Picture Blog

I know, everyone wants pictures of the new house. Those are coming, but not yet. Even though I finally found the cord for my camera, I think I want to retake those pictures since we've put a lot away since I took the first ones. Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks (not in any particular order) while you're waiting. :)

Here's Mike, who insists on doing whatever Dad's doing at the moment.

It looks like Mike loves his Christmas present from Santa!

He can't get enough binks!

Mike climbed up here by himself. Even though he doesn't use the crib, or the bouncer, anymore, they were still in his room until we moved.

Watching his favorite movie of December: Frosty the Snowman

This is what happens when I leave my laptop alone for even less than a minute.

We're In!

We successfully moved into our new house!

Most importantly, I have to give out a huge THANK YOU to everyone who helped. It sure made my job a lot easier! We had my parents, my siblings: Cristal, Katrina, and Tim, then Joshua's parents came with Jordan and Justin. We even had some friends, Kyle and Joyce, who both helped a lot. Jefferson and Joshua both had to work that morning, so they came as soon as they can. (Joshua brought pizza and soda for the whole group!) We had a neighbor come help for a few minutes. Nicolette and Jeremy brought their family over to the new house when they got off work to help with a little of the unpacking and setting up furniture. Cristal and my Mom never even made it to the new house, they were busy cleaning my apartment for me, which is a huge deal to me! Hopefully they'll be able to stop by sometime today.

About the house...no pictures yet. I took them, but I can't find my camera cord (among other things), but when I find it, I'll be posting pictures. So keep checking back!

Oh, and Merry Christmas! (I'm off to go put up my tree!)

Toddler Rules

Okay, I stole this from Marlana. Mike doesn't know "mine!" yet, but the rest of it totally applies to him!

Toddler Property Rules
If I like it, it's mine.
If it's in my hand, it's mine.
If I can take it from you, it's mine.
If I had it a little while ago, it's mine.
If it's mine, it must never appear to be yours in any way.
If I'm doing or building something, all the pieces are mine.
If it looks just like mine, it's mine.
If I think it's mine, it's mine.

Toddler Rules
If it is on, I must turn it off.
If it is off, I must turn it on.
If it is folded, I must unfold it.
If it is a liquid, it must be shaken, then spilled.
If it a solid, it must be crumbled, chewed or smeared.
If it is high, it must be reached.
If it is shelved, it must be unshelved.
If it is pointed, it must be run with at top speed.
If it has leaves, they must be picked.
If it is plugged, it must be unplugged.
If it is not trash, it must be thrown away.
If it is in the trash, it must be removed, inspected, and thrown on the floor.
If it is closed, it must be opened.
If it does not open, it must be screamed at.
If it has drawers, they must be rifled.
If it is a pencil, it must write on the refrigerator, monitor, or table.
If it is full, it will be more interesting emptied.
If it is empty, it will be more interesting full.
If it is a pile of dirt, it must be laid upon.
If it is stroller, it must under no circumstances be ridden in without protest. It must be pushed by me instead.
If it has a flat surface, it must be banged upon.
If Mommy's hands are full, I must be carried.
If Mommy is in a hurry and wants to carry me, I must walk alone.
If it is paper, it must be torn.
If it has buttons, they must be pressed.
If the volume is low, it must go high.
If it is toilet paper, it must be unrolled on the floor.
If it is a drawer, it must be pulled upon.
If it is a toothbrush, it must be inserted into my mouth.
If it has a faucet, it must be turned on at full force.
If it is a phone, I must talk to it.
If it is a bug, it must be swallowed.
If it doesn't stay on my spoon, it must be dropped on the floor.
If it is not food, it must be tasted.
If it IS food, it must not be tasted.
If it is dry, it must be made wet with drool, milk, or toilet water.
If it is a car seat, it must be protested with arched back.

More Silly Boy

He just walked up to me with this on his head.

(It's a heart shaped pillow with a big pocket on the front.)

Finally!

We finally closed on our house! We were an hour and a half late because of the snow, but they waited for us. Whew. We borrowed my in-law's Hyundai Santa Fe because it's better in the snow than our BMW. (glad we did that!) We don't get the keys until Monday though, so we're planning on moving on Tuesday. If everything goes well. (we know how that's been going...) So, yay, in by Christmas, and we won't have to pay that week's rent if we move early in the week.

Also, thanks to a couple of nice people (mostly Joshua's grandma) our finances are comfortable again after I haven't been working all month. Whew. A huge stress is gone. Now comes the moving in December part...ha ha.

Third Anniversary

It's hard to believe we've been married for three years! It's hard to imagine my life before I met Joshua, it seems like I've known him my whole life, but at the same time, three years seems like a long time.

We celebrated tonight with a steak dinner at Sizzler, and a little Christmas shopping, thanks to my sister offering to babysit for free. :) She even paid for part of our meal as a Christmas present to us. Thanks Cristal!

Three years later...still happily married, with an amazing little boy, and hopefully a house by Christmas. I don't think we're doing too bad!

New Hair

Joshua and I both decided to get hair cuts today. His is his normal cut, nothing special, so no pictures. ha ha Mine is kinda short and fun. Oh, and I got bangs. We'll see how I end up liking them. Not sure about the color. The blonde stuff sticking out. It's just leftover from the last time I got my hair done which was...how long ago Jess? Five or six months ago? Yeah, it's been a while. So, I still need to fix the color, but it's better than the blah, outgrown hair I had before.

My hoodie must be really comfy and warm because he asked to wear it again today. Then he snuggled up on the couch and fell asleep. How cute. :)

Silly Boy

100th Post

I was kinda hoping my 100th post would be something exciting. Like we finally closed on our new house. That's not happening yet, so I'm just going to do a normal post as my 100th. Sorry!

These movies are from Joshua's cell phone. One is from a few months ago, at IKEA, and the other is last week at the grocery store. We're mean parents and make him go shopping with us when he's SO tired. ha ha.

Shy kid

I tried to get a video of him trying to juggle. It's really cute, but he won't do it for the camera.
(PS remember we're moving...my kitchen table doesn't always look like that!)

Showing off

So he wouldn't juggle for the camera, but he did want to show off a few of the other things he knows. We would have kept going, but I ran out of memory on my camera. (Just warning you, all his words sound the same. You kind of have to hear them in context.)

Yay Beth!

My sister Beth just called me. She's engaged!

For those of you who have met me in the last couple of years, you probably don't know her, so let me explain. She's 15 months older than me, so we did a lot together growing up. That's why everyone who knew me in high school or before, probably knew her too. Two years ago she left on an LDS mission to Sweden, where she was for 18 months. She came home at the end of May, when she met her only nephew (Mikey) who had just turned one. She got back into the swing of things, going back to Weber State this fall, and living back at home with our parents. Her boyfriend of almost 3 years, David Dille, also went on a mission, to Arizona. He came home just two weeks ago. They wrote to each other their whole missions (he was gone for 2 years) and were still very much in love when they were finally reunited. We were all expecting this day to come, we just didn't know when.

So, back to tonight. I was about to put Mike to bed, again, when my phone rang. I thought "who the heck is calling me at midnight?" I grabbed my phone, which told me it was Beth calling. She was probably the last person I would expect to be calling me at midnight on a week night. My first thought was that she was stranded somewhere and needed a ride, but my parents weren't answering the phone because they were asleep. (Could happen, right?) Here's how the conversation went:

Me: "Hello?"
Beth: "Hi! Sorry for calling you so late."
Me: "That's okay - "
Before I could say anything else she said: "Guess what?"
I was halfway through saying "What?" When I realized her tone of voice sounded very happy and excited and I knew exactly why she was calling me, so it came out something like this: "Wha-oooohhhh! yaaaaay! yaaaay!" I think it went on for about 20 seconds of excited noises, but you get the idea. Of course Joshua looked up from whatever he was doing, so I told him, "It's Beth!" and he knew exactly what was going on.

Anyway, after an 11 minute phone call, ended by Mike being an over-tired toddler, I hope she gets how excited I am for the two of them. Now, it's time to plan a wedding!

Oh, and I hope she doesn't mind that I'm announcing it to everyone I know.

The Big Donut

New Family Picture

Look over on the right side bar and you'll notice we finally got a new family picture! The last one was taken a year ago. My mom was looking through her pictures trying to find one of us to put on her Christmas card and the most recent one she had was when Mike was 6 months old. He's changed a little since then. So, she invited us over for a second Thanksgiving dinner tonight, then my dad snapped a few pictures of us.

Leaderboard

This is a screen shot for the song Say It Ain't So by Weezer from http://www.rockband.com/leaderboards. The band Red Morning Warning (currently #9) is made up of members of Joshua's family. We actually did it twice, with different people, and got gold stars both times. This is the best of the two. We think we're pretty amazing, even though this is an easy song and our first time getting in the top ten on a leaderboard.

Eighteen Months

My son is now a year and a half. Where did the time go?

You can't really tell in the pictures, but the first two are before his hair cut and the next two are after. We've been giving him a hair cut about every two months. When it starts to stick out funny on the sides, it's time to cut it.

(He's not really 3 feet 2 inches. He's sitting on a bucket of baseballs.)

I Didn't Realize

When someone is leaving the Bountiful Applebee's, there's a tradition. At the end of the night, everyone who's there (and not busy) will grab a can of whipped cream and cover the quitter in white. Last night was my last night in Bountiful. It doesn't matter that I'm transferring to Tooele, I'm leaving all my friends in Bountiful behind. I was expecting the whipped cream, and I got it. Since it was a slow Sunday night, and they were low on whipped cream, I only got one can. One person, Nicole. (She was the only server on at the time.) Then I turn around to see something I wasn't expecting. Kendra, the most awesome manager ever, was holding two dozen roses. I should have been the one giving her the roses. That wasn't the first nice thing she'd done for me, probably the 5th or 6th even that night.

She's not the only one though. Nicole gave me a funny card, Lisa and Katie said they'll come visit me, and Pam...her way of saying she'll miss me isn't as nice as the others, but I know it's there and appreciate it. Pretty much everyone has wished me luck or told me they'll miss me, but two dozen roses? That means a lot to me.

For almost two and a half years at least one of us (me and Joshua) have worked there. If one of us wasn't currently working there, the other one was, so we were in to visit all the time. Now we're both gone. I'm not ever the center of attention, or even the "fun" person to be around, so I didn't really realize how much everyone (or at least one person) was going to miss me when I left. Managers who really do care about you make your life (or at least your job) so much easier! Even small things like keeping the office stocked with candy. That's a big deal to me. ;)

Twilight Movie

Nicolette and I went to the Twilight movie this morning! I thought it was pretty good. The effects were kinda weird, like the glitter, but overall, I liked it. It was a lot of fun to be in a theater full of mostly ladies. We were laughing at everyone's reactions to the movie, like when everyone cheered when they showed Edward the first time. ha ha

Maybe the best part was just being out with another female, no kids, no husbands, just the girls. We need to do it more often.

Proof We're Moving

Mike's favorite part about moving is all the fun boxes to play and hide in.

8 things

AnnaMarie tagged me, so here we go:

Eight things I'm passionate about:
1. Joshua
2. Mike
3. Trying to be the best wife.
4. Trying to be the best mother.
5. Trying to be a friend to everyone.
6. Raising my son to be a friend to everyone.
7. Making my life the best it can be.
8. Making my child (and future children) my priority.

Eight words or phrases I use all the time:
1. Love you!
2. Mike?
3. You delish!
4. Mike...no!
5. Help me pick this up.
6. Will you take out the trash?
7. Is Pepsi okay? (at work, when people ask for Coke even though I just told them we have Pepsi products, then they act all disappointed)
8. What do you want?!? (When Mike grabs my finger and drags me into the kitchen)

Eight things I want to do before I die.
1. Have at least one more kid.
2. Travel outside of the US.
3. Go on a cruise.
4. Take my kids to Disneyland (or Disneyworld, I'm not picky).
5. Have all the laundry done and put away for once.
6. Get a job making more than $2.75 an hour.
7. Get my associates degree in graphic design.
8. Be there for my kid(s) as much as possible.

Eight things I currently want or need:
1. Blinds for the new house.
2. Something more than a bite of Mike's apple to eat.
3. Furniture for the new house.
4. To move into the new house.
5. Boxes so I can pack to move to the new house.
6. A hair cut and color.
7. A massage from a spa.
8. My homework to be done.

Eight places I want to visit:
1. ANYWHERE! I just need a vacation.

Eight favorite restaurants:
1. Applebee's
2. Ruby River
3. Mo' Bettah Steaks
4. Noodles & Co
5. Fazoli's
6. Olive Garden
7. Firehouse Pizzeria
8. Macaroni Grill

8 TV shows I watch:
1. CSI
2. CSI: Miami
3. CSI: New York
4. House Hunters
5. Handy Manny
6. Little Einsteins
7. Blue's Clues
8. Nanny 911

Eight People I tag:
1. Whoever wants to do it.

PS

No pictures today. You'll have to wait.

However, Mike was asleep, in his bed, when I got home from work at 11:30 tonight.

ha ha

When Mom's Not Home

When I'm at work or locking myself in the bedroom to listen to my online classes at bedtime, Joshua is obviously the one to put Mike to bed. Well, he's been difficult to put to bed lately, and Joshua doesn't really try very hard so Mike usually ends up crashing wherever. Like on the couch in a weird position. It's much easier to put him to bed that way. ;)

I didn't even know Joshua took these pictures until I was emptying the memory card in our camera so Joshua has plenty of room to take pictures of our new house today. He's going out for the inspection, but I have to work so it's all on him to take pictures. If he remembers, I'll be posting those later tonight or tomorrow!

Twilight Tickets!

I ordered tickets online for the Twilight movie today! November 22nd, at 11:45 am. Barely less than 36 hours after it comes out! I decided I didn't really want to go with Joshua, since he's never read the books, and it's kind of a girly movie anyway. So, I'm going with Nicolette for her birthday. Yay! I'm so excited!

How I met Joshua

How did you meet your significant other? Answer all the questions HONESTLY and re post as "How I met _____"

1.Where did you meet?

At a church dance. It was a multi-stake young single adult dance. It was actually a whole weekend thing, but I could only go to the dinner and dance part since I had to work. To keep the story short, he asked me to dance, three times, then we hung out afterwards.

2.What was the first thought that went through your head when you met?

At first I thought I'd never see him again. I wasn't having much luck with boys, so why would this amazing return missionary like me, a girl barely out of high school? After he asked ME to dance the second, then the third time (the last two songs of the night), I knew he liked me back and I was walking on air.

3.Do you remember what he/she was wearing?

Tan pants and a green golf shirt.

4.Where was the first time you kissed this person?

We almost kissed a few times, but he wanted to wait and make it special. haha. It ended up happening 2 weeks after we met, in my apartment in Logan.

5.Where did you go for your first date?

He had no money, so he taught me how to play tennis at a park, then we got slurpees and went to Barnes and Noble to look at some books.

6.How long did you know this person before you became a couple?

About an hour. ha ha Officially, about a week.

7.How did he/she ask you out?

He just did.

8.Has this person ever proposed to you?

Yes. October 1, 2005.

9.Do you and this person have kids together?

One so far. Mike is almost a year and a half.

10.Have you ever broken the law with this person?

Yep.

11.When was the first time you realized that you liked this person?

It was pretty much love at first sight.

12.Do you get along with his/her family?

Mostly. His brothers...I love them one at a time, but all together...I have to take breaks.

13.Do you trust this person?

Definitely.

14.Do you see her/him as your partner in your future?

I can't see my future without him.

15.What is the best gift she/he gave you?

My son.

16.What is one thing He/She does that gets on your nerves?

He invites his brothers over when I don't want him to sometimes.

17.Where do you see each other 15 years from now?

I have no idea. Ask me in 15 years.

18.What causes the most arguments?

Xbox.

19.How long have you been together?

about 3 years

20.Are you Married?

Yes!

21. Who Do you Tag?

Eh, whoever.

Mike the Photographer

Mike loves to take pictures with my camera. Here's what he's done the past couple of days. I think he has a career in it, don't you. ;)