Our Little Colony of Beas

Santa Claus is coming to town

2011-12-11T16:40:00.002-06:00

We took Noah to the mall a week ago to see Santa for the first time. We thought for sure he would cry. He did look like he might but in the end silly mama made him smile. It's funny the things you do to make a baby smile or laugh. He is sitting with 2 of his cousins, Ethan and Ashton. He loves them and so do we. This picture turned out so cute. I'm not sure what Noah told Santa he wanted for Christmas though. I guess I will have to wait until Christmas morning to find out. :)
Then brilliance shown and thanks to www.picnik.com I realized I could crop the picture perfectly so I could print (yes it's legal if you bought a cd of the pictures which my brother and sister-in-laws did) pictures of all 3 boys for Jason's family and the one with just Noah for my family. Totally awesome program!!

We are all doing pretty well. Noah will be 9 months on the 20th and I can't believe it. Still no crawling although he is getting pretty close. He is hilarious and makes funny faces sometimes because he knows it makes me laugh. He's a pretty funny little guy. He is finally sleeping in his crib at night. He's done it for almost 3 weeks and it is awesome. I finally got tough and made him cry it out. It was really hard for a little while but now he goes to bed usually with little crying and he usually sleeps about 10 hours. He's a tummy sleeper apparantly. I wish I had done this a long time ago. Live and learn. I guess that's why they call the first child the practice child. :) I am enjoying the Christmas season although it is going by so fast.

I have been going to get IV iron for the last 5 weeks and I have 3 more weeks to go before being tested again. Apparantly even with extra iron it has still been very low. Add one more medical problem to the mix. But 2012 will be here soon and since I have decided that I won't have any more medical problem past this year then I should be okay. Right??

I am sure I will not get back to post anything before Christmas. I sure wish I had a computer/internet so I could post more often but then you wouldn't get the thrill of the surprise you get when you discover I have posted. I'm just thinking of you. :) If you still are checking my blog. I sure hope so. Anyway, I hope you have a very

Merry Christmas!!

Updating

2011-09-15T10:10:00.002-05:00

Well my mom has been here for a little over a week (will explain in a minute) and is leaving this morning so I figured I'd better make a post before she leaves and takes her computer. It's so hard to decide which pictures of Noah to put on here because I think they are almost all adorable. I don't think however that everyone is interested in seeing every picture ever took of my son. Wierd as that is. :) The top picture is Noah just a few days ago at 5 months.

Noah is learning to sit up. He can probably really do it but he feels the need to reach for his toes and goes face first most of the time. He does a lot of leaning forward still. He also has discovered here lately the joy of being upside down and has also learned how fun it is to fall backwards while sitting up and have me catch him. He's only done that a few times but oh what fun. All fun and games until Mommy doesn't catch you in time. But, that day is not today. He has rolled from his tummy to his back a few times but is mostly content to lay on his back and roll side to side. He is in no hurry to roll, especially since he hates being on his stomach. HATES.

I love this picture. He just looks so adorable sitting there. I know he's my kid so I am a bit biased but I just think he is such a little cutie. Love my boy. He loves to be kissed and loves to kiss. I even realized the other day that he understands the word kiss and sleep. He doesn't like that last word. It's a 4 letter word to him you know.

When I feed Noah baby food I tend to make mmmm noises and say num num a lot to keep him interested I guess. I have noticed before him making lots of mmmmm noises as he is eating but it wasn't until yesterday that I noticed him saying or trying to say nums in there too. It happened a few times during one feeding and then a few times the next feeding. One time very clearly. CUTEST. THING. EVER. My mom noticed this too so it's not just me. :) Poor kid probably thinks that's what you are supposed to do when you eat. It'll be my fault when he comes home from kindergarten crying because the kids teased him at lunch when he kept saying mmmmm and num. :) No, but seriously. Adorable right. The kid is 5 months old.

Okay so why my mom has been here. I had a large ovarian cyst that wouldn't go away so last Thursday I had surgery to remove it. The surgery went well and I even got to keep my ovary and I am healing well. My doctor is amazing. I seriously recommend him to anyone living in this area. It has been a bad medical year for me. I had never been in the hospital before or had any surgeries before and this year I have been hospitalized twice and had surgery twice (or maybe three if you count my incision being opened again). I don't think I posted about that.

I mentioned the blood clot I had while pregnant with Noah and about the need for an emergency C-Section. Well two days after getting home with Noah my incision started bleeding out a lot. We went to my doctor who said that because of the blood thinners it created something like blood pockets or something to that effect. He drained it and we hoped it would work. That night it kept bleeding out several times so the next day (yes the doctor told me I should have gone to the emergency room) the doctor had to open the incision to let it heal from the inside out. Crazy I know. I got an infection in the wound and had to have IV antibiotics for about 10 days. It took 3 months for that stupid wound to completely close but it finally did. It has been a long year but a good year. One I would do over and over again for my boy. Which is a good thing because those things may happen again with another child since I will be on blood thinners from the time I find out I am pregnant.

I am off blood thinners now and only take a baby asprin a day. So that is my crazy medical year in a nutshell. Thanks to my mom again for selflessly coming and helping me.
We are doing well. Loving our Noah and getting ready for Fall, which even though it's not officially here and still occationally gets warm, it still feels like it's here and I love it. I can't wait for fall and Noah's first Halloween and Thanksgiving and Christmas (hello - way exciting).

So I must end this crazy long post so that my mom can pack up and go which makes me sad. I really enjoy her help and more honestly her company. I wish all my family lived closer together. I love my family. I am now rambling so I am ending this now. :)

One more for the road

2011-06-27T09:06:00.002-05:00

I leave to go home today so I thought I'd better make another post with cute pictures of Noah before I go back to not having a computer/internet available.

Here he is with his worried expression.
Here's his GQ cover. Pouty lip and everything. Every model needs his pacifier you know.

Noah actually does have hair on the top of his head now but from farther away all you can really see is is old man do.

Totally cracks us up.

Sweet little man

Noah's new little friend

2011-06-26T14:20:00.007-05:00

Sorry I'm not better at blogging. I wish I was but it's hard with a little one, no computer, or internet. :) I'm at my sister Karen's right now because she had her second little baby. Emily Amelia Jacobs. She's a cute little sweetie and we are so happy to add her to the family. Welcome sweet one.

Here is me holding Emily and Noah (who seems pretty happy about this arrangement). :)
Noah (who just turned 3 months) holding his little cousin.

I love his little smile.

Noah on the floor talking to Emily. He talked to her for awhile and then he started complaining. We think he was telling her the ups and downs of life.

Noah and Emily - best little buddies (or so I hope). Emily was almost exactly the size Noah was when he was born. It's amazing how much he's grown. For the record - Noah does have 2 legs even though I'm not sure where his left one is in this picture.

I'm so happy that Noah has cousins so close to him in age. He has 2 cousins 6 months older than him and now 1 3 months younger. I so hope they all grow up close to each other. Life has been such an adventure with my sweet little guy. Noah is a good baby. He's usually pretty mellow unless he's very tired. He is a snuggler who doesn't like to sleep anywhere but my arms although during this visit to my sisters I've got him to sleep in his bouncer seat with it laid back a bit. He's even sleeping in there right now in the middle of the day. This makes me very happy. It doesn't always work but when it does it gives me a little bit of my freedom back. I think he might have some reflux or something because he sleeps so much better this way where he isn't laying completly flat on his back. When he lays on his back he spits up a lot. He's not a great eater. He doesn't even come close to the amount of ounces normal for a baby his age but despite that he still is growing strong and big so I guess he is getting enough for him. I took him to the doctor a little over a week ago and he weighed exactly 13 pounds which means he's doubled his birth weight. He's such a little sweetie and I can't imagine my life without him. I sure love my baby guy.

Just Cute

2011-04-22T11:10:00.003-05:00

I don't have much time here so I'm just going to post some cute pictures of Noah for your viewing pleasure. :)

Day 1
1 week old

um.....3 weeks I think. His pants crack me up in this picture.

3 weeks again....I think

Once again........who knows but I think 3 weeks. :)

4 weeks. A little cross eyed but ADORABLE!

Cracking me up

2011-04-22T10:55:00.003-05:00

Here are some pictures that make me laugh.

What am I doing? Trying to eat him?? Noah even looks scared. :)
Getting weighed at the doctors. He looks like E.T. here. Sorry Karen. Just funny.

We saw this look a lot in the first few weeks.

Noah and his Mommy

2011-04-21T17:04:00.004-05:00

Noah turned a month old yesterday and I realized I haven't really posted many pictures of the cute little guy. Partly because there are so many cute ones that it"s hard to pick and choose, partly because I am busy and this guy won't let me put him down (notice the lack of make-up and the fact that I am usually still in pajamas), and partly because of my health problems (will post about that later - I am getting better day by day though). So, I thought I'd start by posting pictures of us together.

Me holding Noah after I got back from recovery.
Yes....we are cute.

Cute little guy staring at his Mommy.

I'm tired.

I am grateful to have this little guy. He is such a sweetie and I love him to bits.

Noah

2011-04-15T10:00:00.003-05:00

I was going to write a post. However, as soon as I added the picture Noah started fussing to eat. Sorry - that trumps my blog. :) At least you get to see the sweet little angel I have for a son.

Introducing.....

2011-03-23T18:54:00.003-05:00

Well we have our little guy. These pictures are ones my sister Amy took when she came up to the hospital to see him the day he was born. There are others I will put on here that my mom took but the computer won't let me upload them at the time. So I went in at 10:00 at night on Saturday to be induced. They put this tablet in me to help ripen the cervix and sometime around 1:00 am contractions started as a result. I spent the rest of the night and the next morning with bad back labor. *NOT FUN* Then in the morning I was only a 1 but the doctor broke my water to try and get me to a 2 at least because I wasn't progressing and I was having a lot of pain so they wanted me to be able to get my epidural. An hour later the nurse exaggerated my dialation to a 2 and I finally got my epidural. Front labor had also started along with the back labor by this point because they had started the pitocin. Epidurals are AMAZING!! Unfortunatly shortly after I got the epidural the contractions got stronger and the baby's heartrate dropped with each contraction. The doctor came in and said they were going to watch it over the next 45 minutes and see what happened. Then after the next contraction the doctor and nurses came in and stopped the pitocin and the doctor told me they were not going to wait the 45 minutes. He said they could watch it but the baby was not tolerating the labor and it would be bad for him if they let it go so I ended up with an emergency C-Section. I was really disappointed, sad, and scared (I've always been afraid of surgery which I had never had before). My dad and Jason gave me a blessing and off we went. It wasn't what I had imagined but in the end we got our sweet little baby boy. He was worth every second and we love him so much. He is so sweet, loving, and so darn adorable. My mom is here still with me helping out and I am so (a million times over) grateful for her. Just being here is making it easier. I am exhausted beyond believe, extremely sore, and amazingly happy to have such a beautiful wonderful gift.

Noah Alexander Beasley

20 March 2011

3:02 p.m.

6 lb. 8 oz.

20 in

The big day

2011-03-18T21:30:00.001-05:00

I am being induced on Sunday!! I'm excited and oh so nervous.

36 Weeks

2011-02-28T13:22:00.002-06:00

I am now 36 weeks! It still seems like a lifetime away but I know it really isn't much time. This is an ultrasound of our little guy at 33 weeks. Cute, huh? I can't wait to meet him. They did a growth test at Thursday's ultrasound and he was weighing around 5 lb 3 oz. One more month and he will be here. I am so excited even though in a way it doesn't seem like it is really going to happen. It almost feels like this is all a fantasy. But, it's not and soon we'll have our son here and life will be so different. Which is kind of scary but so exciting.

This weekend our friends Nick and Karissa came and painted the baby's room. It turned out really nice. All my sisters and my mom were here also for a girls weekend. They also helped clean and organize his room. It's not totally finished but it is looking good. Thanks again to everyone. My mom has been here for several weeks now helping out her invalid daughter. :) I really am so thankful for her sacrifice. She is amazing.

And the baby is once again pressing down on my bladder. Thank you sir. Now please stop. Actually my mom made chocolate chip cookies and I ate a few. Now the baby is bouncing around in there like it's his own personal fun house. He must have liked them...............I did too.

Bedrest

2011-02-16T18:33:00.003-06:00

So I'm not spending the last few months of my pregnancy the way I had expected or would like but I'm very grateful that at the end of it all I will have a healthy baby boy. Ready for the story?

So, for a week or two I was having really bad back pain. It really got so bad and sometimes moved to my bum (thank you sciatic pain). I was miserable and cried during my doctor appointment about it. He sent me to the physical therapist. The pain also traveled down into my thigh (little did I know that it was because of something much more serious). I got pain pills. All that jazz. I had noticed for a few days that my left thigh looked tinted a little purple while I was up but it wasn't bad and I had no idea. Then on the night of Jan. 27th I asked Jason if he noticed a difference in my legs and he said the left one looked puffy and redish purple. So the next morning as soon as I woke up I called my OB office and said I thought I had a blood clot. They sent me to the hospital for an ultrasound right away. By the time we left for the hospital my leg was very swollen, very purple, and very painful.

We went to the hospital and got the ultrasound. They had to do both legs so she started with the right leg first. She did that one for awhile and I asked her if she saw any there and she said no but she had just started. So then she did the other one (which I was positive there was one). She got done and I asked if she found one and she said, "I can't talk about it until I talk to the Radiologist. Get dressed, stay in this room and do not walk around any more than you have to." Oh crud. Yep, I have a large clot from my groin to my knee. Lovely.

So I spent the next 5 days in the hospital (missing my baby shower which was the next day - however we did have it here at the house this past weekend so that was nice and thanks to all who came.) I have now been home for 2 weeks and am on bedrest the rest of the pregnancy. I have to give myself blood thinner shots in the stomach twice a day to keep more clots from forming while I wait for this lovely one in my leg to disolve. It is some better. It still gets a bit swollen and purple when I am up to use the bathroom or take my quick shower but not nearly as bad and the pain is slight most of the time as long as I stay down. Bedrest totally stinks but I am so grateful for everyone who has been helping me.

My mom is here now with my brother Aaron who just returned from his mission. We discovered that their laptop picks up someone's internet if you are in the kitchen so I am reclining in the recliner in my kitchen with the laptop on my lap and it is so nice to be on the internet doing something normal again. :) I'm not sure how long it will take the blood clot to disolve. I am really hoping I'll be able to be back up and taking care of my guy after he is born. He is doing well. I have to have 2 ultrasounds a week and a doctor's appointment every week. He is doing well. A week ago they did measurements at his ultrasound and he was weighing about 4 lb 8 oz. I'm so excited for him to come (when he is ready).

So really I am doing alright. Just doing a LOT of laying around with my leg propped up on pillows. It's boring, uncomfortable, and disappointing but I'm doing it for a really good reason. Yay baby! Now if only we could get him a name. :)

Baby updates

2010-12-03T15:13:00.003-06:00

Things have been going pretty well around here. I did have an 8 cm cyst on one of my ovaries that they said they thought would go down. We sure hoped it would because they were talking about having to do surgery if it didn't. But, luckily when we went to our ultrasound on Tuesday to check on it, it had reduced so now it is only around 6.5 cm. I go back in another month to check on it again. We are very glad it's doing what it is supposed to. We got to see our little man again. This is the second ultrasound we had where he put his legs over his head. He's so silly. Here he is with his legs up. I love this picture. It's so cute. He really is a funny little guy. I'm not sure if it's just comfortable, he's showing off, or he's practicing his wrestling moves so he can wrestle with his Daddy someday. All I know is it is adorable.

Maybe he's practicing so he can put his legs up so it's easier to change his diaper. What a good boy. Something tells me this isn't so.
I love this one too. I think he is just starting to put his legs up but it looks kind of like he is walking up the side of my uterus or something.

Here's his sweet little profile.

In every ultrasound we've ever gotten he is ALWAYS moving around. The ultrasound tech had to work very hard to get this profile for us. This kid still has no name and it looks like it will be awhile before he gets one but we still have time. I've started having dreams where he is born and I get to see him. It has made me so excited for him to come. I want to hold him so bad. Although, I obviously want him to make it until around the end of March. I just want it to be the end of March now. :)

We are having.....

2010-10-26T15:41:00.006-05:00

Disclaimer: I know this is not a good picture. It looks kind of like a freaky Tim Burton character but you'll see why it's not so great if you keep reading. I'm pretty sure that the baby is in reality - ADORABLE. :)
A baby. It's official. Well, we went in for our ultrasound and it's pretty clear this baby will be a handful. It did not stop wiggling around. The little wiggle worm. It even had it's head down facing my back so we couldn't get the profile. It did wave at us though. Either that or it was telling us to back off. Not sure which but waving is nicer. We actually have to go back in 2 weeks for another ultrasound because it looks like I may be about 5 days earlier than expected and the baby moved so much that they couldn't get clear enough pictures of all they needed to. Luckily though, the baby did what it was told to and we got a clear shot.

It's a boy!

We are so excited to know that we are having a boy and can now start preparing. I figured it would be a boy because....well, that's what our families have. Also, we've had a girls name picked out since before we were married. Boy names however....not so much. I actually stopped discussing them with Jason because he likes such odd names so I said we'd talk about them only if we found out it was a boy. It begins. Hopefully in 2 weeks we'll get some good pictures of our little guy. Yay!!

Tomorrow

2010-10-25T12:32:00.002-05:00

So tomorrow is the ultrasound...finally. I'm really excited but nervous too. I'm starting to worry that something could be wrong. What if.....what if..... I know that chances are things will be just fine but it's really hard not to worry. We are so excited to find out if we are having a boy or a girl. So stay tuned for the big reveal and keep your fingers crossed that the baby's legs aren't. I joke that the baby's legs will be crossed, it's hands will be in the way, and it'll pull the umbilical cord up to block the way just to be a little stinker. But, what a cute little stinker it will be.

Chinese Fortune Cookies

2010-10-14T19:41:00.003-05:00

Tonight we went to the Chinese buffet. This was Jason's fortune from his fortune cookie.

"An alien of some sort will be appearing to you shortly!"

Um......okay.

More Ramblings

2010-10-06T13:03:00.004-05:00

Wow - A post 3 days in a row. How awesome am I? :) (I wouldn't get used to that if I were you.)
Seeing the number of days left makes it feel a lot longer than it did when I just thought about it in weeks. Wow!

We went to the doctor today and got to hear the heartbeat. We haven't heard that since around 6 weeks so it was nice to hear. The baby even kicked the dopplar or near it anyway. Cute little stinker. It was awesome though because I can't feel the baby kicking or moving yet so it was cool to hear it do it. It is just amazing to know that there is an actual baby in there moving around. It still feels like it should be the little peanut looking thing we saw in the 6 week ultrasound. We got to set up the ultrasound appointment too. YAY!! October 26 we will (hopefully) know the sex of the baby and I can't wait.

Newest News

2010-10-05T13:01:00.005-05:00

So for those of you who haven't figured it out, Jason and I have had no luck getting pregnant . For just under 5 years we had no success until ........... on July 26 I took a random test because I hadn't taken one in a long time and I was feeling a little wierd. I really did not expect it to say anything but negative. But wait....what in the world is that extra pink line? Seriously - I'm PREGNANT. It took me a long time to really believe it. I actually took several tests over the next few days. It just doesn't seem real after waiting so many years. We have really been blessed and are so amazed and grateful for this miracle in our lives. It really is a miracle. We are so excited! Today I am 15 weeks and 2 days along. I know I could have announced this awhile ago but it almost feels like I'm telling a lie. (I'm not...I swear). :) I am due on March 27, 2011.
I really don't have any idea what I think it is for sure. I have some ideas on it but I'm not going to post it because I am going to put a poll on here and if I say what my guess is, then that puts a bias on everyone else's guess. :) So vote away. If you want to leave a comment and tell me what you think that would be cool too because then I know who thinks what. I'm just so excited and can't wait to find out the sex of our baby. We should find out in about 3 weeks. It's also awesome because my brother Aaron returns home from his mission in Fresno, CA at the beginning of February so he'll be home when the baby is born.

So there is our shockingly awesome news! YAY!

FALL

2010-10-04T15:06:00.005-05:00

I am so happy that fall weather has finally come. I love fall. It just has such a wonderful feeling to it. I love the cool, crisp air, the leaves turning colors and falling. Everything is just much more relaxing to me. I love sweaters and jeans. I am just so happy we have finally made it past the heat of summer. No, I did not take this picture. I swiped it from google images. Wouldn't that be an awesome place to go walking though?

I love that I actually changed my background and am writing a post. I miss it and hope that I can get back into the swing of things soon. We are still without a computer and internet. I do have some pictures from our vacation on my in-laws computer that I will put on here and post about soon....plus some other excited things that happened this summer.

Speaking of changing my background, I love when I do that. It's just fun to me to change it up. During December I always want to change it a million times to get all the Christmas ones up. I do love the Christmas season and am looking forward to it. The hardest thing for me though when changing backgrounds is trying to pick colors for the text and such. Christmas is easy....red and green of course....and when I had a 4th of July one up...easy. But it's hard to pick colors that look good for other backgrounds. You know?

Okay seriously, now that I've started typing I can't stop. That wouldn't be a bad thing if it wasn't babble. :) But, you appreciate the babble, right?

Help

2010-07-02T08:37:00.003-05:00

Okay so it's been awhile since I've last posted. We are without a computer and that seriously makes it difficult. :) I'm at my parent's house right now and changed my background but things have changed with this blogger thing and now I can't figure out how to change the color of the writing on my blog to match the background. It used to have a little tab saying colors or something and now.....nothing. Anyone know how to do that?

St. Patrick's Day

2010-02-25T15:18:00.004-06:00

Confession: I LOVE IRELAND. I really don't know a whole lot about Ireland but just look at it. I think Ireland is so beautiful and I would LOVE to go there someday.

I was trying to find a picture of the rolling green hills (complete with sheep mind you) but I couldn't find one. I love St. Patrick's Day because of the association with Ireland. Not the day really just the green Irishy things. I definatly think it's stupid that you take a lovely holiday full of Irish bliss and have the holiday all about drinking. Whatever.

You have in no doubt noticed the Irish background I put on my blog. I must say that I like the little green shamrocks on the page but the more they are there covering the words the more they annoy me. The other backgrounds were just not exciting enough. Some were green and pretty but didn't express the joy. :) I love the green. Although, I do admit that it may be a bit of an overkill. A bit. :) Also, I HAVE to add.......just because the shamrocks on the side say Kiss me, I'm Irish (and I do believe I do have some Irish heritage) please do not kiss me.

I LOVE the accent. Even though Babe isn't the best movie in the world I still like to watch it occationally because it's set in Ireland. I just get a happy feeling I can't explain when Ireland comes up. Now I now that there's a possibility that I could go there some day and find out it's not all it's cracked up to be but for now....it makes me happy and I love it.

Food Storage

2010-02-25T14:30:00.003-06:00

Okay not that I'm going to start blogging about my imperfections every post but one thing I need to add to that list is that I need to learn how to do food storage and actually do it. I know how to buy extra cans of food and that type of thing but I'm kind of a dunce at how to do the flour, sugar, etc. Does food storage seem overwhelming to anyone else? I need some tips if anyone has them. I did buy 4 cans of chicken noodle soup to start my storage. They were on sale for 2/$1. Yay! I'm progressing!

I need to find a place to store them though. I suppose storage needs to include toothpaste, deoderant, contact solution, soap, etc, huh? I did see that a friend of mine has a link to a food storage site. I added it to my contact list but haven't actually looked at it much yet.

So if anyone has any hints or good ideas about food storage let me know. I already know to buy an extra something when I go out shopping (I just don't do it *sheepish grin*) but it's other things that I just get overwhelmed with. I know it can't really be that hard. I just get overwhelmed with the idea of it and so my brain thinks it's difficult. Silly ol' brain.

What????

2010-02-24T14:58:00.002-06:00

I know I've been a bit behind here. I plan on doing better but our laptop is out for the count. My brother-in-law got it totally virus free but then either the cord or the computer part itself where you plug it in stopped working so it wouldn't charge so we couldn't use it. Then the cord actually broke off. So our only hope is that we can get a new cord and that it's not the computer part that was screwed up and that the new cord will charge it and we can use it like normal. Especially because my pictures are on the computer and I would hate to lose a whole new batch of pictures. When will I learn? Someday (hopefully soon) I will do some major updating. Where would you even be able to buy a new cord that fits the laptop? Anyone know?

Well I got released as the Primary secretary at church and now have a new calling that I'm a bit freaked out about. I'm in the Relief Society presidency. What? Isn't that a grown up calling? Yes, I know I am a grown up (in most respects) but oh my. I'm the Educational Councelor to be exact.

My taxes aren't done yet so that hangs over my head. I need to budget better to be able to save more. Plus I'd really like to start paying more on our house payment and car loan. Plus, I'd really like to get some of the things done with the house that need done. Plus, I'd like to be rich. :) I also really need to get on the ball and start losing weight. That really hangs over my head. Sheesh. Just do it Jeanette. Well there are many more things that could be added to this list but who really needs to hear ALL of the many things I'm not good at? Plus, I may just be rambling because I don't know what else to say.

Well I'll be back soon. Oh, that could be added to my above list. I need to get back to blogging. :)
I just wanted you all to know that I'm still here.

28

2009-12-17T14:47:00.010-06:00

Today is my sister Karen's 28th birthday! In honor of this day I'm going to once again make a list of memories we've shared throughout the years. In fact, I'm going to share 28 of them.

1. "You're rockin' the cradle. Eh eh. Eh eh. Eh eh."

2. Barbies. Need I say more? And yet, I will. "We're doing their hair." You taking FOREVER to actually do their hair. It was pretty genius though. Borrowing Tepka's skipper aged boy barbie for a "school project". Cheerleader toilets. Taping Beauty and the Beast and then having the Barbies act out the play. Playing Jurassic Park songs and having the barbies ice skate to them.

3. Gymnastics. Always wanting to be the youngest in the Olympics.

4. Paper dolls. "I can't stop smiling." Aaron "murdering" Spider...so of course Sally had to go too. (That kind of reminds me of that lady on Addams Family Values.) "The 4 stoways outside the window." and how we can still remember their names.

5. Riding to school after Seminary with "You know who" (not Voldemort) and how mad you got when he accidentally "you know what." Could that one be any more coded?

6. Kate and Allie - Blockbuster. "Are you doing a school project or something?" "We're babysitting."

7. BIG DEBBIE

8. Nintendo thumbs!

9. Our many cooking shows. Remember the one where you made Kool-aid?

10. Our love of Saved By the Bell. Acting out their Cheers and of course the scene when Kelly breaks up with Zach.

11. Splitting your pants during Institute.

12. At Denny's in Rolla after Institute - "I GOT IT!"

13. Around midnight - "Here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna take a little nap."

14. Finger dancing to the theme song of Arrested Development to "prove" you were awake.

15. Harry Potter trivia in the dark, with candles, "pumpkin pasties", etc. How excited we were to see the first Harry Potter movie. Humming the theme music in Goody's.

16. You dressing up for the Lord of the Rings movie. Hahaha. I still can't believe you did that.

17. Coming home from your first date.

18. The Blue Bikers Club. Remember how we wrote the name of our club in nail polish on the storage closet wall?

19. "I gotta save Jeanette." "I don't want stitches."

20. Playing school with Aaron, Tepka, and Bridget during the summer and then getting really mad because they were going out of town and were going to miss "school". Seriously, didn't they understand priorities?? :)

21. You embellishing a story. "Wait. That never happened."

22. "What did you see at the parade?" "Candy". That was my favorite part too. That and Dad giving us his jacket.

23. "Smiley B"

24. Raking the leaves into a house with hallways, doors, rooms, etc. That was awesome. We have to teach our kids the awesomeness of the leaf house.

25. Blanket tents. We made AWESOME blanket tents. Remember the time we actually used a tent pole?

26. Begis and Bethie B. - You zoning out when I was talking about the book, reading the Rolaids bottle - gas, then the noise outside. As the Stomach Churns - Your long flowing hair. You are but a lowly, worthless servant and I am heir to the Slytherin throne. I'm a mother?

27. Aaron and the orange.

28. Playing school with imaginary students. We were both teachers with our own classes. My students were of course angels and you were over there getting mad at your students. "Billy. I saw that." You were totally getting mad at them. They kept getting answers wrong, etc. (when I remembered this at work I was in the back and I just started laughing. Later, when I was waiting on a customer, I remembered this last part and just starting busting up laughing while waiting on the customer) I finally said something to you about how you were acting to the "students" and you said (and I quote) with an angry, frustrated voice, "Well, they're being bad." HAHAHAHA!! Oh, man!

Karen - I am so blessed to have you as a sister and a best friend. I love you!

Happy Birthday!

Miracle M.

2009-12-12T15:22:00.003-06:00

Who needs Miracle Max, when you've got.............

Miracle Martha.

Haha - I crack me up.

These are my in-law's Terry and Martha.

I told my mother-in-law about the whole virus thing and then went to the house to try and put things in order. When I got back to their house Martha was working on our computer to get the viruses off. Turns out that the "virus scanner" was actually a virus. So there's no telling how many viruses we actually have but not 32 malicious ones. What a little jerk. Trying to get me to add more viruses by masquerading as a helpful computer world friend. Stupid virus. See, I told you I don't understand how to do all this virus scan/erase thingy. Luckily there are some smart people out there who do. She's still working on the problem so hopefully soon It'll be back up and running.

New lyrics

2009-12-12T09:08:00.005-06:00

Computer bug

Sung to the tune of All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.

All I want for Christmas is a computer bug.

A computer bug,

Yes, a computer bug.

All I want for Christmas is a computer bug,

so I can't post any of my pictures.

In case you missed it, that song was dripping with sarcasm. :) I'm pretty dense when it comes to computer viruses and getting rid of them. All I know is when I finally got the laptop to connect to the internet at my in-laws house the virus scanner popped up and said we have 32 (yes you read right) malicious viruses on the computer. What in the world? Then it said something about not being registered with the anti-virus thing. Yadda yadda yadda. I don't know what they are talking about so I shut it down until we can visit my sister and her wonderful husband who knows computers and can work miracles. Hopefully soon because I have posts backed up from the summer. Probably from last summer but I'm not going back that far. :)

So you'll have to wait a little longer to get the summary of our life since summer and get to hear about what's been happening to keep me from posting (besides the obvious computer bugs that apparantly are on steroids). Our house has been torn up for over a month but we get to move back in today. Yay! But, you'll have to wait until I can upload pictures to hear the full story. Posts are just better with pictures.

Do you see what I see?

2009-12-05T16:05:00.003-06:00

Jason and I were driving down the street when we looked over and saw Santa Claus on a motorcycle pulling into IGA. I really wish I had my camera with me. Bummer.

The real question is.....what was Santa doing at IGA? I can only imagine he ran out of cookies.

Let's try this again.

2009-11-25T20:24:00.003-06:00

Okay so last year I went to http://www.makemebabies.com/ and put my picture and my husband's picture in and it showed us what "our" babies would look like. They were pretty ugly. So I decided to try it again. They still have a real wierdness to them. It's like they are trying to put older facial features on a baby, but at least they are much more attractive than last years. :) I have a lot to post about as your house is ripped up at the moment. I'll post about that later though.

General Conference

2009-10-22T16:07:00.002-05:00

The first weekend in October was General Conference. I went to Amy and Mike's house to watch Conference. Karen and Mike went too. Here is Andrew during Conference (yes I know I shouldn't be snapping pictures during Conference but he was so adorable.

He loves that toy. No, he isn't sitting up on his own. He did a lot of falling over. :)
Zach was so cute playing with Andrew. He loves to make him smile. Of course who doesn't? Notice Andrew has discovered the joy of his feet. So funny.
This was actually the first picture snapped (yes, we've already discussed the fact that I should have been doing more watching than snapping.) :) But, I looked down to see this and it was just to precious.
Andrew and his daddy. Totally adorable.

Disclaimer: I did also watch Conference and it was only the one Saturday session that I took pictures at. :)

Tessa

2009-10-22T16:02:00.003-05:00

Check it out. Can you see Tessa's tongue sticking out while she was sleeping?

HILARIOUS!

Ethan's sleepover

2009-10-22T15:38:00.002-05:00

A little over a month ago we had Ethan come over and spend the night. He was thrilled. When we got in the car to head to our house he said, "Ready guys?" He was just as cute as could be. Well on the way to the house he was already planning what we were going to do. He wanted to watch Alvin and the Chipmunks (he's a bit obsessed with that movie). In the car he told us that "Princesses are for girls. Alvin and the Chipmunks are for boys." Totally cracked us up.

Ethan and Jason smiling for the camera. Kids in jammies = ADORABLE.
I can only imagine they were discussing something Chipmunk related. :)

Ethan said to take a picture of the movie....so I did.

The next morning Ethan watched some Sesame Street (Old School on DVD) and then decided to watch The Muppet Movie. I swear we did other things besides watch movies the whole time. :) Disclaimer: We didn't even watch 1/4 of that movie.

You guessed it. "Take a picture of the movie." Notice the row of DVD's laying on the floor. It must be little kids favorite thing to do. :)

Silly little Ethan. Tessa loves it when the kids come over. We spend a lot of time trying to keep her from bowling them over so she can kiss them to death.

We had a really good time and Ashton keeps reminding us that it's his turn next (which it is). If nothing comes up this weekend you may be getting a new post titled.....can you guess? Ashton's sleepover. :)

Be one with the hoop.

2009-10-22T15:18:00.004-05:00

I always get to busy or lazy to post things I want to so I figured now's the time to do a little bit of catch up. It still won't be even close to what I wanted but at least some of it will get posted. These pictures were taken.....sometime this summer. It started with Ethan - 3 on the left (Ashton - 4 is on the right) playing with the little basketball. He wanted to shoot it in the basketball hoop in Jason's mom's driveway but there were 3 problems with that. 1. He is too little to get the ball up there. 2. We didn't want him to hit the car that was parked near the hoop. 3. We didn't want the ball to smash the vegetables in the garden. SO, I decided to become the hoop. I held my arms out with fingertips touching in a big circle in true hoop fashion and Ethan shot the ball into the "hoop". Then we found one of those little basketball hoops for children in the garage....or by the garage....I can't remember. There wasn't a base so we propped it up along the fence and the kids had a blast. They were so cute and actually were pretty darn good for their age. So I snapped some pictures so Uncle Jase could see (he wasn't there) and he could be so proud. Which he was. Jason loves basketball...and when I say love what I mean is L-O-V-E LOVES basketball. :)

Aren't they adorable?

Monster Mash

2009-10-11T19:31:00.003-05:00

I can't get this to post the actual video but click on the link to watch it. It is so worth it. It's hilarious. We laughed pretty stinkin' hard.

Click here.

Craft Day

2009-10-11T18:22:00.002-05:00

Yesterday we had a Relief Society Craft Day at the church. I had so much fun. Here are the things that I made. I wish the pictures were a little better but since I don't have the worlds best camera or Amy's photography skills then I just have to take what I can get. I've been saying for years that I want to learn from Amy some of the tricks but it just doesn't happen. I wish we lived closer to her. I also want to learn to make a bird feeder she made and quilted baby blankets. I also want to learn to make some of the adorable paper crafts Karen makes. Someday I'm going to take time off work and have sister craft days. :)

Candy corn pot
Wall hanging. I'm trying to decide how to make it a little bit less plain.

Felt turkey. It is even cuter in person. Seriously so cute.

I also made an ornament but it disappeared before I came home.
I have the desire to be more crafty so hopefully soon I'll rise to the challenge. :)

Oldies but Goodies

2009-10-09T15:57:00.001-05:00

Just another reason why I love my family.

We have so much fun!!

Happy Birthday!

2009-10-09T15:45:00.004-05:00

I am getting so far behind since we don't have internet at home. This is my Mom and Dad (yes they are just that cute). Wednesday was my Mom's birthday and I think she deserves a post about it so she knows just how much I love and appreciate her. Last weekend Karen told me 2 different times that I was doing something like my mom and it made me happy. I think it's funny that you hear of so many people who hate to hear they are like their mother. There are so many jokes about it. What I love is that when someone tells me I'm doing something like my Mom, it just makes me happy. I love to hear that because I take it as a huge compliment. I love you Mom and hope you had a great birthday.

Wednesday was also my sister-in-law Serena's birthday. She's pretty awesome too. So Happy Belated Birthday to you too Serena. :)

Mancala

2009-10-04T15:36:00.002-05:00

Okay this post will be kind of lame but I found it while searching Amy's computer and it reminded me how much I like to play this game. Have you ever played Mancala? I don't actually own it so I don't play it that often but it's a fun, simple game. This is Zach and I playing it at my parents house a year ago (I think). Now you have something to get you by until I post again.

Your welcome. :)

A day in the life

2009-09-18T14:56:00.003-05:00

of Jeanette.

So today I was making the ad signs at work and I noticed that instead of putting Campbells chunky soup, I had put Campbells chunky soap. It made me laugh. It also made me think of a couple other funny mistakes I made at work.

One time I made a huge ad sign and put it in the front window. It wasn't until the end of the week that someone pointed out my mistake. Both Poptarts and Pot pies were on sale that week. I wrote Pot pies right but then made a teeny tiny mistake with the Poptarts. Instead, I had written Pot tarts.

A different day I was doing the marquee at work (you know - where you put the letters up on the high sign in front of a store to advertise?) Well it was starting to rain and the letters weren't sticking very well to the pole so mid word I went inside to wait for it to finish raining. A few minutes later it occured to me that if I'm posting the word Buttermilk, I probably shouldn't stop 4 letters into it. Yes, that's right. On the marquee was the word Butt. I went straight out to finish the word. Too funny.

Yes..........that's me.

In video

2009-09-13T18:40:00.004-05:00

This was Karen and I in January. Just in case you needed further proof of the insanity.

At it again!

2009-09-06T19:53:00.005-05:00

Karen

Jeanette

Perfect for me.

2009-09-06T15:08:00.002-05:00

This is my nephew Ashton (4). The other day Jason and I had to go to Wal-mart and Ashton wanted to go so we went ahead and took him. We were on our way there when Ashton says to me.......................
Ashton: I like you better.
Jeanette: Oh really?
Ashton: Yeah.
Jason: You like her better than who?
Ashton: (after a few seconds) She's just perfect for me.
As you can probably tell.....that melted my heart. Seriously, so cute. He also told us that if he gets disappointed then he's going to live with us. He is so funny. You never know what's going to come out of his mouth.

Suckers

2009-08-31T22:02:00.003-05:00

When I was little (I won't mention just how long I sucked my thumb....and had a blanket........okay I was at LEAST 10 years old.) I was a thumb sucker so there is a special spot in my heart for little children who suck their thumbs. Here are my favorite two. (I say because I think they are my only nephews and niece who ever sucked their thumb.)

My nephew Ethan (3).
My nephew Andrew (now almost 3 months).

I know they say that sucking your thumb isn't good for your teeth but I have to say......I SO hope my kids are thumb suckers. It just melts my heart.

The cuteness continues

2009-08-31T21:31:00.002-05:00

I seriously have trouble not posting pictures of the adorableness of my nephews and I just so happen to have about a million of the newest of the bunch. So I figured perhaps I'd post some pictures of Jason and I with him this time. :) Jason holding Drew for the first time. He was a little hesitant to do it before. I can't remember how old he is but I'm guessing maybe a month old.

Me holding him the same day. He looks thrilled huh? :)
Me playing with my little buddy. He put his little legs up and I got his little feet with my lips. He was about 2 1/2 months.

Still 2 1/2 months old and all dolled up for church. Seriously, how cute could a kid get? I love it.

Amelia Bedelia?

2009-08-28T14:57:00.003-05:00

I spent last weekend with Karen, Mike (well as much as I could with all his law school studying), and Andrew. It was a lot of fun but it went way to fast and there are so many things we wanted to do while I was there that we didn't do. Anyway, did you ever read the Amelia Bedelia books? She is the housekeeper lady that always messed things up. She took everything literally. Well, I think we found a new Amelia Bedelia. Karen. :) At least she had a good reason though. Andrew apparantly woke up almost every hour during the night so Karen was extremely tired that morning. She had to make carmel brownies (mmm) to bring somewhere. Here is the recipe.

Notice it says to mix by hand.
A little to literal there Karen. :) This is what little sleep does to a new mommy. It was hilarious though. As soon as she put her hand in the yummy mess she realized her mistake. So funny. What was the sweet little baby doing while Karen was stirring brownies with her hand?

I could snuggle that little guy forever.

Better late then never.

2009-08-23T00:36:00.004-05:00

Every summer my brothers and brother-in-laws (including Mike #2's dad....Mike) go on an overnight canoe trip. This year they decided to do something different but I'll blog about that later when I can get my pictures. This canoe trip was actually 2 years ago (2007).
2009
-2007
_____
2 years - See. I can do math.
I never have blogged about it and I ran across these pictures so I figured better late then never.

Mike #3, Mike #2, Aaron, Mike #2's dad Mike, Jason, and Mike #1
Aaron and Jason on the Current River.
Jason jumping off the cliffs. They all do it even though every year I beg Jason not to. Sigh... :)

I don't now if it was this year or the year before that both Aaron and Jason didn't put their sleeping bags into trash bags to protect them from getting wet.......which they did. The night got cold and the poor guys practically froze to death. Both of them said it was the coldest they ever remember being. They even tried putting the tarp over them I believe. They didn't sleep that night. They said they remember thinking that it MUST be early morning and then they looked at the clock and it was only a little after 11:00. They went out to the firepit and tried to make a fire out of leaves. Poor guys.

Little us

2009-08-22T20:27:00.005-05:00

Karen, me, and Amy looking a bit sleepy.

Me and Karen

This picture is of Karen (the taco), me, and Aaron. We used to LOVE making "human tacos". Seriously, aren't we totally adorable. The answer is yes. :)

To cut or not to cut.......

2009-08-22T20:12:00.003-05:00

Okay, so my hair is getting really long. Which in a lot of ways is really nice, but, at the same time it tends to drive me crazy. I pull it back all the time since it's hot and I keep getting a bunch of tangles in the under layers and it's driving me batty. I also noticed yesterday that one of my split ends has a split end. So I am thinking of cutting it. I don't know how short to cut it though. I am at my sisters house going through their pictures and I found this old one (taken in 2002). There is a pretty funny story to go along with the lipstick on my cheeks and lips and the little person drawn on my finger (her name was Sister Pointer by the way) but I won't go into that except to say that someone attacked me with lipstick. It was mighty funny. We had so much fun that night even though we did have to run to Walmart and I still looked like that so it was a tad embarrasing but still so funny. ANYWAY, the point is I looked at this picture and wondered if this was the length my hair should be? Any opinions?

Speak now or forever hold your peace.

Oh, and those of you who live in Salem....any ideas on where to go to get it cut because I am NOT going back to where it was cut the last time. Blah.

Read on

2009-08-18T15:42:00.003-05:00

If you haven't read these books then I recommend you do. Gail Carson Levine is a good, imaginative author. I liked Ella Enchanted a little bit more than The Two Princesses of Bamarre but they were both really good. So, I am sharing the news with you in hopes that you read and enjoy these books. I'll have to look for more books written by her. If you've read any and liked them then let me know.

Ding dong, you're wrong.

2009-08-18T14:16:00.003-05:00

"I thought I was wrong once, but I was mistaken." :) I love that quote. Well I guessed wrong. Ashley and Russell are having a little boy and I am so excited for them.

Hooray for little boys.

4 years!

2009-08-13T15:12:00.002-05:00

Jason and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary on August 5th. We lived it up by going to Steak n' Shake (Jason's favorite) and then going to see Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince again. :) We had a good time and Jason was able to get off work so we could spent the evening together. Our computer is still acting up so my pictures are limited to what's already been posted so I can't do this post justice but I didn't want to let our 4 year mark pass by without writing about it and letting my husband know how happy I am that I married him.

4 years down........eternity to go.

Prediction

2009-08-13T14:58:00.003-05:00

One of my best friends, Ashley (on the left - isn't she beautiful?) and her husband Russell get to find out the sex of their baby tomorrow. I am so excited for them. She is due on Christmas day. What better Christmas gift could you possibly ask for? My prediction? I say......girl.

Uncanny

2009-08-07T20:46:00.004-05:00

This is a picture of my Aunt Mary, Uncle David, and my dad. Take a close look at my Uncle David there in the middle and then look at the below picture 0f Scott Farkus from A Christmas Story.

Pretty funny huh? It totally cracks me up. Especially when you can put the pictures side by side. They look so much alike. Oh, man. Funny. Maybe that's why I love the movie so much. :)

I couldn't resist.

2009-08-07T18:42:00.004-05:00

Well once again my computer is sick (and maybe dying this time) so I haven't been able to blog or post any pictures, which is a shame because I have several to share. However, I'm at my sister Amy's house and as I was looking through her pictures I ran across a couple of them that I just couldn't resist posting. So, here is your long awaited post.
My nephew Zach turned 8 in July and was finally able to be baptized. He doesn't really look all that thrilled in the picture but you can have it on good authority that he has been beyond excited about it and it was just an awesome day for him. Well, us too. He's such a sweetie. He gave so many thumbs up during the program. After the baptism we all came to Mike and Amy's to eat and have Zach's birthday party.

Zach has also been way excited to go to Cub Scouts. I had to put this picture in because he just looks too cute and so proud.

This picture is just so funny. The kid has his arms up so much when he sleeps. Even when he is sitting. So cute.

Need I say more?? I LOVE IT! Amy had bought him those shoes and I had bought him the hat last Christmas before we even knew he was a boy. I had to. Luckily he was a boy and he is SO cute in it. This is the outfit he wore on his first day at church in Columbia. Karen, Mike, and Drew moved to Columbia (not the country) :) last week. Mike starts Law School there in a few weeks. We are sad that they are not as close now but it still isn't too far away and it sure beats Boston or Utah. I talked to Karen on the phone the other day and she told me Andrew wore his hat but then when I saw the picture on Amy's computer I almost died (not literally of course). My hands did go to my mouth as I gasped in a "Holy cow, this is the cutest thing I have ever seen." kind of way. My boys will definatly wear those hats someday. True that. :)

Parody

2009-07-06T14:41:00.002-05:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj-x9ygQEGA

I tried to put the actual video on here but it wouldn't work. Seriously though, click on this link and watch the video. It is hilarious. Karen almost wet her pants when she watched this because she was laughing so hard.

In other news I've taken lots of cute pictures of Andrew while I am down visiting my parents for the 4th of July and Andrew's blessing at church. I'll post more about that when I get back home so I can get pictures posted. My husband also had a birthday that is worthy of being posted about so hopefully you'll get more on those things soon. :) As for now, I'm going to go play a card game with Karen.

Malibu

2009-06-29T20:07:00.004-05:00

Jason and I finally traded in our old car for a newer reliable one that has air conditioning, the windows work, doesn't have 210,000 miles, has two side mirrors, the windshield wipers work, etc. Good news indeed. We bought a 2008 Chevy Malibu LT. We bought it today and we are so excited. So, muster up some excitment and get ready to view our new baby. :)

Yay! Oh, and notice our freshly (finally) cut and weedeated front yard. Double yay!
So clean and awesome.
Look at the back of the front seats. I love how they are carved out a little bit in order to give the person in the back seat more leg room. Coming from a family of tall people I can fully appreciate this. Oh, and the back seats fold down so if I ever decide to go crazy and own skis I can transport them in the trunk AND in the backseat. Sweet. :)

You might as well see the whole car.

Here are our cars side by side. A Ford and a Chevy. Our poor Taurus now has over 150,000 miles. We sure know how to pile on the miles, but it is now paid off and it's still working well for us......except in the winter since the heater doesn't work, BUT the Malibu's heater works. :)

Yay!

First things first

2009-06-29T19:41:00.006-05:00

Okay, first things first. My blog apparantly left a comment telling me it was time to update (yes, and it did write that quite awhile ago) and what did it ask for? Well, pictures of little Andrew of course so I thought I'd better do what it asked for and upload some pictures. As you can tell I have a hard time selecting photos of him to post because I want to post them all.....which I didn't. He's just too cute. So there are a lot of pictures but I just couldn't help myself. Just wait until it's my own kid someday. Imagine how hard it would be for me to weed through pictures then. :)

All dressed and ready for his first day at church.

Drew and his daddy. I love the cute little look Andrew is making. So cute.After church Mike showed Andrew what men did after church...take their ties off. It was so cute.

Sleeping baby. Actually, a rare thing in deed. Unless he decides to mix it up and sleep all day which apparantly happens once in a while.

Sweet, sweet baby.

He makes the funniest faces in the world. He's already a riot and he's not even a month old.

Just cute.
Funny baby.

So my little blog I do hope you are find this post to be as blog-worthy as I do. Since you have the same name as the mother of this adorable child I do think you will be pleased. Now, go and give him a kiss from me.

Happy Birthday Amy!

2009-06-03T17:33:00.003-05:00

Today is my sister Amy's birthday. I could go on and on with how much I love and appreciate her but I will sum it up with these few things. She is and always has been very caring. She is so crafty and amazes me with what she makes. She can decide to learn something and then does it wonderfully. One of the things she decided to teach herself was photography and she is amazing at it.

We have so much fun together. I love hanging out with my sisters. It's also important to realize that my sister Laura isn't in this picture and she is included in the fun....just not the picture. :)

It amazes me how much we all look alike (again, Laura too but I have a limited supply of pictures and unfortunatly there weren't any with Laura in them) even though I think we look very different too.

She is a good Mom to her little guy, Zach. She always takes him to many different hands on learning, completely fun trips like the Science Center, Zoo, The Magic House, weekly trips to the library, etc. He knows so many different things and I think that's great.

She married a man who may not be perfect (since none of us are) but is truely perfect for her. He is also very caring and loving and has been just another brother to us from day one. He is always so good to Amy. (So, yeah. I took this picture from your blog too. :) *sheepish grin* I wanted one with Mike in it and I think you look so cute in this picture.)

So, on this very special day I just wanted you to know, Amy just how much I love you.

Happy Birthday!!

I'd like you to meet.....

2009-06-02T18:56:00.003-05:00

Andrew Wyatt

Early this morning (3:36 to be exact) sweet little Drew finally made his appearance. He weighed 8 lbs 1 oz and was 20 1/4" long. Karen and Andrew are both healthy and doing well and Karen and Mike are tired but so very happy. She had a pretty long labor (17.5 hours) but just look what it brought her. He is so sweet. We got to go to the hospital this morning to visit. I kind of stole the above picture from Amy (because let's face it....her pictures are better than mine) but the rest are ones I took. I didn't think you would mind Amy. If you look at Karen's blog you will notice that there are many of the same pictures. That's because she obviously couldn't do much blog updating for a little while, but wanted to let you all see this precious little guy. So she told me what to write and I updated it for her. So there isn't much of a variation of pictures even though I have a ton of the little cutie because I (of course) picked some of the ones I thought were cutest. I'm sure (very sure) there will be more pictures soon. Here is Karen with Drew. I don't think she could be any happier.

Sweet, sweet baby.

Okay this kid cracks me up. When anyone took the blankets off of him he would stretch out his little legs and keep them that way for quite awhile. It was hilarious. He would be sleeping away like this. His cute little legs just sticking straight out in the air. So funny.
Congratulations Karen and Mike. He is so precious!

Maybe we watched the wrong episode

2009-05-24T15:55:00.002-05:00

Well, no baby yet. However.........Dr. Quinn did have HER baby so that made Karen pretty mad. :)
Karen (after Dr. Quinn started complaining): "Shut up. You get to have your baby." Poor Karen.

Well, last week I got released as the 2nd councelor in the Young Women's program at church and was called to be the secretary in the Primary. It was quite a shock and I will miss being with the Young Women so much but it will be fun to be with the little kids. They changed the whole presidency and today was our first week in there. Let me just say, I think the main thing we need to try to improve is reverence. Holy cow! Wish us luck with that one.

I have several things to post but unfortunatly I can't find the cord to transfer picture from my camera so that will have to wait for another day.

Due date sentiments

2009-05-22T15:42:00.004-05:00

This is my sister Karen. Isn't she cute? Today is her due date. We all are SO excited for this sweet little baby to decide it's time to come. Hopefully my next post will be to introduce a new little nephew into the family, but maybe I'll get brave and actually update my blog before that. I have several things to post. I just wanted to let Karen know that I am so happy for her and Michael and I can't wait to hold the little jellybean (even though you already know those things). This little guy will have truely awesome parents.

Crazies

2009-05-18T20:20:00.008-05:00

What would two normal sisters do if they were at their other sister's house and they happened to notice her camera unattended? Yes, normal people would continue talking. BUT, what would two fun loving crazy sisters do? Exactly this.........

The picture above is by far my favorite. It makes me laugh pretty hard.

Welcome to the land of crazies. We have lots of fun. Unfortunaly Karen's pictures are a bit fuzzy because I apparantly didn't know how to focus Amy's camera correctly. Whoopsy. I would have loved to have a clear shot of Karen's 4th picture. My all time favorite as previously stated. :) I LOVE hanging out with my sisters!

Tag

2009-05-16T08:36:00.004-05:00

About Me

A book I highly recommend: To Kill a Mockingbird (I never read it when I was supposed to for school but then after I was out of school I realized that it's pretty awesome. Although, I haven't really read it in several years so.........)

My favorite flower is: Tulips and Lilys

A game I like to play is: Harry Potter Trivia at my parents house (with candlelight). :) Curses is a fun game too.

The music I listen to most is: Whatever is on the radio at work. Pop maybe I don't know. Christmas is my favorite but only at Christmas time or it doesn't feel the same.

A movie I watch over and over is: A Christmas Story (at Christmas time) even though Jason doesn't care for it. Sigh. :)

My favorite quote is: hm.....I don't know. We watched Kung Fu Panda the other day and it had kind of a cool quote. "Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That's why it's called the present." Mostly I just like funny quotes though...mostly from movies or shows. :) "Pound is tic-tac-toe right?" :)

My favorite thing to buy is: Anything that I get for an awesome deal.

If I could afford to buy anything at the moment I would buy: A new car.

If my house were burning down and I could only rescue three things, they would be: Jason, Tessa, and wedding photos maybe.

A smell that makes me pause is: Laundry drying (oh that does smell good Karen) baking bread (stupid store that doesn't sell Cinnamon chip bread anymore) :), Lilac - smells so so so good. True lilac in full bloom. The best.

My favorite sport to watch is: Cardinal baseball (live preferably). I want to go to a game. Anyone want to go this summer? :)

The city I would like to visit most is: hm.... there are too many places I want to go. I can't narrow it down so I'll just move on.

A moment when I achieved absolute happiness was: my wedding day

My favorite meal is: I might have to say Mexican too.

A piece of music that makes me sentimental is: Well, I cry at Rob Thomas's "Little Wonders". I don't know if it makes me sentimental but it does make me emotional. Hm... not the same thing? Well, I really don't know then.

Someone or something that made me laugh this week was: On the phone with Karen quoting "Arrested Development". Too funny.

My earliest memory is: I don't know if it's my earliest memory but I remember having the chicken pox when I was 5 and dancing around the living room (not because I had the chicken pox) :) I remember I had one in between my fingers.

My first paying job was: besides babysitting, I was a hostess at a restaurant. (Is that how you smell the word? For some reason I can't think how to spell it.)

The memory that still makes me laugh is: well Karen's finger dancing to prove that she was awake the whole time still cracks me up. Also all the videos we used to make. Begis and Bethy B. I can't believe that got ruined.

My best birthday was: Well I'm hoping it's tomorrow. :)

A smell that reminds me of my childhood is: The smell of library books. I would never have thought of that Karen but I think you are right.

My favorite color to wear is: blue but that might be because I wear a lot of it.

When I exercise I like to: be done.

The best vacation I ever had was: Tennessee was pretty awesome. I want to go back so bad. Our family vacation to Sunset Point was pretty awesome too even if it was a bit crazy at times...and I got hurt. Hm....... :)

The best thing about being married is: having the person you love around all the time.

The thing I am most passionate about is: the importance of family.

What is one thing you did as a child that you hope your child will NOT emulate: Okay, um....there are so many. Hm.... I'll get back to you on this one....or not. :)

You are all now tagged.......except for Karen who did this first.

um.....what?

2009-04-26T21:54:00.003-05:00

Okay so I took 2 years of French in high school. The first year I think I averaged a C and the next year I failed........mainly because I never, and I do mean NEVER, studied. So I don't know much French and the little bit that I do remember is very rusty. So, whoever knows French help me out here.
Take a look at my last post, the picture of "Jason" as the man being arrested. Does the sign he's holding up say, "Madam, I do not eat six days."? Because seriously.........that doesn't make sense.............at all.

The great adventure: Dinner

2009-04-23T19:39:00.002-05:00

Well for some reason the format on this post is screwy and I can't fix it so I'm just going with it. This is the grill that my brother Aaron and I found at a yard sale last year. It was almost new and it came with a cover and a full tank of propane. It was only $40 and actually Aaron even bought it for us as a belated combined birthday gift. Pretty sweet huh? So tonight I decided we needed to grill up some burgers. Join us for the adventure. :)
See there I am grilling up the yumminess.

Here is my cutie husband and I (obviously).

Here is the finished product. Professional looking? Not hardly. Delicious? You betcha.

Then we have the boxed macaroni and cheese. It's not even Kraft. It's some brand I bought at Aldi one time and honestly....I like it better than Kraft.

So why am I blogging about dinner? Well.....I don't know.

I think it all started when I was forming the hamburger patties. I had taken the hamburger straight out of the fridge so it was freezing cold on my hands so I said, "Holy cow that's cold." Then I realized what I had said and it totally discusted me. Holy COW. Bleck. :)

Oh, so fun!

2009-04-22T22:21:00.004-05:00

This is so awesome....and totally fun. http://www.photofunia.com/ I am wasting WAY too much time doing this so I think I'd better send this off into blogland and then get myself into dreamland. *That was a bit cheesy.....but true* :)

Sheepish grin

2009-04-18T18:45:00.002-05:00

Okay this is maybe a little bit embarrasing just because of the whole pre-teen pop sensation thing but I love Miley Cyrus's new song, "The Climb". I do. It's good and it has a really good moral. So, there it is. So to recap - The song is good. Listen to it. :)

The Wedding

2009-04-12T21:38:00.003-05:00

I'm in catch up mode here and here's another post that needs posting before it's too late. For some very wierd reason when I uploaded these pictures instead of showing the picture so I can write underneath it......it just gives me a bunch of codes so I can't tell where the end of one picture is to write underneath it. So, I'm just going to make a list. My sister-in-law Becky got married on March 20th. I was a bridesmaid and Jason was a groomsmen. It was of course stressful to get there but it was a fun night and we are happy to add her husband Keith as a true member of the family. Okay the pictures.
1. This was taken the night before the wedding as we were finishing decorating the reception room. I made this heart out of a string of red and white lights and then put it over the cake table. It turned out pretty cool I must say although this picture doesn't do it any justice.
2. This is a picture of my nephews Ashton (4) and Ethan (2) the same night.
3. Here is Ethan and me.
4. Here is of course Jason and I before we headed to the post reception, reception at La Cabana here in Salem.
5. This is my nephew Vincent (19 months) and Ethan at La Cabana. Ethan has always considered Vincent his baby and loves to hug him.
6. Here is my other nephew (notice a trend here?) Seth at La Cabana. He's looking so handsome.
7. Here is Ashton blowing bubbles at La Cabana. There were little vials of bubbles on the tables at the reception and they turned out to be a hit with the kids.....some of the adults too.
8. Here is Vincent and me again at La Cabana. :) (another trend)
9. Okay these last 2 pictures were taken by the photographer. This is a picture of the groom and his groomsmen. Jason is on the left and Keith (the groom) is the next one. I don't remember the other men's names. This picture is funny because the groom and I believe all his groomsmen (excluding Jason) smoke so Keith said, Let's take a picture of all of us with a cigarette. Jason and I just looked at each other. So they took the picture and Jason felt so awkward. The picture is kind of cool though in a way. It looks like an album cover.
10. Here is Becky, her mother (my mommy-in-law), and her bridesmaids, Liz, Serena (both are Becky's sisters), Martha (the momma), Becky, me, and Becky's friend April (who was the maid of honor).
I know I don't have very many pictures of me and Jason and none of Becky and Keith together but you have to take what you can get right? :) Well the major catch ups are over for now I think.....well I have one more about ducks. I can't promise it will be the next post but it's coming up soon. For right now....I'm off to bed.

"Too little too late".... or is it "to little to late"?

2009-04-12T21:22:00.003-05:00

So I just realized that I am way behind in my blogging. Mostly because the posts that require a lot of pictures I tend to put off because I hate trying to move pictures around on the blog. It is so difficult and I always seem to accidentally erase at least one of the pictures. So I procrastinate (imagine that). I just remembered I never posted about my brother Aaron leaving on his mission. I had pictures to post and all so I decided to bite the bullet and post them. I went to the page to add the pictures and then I remembered.......my pictures are gone. Sad. So, I guess I will just tell you I had pictures and it would have been great. There was one in particular I wanted to post. Karen and I were being silly and standing on either side of him at the airport looking up with a wierd admiring look and Aaron was looking straight ahead with a pained look on his face. Priceless. Anyway, Aaron left for the MTC in the beginning of February (the 3rd I think). He is now serving in the Fresno, California mission and is doing great. It's wierd to think that he is gone. It's been 2 months already but at the same time it feels like a lot longer. I am already looking forward to him coming home (in 22 months that is). I saw a picture of me with him in the background and it made me sad. I miss that boy but I'm so happy he is where he is. He's a pretty awesome brother. If anyone knows him my Mom writes parts of his letters (or sometimes a summary of a letter) on his mission blog. The link is on my blog list under Elder Barnard. So this would have been better with pictures.....and probably if I wrote it 2 months ago when he actually left, but there it is. :)

It happens to us all at one time or another.

2009-04-09T21:30:00.004-05:00

Oh Barbie, Barbie, Barbie. Where did you go wrong? Did you have too many W.A.N.S.I. parties? :)

Hallmark

2009-04-08T15:16:00.004-05:00

I used to love to watch Hallmark movies as a kid because they played good Hallmark commercials in between. Today I decided to play around on youtube and see if I could find some of them. I couldn't. Well, I did find one of them but that is all. There is one more I remember off the top of my head but I can't find it. Bummer. Seriously though, this old Hallmark commercial borders the line at sappy (it might even cross the line) but I love it. The little boy's acting is so good and I'm embarrased to admit that I totally teared up while watching it. That's not saying much though because I tear up at the stupidest of things. That said, I still think this commercial is sweet.

Trees

2009-04-08T14:20:00.002-05:00

A few weeks ago I pulled into the driveway after work and saw this tree in our front yard. I gasped. I didn't know we had one. They are so pretty. FYI: these trees are gorgeous BUT they stink. When I got up close to take a picture I thought, "What in the world is that smell?" Come to find out, it was the tree. It smells a bit like the monkey house at the zoo. I don't think you can smell it unless you are up close though.

Isn't it beautiful? I love those flowers. I like the pink version of this tree too.

I would really love to have a Magnolia tree in my yard. Just look at these flowers. They are so pretty.

I also want to have some Lilac trees. They are not only pretty but the smell is fantastic. The rent house we lived in for 2 years before buying this house had one in the side yard. They don't bloom for very long but when they do. Oh! I loved to walk by it to take the dog out. Fake lilac smell can not even begin to compare to the true lilac tree. If you have never smelled one then you should go out right now and sniff away.

The cuteness

2009-04-06T19:39:00.002-05:00

Did you notice my cute little dragon on our new fridge? I love this little guy. I got him 2 or 3 years ago and he's so cute and it's so fun to position him in different ways. Hm...the thought just occured to me. I never named him? Isn't that weird? Or is it totally weird that I think it's weird that I never named him? Hm...

A day in life........of a fridge.

2009-04-06T19:09:00.003-05:00

Right before I left for work this morning I noticed that the things in the freezer weren't frozen anymore. Kind of defeats the purpose there huh? Anyway, here is our poor broken fridge that I loved.

It was so pretty and had lovely glass shelves. I was so disappointed we had to lose our newish fridge. (Well, we didn't really lose it. It's now in the shed where we plan to someday get it fixed later down the road.

Luckily Jason's Grandma had an extra fridge in her garage. They had bought a new one a few years ago. So she gave us this one. We are so blessed to have such a loving family.

My father-in-law, Terry, and Jason took the old fridge to the shed and brought the new one to our house. There is only one problem. It's been raining so much lately (and actually it sleeted today - I don't know what's up with that.) that our yard is swampish. It's wet, soggy, muddy, and just plain discusting. (In fact Tessa had to have another bath today because she was so muddy.) Anyway, Terry drove his truck into the backyard and backed up to the deck. That was great except when he tried to leave it didn't exactly work.

R.I.P.

2009-04-03T13:30:00.003-05:00

This post gets no picture for a very important reason. I have none. So, our computer was nice and broken. Broken and sick. It would not do anything when you turned it on. Well, that's not exactly true. It turned on and kept trying to boot up but it just kept running numbers across the screen in a really wierd way and that's all it would do....over and over and over again. My brother-in-law finally fixed it BUT the problem is he had to totally redo the computer. (I seriously don't know the technical terms.) So (I just had to take a break from this to wash a muddy footed dog that just came in from the backyard tracking mud into the house - stinkin' rain) So we lost everything that was on our computer including all of our pictures. It's so sad. All the pictures we've taken over the last year and a half are gone. Although, on the bright side, I have a partially wettish dog lying on my lap as I type this. So........good times. :(

Oh, I forgot the best part of the day (and this time I'm not being sarcastic). :) I went to IGA here in town and they have their 10 for 10 deals and they had IGA shredded cheese on sale for a dollar. I bought 8 and threw them in the freezer but I think I should have bought more. Maybe I'm crazy for being so excited about it but, I love finding good deals.

Sledding

2009-03-28T19:06:00.002-05:00

Well my computer has crashed until we can get it to a doctor to fix it's virus so I don't have much opportunity to post blogs - even though I have many I want to post so I'm afraid that it will be overwhelming and I won't acutally do it. :) I'm in Collinsville at the moment so I decided to write a little post explaining my lack of posts and while I'm at it.......swipe a few photos off of Amy's computer. This is a picture of Zach and I "sledding" when we were at my parent's house at the end of January right before Aaron left for his mission. I say "sledding" because we actually used a trash bag as a sled and we sled down a tiny little slop in my parent's side yard. It was fun though. I have more photos of this day on my computer but......that's not going to happen. This little post will have to get you through these rough days without me. :)

Correction

2009-03-15T14:17:00.002-05:00

I'm fairly certain that the phrase should have been "What goes around comes around". Which would mean that I totally butchered the phrase on the title of my last post. The more I think about it the more confusing it seems to be. Is "What goes around comes around" the correct phrase? I think so. Hm... Somehow the knowledge that I messed it up (I think) bothers me and I could go back and just change the title of the blog but instead I have to write a whole post about how I screwed up. :)

What comes around goes around.

2009-03-12T18:44:00.010-05:00

BEST LAWYER STORY OF THE YEAR

Charlotte, North Carolina. A lawyer purchased a box of very rare and expensive cigars, then insured them against, among other things, fire. Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of these great cigars and without yet having made even his first premium payment on the policy, the lawyer filed a claim against the insurance company. In his claim, the lawyer stated the cigars were lost 'in a series of small fires.'
The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason, that the man had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion. The lawyer sued, and WON! (Stay with me.) Delivering the ruling, the judge agreed with the insurance company that the claim was frivolous. The judge stated nevertheless, that the lawyer held a policy from the company, which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure them against fire, without defining what is considered to be unacceptable fire' and was obligated to pay the claim.
Rather than endure lengthy and costly appeal process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid $15,000 to the lawyer for his loss of the cigars lost in the 'fires'.

NOW FOR THE BEST PART...

After the lawyer cashed the check, the insurance company had him arrested on 24 counts of ARSON!!! With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case being used against him, the lawyer was convicted of intentionally burning his insured property and was sentenced to 24 months in jail and a $24,000 fine. This is a true story and was the First Place winner in the recent Criminal Lawyers Award Contest.

Seriously? I thought this was hilarious because I can't stand it when people sue others for stupid things like "The coffee was too hot and burned me." DUH! Coffee is hot. It makes me happy that this selfish man got what was coming to him. Mhmm. That's right.

Fluffy

2009-02-27T18:05:00.003-06:00

It's sad when your life is so boring that all you have to post is things about your dog. That said....here's another post about Tessa. Actually, life was boring up until I uploaded the pictures and then things got interesting again. So here I was doing laundry yet again and water started pouring up out of the drain....AGAIN. I can not even tell you how upset I am about it. This will be the third plumbing problem we have had with this house in the last 5 months. Anybody want a house that's wonderful when you don't have problems? I'm only half kidding of course but seriously this house is going to end up costing us a fortune. Sigh.

Then I called my mother-in-law to get some sympathy and she told me that my sister-in-law, Becky, is getting married in 3 weeks. This is only half a shock. Her fiance is going into the military so are trying to get married before he leaves for basic training because they will be going directly to California. For awhile we didn't think the wedding would even be here but it is. I'm so happy and excited for her. On the other hand I only have 3 weeks to lose um......too much weight. :( Yet another example of how I should have been working on that a long time ago and this problem wouldn't be a problem. I also have to find a formal dress that looks good on me that isn't too expensive (remember the plumbing. Grrr.) Becky just picked a color and us bridesmaids will find a dress of our choice in that color. Well anyway, such is a day in the life of me.

So, back to Tessa. I've been saying for days now that I need to give her a bath. Well, after I got home from work I let her outside and since it has rained it is muddy. She came back in with her little feet muddy so I plunked her in the tub and gave her a bath. She hates it but she is good. She doesn't try to jump out. Well, since it is cold and also because she has a habit of running into the living room after her bath and jumping on the couch to rub her wet body all over it, (eww) I decided for the first time to try to blow dry her some. She did not like it but tolerated it as much as she could. Basically she ran back and forth in the bathroom while I tried to blow dry her. I had Jason bring the camera in because she was so fluffy. It was hilarious. Here she is.

Now like I said she always jumps on the couch and rubs her wet body all over it (again, eww). Well I found her on our bed. I decided since I had the camera in my hands to take a couple pictures before I called her away from the bed. This is her rolling around trying to get the dreaded water off of her. What a goober.

Lumpy

2009-02-26T18:30:00.003-06:00

Here is another way Tessa sleeps. I call them lump 1 and lump 2. :) Tessa climbs under the covers anytime she is tired. As a matter of fact Jason is lying on the floor in front of the t.v. right now with a blanket over him and Tessa just crawled underneath.

Another Engrish

2009-02-21T22:48:00.003-06:00

Here's another Engrish photo that makes me laugh. It was found in Japan on a "How to draw" book. CREEPY! :)

Sentimental

2009-02-20T15:33:00.004-06:00

I totally love Jane Austen's books and the movies they made from them. I also love 'Little Women' from Louisa May Alcott. I've been reading the book and so then I decided to watch the movie again. I just love these authors. Their books have amazing heart. I do have quite a fascination with this time period. I'm not sure if that is because of the books/movies or just enhanced by it. In any case......good stuff.
Little Women - Seriously how could you not love a movie (and book) with scenes like this? If I had four daughters would I name my girls Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy? Well....no, but it's a nice thought and a part of me would want to for sentimental reasons. I'm not going to post about all the wonderful books I love but we do have to talk about this last one.

Pride and Prejudice - Oh my! How I love this book and movie. It fills me with joy. Again, I wouldn't really name my five daughters (if I had them) Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Kitty, and Lydia but part of me would want to. While we are on the subject, I was reading Pride and Prejudice a little while ago and I was at a part with Mr. Darcy (Oh how I love Darcy) and the thought popped into my head (and I thought it was a brilliant idea), "I could name my first boy Darcy. Seriously why has nobody done this?" Seriously the thought made my day. Then a few seconds later I remembered why nobody has done this and it actually disappointed me. Darcy......is a girls name. Sad.

Trickster

2009-02-19T17:20:00.004-06:00

After I came home from work today I was lying down on the couch reading and then fell asleep with Tessa at the end of the couch. An hour or so later she woke me up whining. Usually she only does that when she has to use the bathroom. I was hoping she was just bored. She jumped down off the couch and I ignored her hoping she would jump up on the recliner and sleep. No such luck. Grr.... So I got up intending on letting her outside. I went into the kitchen to throw something away and seeing Tessa didn't follow me I headed back to the living room grumbling, "Why did you wake me up? What do you want?" I turned the corner and this is what I see.
Are you kidding me? She was actually sitting there looking at me when I first saw her. By the time I was taking the picture she was like this. Tricky little dog I have, huh?

Poison Bakery

2009-02-17T18:28:00.003-06:00

www.engrish.com is a hilarious website. They are pictures of things (buildings, signs, shirts, etc.) that people have taken pictures of when they were in Asian countries. The language is usually messed up in a funny way. This is the one I laughed at most recently.
It's funny enough that their translation came out to be Poison Bakery but what made me laugh the most was the title they posted above the picture. It read...................

Try our peanuts imported from the US!

How could she do this to me?

2009-02-12T19:33:00.004-06:00

There comes a time in everyone's life when they find they just can't help themselves. This time came for me when I took a bite of one of these. I was at work one day when my manager gave me one of these evil things. How could she? :) They are pretty easy to make and if you like Oreos and chocolate.......these just might be your downfall too. I've learned my lesson so I won't post a picture and not leave a recipe. :)
Ingredients:
1 bag of Oreos
1 8oz package of cream cheese (softened)
chocolate and/or vanilla almond bark (melted)
Directions:
Finely crush Oreos in a blender or food processer. Mix the cream cheese and crushed Oreos together. Form small balls. Dip in almond bark and put onto wax paper to set.
Difficult huh? Now go make some.

What to do?

2009-02-09T18:29:00.010-06:00

Well, Jason is off at the community center playing basketball with some friends so that leaves me here by myself. What to do....what to do. I could clean up the house or do the laundry. (Both of which need to be done very badly.) No............this would obviously be the thing to do. Don't you agree?Am I that bored? Well, yes. However the real reason I did this is because I found this mask that I've had for awhile and I decided to use it to try to regain some health to my skin. It's decided to totally break out (regardless of the fact that I haven't been a teenager in quite some years - apparantly my skin is clueless). So then what else could I do but to take pictures of myself?

Anyone want to come visit me? :)

Save room for some of this.

2009-02-05T19:46:00.010-06:00

I have a lot to post but I'm waiting on a few pictures I need to get from Amy. In the meantime I'll share this with you. Jason and I went to Wal-mart to get some groceries and other things we need. When we got there only 2/3 of the lights were on. They were having problems with their power. Then after awhile another 1/3 of the lights went out. Uh.......okay. Luckily about 5 minutes later they all came back on. I can't stand dim lights. So, Jason and I were in the grocery aisle and I turn to see this. Luckily I still had my camera in my purse from yesterday. This isn't an American food but really?Obviously it's not really what it is but what in the world is it? I thought it was so funny though. Yum yum. It's like something you would find on http://www.engrish.com/, which is such a funny site by the way. Anyone up for some mole?

Again? No, really you'll like it.

2009-01-31T23:34:00.004-06:00

Okay, while we (and while I say we I really mean I - I really don't have split personalities) :) It's like when I was on a mission and since we were always in a companionship I said we all the time. Anyway, since I am on a video kick here I think this video needs to be shown. While we were watching videos we came upon this one and everytime we watch it we laugh very hard. It's from Sweeden Idol (I suppose that's what they call it. In any case it's American Idol only not American because it's made in Sweeden. Yes, I realize you probably totally understood that from the beginning so there was no need for me to even write this sentence. But, honestly who wouldn't want to hear the ramblings I can create? Don't answer that.) :) So here is the video of the day.........or at least the video of the hour.

My emotional state

2009-01-31T15:20:00.003-06:00

For those of you who know me well, you know that I don't...no make that can't hide my emotions well. I cry at movies and so much more but lately I've been even more emotional. I've been taking a new medicine for the last 3 1/2 months and I think it messes with my hormones. So even though I do cry at so many things it's become a little more intensified as of late. (As of late? I think that's me trying to sound smart. Did it work?) So my sister Karen and I were looking at youtube videos. Mostly Americal Idol auditions and America's Got Talent. She showed me this clip from a Britain's Got Talent and it seriously gives me chills and makes me almost cry. I'm not sure if it's a normal emotional Jeanette or a super charged emotional Jeanette. In any case it is so good. Watch it if you'd like.......oh, it's good.

<
P.S. If people think I'm emotional now, just wait until I'm pregnant someday. "Uh-oh. Here comes the water slide." That will be a trip.

"Weather alert. Weather alert. It's starting to snow."

2009-01-28T18:52:00.009-06:00

So last night it started to sleet again. I had heard that there could be more snow but it hadn't started when I went to bed. I was supposed to be at work at 8:00 this morning but I was awakened by the phone ringing. It took me awhile to figure out what it was and then I wondered who was calling in the middle of the night. Well it wasn't the middle of the night.......it was 6:00 a.m. It was my manager of the store who said that she was snowed in and couldn't get out of the driveway. She lives in the country. So I had to open the store. I was really hoping I could get out of the driveway myself. Apparantly we had gotten between 10-12 inches of the snow overnight. So I got ready to go and then started backing out of the driveway and I got stuck right away. Luckily I was able to go forward and back and get out of the driveway. Our house is not technically in town so they don't plow our road. Luckily someone had already been down the road so I could go in their tire tracks. It was pretty amazing that I got out of the driveway and to work because later in the day Jason was trying to get out of the driveway and he couldn't do it. So I got to work and had to shovel off the front path. Oh, my! That took forever and it was likely to kill me. It was bad enough that there was so much snow but the snowplow had pushed some of the snow up to the sidewalk so there were tiny snowpiles all along it. Man! So then people called off work because they weren't able to get there. The girl that said she would come in at 8:00 got stuck in the snow and couldn't get out for an hour. Poor girl. So then on the way home our road was still really bad. By the time I got to our driveway I knew that if I took it slow I would get stuck for sure so I gunned it and amazingly slipped and slided my way into the driveway. It was so funny to see Tessa out in the snow. She followed Jason to the shed and she had to hop because she couldn't walk in it. She kept trying to walk in his footsteps. Funny girl. Then when they were walking back to the house Tessa ran under the porch and walked under there so she wouldn't have to walk in the snow. She was so cold. So I tried to take pictures of the snow tonight. It didn't work out to well. Anyway I was taking pictures and all of a sudden this picture comes up. It kind of freaked me out. I went inside and showed Jason who said, "It's probably your breath." Oh. See, that's why I married him. I had to go outside and see if he was right. He was. :) I think we are done with snow for awhile and as much as I like it......I'm done with it. I love it when it's snowing. It's so beautiful. I just wish it wouldn't stick to the roads, driveways, and sidewalks. Maybe I can invent a super sidewalk that heats itself. Oh, yes. I'm going to be stinkin' rich. :)

"It's snowing..It's snowing....It's sno-o-o-wing."

2009-01-27T16:20:00.004-06:00

Well we got the sleet/freezing rain and then some snow. Finally we got more than (as Karen would say) dandruff. It may cause problems which I hate but I do like snow.......for a little while anyway. We got some more sleet today but unfortunatly no more snow. Maybe later, although I think I'm quite okay to be done with it.This is a picture of our backyard taken from the doorway of my kitchen which was much warmer then it was outside so that's where I stayed hidden.

After I got home from work today Jason and I played a few games on Wii Sports and then decided to go play in the snow a bit. Jason and Tessa ran around for awhile until Jason started throwing snowballs at her. It freaked her out so she ran back to the house and went inside. Poor girl, being beaten up by her "daddy". We did get her to back outside though.
Jason and I made snowangels. I haven't made one of those in so many years. You can't see much from this picture. I had invisioned the perfect picture of our snowangels side by side. You can see how that worked out. :) Here we are after our snowball fight. Actually there weren't too many real snowballs. It isn't very good packing snow. Mostly our "snowballs" were hand (or arm) loads of snow being thrown at each other.

Aren't we adorable? :)

Change is inevitable

2009-01-26T21:34:00.002-06:00

FYI: Lately I've been a bit obsessed with changing my background. Every week or so I want to find a new one. I just get sick of the old one. Even if I still like it, I need to change it. I wonder what that says about me. :)

When it rains it........sleets.

2009-01-26T18:36:00.005-06:00

We are supposed to get some bad weather tonight and tomorrow. Snow and sleet (wintery mix they say). Jason got an Applebees gift card for Christmas and has been dying to go so we finally went this evening. The bad weather wasn't supposed to start until after 6 so we went early. Remember our "good" car has no heat and our "bad" car has heat but the windshield wipers have stopped working. What's up with that? So anyway we finished eating and left Applebees (before 6) and it was already sleeting. Shoot. So we get in the car and drive home as carefully as we can. Without a defroster/heat the sleet froze immediatly onto the windshield so we had to pull over several times to scrape the windshield and jump back in the car to try and go another 1/2 mile or so. We took the back road so there would be less traffic.

These pictures aren't the best but here is a picture of the car in the garage after we got back. I was so scared on the way home. Darn ice.

Half way home the ice either slowed down or something because we didn't have to pull over as much to scrape the windshield. This was Jason's view by that point. I'm really glad that it stopped freezing so fast because.........................

this was my view. I was seriously freaked out not being able to see anything. I had to try not to look at the windshield so I wouldn't freak out. At one point I looked up and saw the brake lights to the car in front of us and I kid you not they were right in front of us. So, I started yelling at Jason to "STOP" while freaking out even more because he wasn't stopping. Jason on the other hand was trying to figure out why I was screaming to stop the car since the car in front of us was actually pretty far away. Golly! What an adventure for a 3-5 mile car trip home. Needless to say we are home safe and sound and not planning any trips out tonight even though we have a movie that's overdue. Sigh! More money. We didn't get it returned yesterday and we brought it with us to return after we ate but we thought it was more important to get home. I hate paying late fees. Such a waste of money if you aren't even watching the movie anymore. So we paid $2.60 for the movie and now it will be 2 days late. Does that mean we have to pay $5.20 more? Probably so. The really irritating thing is that you could pay $2.60 for one night or $3.10 for 5 nights. They always try to put it in the computer for 5 nights so as to get more money. We want to save money so we always tell them we only want it for one night. See how well that worked out for us? (Could you feel the sarcasm dripping off that one?) :) Oh, well. What's done is done. We'll just have to pay $7.80 for a darn movie (we could have bought it for not much more than that) and move on. Maybe I can sled there. Alas! No sled.

Otters in love

2009-01-25T18:18:00.004-06:00

You know there's nothing going on around here when my posts are videos but at least it's a post. :) This video is so totally cute. The best part is near the end so don't give up on it. It's so adorable.

Oh so funny

2009-01-24T23:54:00.000-06:00

This video totally cracked me up.

A Tale

2009-01-23T11:10:00.003-06:00

Here's a tale you may not have heard although probably experienced things quite similar to. Our story begins on a Friday morning. This morning to be exact. I was off work so I decided to sleep in even though I woke up early I forced myself to fall back asleep mostly because I'm tired of waking up early. So after I woke up I decided I'd better get started on the laundry. I've been putting it off for quite some time so I have easily 3 or 4 loads of laundry. Needless to say we were about out of clothes. So I started the first load of laundry and after it filled with water the washer stopped. This is not unusual for my washer actually. We got it from a couple at church over 2 years ago. They were buying a new one so they gave us their old one. We have been very grateful to have one but the moral is it is an old washer so sometimes it just stops working. Very irritating. I have to keep turning the knob around and around and trying to start it again. This time it wouldn't start for at least 10 minutes. Grr.... So now the second part of the story begins but we have to go back in time a bit. (as a bit of a sidenote I can hear the washer knocking loudly) We have a leak in our plumbing somewhere. For the last few months our water bill was about $170. Unacceptable. However, it's going to cost a pretty penny to get it fixed. So Jason finally called the plumber who said he could come out early next week. So back to today, here I am sitting in the recliner watching an episode of Dr. Quinn while I am waiting for the laundry to hopefully be washing and there is a knock at the door. Dang it. So I have to go answer the door and it was the plumber who wanted to look for the leak which he said he could hear on the far side of the house. So he is going to come back next week to fix it but it will be a 2 man job so you know what that will mean.......more money. Besides that underneath the house is completly flooded. There goes our savings I'm sure....or at least a good portion of it. Now the really fun part of the story is what I looked like when I answered the door and talked to the plumber. So because we didn't have clean laundry I was sitting here looking so lovely. I hadn't taken a shower yet, no makeup (it gets better), I'm wearing a pair of yoga type sweat pants that only look good on a model which (and don't let this shock you) I'm not. I've also got on this huge oversized sweatshirt and well my bras are in the washing machine. :) Oh, yes. Fun times.

To spoil or not to spoil

2009-01-18T23:04:00.005-06:00

I think that Tessa might be a bit spoiled. When we first got her as a puppy we didn't allow her in our bed. It then got to the point that she would start waking up earlier and earlier in hopes of getting on the bed. This meant that we would have to wake up several times in the night. We gave in. It was easier. So she is a bed sleeper...and not just at the foot of the bed either. Here are a few pictures of how she sleeps.

This last picture is my favorite. In the winter she spends most of the night under the covers in the middle of the bed squished up next to us. She surfaces occationally but then she always walks up to the top of the bed and nudges the covers to let us know she wants under. This wasn't the way we wanted it to be but as gross as I still think it is to have the dog in the bed it still is sweet the way she cuddles. She's a good little girl....as yes, spoiled.

Families are Forever

2009-01-11T18:15:00.009-06:00

On January 3rd Aaron went to the temple for the first time. It was pretty awesome and because he was the last one in the family almost all of us were able to attend. Unfortunatly Jason couldn't get out of work to go. It was a very special experience to be in the temple surrounded by family. Here are a few pictures from the day.

Here is Amy getting the right exposure and position for the picture and her husband Mike. This picture cracks me up especially because their son Zach does the same thing with his tongue. In fact I saw him drinking out of a straw while doing this. Zach, not Mike. :) Totally funny.

How hard is it to take a family photograph?

Finally!
Here are my parents and their 6 kids. What a special day. I'm so grateful that families are forever. Aaron leaves for the MTC on February 3rd. My Dad joined the church while he was in Vietnam and my Mom joined soon after in Illinois. Now all 6 of thier children will have served missions. Amazing isn't it?

Why I should keep a better eye on my camera.

2009-01-04T18:26:00.005-06:00

These are some of the pictures I found on my camera after I got back from my parents house. I suppose I ought to watch my camera more closely. :D

Christmas Part III

2009-01-04T00:52:00.004-06:00

Christmas Part III

We had wanted to go to my parents house before Christmas but it never worked out. I mentioned this once before about how I went ahead without Jason because he was sick. Yes, I left my poor sick husband all alone. At least I took the dog so he didn't have to care for her........He wanted me to go I promise. :) Anyway here are a few pictures of things we did that weekend. Here is a picture of my parents Christmas tree. I love my parents house at Christmas. There are so many good memories there.

Here is my Mom and my nephew Zach (7) making huge bubbles. It didn't work too well. Maybe it was the soap they used but it did make a few bubbles as you can see from the picture.

We went bowling on one of the days. It was pretty fun. My sisters, Amy and Karen, Zach and I were on our own lane and it kept messing up and not registering a roll so we got to roll an extra time. That was nice. Once I got a strike that should have been a spare. Oh yeah! We rock! :) Zach's ball looked like it had a face so here he is imitating the ball.

My sister Amy taught Karen and me how to make pajama pants. They turned out really cute. We didn't have enough material left to make me a pair of pants so I made some pajama capris. Not too practical for the winter but they'll be good in the summer. We took a few pictures of us wearing the pajamas but I looked HORRIBLE in all of them. This is NOT an exaggeration. Therefore, you don't get to see them because I'm that vain. :D. Just kidding but really I looked awful. The top picture is of Karen making her pants and then the bottom one is of me making my capris. See how totally domestic we were being?

SIDENOTE: I am getting really sick of trying to write blogs because it always screws the format up and I can't get the picture in the right place or I can't put the words in the right place. Sometimes it works just fine and then other times it totally messes with me and it makes me crazy. Maybe I'm the only one who has problems with this but seriously it sometimes doesn't feel worth it. See what I go through to bring you all so much joy. :)

Christmas Part II

2008-12-31T20:50:00.005-06:00

On Christmas Eve we arrived home at about 11:00 p.m. I wrapped the rest of the presents for Jason's side of the family and then I made the Christmas breakfast that has to refrigerate overnight. Jason and I didn't get to bed until around 1:00. Jason said not to set the alarm. We will just wake up whenever we wake up. He figured we'd wake up around 9:00 or 9:30 so it was pretty funny when he woke me up at 6:45 saying he couldn't sleep. When I asked why he said it was because of his present under the tree. What a cutie. So this brings us to

Christmas Morning

The Christmas tree never looks so beautiful as it does on Christmas morning.

Here is our Christmas breakfast. It doesn't look that great in the photograph but it is so good. It's a sausage, egg, and cheese casserole. Growing up my Mom made this for us every Christmas. I've made it for Jason the last four years.

Here is Jason with his Christmas present. I stood in line in Wal-Mart the day after Thanksgiving to get this for him. It is an XBOX 360 and Guitar Hero III combo. Jason wanted an XBOX so bad. Because of the shape of the box (it was longer because of the Guitar Hero) he had no idea that I got that for him. He was so excited. Yay!

Here is Jason's XBOX and my my present from Jason, the complete seasons of Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. Yay!

Then we went to Jason's mom's house to open presents and spend time with the other side of our family. This is my nephew Vincent (16 months). Isn't he just adorable? I love that kid.

Our Little Colony of Beas

Santa Claus is coming to town

Updating

One more for the road

Noah's new little friend

Just Cute

Cracking me up

Noah and his Mommy

Noah

Introducing.....

The big day

36 Weeks

Bedrest

Baby updates

We are having.....

Tomorrow

Chinese Fortune Cookies

More Ramblings

Newest News

FALL

Help

St. Patrick's Day

Food Storage

What????

28

Miracle M.

New lyrics

Do you see what I see?

Let's try this again.

General Conference

Tessa

Ethan's sleepover

Be one with the hoop.

Monster Mash

Craft Day

Oldies but Goodies

Happy Birthday!

Mancala

A day in the life

In video

At it again!

Perfect for me.

Suckers

The cuteness continues

Amelia Bedelia?

Better late then never.

Little us

To cut or not to cut.......

Read on

Ding dong, you're wrong.

4 years!

Prediction

Uncanny

I couldn't resist.

Parody

Malibu

First things first

Happy Birthday Amy!

I'd like you to meet.....

Maybe we watched the wrong episode

Due date sentiments

Crazies

Tag

um.....what?

The great adventure: Dinner

Oh, so fun!

*Sheepish grin*

The Wedding

"Too little too late".... or is it "to little to late"?

It happens to us all at one time or another.

Hallmark

Trees

The cuteness

A day in life........of a fridge.

R.I.P.

Sledding

Correction

What comes around goes around.

Fluffy

Lumpy

Sheepish grin