It has been another good week.  I have been reading to Josh and Nate at night lately.  Nate often laughs the whole time.  Reading helps Josh calm down and, hopefully, fall asleep at a reasonable time.  For me, it is a highlight of each day.

This week, Marie and I will celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary.  It is hard to imagine we have been married for nearly five years.  It seems like just yesterday we were preparing for our wedding, just like Becca and Landon, with bright hopes for the future.  I think it is safe to say, these five years have been more challenging, yet more rewarding and joyful than we could have imagined.  In five years we finished school at BYU, attended medical school, started residency, had two children, and have created many wonderful memories in the meantime.  I love Marie and I love our two boys! ~John

Josh playing blocks.

Marie and John at the canal.

Marie, Joshua, and Nate at the canal.

Nathan.

John Graduated!!!!! Yeah!!!

John is now officially:

Dr. Edwards

We are so grateful for all of Johns hard work!  It has definitely paid off.  Tonight John is on-call as an actual doctor.  So, I'm catching up with my blogging like usual.  I figure if John's up all night, I might as well be up too.  Well, I actually should be sleeping or tomorrow we will both be dead tired!  He actually graduated on May 15, 2009.  Time flies so fast.  I cannot believe how quickly the four years went!   

John and Ben

Josh and Dad

(Josh was so hyper that night.  Josh had just been recently diagnosed with asthma and has been on several medications since so he can breath.  The problem is that they make an already active boy 10x as energetic and keep you from sleeping (yeah, kind-of a nightmare in the toddler world).  Some of the medications are steroids (you know the ones that athletes take illegally as performance enhancers).  You seriously cannot even begin to believe how fast Josh is on his steroids.  Note to self, if your child is on prednisone don't take him to your husbands medical graduation, you might go crazy! ;)  Haha!  I'm laughing now that I look back.

John and his amazing mom (she raised him so she's gotta be one of the best mom's ever!).

Graduation lunch with John's family.

I forgot to post this event a few weeks before gradation.  John's dad was asked to be the visiting professor for AOA(Honor's Society for Doctors).  He gave an amazing talk.  He was so funny too.  It was so fun to have family out so much.  When are you guys coming to Indy?  We've been so spoiled.

I thought I would start contributing to the blog.

Things are busy as usual.  I was on call Sunday and Tuesday.  When I am on call on a weekend, I show up early in the morning and complete my call duties the next morning.  Weekday call starts at 5 pm and ends the next morning.  I got a call from the trauma hospital, Wishard, Tuesday night saying a patient had a large bleed around his brain and was critically ill.  I went with one of the 3rd year residents to see him.  His right pupil was fixed and dilated (an ominous sign) and we took him straight to surgery.  We removed the right half of his skull, cut the covering around the brain and right there, sitting on the top of his pulsating brain, was a large clot.  We took it out, stopped the bleeding, put his skull back together, and sewed up his scalp.  I love my job!  

The real highlights of the week, though, were with the family.  We all went to the Zoo Friday night.  Because we have a membership, we had no concern about showing up just 50 minutes before close to enjoy the zoo in a very peaceful and uncrowded setting.  Josh loves the animals.  He is currently working on potty training, and most of his prizes are little animals.  Marie and I had a great date last night.  We had dinner at PF Chang's and went for a long walk along a recently renovated canal downtown.  

We love our home and neighborhood.  We live 2 blocks from a park with a pool.  I play basketball there every morning.  I think the neighbors wonder what crazy person gets up to play basketball 5 am.  All I have to say is, it beats the heck out of running.  One of our neighbors is 12 and loves babysitting.  We have had her come twice already.

We have a great ward.  Marie was called to play the piano in Relief Society.  Josh loves nursery.  We are making friends.  On the 4th of July, a family from our ward invited us and several other families for breakfast at their home.  It was great.

--John

Josh's 3rd Birthday Party Celebration in Iowa

I know that this post is way overdue.  I still have tons of catching up to do.

We celebrated Josh's 3rd Birthday at our favorite park in Iowa, North Ridge Park, which was right by our old apartment.  We had a baseball cake and ice and the kids had a blast playing at the playground.  

We really miss all our friends in Iowa.  Josh talks about all his Iowa friends all the time. 

I love this picture of Josh and Sonah!  They have the cutest happiest smiles!

Josh loves his birthdays.  He talks about having his 4th, 5th, 6th, etc. birthday often.  He'll say: "I'm 5,  I have a birthday party today?!"  He really tries to find any excuse to have a party and friends.

Josh and Sam ("Sammy")