Surprise!

So I've told you all before how our house was bought by a land developer who doesn't charge us rent. He told us months ago that our house would not be part of his new development because of zoning restrictions. Well, yesterday I came home from running errands to find this.

That giant whole would be my driveway. Apparently our house is going to be part of the new development and they needed to lay new sewer pipes. And by part of the new development I mean they are going to level our house and build a new one. The best part is that we still can't get our landlord to call us back and let us know exactly when our house is being demolished.

So now i'm thinking that me getting a job handed to me was not so much to bring in a little play money as much as it was a hint from Heavenly Father saying "your gonna need this". I hope not, and I hope we will get to stay in the house till April but with that hole, and lovely peice of machinery sitting right outside the living room window i'm getting very nervous.

In other news Andi's first tooth has made it's apperance. It's not all the way in, but just poking out enough to see and feel when she puts my finger in her mouth.

more changes

Well, now that we are all unpacked and settled in I've got time to tell you about all the little changes that have happened this last week.
First off Thad and I both got new callings. He is now the 1st councilor in the Elders Quorum and I am on the Enrichment board. I have to say I threw a bit of a stompy fit when I found I was getting released from Young Womens, and I'm still a little bitter about that. But I guess it's time I learned to appreciate Relief Society and enrichment. We'll see how that goes.
Also I got a job, well Thad kinda got me a job. Anyway Thad works for a guy who ownes a bunch of houses in Provo and Thad takes care of them. Their manager lady just quit so I'm going to be doing the management part of it. Dealing with tenants and contracts and rent and all that. It's only a few hours a week and the owners are really nice so that will be fun.
My sister got engaged a couple weeks ago and since then we've been wedding planning like crazy. I took her to Alyssa's and found her "the dress" in an hour. We found bridesmaid dresses on-line, which I have to order today, and she picked out flowers, cake and invites in Bako. So the bulk of it is done, which is good cos she's in Jersey till mid october and getting married Nov 18.
That's what i've been up to.

I'm Back!

Well It's been an action packed, fun filled, long yet short month. We headed to Bako the 2nd week in August and spent a week at my parents house before we left for the beach. We discovered that Andi LOVES the pool and has no fear of the water. She kept sticking her face in it, trying to drink it I think, and though she choked and sputtered would stick her face right back in it.
Saturday Kelsie and her "friend" (now fiance) Cameron arrived and we went to Rosemary's. For those of you who don't know, Rosemary's is by far the best ice cream place in the world and if you are ever near Bako you need to stop and eat there. Sunday my brother blessed his baby boy and we had a big family dinner where everyone had an opportunity to size up Cameron. He handled it well.
Monday we headed to Pismo and stayed in this awesome beach house. The 12 of us actually had plenty of room and it was right on a cliff over looking the ocean. We also had wet suits with us this summer which I decided is really the only way to go boogie boarding. I wasn't cold at all! It was awesome. Here are a couple of pics we took as a fam.

The whole crew

Kelsie and her now fiance Cameron

We got back from the beach Thursday afternoon in time to do some laundry and gt re-packed to go camping with Thads family. Friday afternoon we went to Wishon and Thad of course went fishing. He'd been talking about it for weeks. I always think that a few good fishing days will get it out of his system for a while, but that is never the case ;) We had a great time and Andi saw her first bonfire and trout.

The whole gang (yes Tara is holding her 1 month old and they camped in a tent trailer!)

Thad showing the kids how to gut a fish.

As you can tell they were almost as grossed out as me.

After camping we still had 4 days to just hang out. Unfortunately Andi got a double ear infection and couldn't go swimming anymore. We had a b-day BBQ for Thad at his parents Thursday with all the fam. And then drove back to Provo early Friday morning. And this is Andi boxed in by all our stuff in the back seat. Poor thing hates the car again.

We had a great 3 week vaca, and I know we'll never get to do that again. But we are glad to be back home and start getting un-packed from our WA move.

I'm not in right now

Well, we are getting all packed up this weekend and will be driving to Provo on Tuesday. Yay! I know you will all be sad, but I will be out of blog contact for almost a month as we will not have internet conection in Provo before we leave for California. I should be able to check on your blogs at some point on our trip, so keep them updated!
I will return in September.

The Wrestling Match

I've known since day one that Andi is a big fan of being naked. She doesn't get the chance often to be so, that is until she figured out how to crawl. She will sit still during the diaper change until the diaper is off, and then she's off. It doesn't matter if I'm holding both her legs, she flips over and wriggles free and starts scooting away! This morning's wrestling match was pretty rough, I finally had to put my leg across her stomcah and chest so she could not flip over, and try to put the diaper on working around my own leg. I think i'm going to find a way to strap her down from now on.

Week of the Babies

The stork has been busy this week. At least with my family members! My sister-in-law Tara had a little girl(Paige) Thursday night. My Sister-in-law Stefanie had a BIG boy(Walter Glenn Ray IV, or Cuatro as we call him) this afternoon. And my best friends wife is having a baby any time now. Yay for the babies!

Pictures

Here are the action shots of Andi crawling as promised!

Out of Order

Sunday night the computer decided to shut down and die. . . completely. We couldn't even get it to turn on! So after Thad pulled everything out of it he discovered that the motherboard had died and it took 2 days to find one a new one. So I've been without internet for 3 days! I felt so disconnected. . . I couldn't check e-mail or your blogs. . . but luckily it's fixed ;)
I'm getting antsy to go back to Provo. I keep getting these spassy urges to start packing. . . I start eye balling things around the house that we won't need in the next 2.5 weeks. So I have to distract my self by cleaning. I just wish we could pack up and go right now and get it over with! But I'm sad, the neighboor kids have been mowing the lawn for us this summer, and one of them e-mailed me to say that the lawn is dead! Apparently the sprinklers broke and our cousins who happen to be staying there have not fixed it. Thad and I worked so hard on that yard to get it looking good and now it's dead! I'm very upset.
Andi has begun crawling, sorta. She get's up on her hands and knees and lunges foreward, but from the initial lunge it's more of an army crawl. . . scrambling and pulling with her arms and pushing with her legs. It's very funny, and surprisingly effective. I've been trying to load a pictuer of it, but Thad has not finished fixing this dumb thing and it won't read the photo card. Oh well, I'll put one up when its fixed.

Agh!

There are few certanties with babies. With Andi we know that anything in her line of vision must immediately go in her mouth. Whether phisically possible or not, she will try to put whatever it is in her mouth, and if the object is too big, she covers it in drool. The other thing is that she freaks out over toothbrushes. Everytime I take her into the bathroom(she likes to stand on the counter spit at her reflection in the mirror) she tries with all her might to wriggle out of my arms and get mine or thads toothbrush. Yesterday during this event I realized that we actually had a baby toothbrush for her just waiting for a little chomper to come in. So I gave her the toothbrush and she would not put it in her mouth. The one object in the house that she is supposed to put in her mouth and she wouldn't do it!! She'd get close, then make a weird face and pull it away!


Oh! and my sister called me from Jersey last night with a disturbing situation. She was sitting with her employer and another lady and neither one of them knew what Newsies was! They had never heard of it! Fearing she might have slipped into some twisted alter uiverse she called to verify her sanity. I mean, who doesn't know what Newsies is!?!?! To shake off the bizarness I had to immediately turn on the soundtrack. What kind of Crazies live out on the east coast!? I'm still disturbed.

ho hum

So we finally have a picture of Andi with her hair done and I thought it deserved to be shown off. It's finally getting long enough to put a clip in it ! !


There is nothing terribly interesting going on lately. Our stake is having a pioneer day celebration at some park. We are going, but I can already gaurantee it will not be able to compare to Pioneer Village in Bako. That is one thing the tri-stake does very very well back home. . . TONS of good food, music, parade. . . not even the 100 + weather keeps people away. It's quite the party every year.
I really have nothing else interesting to post about, but we are going to Cali in a few weeks yay!

Half Birthday!

Today is Andi's half birthday, I can't believe it's really been 6 months. But then I look at her and can't believe it's only been 6 months. She's grown so much! She is still not crawling, but I still think she's going to skip that and go straight to walking. She sits up by herself now, and even stands holding on to the couch and coffee table. See. . .

She loves her jumper, mostly b/c she can walk around in it, and walks well if you hold her hands. She just doesn't show any interest in crawling. I've been looking up stuff to see if it's bad that she skips crawling and all I see are a bunch of people(Dr's included) arguing back and forth about the issue. Some say it doesn't matter, some say it does. I dunno.
It has been a long week. Not for any particular reason, it just feels like it has lasted forever! thankfully it's almost over.

Pirates and more. . .

Well we had a fun weekend. It was Dave's(Thads cousin here in vancouver) Birthday on the 7th, and to surprise him Mike, Heather Spencer & Hilllary drove out from Utah to hang out for the weekend. We of course saw Pirates on Friday night, which was so packed that we were on the very front row! Strange angle, i'm not even sure why they put seats that close to the screen. And I was kinda irritated by the ending of the movie, or lack thereof. Total cop-out ending. . . it's like the whole movie was just the lead up to say, hey, Pirates 3 soon to come! BUt it was still good, I'm just bugged b/c now I have to wait who knows how long to get some resolve and closure on the story.
Anyway, Saturday we went out to round lake and had a picnic with everyone. Thad caught a couple of ugly sunfish just to prove to everyone that he could flyfish even in a lake. It was pretty warm this weekend, Sunday of course always feels the hotest b/c we can't go to the mall to hang out in the AC or to the pool. But we did find a way for Andi to cool off ;)

Andi's first 4th of July was eventful. We started the day by buying her some new toys. We bought those foam alphabet puzzle piece mats and some blocks. I don't know why I didn't buy one of those mats before. It is genius! she spent like an hour just scooting around chewing on the letters and whenever she spit up, duh, the carpet was saved. Definitly a good purchase.


Then we went with Thad's Cousin to a BBQ at his in-laws, which was nice. Andi even enjoyed the fireworks. . . at least the ones she saw. They do their firework show really slow, one little popper at a time, so she was falling asleep before the good stuff started.
Growing up in a place where the big cool fireworks are illegal I had no idea how great a show you can see without going to a stadium. After we put Andi down for the night we sat on our patio and just watched the sky and there were fireworks going off everywhere! It seriously sounded like a warzone. . . I don't know how Andi slept through it. But it was really cool. I think we are going to buy some today and smuggle them back to Utah for New Years ;)

Happy 4th!

Well, it has been a fun couple of days. Friday we went down to Corvallis to hang out with Tanya & Billy for the weekend. We had a lot of fun, played games, watched movies, went on a picnic and walk along some river. Unfortunately they did not have Monday off so we came back to Vancouver Sunday night. This is our little picnic/hike.




Thad however did have Monday off which was great, because it was my birthday. So we planned to go downtown in Portland and check out Chinatown and the Pearl District. . . both of which sounded very cool and a little touristy from the website. I was expecting something along the lines of San Francisco. . . but it was really LAME! Chinatown was nothing but chinese restaurantes and the pearl district was full of construction and homeless people. So we came back and had a picnic at the park down the street.

Trouble!

Okay, so I discovered today that no matter how young they are all girls are capable of the craziest moodswings, even 5 month olds. Andi woke up this morning very happy and playful and we had fun for about an hour. Then the beast turned and did nothing but scream and whine, and nothing I did made her happy! She was like that for over an hour before she calmed down and went back to normal and she has been normal and cheerful since.
It makes me very nervous for the teenage years. If she can pull something like that at 5 months, what are we going to do when she's 15 and teenage insane?!

The Coast

We definitly went to "the coast," not the beach this weekend. It was very pretty and nice and cool. We went to Cannon Beach and walked along the water for a while. Andi thought the waves were very funny. Then we walked around the little town, which was very cute, touristy shops. We even found a bead shop and got stuff to make Andi a new bracelet. . . like she cares, but her other one is getting too small. Anyway here are a few pics of the day even though Thad is going to get mad that I am posting pics before he is ;)

Bubbles!!!

Andi took her first bubble bath last night and loved it. She kept trying to eat the bubbles, and I think she actually sucked a few down. She did manage to cover her entire face in bubbles and suck a few up her nose too, which she didn't really like.
We are headed to the coast this weekend. . . yay! e are taking Andi to the aquarium and to whatever else we can find in Seaside. I'll let you know how it goes ;)

Andi's Page

In case anyone was wondering Andi's page has been down all weekend because that part of the BYU server is down. There are new pics on the site, but we have no idea when it wil be back up. Keep checking!

I'm a big girl now!

Well, She's not walking yet, but Andi has figured out how to take the bumper pads off the sides of the crib to play with. The last few mornings I hear her babbling and walk in to find her chewing on the bumper pads or the ties that are supposed to keep them on the crib. And laying sideways like this.

We also finally bought a high chair this weekend. We started Andi on Solids this week and she loves the cereal, and we figured her swing was probably not the best place for her to be eating. So here she is in her new big girl chair.

For my Friends

Someone once said that life's largest conflicts are between your head and your heart. I couldn't agree more. But I think that no matter the struggle the heart will always win, because the heart cannot forget. The heart does not suffer from memory lapses or forgetful spells, but holds on to feelings, people, emotions you think your head might have forgotten.
I am having one of those conflicts today and thankfully my heart is winning, or reminding me of what my head had forgotten.
It is strange to me how content I can be in my life, and how much I can feel at a loss at the same time. My life is good. I am happy. I have a wonderful loving husband; a beautiful sweet baby girl whom I have the privilege to stay home with and take care of, and I have accomplished some of my life's most important ambitions.
But today I miss my friends. My old college roommates who are scattered across the country; My old high school friends, many of whom I've lost track of; and those people I've known my whole life who always seem to live so far away. There is a melancholy, a bittersweet sadness, in knowing where they all are, and what they are doing with their lives, and being unable to be apart of it all. In being unable to have them share in my joys every day. My parents used to tell me that friends come and go, but family will always be there. That is true in a way, but very untrue in another. My family will always be there, and we will get together for holidays and summer vacations, weddings, births and funerals. And while I won't see my friends nearly as often, I will always have them in my heart. I will always want them to be apart of whatever event is happening in my family. I will reminisce and look through pictures and wish that I could transplant everyone I love to the same place. And I will treasure what they have taught me, for each of them has changed my life in a different way.

This is what comes of watching Dawson's creek re-runs by myself in the morning. The funny part is that I never watched the show when it was on in new episodes. But I watched the last 2 episodes of the series today and felt somehow attatched because of how life had scattered them. Thankfully it is time for Andi to wake up and I will now be distracted from this weird funk that I am in.

just checkin in

I don't have anything exciting to talk about. Life is back to normal since our little trips. Although Andi decided to turn in to a teenage since we've been back and does not want to get out of bed in the morning. I usually don't set an alarm b/c she get's up right about 7 every day, but saturday and sunday I was dragging her out of bed at 8 or 8:30. Oh, and now for some reason she sleeps with one arm hanging out of the crib between the bars. I know I did that as a kid, always had an arm or leg hanging off the bed, but i'm not sure it started this early. Strange.
Anyway, it's temple night so Thad is getting off work early and we are having counsins kid baby-sit again. But this time Andi will be awake so we'll see how he does ;)

catching up

Well, I hope you all saw the pics of our weekend in Corvallis on Andi's website. I am back from Cali and so now have some cute ones to post of that trip.
Andi decided she loves swimming so here are a few pics of her in the pool.














Thankfully on our trip home we had an entire row on the plane to ourselve. So Andi spent the flight like this.
I love going home, but am so glad to be back. Andi sleeps so much better in her own bed, as do I. And I sleep much better when we don't have to share a room! But it was a fun trip and we are looking foreward to my fam coming to visit in July. We are headed back to Cali in August Sean and Ash so don't forget!

Trauma

First of all, Thad put some great pictures of last weekend with his family up on Andi's website. So since they are up there I'm not going to put them up here. So check them out there.
Second we have had a rough few days with Andi. She was really fussy and whiney and just not herself saturday and I just figured it was teething. Well Saturday night she woke up around midnight just screaming. SO I picked her up and she was just burning up, it hurt my arm to hold her. So we gave her some tylenol and water in her bottle and took her outside by the pool to cool down. Sunday after Dad and Walter gave her a blessing we took her to the Dr's office I used to work at and she has a wicked ear infection. All the Dr had to do was put the light thingy in her ear and she started screaming. So we got her some meds and keep her on tylenol and she is much happpier today. Much more like herself. ANd since the meds are a 5 day supply she should be much much better by the time we have to fly home. Poor baby.
Oh, but we did take her in the pool saturday and she is a fan. and looks stinkin cute in her bathing suit ;)

Friend!

Okay Lisa! Now my life is complete! I have found everyone I miss! well sort of, I still need your e-mail Lisa.
Graduation went well last night. Bobby secretly(well he told me and kels but we couldn't tell the parents) auditioned for and was chosen to sing at graduation. Mom and Dad were completely surprised, "Bobby's singing. . . by himself. . does he know that?!" But he did really well, and I was so proud of him.
Tonight we are actually still in the middle of the party for he and his group of friends. The nice part is that it was a family party, so the kids all came with their familes. But as an older sibling I am a little tweaked about all the hoopla. My parents never threw parties for me. If I had one I planned it and did all the work. I guess those are the perks of being at the end of the line. Loosers get everything!
I am, at the moment, waiting for the paint to dry in these blocks we are using as center pieces for tomorrows baby shower. I have become a little crafty in my stay at home mom career. Not really, Thad cut out teh blocks and sanded them, I just get to paint them.
I will report back when more fun happens.

Keeps going and going . . .

Well, Monday was really nice. The boys went fishing of course, and the girls went downtown. They have a super cute walking path along the river in Corvallis, and all these fun shops, including the best bakery/deli ever! It was a great discovery. Andi quite enjoyed herself, and even tried to drink out of my straw, she didn't get anything out, but tried really hard.
Tuesday and today I have been doing all the laundry from the weekend trip so I can re-pack everything for California this weekend. Andi and I are flying to Bako tomorrow morning for my little bro's graduation and my sister-in-laws baby shower. Plus my parents are hosting a graduation party for Bobby's friends, and I am teaching YW's on Sunday, and Tarin is throwing her little guy his first birthday party. As usual it's non-stop action. Should be fun. I"ll post pics when I get them!

Memorial Day Weekend

Well, our weekend has been fun, and it's not over yet! Saturday noon-ish we headed down to Corvallis to hang out with Tanya & Billy(Thad's sis and bro in law) and Thads parents who are visiting the NW for the week. Andi of course hated the drive but loves Tanya's little dog Roxi. I was afraid she might be scared of the dog, but can't get enough of watching it run around. The dog even licked her ears and Andi just tried to grab it's nose. Tanya and Billy are building a fabulous house here in Corvallis and we got the grand tour. I Was way impressed with all the colors they used on the walls and how awesome it looks. I've got to get brave like that, it looks great. Tomorrow I think the guys are going fly-fishing, and i'm not sure what the girls are doing. But i'll be sure to post if it's anything fun!

Chuck Norris

So lately Thad is really entertained by anything that mocks Chuck Norris, as we all should be. Anyway, he found a hilarious website with a Chuck Norris fact sheet. . . here are a few of my favorites. . .


Fact # 64 - Chuck Norris never goes hunting. Hunting implies you might fail, Chuck Norris goes killing.
Fact #42 - Chuck Norris never sleeps, he waits.
Fact # 36 - Chuck Norris can slam revolving doors
Fact # 88 - Chuck Norris' tears cure cancer. Too bad he's never cried.
Fact # 27 - The chief export of Chuck Norris is pain.

So Funny!

Where are they?!

Okay so i've managed to get in touch with everyone I have been missing but Leeann and Rebekah. If any of you have talked to them recently or know how to contact them let me know. Or tell them to start blogging and join the fun. Jayme, I expect a blog from you any day now ;)

Welcome to the Real World

Well, we've had a fun weekend. Friday night we hired our first baby-sitter. Not that we haven't been out on dates since Andi was born, but Kelsie watched her while we were in Provo so that doesn't really count cos it was free. Anyway Thad's cousins kid Carter came over so we could go see The Davinci Code. Fabulous byu the way. As usual the book was better and there were parts it left out, but all around good suspenseful actionpacked thriller. So we went to a very late showing so Andi would be asleep for the night and 11 year old Carter really wouldn't have to do anything, but be there just in case. But I think Andi has this sense, she knows when i'm gone. She woke up 30 minuted after we left and we hadn't left the poor kid a bottle, showed him where diapers were, instructions or anything! She sleeps 10-12 hours a nigth now, so why would we! But he changed her and made a bottle and tried to feed her and everything, so we were really impressed. Bradon is 11 and I don't know that he would have figured out what to do, but Bradon is the baby and Carter has 4 younger siblings, so he seems older than Bradon.
Anyway Saturday night we went to an office BBQ at Thad's bosses 20 acre gentlemens ranch. It was fun, but kinda weird at the same time. They had coolers full of beer and everyone was drinking. We've just been in Utah so long that it seemed bizarre, you just forget what the real world is like living in the bubble. But Thad works with some really great people, a couple that I would have thought were LDS if I didn't know better. So Thad picked up a couple Books of Mormon at church today to have at work.
All in all, good weekend.

Totally No Lack of Cuteness

Okay so you have to see these pics we took of Andi this weekend. This first one I call her first modeling shoot.

And this one is just to show of Thad's editing skills. I was actually holding her up, but it totally looks like she can stand by herself!

Tweaked!

OKay, I'm a little tweaked and no one is picking up their phones for me to vent. So I will vent to all of you at once. I have had headaches everyday for almost a month now. 2 excedrine usually takes care of it, but i'm pretty sure that will eat holes in my stomach sooner or later. So I called around to Chiropractors offices today(i'm pretty sure the headaches are because my back is tweaked) to get an appointment and check prices since we don't have insurance right now. Anyway, I set up an apointment for this one place at 2 o'clock. So I just went and the lady was like, Oh your a new patient we need you to come back at 4 instead because we didn't schedule enough time for a new patient exam right now. So I leave and then they call me to say that they miss quoted me a price, so instead of $38 dollars a visit it is $350 for the initial and then like 50 after that!. Are you kidding me!!!! So I cancelled my appointment and luckily got an appointment somewhere else for later today that is much more reasonable. But it irritates me that they didn't call and tell me before I got there that I needed to reschedule, vastly miss-quoted the price and made me drag Andi out when she was supposed to be going down for a nap! Loosers!

Bizarro!

Okay, the stupidest thing keeps happening to my shirts. Seriously this is weird. It has happened to 4 of them and it makes me crazy! For some reason randomly I look down and there is a tear in the elbow. . . left elbow on all four shirts. I moisturize like crazy so it's not like my elbows are rough and rubbing holes, if so it would rip both sleeves. But I decided to patch one of them and it seemed to work. I wore it for the 2nd time today since I patched it and guess what. Another tear, left sleeve just above the patch! Thad thinks I do it on purpose so I have an excuse to shop. . . like I think we have the money for that. Whatever. . . it's stupid! Has anyone else ever had this problem?

Nostalgic

So I have reconnected with my old roomies and King Henry friends the last couple weeks and it has made me so nostalgic. So I had to post some pictures that just make me happy. I love you guys and miss you all!

I have been thinking that in a year or so when we(spouses included) are all done with school/not pregnant and can travel, need to have a reunion.

There is nothing super exciting to report from here. In the last week I have managed to find Costoc, Albertsons, blockbuster, Target, and Papa Johns, you know the essentials. But I haven't been to adventurous as far as exploring goes. Maybe this weekend when Thad is around to help with Andi we'll go exploring.

We kind of have a tradition of going to a show for my birthday, and being near portland this summer we want to do it again. Hairspray is coming. . . anyone seen it? Should we go?

Another Day

So this is my new favorite picture of Andi. I don't know how Thad get's her to make these faces! Thad started work yesterday and seems to like it. He has his own office, which I think is weird for an intern, but he thinks it's normal. "Why wouldn't they give me an office?" "Uh, becuase you are an intern, and intern is another word for Peon!" But apparently not in this company, so he's happy.
I think I can see the tooth that has been giving Andi such fits lately. It's on the bottom, and i'm thinking it should be popping out in a few weeks. . . right now it's just a little white spot. I can just picture the face she's making in this photo with one little chomper sticking up.
p.s. anonymous, Jayme, so glad to hear from you! e-mail me so we can catch up, my e-mail is posted on my profile.

We Made It !!!!!!

So, after a grueling 14 hour drive on Tuesday we finally made it to Vancouver. Andi and I were not friends for a while, but we are okay now. Here are a few pics of our new place. This one is part of our front room, and as you can tell we are not completely done with the organization of the place, but it's getting there. One good cleaning and we should be good.

This is the other half of the front room, and you can see the table in the bottom left corner, the rest of it is in the little dinning area that you can't see in the pic.

This is the Kitchen, and if you lok very closely at the stove you will see the apple pie that I made from scratch last night. First time i've ever done that, but I did very well.

And this might be my favorite part of the new place. The closet. This picture does not do it justice, but you can see that the dresser is inside of it, and you can't see Thads side, so just imagine how spacious it is. This has been added to the list of must haves when we buy a house ;)

So things are going well, Thad starts work on monday so we've been running errands and getting everything we need before he starts. It should be a fun summer.

Space Rocket Derby

I don't know if anyone knows this, but Thad is the cub master in our ward . . . and a month ago at the pack meeting they did a space derby. Kinda like a pinewood derby only with rockets. So for date night tonight we got together with 5 other couples in the ward and had our own derby. We made the rockets during the week and raced them with the track Thad made for the cub scouts. It was way fun . . untill the husbands started a rubber band fight . . and shortly thereafter the wives left with the babies to protect them from their fathers. I'm pretty sure even the cub scouts were well behaved enough not to start a rubber band war. Anyway, here's a picture of our rockets. . . both of which rocked the races!And in more childish fun news, the tree house Thad and the bishop(our neighbor) have been working on is finally finished. Thad had a friend of his at the BYU sign shop make a sign for it, so now on the porch just under the porch light(yes the tree house has electricity, and a porch) is a huge sign that says "The Rameumptom". The best part is that it's facing the church parking lot so everyone in the ward get's to see the sign on Sunday. . . although we failed to get it in the picture.

Teething

So we are pretty sure Andi is teething these days. She chews on anything that is close to her mouth. . . in this case the leg of her floor toys. She was laying on a pillow playing with the toys that hang abover her, but managed to wriggle down and chew on the leg of the toy instead. The girl knows what she wants ;)

Packing

So this is kinda funny. We are leaving in a few days for the internship and I have been packing everything we don't absolutely need. Spencer and Hillary are staying in our place for the summer and had to be out of their current apt before they left for Disneyland today. . . so we have all of their stuff in the basement and front room, and everything i've boxed up on top of their stuff. . . so the front room looks like this right now.
Yes, besides our couches, and entertainment center, and fouton, and bookcase(in the other corner you can't see) we have their mattress, couch, table, coffee table, dresser, bookcase, and t.v. in the front room. And it's only going to get worse till we leave ;)

Bizzarly fortunate

I don't know how Thad does it. I don't know anyone else on the planet who get's handed jobs like he does. In the last two weeks he has had three companies call him and offer him a job running some part of their company. . . he has not even graduated! I don't know if that says more for Thad as a person or for the CM program at BYU. It's just weird. I'm not complaining, him getting jobs thrown at him is good for me too ;) But i'm just boggled by the fact that people are so willing to offer him things without having met him, or without him having his degree. . . weird.

So Easter Sunday was a nice day. . . about 70 degrees and sunny. Yesterday. . . just one day after it looked like this in lovely Utah.
Don't be fooled by the look of sun shine in the first picture, that's the camera flash reflecting off the kitchen window. And these are the pretty spring flowers that are now going to die because someone thinks it's okay to snow in April!
Yet another reason I cannot wait to get out of Utah!

Easter !

So here are a few easter pictures. Andi's outfit was a little big, but I really wanted her to wear it so we pinned the skirt and made it work.


We had an easter egg hunt with Kelsie before church, but all those pictures are on her camera so I don't have one to post. We took turns hidding the eggs in the backyard and then finding them. Kels and I thought we had super hard hiding spots for Thads eggs but he found them all in like 3 minutes, but in all fairness he was the last to hunt so he just checked the places that hadn't been used yet, so if he had gone first it would have been much harder.
Then I had to sing in Sacrament for the Choir Nazi's program. . . which was a joke. A full hour of her showing off on the organ and piano. . . we have a choir pianist, but he didn't play because she likes to showboat. So it was lame and annoying and i'm glad it's over.

Ginormous !

Okay, so we discovered this weekend that Andi is pretty much ginormous. First of all one of the neighbor kids had a b-day party friday night and we went and her 6 month old cousin was the same size as Andi. Then sunday morning I was trying to get her dressed and the dresses she has been wearing are all too small, and I didn't have any 3-6 monthers, so the next size was 6 or 6-9 months. I put one on her assuming it would be too big but it fit almost perfectly, and it's a 6-9 monther. She turns three months in a few days. Beast girl!

Here is another cute pictureof her giggling.

I finally got picture of all of my Laurels together on sunday. They are a fabulous group of girls! I will definitly miss them this summer, but I guess they aren't releasing me and I get to go back to teaching them in the fall ;)

Shots

Andi had to get her shots today. 4 total, 2 in each leg. She was definitly not happy about that. But she weighs 13.9 lbs now and is in the 90th percentile for height(wonder where she gets it) and 95th percentile for weight(chunk!)Aside from being very mad at me right now,she's doing well ;)

The Trip

What a weekend! First of all let me say I cannot believe we made that 13 hour drive twice in one weekend, or that we have to do it again in three weeks! But aside from the years we spent in the car it was a fun trip. We stayed with Thad's cousin Dave & his wife Kristyn and their family. . . 5 hillarous rowdy boys and a cute little girl. We did find an apartment but not in Portland, in Vancouver. The commute was about the same from vancouver as any of the places we looked at around Portland, and Vancouver just seemed more our style. Portland just felt weird. . . cool city, and fun to hang out in on the weekend but not to live in.
Andi did really well in the car, although I'm pretty sure she wishes her car seat would burn so she would never have to be in it again. She managed to entertain herself for a while in the back seat and taught herself to blow spit bubbles and buzz her lips. Very fun.
We are glad to be back and now have to get organized so we can get packing!

So, we bought a digital video camera yesterday, very exciting. And I realized that Thad truly is his mothers son. He whipped the camera out several times once the battery was charged to video just in case Andi did something cute. She rolled over again . . . phew! good thing we had the camera to cath it!
Um, my skirt is finished all except the zipper, amd I did it with no tantrums! which is why the zipper is not done yet, I got frustrated and had to put it away for a while till I could calmly tackle it again. Other than that, nothing terribly interesting to report, though I'm sure there will be when we get back from our trip this weekend.

Plans

So this picture really has nothing to do with the post, but it's cute.
Anyway, we are headed to Portland next weekend to find an apartment for the summer. Wish us luck! It's not the apt hunting I am worried about as much as it is a 12 hour road trip with this little one. She is not a huge fan of the car seat these days, unless she is asleep and doesn't know she's in it. So she'll probably sleep all day while we are driving and be up all night once we get there! yay!
So I bought material and a pattern to make a skirt, i've got it all cut out and after reading the instructions several times I think I will attempt to put it together. That is after Kelsie comes over to help me thread the devil machine that hates me. It really does hate me. Everyone else seems to ba able to use it just fine, but as soon as I touch it the thread gets all knotted and messes everything up. But my goal is to finish the skirt without a huge tantrum ;) We'll see what happens.

Blessed

So Thad finally tracked down our landlord at a public meeting and asked him, ya know, if he wanted rent for the last two months! This guy is either crazy or very very nice cos he said he wasn't worried about collecting rent from us ever! He said he is too busy with his other projects to worry about being a landlord right now, and that he didn't buy the properties to get rent, but to develope it. So there is a huge testimony to the power of paying tithing, which is my only explanation for our fabulously good luck. It's not luck at all, but blessings ;)

Independent Woman

Andi Discovered her independence at Grandma & Grandpa's house. She spent most of her awake time laying on a blanket like this.

I think she had a bit too much attention with all the family & friends around and for the rest of the week got cranky if you held her too long. Which is kinda nice for me in that it gives me a little more freedom to do things while she is awake. She will let you hold her while she's eating, being burped, or if she's really tired and wants to be rocked, but other than that she seems to prefer being left to her own on the floor. She also rolled over for the first time this afternoon, but i'm not sure it wasn't an accident.

Andi's Big Day

Here is Andi on her blessing day . . . wearing the very same outfit I was blessed in. It fits her better though . . . I was a super fat baby.


It was a wonderful day, and she even managed to keep the outfit clean! There are of course, a bazillion more pics with all the fam, but you'll have to check out Thad's site for that. More about the trip home to come . . . stay tuned!