cute and thanked Justin for his help. I am so excited for the release of the book and to work with Richard Paul Evans, he is a great person and his team is great too. I have been so busy lately because we are getting ready to take the kids for a vacation to California. We need to get away for awhile. We're going to Disneyland and Legoland. All we want to do is lay on the beach and just play. When we went last year the kids wanted to swim the whole time. I have been taking the kids at night swimming, while Jake has been working late. It takes Maliyah several hours to warm-up and like the pool. She is so scared of leaving me because she says she might drown. She is so funny!! Courtney's first dance competition is Saturday, bright and early, we have to be there by 7:15am. Good thing I am a morning person. I am going to take the video camera and upload some videos. She is a very good dancer.

Update

2009-03-13T12:54:00.001-06:00

I have been very worried about Maliyah since October. I haven't been sleeping at night, and she was up a lot as well. I took Maliyah to the doctor for her once a month doctor visit. They told me that she was only receiving 1/2 of her calories for the day. I had no idea!! It really made me mad, they know how bad Maliyah was doing and they let it slide because she was gaining a little weight. She is 7 and doesn't even weight 30 pounds, so how could that be good for her. So I got that taken care of. She is doing so much better!! She is getting around on her own and finally thriving, when I wasn't sure she was going to make it through some of the nights. What a weight off my shoulders. I am able to sleep and not worry so much about her. Life is really good right now. I have been staying really busy with the boys. They didn't have pre-school this week because the teacher's daughter was getting married. Courtney will start her dance competitions in 1 week, so she is working really hard at that. I can't wait for Courntey and I to head to St. George for a weekend in April. Just some alone time!! I know that we will be busy with dance most of the time, but I do hope there will be time to swim. It will be nice to have a break from the kids, Courtney needs a break too. Kendra is working very hard on her crutches. We are starting the filming of the TLC special at the end of March, it will air in June. But that can always change. Some friends of our just lost their conjoined twin daughters. So our hearts and prayers goes out to them. There are more conjoin twins that die, than are ever separated. Our girls are Miracles and we are better because of them.

New Pictures!

2009-03-10T15:19:00.000-06:00

We had to take the guestbook down on http://www.herrintwins.com because of the overwhelming amount of spam we were getting. We're going to have to figure something else out. Either email us or post comments on http://whenheartsconjoin.com . We're also excited about our new pictures, you can see them on http://donpolophotography.wordpress.com/2009/03/04/when-hearts-conjoin/ please check out their work, they are awesome.

Order book by check or money order

2009-03-02T10:48:00.001-07:00

Thank you for the overwhelming response on our upcoming book!

If you would like to purchase a book using a check or money order.

Send the check or money order to:

WriteWise
Attn: When Hearts Conjoin Order
65 E. Wadsworth Park Drive, Suite 110
Draper, Utah 84020

Check payable to WriteWise

Enclose the cost of book + $5.00 for shipping and handling.

Maliyah has RSV

2009-02-23T11:44:00.000-07:00

It was a scary week, last week. Maliyah had gotten a cold and so had the boys. On Monday she was throwing up with the cold and getting dehedrated. So I made an a appointment with our ped and got right in. They check Maliyah oxygen and it was down quiet a bit. So that called an ambulance to transport she to the hospital. I had Courtney and Justin with me, so Courtney rode with Maliyah and I drove the car behind them. Jake met me at the hospital and got the other kids. That night the nurse wrote down the wrong dose of prograf for Maliyah, 5 mg instead of .5 mg. Prograf is to keep Maliyah's kidney from rejecting.They gave her two doses and than the pharmacy caught the mistake. The prograf level were to high in her blood and made Maliyah go into a form of rejection, she stopped being able to pee and her kidney was in shock. Her blood work was so bad I didn't know if she was going to have to return to dialysis. Thankfully her kidney started working again and we went home from the hospital with Maliyah on Friday. She is still weak but back at school. She had RSV, and today just a cold.

We are now on FACEBOOK! Join us!

2009-02-13T15:45:00.000-07:00

Everyone become a fan of the Herrin Twins on Facebook, just go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/Herrin-Twins/56276037018?ref=nf It's a great way to keep updated on the book and everyone can share links, pictures, stories, and videos. Kendra and Maliyah are getting a video camera for their birthday (shhhh, don't tell them) and hopefully they'll make some videos to put on it.

Update from Kendra and Maliyah

2009-02-09T11:46:00.000-07:00

Update from Kendra and Maliyah word: Kendar lost a tooth forever!! Maliyah has a tooth!! Its almost our Birthday!! The sky is blue, roses are red,and I love you!! Maliyah says she is feeling better. We got cut apart. They really love to be silly, can you tell. They are having a great day today. Jake is with the boys at the store, Courtney is at dance, the girls and I are just playing at home together. The girls are getting fitted for their legs on Wednesday, a company is donating one to each of the girls. We have something better than pictures, our family will be on TLC. Its a show about Hope, Inspirations and love. We are excited to start filming it soon. The girls are too. They will also show alittle about the girls getting fitted for their legs. I am still worried about Maliyah because she isn't strong enough to get a leg yet, and she struggles to get around someday. Her skin color is still pale, but she is trying so hard and I am proud of her. We are changing the name of the book to, "When Hearts Conjoin." I can't wait to share that with you all. Its so great!! I have enjoyed writting the book with Lu Ann. Our family will treasure this book forever.

Family Updates

2009-02-06T16:47:00.000-07:00

I know everyone is asking for pictures and we will get those up ASAP. It has been very busy!! I am finally finding time to do some of the projects that I have put off for so long. I am painting the boys rooms and giving them big boys rooms. I am really enjoying this last little while because Maliyah is doing better. It seems that it won't last very long. She is starting to hurt again, so it will be a work in progress. I feel she is more improved than she was. We just have to stay postive. I am going to call Dr. Meyers office again and see if she can schedule her to have another CT scan. I am worried about Maliyah, but I need to stay busy. I know that's hard to understand, but its the way things need to be. Kendra is doing so GREAT!! In a couple of months Kendra will be ready for her leg, she is nervous about it, but I will be with her ever "step" of the way. The boys are big handfuls and eating machines. Courtney is doing so well with dance. I am so proud of her. She dances sometimes 5 days a week, if she has extra dance times. If she isn't dancing, she is teaching our other kids to dance. Most of the time music is on at our house. As you can tell from my post we have many ups and downs, but we are still moving forward even if they are little baby steps. Please keep Maliyah in your prayers. We know that will help her get better.

Book Update

2009-01-26T12:50:00.000-07:00

I have been going through so many picture for the book. I am so excited that this large project is almost done. What a great thing for my children to have. They will understand how strong they are and how much we love them all. As I understand it there will be a lot of pictures in the book. I am very excited for you all to see. With there being more pictures the date has changed to May. I hope!! Everytime I think we are close something happens.. Life is funny that way. Kendra and Maliyah's birthday is coming up and they can't agree on the best theme for the party. I am just excited to make their invitations. My sister-in-law Amy is getting married and she is allowing me to make her inviations. Its a fun hobby I have. I hope everyone is doing well and that you are all healthy. Talk to you soon. Love The Herrin's

Maliyah doesn't need a new transplant

2009-01-21T11:51:00.000-07:00

Maliyah doesn't need a new transplant. They remove a kidney that never worked, it didn't even have kidney tissue in it. It was a sac like fluid inside, but I could of been causing the pain. She is doing so much better!! We are so proud of how fast she has recovered from the surgery. She is back at school and the teacher says she is the best she has seen her in a long time. I had to take Kendra to the ER yesterday because of throwing up, she needed IV fluid. When we were gone Allie got out and was hit by a car. One of our neighbors saw it. SHe told us that Allie ran and she jumped in her car to find her but couldn't. So when Jake got home he went look, I did as well, but we could find her. We left our back door open a little just in case she could make it back home. Courtney was up crying that night. At about 12:30am Allie came walking into the house. We jumped out of bed to see if she was ok. Everything looked good, other than some large cuts on her. I took her to the vet the next morning. They did surgery to close some of the larger cuts and to clean everything up well. Needless to say Allie is now our Miracle Dog!! We love you Allie. I do have to add that as soon as Allie walked into the house she ran downstairs to sleep on Kendra's bed. The kids were so happy!!

Update on Maliyah's surgery

2009-01-09T12:14:00.000-07:00

Hi Guys!! Maliyah had surgery on Thursday. Doctor Meyers called us on Tuesday and she had the surgery on Thursday. She is doing really well. I was very surprised how fast her bowels are recovering. She had 3 surgeries in one. She had a hole in her bowel that was fixed, a kidney removed and than bladder stones removed. Her incision is pretty large. Her ribs are doing much better. I hope she will be able to return to school soon. I am so proud of her!! All the kids are doing really well. Kendra is doing her crutches at school instead of her walker. Austin and Justin are enjoying preschool and playing at Grandma's when mom is at the hospital with Maliyah. Courtney is still dancing up a storm. She was really sad when everyone went to the movies on Saturday and she had to go to dance. When I was at the hospital I got a call from Jake because they had gotten a flat tire on the way to the movies, on Saturday. He was able to get it fixed fast and make it to the movies on time. He is so great!! They had a great time.