Welcome
to CasaGrutta
home of James
and Traci
Vaughn family snowboard day! January 2007
Matt & Lis wedding & riding Moab, Oct 2007
Jumping at Trailside park in Park City
Grandma Vaughn's 80th Birthday
Brian Head Mtn Biking - June 2007
American Fork Biking Adventure! - June 2007
Red Riding Hood Century - June 2007
Girls Nordic Skiing - March 2007
More Plummer Yurt from Matt's Camera
Skiing w/the kids - Christmas Eve 2006
The Vaughn Family Christmas Party 2006
The Grutta Family Christmas Tree!! 2006
Thanksgiving 2006 - Eugene, OR
Third tracks of the season! Alta 11.12.06
Second tracks of the season! Alta 11.05.2006
Fruita - Oct 2006 (Josh's photos)
Greatest Wedding in August - Scott and Becca
Moab - 2005
Tahoe - 2005
Honeymoon in Hawaii - 2004
Wedding - 2004
06.22.2009
Well, Holden's here, and we couldn't be more excited! He had a bit of a difficult time getting here - Traci went into active labor on Sunday, June 7th and we went to the hospital around 5pm that night. The first time the nurse checked, she was only dilated to 1, but because the contractions were fairly regular, they let us stay. The nurses continued to check her every hour, and suggested that she spend an hour walking the halls of the maternity ward to see if that helped speed things up.
By 9pm she was dilated to a 4, and the nurses agreed to admit her. She was in a lot of pain and was requesting the epidural asap! As soon as the epidural was administered, the doc on call broke her water, and we waited. By 1am, Traci was so uncomfortable, she wanted to start pushing. The nurse agreed, and we pushed for about 2 hours, making a bit of progress. Finally, the nurse told Traci to take a break from pushing and rest. However, she was still super uncomfortable, and decided pushing felt better than just laying there.
Another hour passed - Finally, around 6am, Dr. Larson showed up. Traci still has some energy left, and continued to push for another 45 minutes. Come to find out - when she broke her tailbone about 10 years ago, it healed a bit funky, which was why Holden was having a hard time getting out. Dr. Larson suggested that he use forceps to help him along. We were a bit nervous about the idea of forceps, but the nurse reassured us that Dr. Larson was the best doctor when it comes to using them. Finally, with the use of forceps, Holden was born at 6:54 am on Monday, June 8. He weighed in a 7 lbs and 13 oz and was 21 inches long.
He found his lungs right away, and continues to use them. We're learning new things every day, and trying to sneak in some sleep whenever we can. He's a lot of work, but definitely worth it. Thanks to everyone who has stopped by or sent us nice notes. We appreciate your thoughtfulness!
Deep Thoughts... With James Grutta
05.02.2009
The past month has been filled with a few spring trips to Moab, and preparing for the mini-Grutta's arrival.
Last weekend, we had 2 showers and our house now looks like "Baby World". We are so thankful for all of our awesome friends and family that chipped in to hook us up! There's so much stuff that we needed but didn't have yet, and everyone took care of us. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
At one of the showers, we played a game where I had to try to match James's answers. They had video taped him answering the questions earlier - check out the video to see how he did.
James is in Moab this weekend, while I opted to stay home. The weather was looking a bit dismal, and I decided to take advantage of some relax time at home.
We're currently in week 36, and seem to be measuring on track. If all goes well, Holden will be here in the next month. We're so excited for him to join our little family!
03.08.2009
Two weekends ago, BV called early on Sunday morning to see if James and I wanted to go ski and ride with him and his kids. Since I'm a bit slow on the snowboard these days, we figured it would be a good way to spend the day. James decided to snowboard for the first time in a couple years, and we headed up to Brighton to meet Brian and the kids. Turned out to be a super fun day! The kids are getting better at skiing and snowboarding, and, minus one small incident in the trees (Noah & Megan crashed into each other), it was an awesome day. See the pictures here.
We spent most of yesterday getting the baby room ready to move the furniture in. I picked up the furniture, (big thanks to Kasey for letting me borrow the truck!) and James finished assembling the crib this morning. While we still have a lot more details to finish up, the room is coming along!
I'm almost to the end of week 28, which means about 12 more to go. I have one more trip planned for work (Miami in 2 weeks), then I'm done with travel for a while (except for a Moab trip or two! I'm ready for springtime!).
2.15.2009
Today, I'm home nursing a cold that won't go away and James is out backcountry skiing with friends. I spent the last week in Long Beach for work, while James enjoyed some freedom at home (actually, he fixed a lot of the electrical issues left behind by our horrible electrician - you're the best, James!)
Since the last update, we've been working getting the room ready for the mini Grutta. We've painted, ordered carpet, and picked out the bedding and furniture. Just waiting for the carpet to get installed so everything else can fall into place.
For the most part, I'm feeling pretty good (except for this cold!), and I feel like my belly gets bigger and bigger each day. At every Dr.'s appointment, he says that we have one active little guy - I believe him now, because I can feel him moving around all the time. We're at the end of week 25, which means only 15 more to go!
12.27.2008
Happy Birthday, Mom!!
We had an awesome Christmas with the Vaughn family. Started with James and Traci opening gifts at their house - Traci got cross country ski gear (apparrently, it's a safer pregnancy activity than snowboarding! - see James' creative wrap job to the left) - James got a Wii, which has kept him busy over the past couple days.
Next, we spent a few hours and Kent and Susan's - Susan made an awesome brunch for us, and we got to see the kids open all their gifts from grandma and grandpa. We spent the rest of the afternoon playing Wii with the whole family.
For dinner, we ended up at Grandma Vaughn's, where she and Vicky made Christmas dinner. After presents and dinner, we played more Wii. Who knew it was going to be such a hit?
We have enjoyed the last few days off work - James has been skiing & I've relaxed at home. Today we're off to do some cross country skiing.
In other news - we've just scheduled our 20 week ultrasound that will happen in 2 weeks. We really thought we could wait and not learn the baby's sex, but it's going to be hard! We'll see if we can last that long.
11.02.2008
So, I've had a couple of requests to update the site, so here goes.....
Traci's dad is home and still recovering from the liver transplant. He's had his ups and downs, but is on his way to full recovery. He's eating well and getting his strength back in hopes that he'll be back on his motorcycle in the spring. You can stay up to date on his progress through Care Pages here.
Traci was recently promoted, and is now working as a Strategic Account Manager at eBay. She is responsible for about 20 of the top grossing sellers on eBay, which is super exciting. James continues to work for BD, and has been prepping for potential upcoming trips to Asia - we'll see if that happens or not.
Our most recent home improvement project was painting the front entry/door area. We've got most of the molding and casing installed, and the next step is painting the stairwell (and installing a handrail). This home improvement stuff is never ending!
We had an awesome Halloween - check out some pictures here. We spent Halloween night with Traci's family, and Saturday night with friends at their annual Boos and Brews party. Good times for sure! For those of you that we didn't see this weekend (or haven't heard yet), we're excited to let ya'll know that we recently learned that we're expecting our first child in June! Yay!!
We finally saw a bit of snow today in the mountains - It's coming slowly this year. Traci will be teaching at Brighton again part time, but James has decided to take a year off from patrol. It's his year to play without patrol obligations. Now if it would only snow!!
9.9.2008
What an eventful past week. It started on Friday, August 29th when we packed into Gaugh's truck and began our adventure up to Whistler, BC for a week of downhilll mountain biking. After a long 2 days of driving, we arrived at the awesome 4 bed/4 bath house right outside Whistler Village.
On Sunday afternoon while we were riding, Traci got a call from her mom that there was a potential liver available for her dad. Great news! we all thought. Traci's mom and dad packed up and headed to the hospital, only to find out a few hours later that the liver was bad. Ugh - the roller coaster begins again. Traci's dad's condition wasn't improving and he was in need of a liver. Being a holiday weekend, we hoped that another one would come along soon - and it did.
On Monday afternoon, the call came in that another liver was on it's way. The transplant started in the wee hours of Tuesday and lasted about 11 hours. Kent is recovering at the IMed hospital, and is doing quite well so far - for updates, check here.
The rest of our trip was awesome - we rode the Whistler Bike Park 5 days, and explored the valley trails one day. On our last day of riding, one of our friends had a pretty bad crash, which resulted in us evacuating him down the mountain on a backboard. Luckily, James was there to assist - it pays to have a patroller in our riding group! Drew made it to the clinic in Whistler Village, where they flew him to a hospital in Vancouver because he had some internal injuries. He's in SLC now recovering in a hospital here. Check out pictures from the trip here.
8.4.2008
Another week, come and gone, and more work done on the house. We installed casing and molding in the living and dining rooms and moved our furniture back in. It's SO nice to have our living space back and it looks great! I'll try to get some pictures up soon.
James is stll recovering from a separated shoulder, but he was able to ride bikes this weekend and even did a little climbing. Hopefully, he's 100% in a couple weeks, since we're hoping to be in Whistler the week after Labor Day.
7.25.2008
So, our floors are finally 100% finished! YAY! We've been working on installing casing around the new doors and molding. We're hoping to finally have functioning living and dining rooms soon!
Still a lot of small projects to do, but things are finally coming along and the house looks great. Still looking for ideas for a cool backsplash in the kitchen, so let me know if you have ideas.
Spent last Saturday watching Stacey compete in her first triathlon, which was awesome! She did great - check out the pictures. She almost convinced me to want to do one, but we'll be in Whistler when it happens - maybe next year.