a sweet video update

a little st. patty's video from baby b

Stay tuned for the posting of his birth story... I have been meaning to do it for the past 6 weeks but when do you find time to do this stuff? I mostly just stare at this cute baby all day and try to sleep and shower and sing songs and read stories and sometimes make food and clean and now work out too... blogging has taken the back seat. Well, even more of a back seat than before. :) But I think I am getting the hang of typing while nursing, so maybe there is hope!

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all of you!

a Christmas photo spread with short captions

Jason and I got sweet cameras for each other for Christmas--his video, mine DSLR style--and I would like to show you rather than tell you some things about how it was. So fun. Photos begin Christmas day, post-camera reception.

Jason used his sweet video camera to record some of his parents' sweetness.
We haven't interviewed mine yet--they're warming up to the idea. :)

I still love technology... we used Skype so my sisters could be semi-
present while my missionary brother called home from Nicaragua.
So awesome.

I think Jason is the most good-looking man of all time.
Doesn't he just exude pure goodness, awesomeness, strength, and braveness?

Here we are chatting with my brother. It was a virtual family reunion!

The two brothermen a-chattin'. I sure like these guys.

Steve has sweet piano skills.

I come by my weird face-making honestly. Directly from my momma.

So happy to see this kid at Christmas! My nephew. So dang adorable.
So happy to see his parents, too. I just didn't post photographic evidence.

Momma is a doting grandmomma, too. I love how my parents
absolutely adore their grandchildren.

Great-grandmomma adores them, too.

Here is my cute other grandma, my papa's mama. We had
so much fun with all the folks at her place.

J loves his parents a whole bunch. They are good people, I tell you what.

And I seem to fit in with them just fine.

My papa gave me a fathers blessing as I have been feeling pretty
nervous about giving birth and becoming a mother and such.
One of the sweetest moments of my life.
I treasure it and I treasure my papa. Oh how I love him.

The day we left, it snowed! Here is adorable Grandma
waving at me through the frosty window.

It has snowed and snowed and snowed since we've been back...
we took advantage and went for a little light snowshoeing. Ahhh, clean air.

J constructing me some good meditative tracks to get me
through the labor and delivery process. This man gots skills.

Blairsy sent me this for Christmas this year. I love it. It is a physical
representation of that childlike hope that Christmas is all about--
the believing in good and in good things to come. Thank you, Blair.

Here are the curtains I put up over the closets in the baby's room.
Mostly this is for my sisters who helped me pick them out. I like!

When I go out in public these days, people look briefly
at my face, then immediately their eyes drift to the belly.
I am basically a walking belly. Nice.

Here I am at 36 weeks--took this one this morning.
26 days to D-day! Yipes!

officially freaking out

I counted the days until our due date this morning. 37 days. Oh my goodness. Am I ready for this? Is anyone ever ready? Probably not, but I think I'd better get to buying that crib and installing a car seat. Baby B's a-comin.

Do you make new years resolutions? I made a couple: 1. Go to bed at 10pm. 2. Read the New Testament through again. I have some other ideas floating around my brain but not solidified.

Christmas is so fun, no? I had the best time at home with my familia and J's familia. It is the best to be among those who know you so well and love you anyway. I feel pretty lucky to have a family that does, and to have pretty much the best in-laws of all time. J and I got sweet cameras for Christmas--me a DSLR and he an HD videocam--and we have been busily documenting our lives with live and still shots since. So. Much. Fun. So. Much. Disk space. I need a new external hard drive. :)

I have been reading The Peacegiver whilst on vacation and since returning (thanks Mom for letting me borrow your book). I highly recommend this one. One of the reasons I so enjoyed Christmas this year was because of what this book is teaching me about Christ and His continual ability to heal hearts. Give it a first or second read sometime. I am hoping to acquire this one to add to my bookshelf.

Happy New Year, lovies. I am lucky to know you folks. Here's hoping I get to see all of you in 2011.

xoxo

you asked for it

I have been negligent about posting belly photos. Reasons: (1) it is a little hard to get used to the idea of myself as such a large person. (2) I am also somewhat of a private person, so I forget to post stuff like this unless reminded. I have been reminded, so here is a photo--taken yesterday evening, of me at 32 weeks. I am getting progressively there! 56 more days, my weekly email tells me. Yay! And also, aggghh!! It is getting closer which = more real, which = more scary. But we are also excited.

We had some family up for to see the Christmas lights and enjoy a little holiday cheer and delicious food. This was good times. Enjoy photos:

Happy Christmas, everyone! May the season fill you with light as much as The Light of the world has filled our souls with His birth. Yay and double yay for that.

xoxo

happy decemberween!

Yay! I love December. Christmas and snow and seeing family and friends and drinking hot cider. So much goodness in this month. I love how friendly everyone is all the time and wishing me happy holidays. I may keep this tradition up all year round. If I'm asked what holiday, I'll just pick the closest one.

9 more weeks of pregnantness. Yay. I feel so big. Baby is measuring 3 lbs 14 oz and about 3 days ahead of his due date, according to ultrasound yesterdee. Also, he is cute. You'll have to take my word on that one since I don't want to put ultrasound photos on my blog. That seems weird. Here I am at 28 weeks, so this is 3 weeks ago. Baby is kicking tons, nausea has come back a bit (boo), and I am trying to mentally prepare for childbirth, which has me alternately excited and terrified.

Jason is ridiculoso busy with school and work. We don't see much of each other, and when he's around he's usually typing up a paper. Here he is on Thanksgiving weekend, with his new leather jacket which he wears around the house because it makes him feel awesome. He is. I will be glad when this guy gets a break and a chance to sleep.

It snowed a bunch one day and Jason was trying to suggest things we could do together while he was both home and awake one Sunday... I picked building snowmen. Here are our friends:

Bet you can guess which one is me. Clue: the pregnant one. And at our house, snowmen wear sombreros and their mouths are made of strawberry jam.

We had a lovely Thanksgiving with family and continued to get more snow... our little friends were buried.

As they have melted in the past few days, I look at them outside the window and think, "Uncle Owen! Aunt Beru!" Hahaha. I'm hilarious.

Are you getting excited for the holidays? I hope the season finds you well and with lots of ideas about how to make it meaningful and fun.

xoxo

bump, set...

...ok, just bump. Here's a pic of J and I at Halloween this year. He's a construction worker. I am self explanatory. :) Also our awesome pumpkins. Recognize them? 20 points to whoever figures them both out.




Also my sister sent me a link to this excellent website about intuitive eating. I know many of us have weird relationships with food or fall prey to other folks' weird theories about eating, and I thought this website had some good, sound advice.

Lastly, I now wash my face nightly with olive oil. Yes, you read that right. WITH OLIVE OIL. Never have I enjoyed such even-toned, soft, and clear skin as I have since embarking on this new routine. It is awesome. I won't preach the gospel of oil washing here but let me know if you want more info. It is easy, cheap, and effective. All favorites.

Now adios! I'm going to bed! At 10:30 on a Friday! I'm old!

rocktober

So, October has been rad. J and I went to California for an adventure with some of our favorite peeps. So glad we got to see those of you we got to see! And so glad to have some beach and sun time before we came back. To snow. Sigh, winter...

So happy to see all of these ladies. I love you girls.

...and my favorite little sister and her cool husband

p.s. their kid is adorable

J and I spent hours and hours together driving and we didn't even
get bored of each other. That is amazing. True love here, people.

...but then, how could you not love this man?

Back to life, back to reality... J has been working and going to school lots. I have been growing a baby lots. He is getting strong and good at kicking me right in the spinal cord, or so it seems. Still training some folks and doing a lot of domestic things like baking bread and cleaning and organizing... all the things I couldn't do while I was so nauseous, and probably won't have much time for come February. It is fun. I feel an odd sense of peace in my life, even though by every someone else's standards, I might appear a bit lazy (no job? what?)... but I am having a good time researching about babies and all the STUFF they need and how to properly care for one, and trying to keep things flowing at home so the J man can have clean clothes and food to eat, even if I don't get to see him very much. (p.s. This takes up a considerable amount of time. No wonder I never cooked or organized or cleaned properly while I worked full time! And props to you people who do work and/or raise children, and also do these things. I am in awe of you.)

Want to see the belly? It is a-growin. Course my california dessert adventure may not have helped much. :) J took one as well, as usual. Ha. For my 2nd belly photo I stuck that sucker out so you could get an idea of how I FEEL. Enormous. But that is good. Grow, little man! Only 15 more weeks to go!

oh, how LOVELY was the morning

So enjoyed General Conference this morning. I feel to change and improve. Looking forward to some more learning, reproof, and revelation this weekend. I love October... or, as J calls it, ROCKtober. :)

I passed my personal training certification test yesterday, yay! (NASM) So now I will be seeking for some folks to punish, ahem, I mean, help to improve their movements. I'm so excited. I've been training a friend along with myself for the past two months and I love this methodology. Makes a lot of sense and my body, though it feels enormous, also feels strong. Yay.

Baby update: he is kicking around so much these days. He's quite active, it appears! I'm excited. I need a son that I can teach to play sports. J is in charge of teaching him how to be a rock star. I guess we'll both take on the effort to teach him who he is and what he's doing on this planet in the first place. Intimidating? Yeah. But we'll rely on the Spirit all of the times. I think it will be ok.

Off to Costco for me! I require almonds, in bulk!

some of my favorites lately

So. First of all, I haven't died of nausea. That's a miracle and it's thanks to these:

No joke. Buy some at Walgreens or wherever if you experience nausea for any reason, and tell every person you know. They are amazing. Saved me from many an embarrassing public puking session.

That got me thinking about some of my favorite things...

• For taking off mascara: Huggies Natural Care baby wipes. Keeps my lashes luscious. :)
• For eating: ramen noodles. I ate 3 packages today. I'm disgusting. Hopefully baby likes sodium.
• For smelling nice: I've been on a Marc Jacobs Daisy perfume kick for a while. I think maybe it's time for something new (and I'm running out). Any suggestions?
• For a new hair experiment: I just bought hot rollers to create those oh-so-desirable waves in my hairs. I shall experiment directly. Hopefully it works and I look awesome.
• For muscle tightness: foam rolling, or self-myofascial release. I'm kindof a junkie lately. My foam roller arrives Saturday. CAN'T WAIT. Here's where I got a roller for myself and for J.

That is all. Sorry for the long breaks between blogging; I thought I was crazy for thinking that the computer made me sick, but it turns out that the refresh rate of a computer screen can actually do that. So now I will return to my books. And my hot rollers. To end, belly photos! (J insisted on having one as well. Hahaha, how I love him.) What a strange sensation this pregnant thing is. It is, in a word, a miracle.