"I have a Family here on Earth....."

I hope I'm not being too sappy, or personal by writing this, but I wanted to remember this day in a few years.

This past Monday I got a phone call from my former Principal, Mrs. Miller. She told me that one of my co-workers sons had passed away that afternoon. He had been battling thyroid cancer for the past few months, and had lost his fight that afternoon. He was only 27 years old. I knew he had not been doing very well, but I was still so sad to hear he had passed away.

Today was his funeral. I got up early this morning and got Keric and I ready. Most of the teachers I worked with were there and it was so good to see them, but so sad to see Wendy. I couldn't help but cry as I gave her a big hug and told her how sorry I was.

The funeral was very nice, however Keric was pretty fussy during the whole thing and I spent most of the time outside in the foyer trying to calm him down. I got him settled down and asleep just in time to walk back in for the closing song and prayer.

After the service we all stood as the casket was taken out. As I stood up holding my sleeping baby I watched as the casket moved slowly down the aisle. I was looking at the top floral arrangement and the big red ribbon that was on it. On the ribbon was the word "Son". Right about that time, I caught Wendy's eyes. I realized as I stood there with my little fussy mess, what a surreal and horrible scene that must have been! I was HOLDING my baby, and she was BURYING hers! We both began to cry and I realized that I was unintentionally holding Keric a little tighter and closer to me as I sadly watched her follow her son's casket out of the chapel.

I was so humbled by the thoughts that were running through my head at that very moment. In a split second I was reminded of a few things that I needed to be reminded of:

1. Life truly is very fragile.

2. Your "baby" is ALWAYS your baby, no matter how old they are.

3. How thankful I am for the knowledge that I have that Families are Forever, and that there is life after this one.

I came home from the funeral with mixed emotions. I was so sad, and even almost depressed for the rest of the day as that image kept running through my head, but I was also thankful for the lessons that I was reminded of today.

One of my friends referred to this scripture in her blog the other day, and I actually thought about it today and it helped me to not be so sad.

D&C;101- 16 Therefore, let your hearts be comforted concerning Zion; for all flesh is in mine hands; be still and know that I am God.

Story Time

Recently Keric has started smiling more on "demand". It used to just be once in awhile while he was drifting off, or on the rare occasion when he was actually sleeping, but now we can get him to do it a little more when he is awake, and looking at us. It is SO FUN to have him look up at you and then give you this big happy grin. He's also started to "talk" a little bit too. I just love it! He is becoming such a little person! I happened to have my phone close by this morning after his bath. He was being SO CUTE and I actually got some of it recorded on my phone. We'll see if the movie part of this works. Well I'm sure it works, but we'll see if I can make it work. :) I'm sorry you have to listen to my high squeaky voice in the background!

Mr. Sandman, PLEASE bring Keric a dream!!!

My sweet little boy truly is so so sweet but, sadly it's only about 95% of the time. When it comes to bedtime or naptime that yucky 5% comes out. He for whatever reason refuses to sleep and when he does sleep it's never longer then 2 hours at a time, mind you this doesn't even usually actually happen until around 1 or 2 in the morning! This makes for kind of a cranky mommy. As much as I hate the 2 hours of sleep at night, it wouldn't be so bad if he would take naps during the day, but alas, he does not, unless you count the 10 minute cat naps he takes once in awhile.

You think I jest....let me prove it to you!

A typical Keric "nap":


Awww....Mommy just changed my diaper and took my clothes off. I'm so much cooler now and so comfy. I wonder why she wants me to be comfy?


I'm just gonna STREEEEEEEETCH for a minute!


Awwwww that felt good!


Hmmmm? My eyes are getting a little heavy.......


I'll just close them for a second. Hi Mommy! I'm still awake!


"Night Night Bubby! Mommy Loves You! Sweet Dreams!"


Wait a minute! Did Mommy say Night night?? NO!


How long was I out? WHAT DID I MISS!?!


I'm Up, I'm Up! What are we going to do NOW?!?

FOILED AGAIN MOMMY! Better Luck Next Time!

No longer my "too tiny man"!

The 17th of the month was kind of a busy day for the Bennion family! It was my Mom's birthday, the day Bethany had baby Iris, and Keric officially turned 2 months old!

I took Keric into the Dr. yesterday for his two month visit. I had prepared myself for all the shots he would get, but I guess I was naive in what the scale would say. Chris and I had both thought he would be around 7lbs or so. My guess was 7lbs 6 oz and Chris' was somewhere close to there.

I took him into the exam room and changed his diaper so he would have a fresh dry diaper. Then I carried him out into the hall and put him on the scale. If I hadn't of been standing there myself I don't think I would have believed it, the scale said my little preemie boy now weighed 8 lbs 11 oz!! I thought his baby seat was getting a little heavy lately! :)

They also measured him and he is now 21.5 inches long. He's a tall baby, which probably is the reason why he still looks so "skinny".

He gets credit for the 4 weeks he came out early, so they really measure him as a one month old and not a two month old. As a two month old he is only in the 2%, but as a 1 month old he is in the 25%.

The Dr. was happy with his progress. She said he looked like a completely different baby, which if I go back and look at pictures, she's right. He is catching up nicely, which is encouraging. He has started to smile a little more, and really he doesn't even HAVE to start doing that for another month.

He is sleeping a little more, eating lots more, and is such a fun fun little boy! I just love him!

I'm not exactly sure how I feel about my too tiny man no longer being too tiny... I mean I am glad that Keric is finally catching up and putting on weight, but I miss my little teeny tiny baby! I knew he was getting bigger because his preemie clothes were looking rather tight on him, his socks actually fit his feet now, and his legs fit down into the leg holes of his jammies, but I wasn't prepared for just HOW big he was! They truly do grow up too fast!!!


He even fits in his swing now!

What's in a name?

This weekend was kind of a big weekend for our family. Cameron got Baptised on Saturday and Keric was blessed yesterday, (Sunday) by his Daddy during Sacrament meeting. My parents and Cicily were able to come which I was very grateful for, along with Chris' parents, his sister Denise and her kids, Rylan, Owen and Teran, My sister in Law Denise and her kids Jack and Anna, Chris' sister Maren and her husband Dave, and also Chris' friend from high school Dean.

Keric unfortunately was not cooperative during his blessing. Chris was able to give him his name, and then pretty quickly after that he started crying. Not just fussy crying, but MAD crying. It wasn't as noticeable to those of us in the audience, in fact it took me a minute to realize it was MY baby crying and not one in the audience, but poor Chris was pretty stressed about it. I'm sure it was very loud in the circle! Anyway, it was a nice blessing despite Keric's protesting. Chris said Keric must have only wanted his name, and didn't care much about the blessing afterwards. ha ha

I thought with it being his blessing day yesterday, it was only appropriate to tell Keric and the rest of you, what his name meant and why Chris and I decided on naming him what we did.

The day we found out we were having a boy, we were both a little shocked, me more so then Chris I think. For whatever reason we (again...probably more so me) assumed I was having a girl. We had a girl name picked out and everything. When we found out he was a boy, I felt like we needed to find him a name and quickly. I guess I felt guilty for thinking he was a girl and calling him by a girl's name for a couple months. (Sorry Bubby!)

We talked about lots of different names, and even went to Barnes and Nobel to buy a baby name book to help us out. We couldn't seem to agree on any names that either of us came up with. I liked the name Grey or Greyson, and Chris liked the name Graham. Neither of us were going to budge for the others name. I had a hard time with names because being a teacher, you hear a LOT of them, and unfortunately the names kind of stick with the person, either good or bad. Chris hates "made up names" so there was a point I was almost convinced he would be forever called "Baby Boy Wexels". As we were driving home later that night, I was reading some baby names out loud. I don't know what made Chris think of it, for all I know I could have been reading "K" names, I don't' remember, but Chris asked me how I felt about the name Keric. I thought about it for a second, and then decided that I liked it.

Chris had worked with a guy named Keric Donnely a few years ago. He was Irish, and he said he had always liked the name. I had never heard that name before which was good, I did want him to have a sort of unique name without it being too "unique", so I looked it up in the baby book and sure enough, there it was. So there we had it! A name we could BOTH agree on, one that was unique but yet not "made up". We were making progress! There were lots of different spellings of it, but we both decided we liked the spelling of Keric. I liked it for a couple different reasons. The first reason was because Chris' middle name is Eric. I liked that in a way Keric would be named after his dad a little bit. I also liked the fact that it was easy to pronounce spelled that way. Being a teacher I had had far too many experiences looking at the spelling of a name and not having a clue how to pronounce it. I didn't want him to be one of those poor little boys in school always having to correct the teacher on the pronunciation of his name.

His name Keric, depending on where you look is either Gaelic or English. The most common meaning of the name Keric is "King's Rule".

His middle name is Daniel. His middle name was much easier for us to agree upon. He was given the middle name Daniel after my Dad. I have always loved, respected and admired my Dad. I have always felt like my Dad and I have a very special relationship. I still go to him for advice, and seek out his wisdom on lots of different things. In my eyes he is one of the greatest men I know! Chris also really likes and respects my Dad a lot,so we agreed on Daniel as his middle name.

Daniel is a Hebrew name, found in the Bible and it's meaning is "God is my Judge".

So the full name that my sweet little baby was given yesterday by his Father, is Keric Daniel Wexels.

I hope that as he gets older he is as proud of his name as I am. I want him to know that in his mommy's mind, his name is very special to her because it reflects both his Daddy and his Grandpa, two very important men in her life. It was only fitting that the third important little man in her life, had a little part of the first two.

I love you little man!!!


He wasn't too happy even before we got to church.

Cameron's Baptisim

Today was a big day for Cameron. He was baptised this morning by his Dad. We had almost 60 people who came to see him! My mom and dad and Cicily made the big 500 mile trek to come. He was so excited when we told him they were coming. He even asked Grandma Lynn to speak at his Baptism, and Grandpa Dan to help confirm him. He has lots of people who love him. :)

We all had a great time, and he looked so happy and proud.

Congratulations Cam, we love you!

The Wexels Week of Wonder/ Happy Birthday To Me

Every year Chris' family plans a little family vacation/reunion during the Summer. I'm not sure where the name came from, but we refer to it as the "Wexels Week of Wonder". So this year, the week of wonder took place in Southern Utah at a ski resort called Brian Head. This is a place Chris has gone to with his family since he was a little kid, so they were all very familiar with Brian Head and its surroundings, but I had obviously never been.

Most of the family, including Chris Aunt and Uncle from California arrived in Brian Head on Wednesday July 1st, but we weren't actually able to go down until Friday the 4th.

We packed the car up and headed down in the late afternoon. Cameron and Reagan had spent the morning with their Mom and Justin doing 4th of July parades and I think they told me a little BBQ in the park, so we weren't able to leave until after we picked them up. It gave us a rather late start, but we eventually made it. Keric was really good in the car. He hates his car seat and I was worried about him crying the entire time down there, but he actually slept for most of the time, and only woke up and cried when he was hungry.

Chris' family had rented a couple of Condos, so when we got there, we unpacked our stuff into the condo we would be sharing, and then headed out to find a place to watch the fireworks. It was the first time I ever remember being almost too cold, sitting outside watching fireworks. It felt good. I thought maybe Keric would stay awake to at least see one or two fireworks, but he slept through the entire thing.

The next day we went exploring. Chris took me to some neat places in Brian Head. There are lots of really pretty red rocks and canyons all over Southern Utah. It was really fun. He took Cameron and Reagan fishing later on that evening, but Keric had had enough "fun" so I stayed at the Condo and tried to get him settled down.





Some of the sights we saw.


Cameron's Fish he caught.

Later that night we had a BBQ with all of the Wexels, and Chris surprised me with a little birthday cake. The kids had gotten me a little gift that I opened also. It was fun.




The next day was my birthday, the big 33. I can't believe I am that old! I don't FEEL that old, and I'd like to think I don't look it, but who knows I guess? What does 33 really look like anyway? We decided we weren't in a big hurry to get home, so we decided to drive down to Bryce Canyon.

We got to see lots of really pretty sights, including "Big Rock Candy Mountain". I had no idea it was a real place! I only thought it was a song.








It was a fun trip, and a fun birthday. I got text messages and phone calls from my entire family, telling me happy birthday which was really fun to get when we got home. By the time we got home, it was about 12:30 a.m. and the kids were zonked out. We quickly put them to bed, unloaded the car and then crashed!

It was a quick little vacation, but we had lots of fun. The thing I love most about our road trips is all the laughing we do, and this trip was no different! Despite the fact that I turned 33, it was a fun birthday and a weekend full of "wonder"! ha ha