A Touch of Tyrell

Devoured

2012-01-26T23:58:00.000-08:00

Our house is devouring every ounce of me right now. In fact, I even forgot one of my bestest friends baby shower was last night... I totally spaced. The only thing I can think about is the fact that our house (and my life) are covered in plastic right now. Ev and I have been barely surviving the last 6 days living in two small bedroom... without a kitchen.

Thankfully, the texture was stayed last night.

Absolutely everything that wasn't 100% covered got textured.

So last night, when they were spraying the texture, we left the house and headed to ikea (WHY didn't I remember the baby shower!?!?!?!).

We looked at the kitchen cabinets again and bought a few for the laundry room. On the way out of the store, we stopped and got some ice cream. Everett's last run in with ice scream was a little rough... but this time he loved it.

We bought two cones. One for me, one for Jake. As soon as Jake handed me my cone, Ev snatched it out of my hands. At first, he was just pressing his mouth onto the ice cream.

He wasn't really eating any... just melting it with his lips. We showed him how to lick it with his tongue and then every last drop of that cone made it into his little tummy!

It had to be one of the funniest/cutest things Everett has ever done. He would stick he tongue out and just wag it side to side on the cone. Hilarious!

About half way into the drive home he grunted at me a few times (because he still isn't talking). I turned around and he handed me his cone. He had licked everything out of the cone. It was ALL gone and it didn't even leak out of the bottom. I don't even know how he got his tongue into the very bottom of the cone!

He devoured it. Like the house is devouring me. Every last drop.

Jake stayed home from work today to get everything primered and painted so that we could take the plastic down.

(The ceiling paint goes on light pink and then dries white... so you know where you've painted.)

I am so glad he was able to paint today because I don't think I could have made it another day. All of the plastic is gone and our house is much more livable. Jake is passed out in bed. He woke up at 4:30 this morning to get it all done. He's kind-of a big deal. :)

Bleeping Dogs

2012-01-24T20:34:00.000-08:00

This is my blog... hear me roar!

Sometimes I feel like Jake and I are the minority around here for not having pets. Truth be told, we don't like pets and we probably won't ever have pets.

I totally understand the love somebody can have for a pet and the relationship that is there, but we aren't interested in everything else that comes with owning a pet. The cost, responsibility, smell, hair, burden... are not worth it to us. But apparently it's worth it to everyone else in our neighborhood.

Our favorite neighbor comes outside to talk to us any time we are out there... and she brings her dog and cat with. During Christmas, when I had garland wrapped around our light pole, the dog peed on it. Not once, but twice in the same conversation! (curse words!) During Fall, when we had tons of leaves on our grass, the dog pooped right in the leaves. I was thankful (*gag me with a spoon*) when she scooped up the stemming poo with leaves and tossed it across the street.

The neighbors (on both sides of us) each have two dogs.

One neighbor is good about keeping his dogs from extended periods of barking... but the other neighbor can tune out the sound of his dogs for hours and hours.

Pretty much the second neighbor was ruining our lives because his dogs were barking all night long and it was keeping us up. It was horrible. (Remember Christmas morning?... 5 am... because his bleeping dogs woke us up! On Christmas morning!!) Now he keeps his dogs in at night. I've been meaning to thank them for being responsible about their dogs (although I would word it a lot more kindly than that!) until their dogs broke through the fence this afternoon. They pooped 4 times in a matter of minutes and then started to dig themselves out of our yard. (grrrrrrr!)

I was tempted to just open the gate and let them run away... but I walked over and rang the neighbors doorbell instead.

I say, if you are going to own a pet, make sure it doesn't ruin your neighbors life, grass, or fence. Okay?!

A Little Story About Why Our House Looks Like Crap.

2012-01-24T02:08:00.000-08:00

I'll probably be up until the wee hours of the morning trying to document and explain why our house looks like this:

Kitchen:

Hallway:

Guest bedroom:

Here is the explanation:

Our house is 1400 sq ft with 3 small bedrooms, 2 small bathrooms, a living room, dining room, kitchen, and a den.

Because our house used to have a funky wall dividing the living room from the kitchen and dining room, the previous owners just had a couch and a piano in there (because it was virtually impossible to arrange any sort of "living room" in the living room).

Funky wall:

Previous owners layout:

So the previous owners used the den as their TV room:

(The TV was in the bottom right of this picture)

The door on the right leads to the backyard and the door on the left leads to the garage.

Here is a picture facing the other direction:

The bi-fold doors on the right used to be a laundry closet... but they turned it into a storage closet and put their washer and dryer in the garage. Since the back of the closet wall and the garage wall are the same wall, they just flipped the hook-ups to the garage side of the wall. They put shelves in the closet and used it to store toys and craft supplies. We knew that the hook-ups could be flipped back (because we didn't want the w/d in the garage) so we planned on turning the laundry closet into an actual laundry room. (Plus, we had already ripped out the shelves and used them in our tiny bedroom closet.)

We could have just flipped the hook-ups and installed our w/d and called it good. But we are the kind of people that just open the laundry room door and throw our dirty clothes in there and then close the door again. The laundry baskets are always on the floor... overflowing with clothes waiting to be laundered... so we didn't see the logic in having a closet when there was enough space to make it a room... especially when the closet doesn't have enough space for our usual piles of dirty clothes.

I took the doors off... and that's about all I've done to contribute to the laundry room renovation.

Back in October or November, Jake framed the room in and ripped out the carpet.

We didn't want our laundry room to look like it had been a closet in the past... so Jake took out the studs and header that had previously made it a closet.

He worked loooong and hard making the walls level.

But he did a great job and you can't even tell that the walls and ceiling used to been uneven.

Jake is actually in the process of moving the hole for the light to the middle of the room. (But the fan will stay where it's at).

We wanted to finish our laundry room so that we could get the w/d out of the garage because they are taking up precious storage and work space.

Now that laundry room is taped, it's ready for texture.

Jake spent a lot of time taping the room and getting it ready for the texture. He took into consideration how long (and how difficult) it was to tape a small room... and thought about how much taping there was to do in our kitchen and ceiling... so we decided to hire someone to do the rest of the taping and all of the texture (because we wanted to get all of the texture done at once) and we wanted it to look professional.

Lucky for us, one of Jake's friends (from high school)'s dad does tape and texture and gave us a good deal.

(how'd you like that terrible punctuation?! Jake's friends' dad? Jake's friend's dad?)

He was going to come over on Saturday to do the first coat of tape. In order to tape the ceiling above the microwave and the flat ceiling in the kitchen, we had to take the upper cabinets down.

Jake and I had been ~~debating~~ fighting and arguing to no end about what to do with our kitchen cabinets (in general). Replace them or refinish them. I wanted (SOOOO BADLY) to paint them white (like I had always planned on doing) but Jake wanted to replace them. I even painted some of the lower cabinets and bar white to show him how good it would look:

We even spent a Saturday sanding the doors down and we bought breadboard and cut it to fit in the recessed part of our cabinet doors. I really love old country-looking cabinets and I love saving a ton of money, AND I love a good project... but in the end, I lost the fight.

Here is why. I had measured and re-measured and pieced our cabinets to fit perfectly back together to our plan of having an L shaped kitchen with an island (in my head and on paper). We were going to take the cabinets in the bar apart and then re-arrange them to their new place (and then I was going to sand them and re-finish them... and now was the perfect time since we were taking the upper cabinets down anyways). We took the counter top off (because that was going to be replaced regardless) and that is when my dreams of re-finishing our cabinets fell apart.

We slid the stove out and then lifted the counter top off.

One of the cabinets had a built in cutting board that was horrifically disgusting and had blood all over it. I shivered and gagged and then we threw it out.

Then we moved the cabinet just to find mice poop EVERYWHERE. I wanted to die. Under every cabinet there was a ton.

I shivered and gagged and wanted to die all over again as we vacuumed it up with the shop vac.

I knew that our cabinets were in less than perfect shape (and were in need of a good cleaning) but I finally came to the realization that our cabinets are crap.

We only had five tiny, tiny, tiny drawers in the entire kitchen and, in general, the cabinets didn't function well at all. Plus, they were the cheapest version of builder grade cabinets from 20 years ago.

So that is how we ended up with three cabinets, a sink, and a dishwasher for a kitchen and why our hallway is our temporary pantry; all because our laundry room needed texture... and we wanted to do all of the texture at once. Are you following this ridiculous story?

To add to the craziness of this past week (you know, the biggest, coldest storm in forever) we replaced the window in our dining room with a sliding glass door.

It's a nice, big, 6 ft window... but below the window (on the outside of the house) there is a deck. But there in no way to get onto the deck unless you go out the slider in the 'den' and then walk across the concrete and then up onto the deck. So we wanted there to be a slider in the dining room instead of a window. We could have replaced the 6 ft window with a 6 ft slider but I couldn't stand how the window wasn't centered with the dining room/dining room chandelier. It hangs over on the right about 16 more inches than it does on the left. So we replaced the 6 ft window with a 5 ft slider to help it look a little more centered with the dining room.

There were electrical wires that ran under the window... so Jake had to rewire/add more wire and go up and around the window so that we could make it a door.

Jake's family happened to be over because they were out of power and were coming over to shower... little did they know... we didn't have a kitchen, or a TV (just a couch in an empty room), and that Karl would have to 'work' for that shower! He helped Jake take out the window and put in the slider.

See how there was no way to get onto the deck from the inside of the house:

Huge hole in our house during the biggest storm ever:

We had to replace the window with a slider now so that the wall to the right of the slider could be taped and textured too... because we only want to have to do this once!

Do you like where our oven is!? At least it's hooked up!

The good news is that the laundry room, kitchen, dining room, kitchen ceiling, and parts of the 'den's' walls and ceiling were taped on Saturday and are ready for sanding tomorrow (technically today...) and then the texture will get sprayed on Wednesday. It's looking better already!

While everything is covered in plastic, we'll paint the ceiling. Then, perhaps we'll figure out some sort of temporary kitchen and get our living room and dining room put back together.

Ice At The Gas Station :)

2012-01-19T16:31:00.000-08:00

All that snow turned into ice...

We heard branches breaking off of trees and crashing to the ground all night... and all day. It's a good thing we cut that tree in our front yard down when we did. I have no doubt that the branches would be touching our roof if it were still there. Some of the trees in our

neighborhood have branches so heavy that they are touching the ground. Even the little tree in our front yard is having trouble.

Our power went out again this morning and we're kind of just waiting for it to go out again. But I have to admit, the snow and ice do look pretty cool.

In other news... Ev has the most horrible and absolutely worst smelling gas EVER right now. I'm not really sure whats going on in that little tummy of his... but its foul. And I'm trapped inside with him all day. I'm praying for some warm temperatures so I can breath fresh air again!

sNOwMORE

2012-01-18T21:45:00.000-08:00

We woke up to lots of snow this morning! It was so beautiful.

I felt a little guilty that Ev and I hadn't really played in the snow yet. Turns out Ev isn't all that interested in it... especially when it's too deep to walk in or ride your bike in.... and when you don't have snow pants or a sled. Then it's just cold, wet white stuff.

So he sat on his bike and watched as I made a snowlady.

Maybe he'll like it next year... or the year after that. Or maybe we should just get a sled and then maybe he'd like it.

Jake went to work this morning so we were left with a 2-wheel drive car and the un-paved roads. We didn't go anywhere. We were super excited when Jake came home... but then (literally) 5 minutes after he walked through the door the power went out. We had cold sandwiches and crackers for dinner, cold milk before bed, and we dressed Ev in two layers of pajamas.... after building block towers, coloring, and reading books by candlelight.

I'm not sure if Ev is a big fan of these Winter adventures. Good thing they only happen once or twice a year.

Fireplace Decorations

2012-01-17T21:55:00.000-08:00

Before we moved in I told Jake that I didn't want to mount our TV over the fireplace because I wanted to decorate it instead.

After a few months of having the TV on a stand we decided that our floor space was more valuable than some decorations above the fireplace. I was a little bummed because I thought our fireplace would be ugly forever... but it turns out that it doesn't look so bad after all!

I made a little something to hang across the fireplace. It's just some jute/twine with burlap strips tied around it but I'm completely in love with it.

I used about a yard and a half of burlap so it the entire project cost $6.50. So get cracking' on your own... I know you want one!

It's Snow Exciting!

2012-01-16T23:34:00.000-08:00

It's been snowing for the last few days and it's been the best thing ever.

I grew up in Colorado where it snowed a lot every Winter. Every Winter since we've lived in WA it snows once or twice (MAYBE three times) but it's always gone within a day or two. I happen to like the snow so it's nice that it's stuck around for the last few days.

Jake called me this morning and told me that it would probably snow later today and that if I needed to go to the store that I should go sooner than later. I put together a menu and shopping list and headed to the store. I put the car in park and turned around to ask Everett if he was ready and he had fallen asleep on the way!

So I turned around and went home.

I just love a good snowy day. It's almost magical. I crawled into bed and read while Everett slept and the snow fell out my window.

I love the excitement and beauty that snow brings, but above all, I love how quite and still it makes everything. It's so peaceful.

The Most Delicious Caramel Popcorn... Ever!

2012-01-14T23:24:00.000-08:00

If you new years resolution was to exercise.... then I have the perfect recipe for you!

Chewy Caramel Popcorn

It's the most delicious thing ever and your mouth will be doing a lot of exercise :-)

I got this recipe when I was a freshman in high school when I took Foods 101

1 to 2 bags of popped popcorn

1/2 cup butter

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup corn syrup

1t baking soda

salt to taste

Put your popped popcorn in a very large bowl and set aside.

Melt the butter in a medium sauce pan. Add the brown sugar and corn syrup and mix them in.

Bring it to a boil and let it boil for 2 minutes.

Remove from heat and add 1t baking soda. It will start to look like a science experiment. Stir it until it looks like it's all mixed in and then pour the mixture over your popcorn.

Mix it all up and eat it as soon as it's not hot anymore :)

It's delicious. And chewy... that's where the 'exercising' come in!

You're welcome ;-)

It's A Win/Win

2012-01-11T22:46:00.000-08:00

Somebody likes the movie Cars.

He loves that movie so much that he's watched it, beginning to end, about 15 times in the last week.

We still read books, put together train tracks, stack paint bottles, work on our words and animal noises, ride bikes, and go outside... but watching Cars is #1 on the list everyday.

I happen to love that he loves watching this movie. I think it's adorable that he has specific interests already... like cars. And it replaces the two hours a day he used to cry and throw fits... and I get some free time. It's a win/win.

Everybody loves a win/win!

The Same Me

2012-01-10T23:19:00.000-08:00

Hmmmm... a new year, a new you.

That's all I've been hearing on the radio lately.

So I've been thinking about me a lot lately, and you know what, I actually like me.

I know I couldn't have said that 10 years ago... 5 years ago... 2 years ago... and probably not even 1 year ago, but I can say it now. I like me.

It's been many years in the making, but I'm finally okay with my life and who I am. I feel like I've found my place in the world.

OF COURSE there are many (SOOO many) things that I have to constantly work on and try to improve, but for the most part... I want to keep being me for the new year.

A new year, the same me.

*I'm a little nervous to post this post because of what usually happens... you say something on your blog and then the next day it changes. But I really hope this doesn't change

NOT Enjoying The Journey

2012-01-10T00:34:00.000-08:00

I've got the blues... the construction blues.

You know how some things get worse before they get better?... well that's our house.

We've been working like mad to make the house ours and look/live the way that we want it to look/live but I'm having a hard time 'enjoying the journey'.

In the last few months we have taken out the wall dividing the kitchen and living room, framed in a laundry room (the W/D are currently in the garage), ripped out the kitchen ceiling and re-vaulted it, put in 8 new lights and 3 new switches, taken out the pantry and linen closet (to make our kitchen bigger and so that we'll have room for an island), cut kitchen cabinets in half, and we had the monstrous tree in our front yard removed. Besides the sheetrock, studs, lots of wire, some outlet boxes, and the tree removal... we haven't had to spend a whole lot of money. But here is the problem: everything else is pretty spendy.

Jake has spent a lot of time working on taping the wall in the laundry room (getting ready for texture) and he said it's just not worth his time to tape and texture the vaulted ceiling. We haven't gotten a bid for the job yet but we figure it will be worth it since a professional should be able to match the rest of the ceiling. Here is how bad it currently looks with just the sheetrock on it:

Jake wants the ceiling to be done before the kitchen or flooring. So ceiling first. Then a new kitchen. New cabinets, countertops, and backsplash. Well, have you ever priced out a new kitchen? Holy break the bank! So this is what we did for the time being:

And that looks DAMN good for how it's looked for the last few months!

(This was in the middle of getting rid of the pantry.) See how getting rid of the pantry opened up the space?... but we also lost a ton of storage. I had to get a little creative. I also couldn't stand the microwave on top of the fridge for one more day so we put it behind the kitchen table:

Hello ghetto!!! (And we DO cry over spilled milk in this house!)

I had been trying to convince Jake to cut one of our wall cabinets in half (so we could mount the microwave in-between it) FOR MONTHS! He was being such a punk about it.... he just didn't think it would work. On Saturday he promised that he would do it for me. I helped him cut it in half and he did everything else.

We took the cabinet that went over the vent from before:

And mounted that and the microwave between the two halves. It looks so much better now!!! (Jake has since repented for not seeing the potential in cutting the cabinet in half ;-)

And we can't do anything with the floor until we get new cabinets. (An island is going where the blue tape is and the stove will go under the microwave and the bar will go away.) So that is why our house is a giant disaster. So we basically can't do one project without doing the other and the cost to do them all at once is astronomical.

Our house has gotten much worse since we've moved in. I mean LOOK AT THAT FLOOR! Carpet, curling laminate, carpet. Check out the wall and ceiling.

I feel like I might be enjoying the journey if I knew when it would end. And the worst part... the outside looks almost as bad as the inside. We have a giant hole in our front yard where tree roots used to be.

I've got the blues... the construction blues.

New Look

2012-01-08T23:18:00.000-08:00

Okay, So I've spent the last several hours working on making a new header and background for my blog and I just don't have the skills necessary to make a good-enough looking blog for myself. Blog stuff is so complicated! So I've temporarily changed my blog to look like it does now. If you hate it and can't stand it please let me know... I happen to love it... maybe because I'm a sucker for collages. (Mine pops up on the flip card setting... it looks like you can change it to classic or any of the other settings (top left))

But if it's complicated and just not worth your blog-reading time I will call on the expertise of my good friend (who is genius with photoshop) and I'm sure I could sweet talk her into making me something gorgeous for my blog. (Or I could just use a pre-made template.... Ha! Now there's an idea!)

So let me know.

No Words, Tall Towers, Jump Rope Wounds, And Jake's Joke Beard

2012-01-05T22:50:00.000-08:00

So I have a few baby/toddler books that I flip through every couple of weeks. I've learned a lot about babies/toddlers and they've really helped me have patience raising Everett because they help me to know and understand certain behaviors and milestones that are typical for his age.

There is one problem though... he's hasn't reached the 'talking' milestones for the last several months. (Everett is 19 months and 1 week)

For example: 16.5 months he should have been able to say 2 words. He does say Mommy but never, ever when you ask him. He doesn't even say it to me... he'll just randomly say it whenever.

He can make the sounds that a cow, dog, cat, bird, and a lion make and he can make the sounds of the word please (eeeeee's) but that is about all the talking he does. Perhaps he will be a 'late bloomer' when it comes to talking.

On the other hand, he's right on 'schedule' for almost everything else and he's super advanced in other areas. For example: he should be able to use a spoon/fork (but not exclusively). He's been using a spoon and a fork exclusively since he was 10 months. Also by 19.5 months he may even be able to build a tower of 6 cubes... he hit that ages ago.

Oh, and did I mention that he can even stack paint bottles?!

He can do the shape sorter toy with only one or two mistakes and he can even stack the little tiny Lego's.

His eye-hand coordination is amazing... I just wish some of that would rub off on his language skills! I know that he will eventually talk, I'm just starting to get a little concerned at how long it will be before he does. At his 18 month check-up, the Dr. said that he'll only start to get concerned if he still hasn't started talking by age 2.

But I shouldn't be too hard on him because I still haven't even learned how to jump rope!

Yeah! Who does that?! I think that the jump ropes at bootcamp are a little too long for little ol' shorty because I got myself pretty good a few times.

And just because Jake's grandpa said that there aren't enough pictures of Jake and I on the blog...

Lol.

Four-Day Weekend Fun

2012-01-02T23:59:00.000-08:00

The last four days:

Friday. Jake turns 28.

Jake is a pretty special guy. Everyone knows it too. I've never met someone that doesn't like Jake (well, at least they've never told me (I know, and why would they?) but my point is that he is amazing and I'm extremely lucky to have him as my man.

He took a half day at work and was home by 3. We drove Everett out to visit his grandparents so that we could have the night to ourselves.

I had planned on getting Jake some clip-in bicycle shoes for his birthday but I wanted him to pick them out. He's been wanting some for the longest time so I thought I would surprise him with the idea and let him pick them out. We got to REI and Jake had no idea what I was getting him. He is a gear guy and would love to have one of everything in the store... so I took him to the cycle shoe section and told him to pick out a pair. There was a clearance table next to the cycle shoes so I took a look... and BAM! The most beautiful cycle shoes just in my size and they were 50% off. It was love at first sight!

So we each got a pair of cycle shoes and we bought some cleats for Jake's shoes (because they only had one set left).

We headed over to the Cheesecake Factory for some birthday dinner. The wait was 45 minutes so we ended up opening his other present in the car.

Another pair of shoes! He's been wanting those forever too.

Dinner was amazing. We were kind-of smashed into a corner with a HUGE party of collage girls next to us with Hello Kitty birthday balloons making all kinds of noise... but we still had a good time. And we got stuffed.

Jake's 'birthday cake':

We walked around the mall afterwards and had the most amazing time people watching. It was intense! We tried out some sleep number beds and got the best white elephant gift EVER. We got a calendar of Hot Guys and Cuddly Baby Animals. I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of it. So stinkin' hilarious! (Just imagine... huge, ripped black guy with the tiniest kitten ever... snuggling. Hahaha)

Jake's only other request for his birthday was to watch a movie really loud (since Everett was spending the night at Grandma and Grandpa's). I can't even remember what we watched because it was one of those action packed-iron man-transformers-hulk-green lantern-batman-spiderman-superman kind of man movies. It was really good but I fell asleep.

Happy birthday Jake! I'm lucky to have you!

Saturday. Run, Party

Saturday morning we slept in and then Jake went to pick up Everett while I cleaned the house. Everett fell asleep on the way home so I went on a run while Jake worked on the laundry room. (Remember how I gained 5 pounds eating Christmas cookies... well apparently my body wants to hang on to it because I worked out my regular 5, one hour classes last week AND ran 9 miles. Nothing. The scale it stuck. So I went for a 6 mile run on Saturday... totaling 15 extra miles for the week. All of the running I've been doing has been working because I'm faster... but I can't stop eating Christmas candy from my stocking so I guess it hasn't actually been working...) The run was great but a little chilly. I love running because it makes me feel alive... and strong!

Other than that, it was a regular Saturday until Everett went back out to Grandma and Grandpa's to spend another night while Jake and I went to a New Year's party. It was a semi-formal party to begin with:

We ate lots of food and then had a super-hilarious, highly-inappropriate white elephant gift exchange... which are the best kind. A 45ish year-old mad opened our calendar and everyone died of laughter. Jake scored a fuzzy steering wheel cover with pink hearts embroidered on it and some cheetah print slippers! Oh, and a silky hair net.

Later, everyone changed into pajama and played minute-to-win-it games. I had to drink that bottle of orange soda out of a newborn flow bottle. I lost the race by just a few drops! We had to stack chapstick with chopsticks, balance dice on a wooden stick in our mouth, Jake had to put gum balls into a sprite bottle only using his mouth...

The games were really fun. We also played Rockband and other dance games on the Wii.

The night went by so fast.

Right at midnight we let off fireworks in the rain and welcomed in the new year with some plastic glasses of Martinelli's. What a fun party. We stayed late and talked with our friends... we didn't get home until 3.

Sunday. Church, Overwhelmed

I woke up with the sun and started preparing my lesson to teach the 4 year-olds at church. I got asked to teach them and felt extremely overwhelmed when I learned that 10 of them come every Sunday and 2 more come occasionally.

It was crazy. I did hear some pretty hilarious and totally random things come out of their little mouths whenever they raised their hands.

From a little girl: "Someday, when I get big, I want little baby girls to come out of my tummy."

From a boy: "Teacher, when I get big and when I get rich I can buy fast cars."

Girl: "My mom says that if I don't clean my room the gunny sack monster will eat my toys."

Girl: "I have candy canes on my tights."

Boy: "I was wrestling on the floor with my puppy and he scratched me right here" (pointing to his cheek)

At the end of church I asked to teach an older class because they were just too much for me. Next week I have the 8-year-olds.

Grandma and Grandpa dropped Everett off at church. It was so good to see him because we hadn't seen him nearly as much as we are used to. It's amazing how much I missed him for those two nights.

Monday. Ikea, Cheesecake Factory

Everett and I played trucks all morning and played outside for a while while Jake worked on the laundry room again. Everett took a crazy long nap (it makes me wonder it he stayed up for new years too! :) and then we went to Ikea to check out their kitchen cabinets.

We love the white. I'm 90% sure we will get the Ikea cabinets when we are ready to re-do our kitchen. I heard a rumor that the cabinets go on sale in the Spring and Fall so maybe we will have a new kitchen in the next year or two.

We drove all the way to Ikea (an hour drive) and we were only there for a half hour... so we wanted to make sure the drive was worth our while... so we ate at the Cheesecake Factory again (just a few miles from Ikea)!

The wait was 45 minutes again, but it was worth it! Everett has been SUCH a good little boy the last few weeks and surprised us (once again) and was completely enjoyable the entire evening. I love this little person!

Since we were at the exact same place we were on Friday night, we decided to see if REI had a pair of cleats for my cycle shoes. While they were looking for the cleats, Jake took Everett for a ride on a little bike.

Everett loves bikes so much. This little bike doesn't have any peddles and it's supposed to be a training bike so that the little person learns how to balance on two wheels while scooting instead of having to go through the training wheel stage. It even has rubber ends on the handle bars for when they get off the bike and it falls over. Genius.

Well, REI didn't have any more cleats (I guess we bought the last pair on Friday night) but they did have this awesome helmet we found on the clearance table for Everett.

It's a kids XS and fits him perfect... and it was 50%!!! I love when this happens! My sister (Montana) was telling me (the last time I was in Portland) that kids need to wear helmets even when they are riding in the bike trailer. So now we are safe! Now we just need a watermelon nutcase in my size!

We had such a great 4-day weekend.

This Is What Makes Me Happy

2011-12-29T22:11:00.000-08:00

I must say... I'm living my dreams.

Jake comes home every night in a shirt and tie with plenty of energy left to play with little Everett. They play and wrestle together while I cook dinner. Then we eat (Everett even ate fried rice tonight!) and we tell each other about our day. Most nights we have enough time to all play together before Everett goes to bed. We'll play blocks, Lego's, cards, balls, trains, cars, watch cartoons, color, or we'll read books. Tonight we played trains and cars.

Playing trains and cars with Everett is so fun. He makes all the noises and usually makes up the activity. (He loves when he plays the 'bad guy' and we chase his car with the police car.) Sometimes he laughs until he hiccups. It's the best!

Tonight we played on the couch.

We had a lot of fun. And Everett made a lot of noise. I have an awesome video but I can't seem to upload it.... so here are some pictures of his totally cute and gigantic lips making the car noises. Just imagine cute boy + cute car noises and you have Everett!

I love his monkey lips and the Oreo crumbs on the sides! I love that little face!

I say I'm living out my dreams because this is what I've always wanted. A sweet little family in a sweet little house. We live a slow, quiet life and that's what makes me happy.

Shoe Lick, Bad Limp

2011-12-29T22:09:00.000-08:00

Everett licked the bottom of his super dirty shoe.

He's usually pretty good about sitting down to put his shoes on before we leave the house. He will get his shoes and then sit down. I was tying his first shoe when he grabbed the other one and just licked it. He made an ugly face and then stuck out his tongue with a whole bunch of nasties on it.

He's a boy.

If he doesn't have his pacifier in his mouth be will put anything else in there... apparently even the bottom of a shoe.

Speaking of shoes. I bought him a second pair of those sock/shoes for Christmas. They are like socks on top but they have rubber nubs on the bottom for traction and you can wear them outside. His first pair was size 18 mo. but he wore them out already and he has pretty big feet so I bought size 24 mo. this time. I think they might have been a little too big because he wore them to the gym on Monday and walked out limping. He's been limping ever since and it's the saddest. thing. ever. I think he rolled in ankle or something because he limps and he will walk on the outside of his foot with his toes up. His limp has gotten better but he's definitely still limping. He doesn't ever cry but I can tell it hurts. Poor little guy... and he can't even tell me what's wrong!

Owl Be Warm For Christmas

2011-12-28T21:25:00.000-08:00

When I made Everett's hat out of a sweater I thought he had the cutest hat in town... then my Mom sent this hat for Christmas and now I'm positive that he has the cutest hat in town.

Come Again Another Day

2011-12-27T22:15:00.000-08:00

Ev and I went for a bike ride the other day. It's been an unusually nice and sunny winter. But it's also been very cold so I put on a sweet ear warmer that my little sister made for me before heading out the door. I stuck my favorite hat on Everett (even though it looks like a girl hat... okay, okay it actually was mine in high school but who cares!!!!) The hat is so cute on him and he was so excited to go for a bike ride that I wanted to snap a quick picture with my phone.

I asked him to smile:

LOL! If smiling means show all your teeth and cry then mission accomplished!

When we got back from our bike ride I wanted to take a picture of my awesome new ear warmer. I pulled out my phone and Ev was right there ready to click the button a million times... which he did:

(All those pictures and there isn't even a good one of my ear warmer. Oh well, there's about 10 good funny faces though!)

He loved clicking the button so much he had to do it later with dad, too:

These pictures crack me up!

We always have good times on our bike rides but it doesn't look like we'll be taking any rides for a while. It's supposed to rain for the next.... well, FOREVER! I made a little song about it:

I looked out the window and what did I see?

Rain in the forecast for eternity...

Although tonight there was a little thunder and lightning and that always makes the rain more fun. Wish me luck as we enter the dark days...

Christmas Morning 2011

2011-12-25T22:45:00.000-08:00

Christmas morning started early again this year.... but not as early as last year! The neighbor dogs started barking at 5 this morning so we just started opening our presents hours and hours before the sun came up.

We had Everett open his stocking first. A Scooby Doo toothbrush.... matchbox cars... and trains!!!!!

And we didn't see Everett for the rest of the day!

He was so content with his cars and trains that he pushed the rest of his presents off the couch so he'd have more room to play with his cars. I even got him Mega Bloks and he didn't want to touch them!

So Jake and I opened our stockings from each other.

I totally and completely surprised Jake this year with a GoPro camera. He's wanted one for a long time so I thought I would get it for him.

There is a funny story behind the Christmas gifts we got each other this year. I went to Best Buy to buy his gift and as Ev and I were driving out of the parking lot we saw Jake pull in. He made some lame excuse that he was buying some Disney movies for Everett but I knew he was buying the lens I asked for! I could hardly wait for Christmas to open it!

picture with old lens/picture with new lens

Jake also bought me a camera bag that's pretty awesome!

Jake bought a surprise gift for Everett that I didn't even know about. It was huge and Jake was SO excited for Everett to open it (and love it) but Everett was not interested in anything but his cars and trains. So we had to drive his little cars down the couch, across the carpet, and onto the box just so Everett would pay attention to it. He did have a pretty good time ripping the paper off...

And it was a baby four wheeler!

It's the cutest thing ever. (Jake said that this was the boy version. It was this blue and purple one or Dora the explorer.) It's battery operated so he's a little unsure of it still. Maybe in a few days he'll play with it more... for now he keeps a comfortable distance...

It was still dark when we were done opening presents.

A few hours later we went to church and then ate another batch of Jake's Christmas nachos.... and cookies and candy!

It was a good day. We were all pretty tired but it was still nice to spend time together as a family and celebrate Christmas.

The Night Before Christmas 2011

2011-12-25T14:06:00.000-08:00

Saturday was so warm and sunny. It was so nice.

Jake made some Christmas nachos for lunch, Everett took a LOOOOOOONG nap (3+ hours because he slept terribly the night before) and then we headed over to spend Christmas Eve with the family.

We had Chinese food for dinner and it was SOOOO delicious. Then the little kids got to open their presents from their grand-(and great grand)-parents.

On the way home we toured a few neighborhoods with Christmas lights.

Later, when Everett was in bed, I let Jake open his Christmas Jammies! LOL! He bought a pair of grey Nautica sweatpants right after he got home from his mission (Christmas 2004) and I made him throw them away a few months ago. He's been wearing them for the last seven years and I hated them. HATED THEM!!! So I bought him some new sweatpants for Christmas. He was pretty stoked!

Christmas Card Pictures

2011-12-24T14:21:00.000-08:00

I can't get over how much I love this pictures!

(Taken and edited by Amy)

Twelve Handprint Wreath

2011-12-24T13:18:00.000-08:00

For the twelfth day of Christmas we made a family wreath out of twelve hand prints. 4 of Jake's, 4 of mine, and 4 smeary, blurry hand prints of Everett's.

It's so cute! I love it and I'm sure I will cherish it as the years go by and remember when it was just the three of us (this is not an announcement... but I assume our family will get bigger at some point in the future).

And it even matches the new decorations I put up.

I was having some problems with our Christmas tree this year and the decorations just weren't working for me... so I re-decorated and took the Christmas tree down yesterday. It seems like a silly thing to do but I just couldn't handle it anymore. (And I like the new decorations WAY better anyway!)

Since we didn't have a tree anymore I made a tree out of our presents... but then I decided to at least put a little tree on top...

Look at all that sunshine!!!! Ahhh, it's love!

I've loved celebrating the twelve days of Christmas with Jake and Everett this year.

We'll spend tonight with Jake's family eating a Chinese food feast and maybe I'll even let Jake open his new Christmas jammies tonight :). We've still got to make some cookies to set out for Santa and we might even make some hot chocolate and drive around town looking at Christmas lights!

I love Christmas and spending time with my little family. They are the perfect gift!

Fantasy Lights

2011-12-22T23:46:00.000-08:00

I'm really trying to celebrate Christmas to it's fullest this year. It seems like the years come and go a lot faster these days and sometimes it feels like if I don't do it now, I'll never do it. So for the 10th day of Christmas we drove over to the Fantasy Lights in Spanaway. The line of cars just to get into the entrance was a mile long and there was no way we were going to get in for at least an hour... so we turned around and went home. Sometimes things don't go as planned.

So we went again tonight but got there the minute it opened. You pay $10/car and you get to drive through Spanaway park and look at all of the light displays.

The moment we got into the park I felt like I was in Disneyland. I was pretty excited. I let Everett sit on my lap as we drove through the park.

It was awesome. We all loved it. My favorite was the giant Santa ship.

(blurry pictures... that's what you get when you let your toddler sit on your lap!)

I'm assuming Everett's favorite was the train station.

Towards the end of the display Everett really wanted to sit on Jake's lap... he ended up steering a little!

He had so much fun driving and seeing all of the lights that he had a pretty big breakdown when he had to go back into his seat... (to be expected) but some Mcnuggets and an eggnog shake cheered him right up!

There was a Goodwill in the same parking lot as McDonald's so we went to check it out. We bought a few more books for Everett. When we got home Jake taught him how to READ his books:

Building towers and ramps for his cars.

The 10th/11th day of Christmas was great. Our neighbors stopped by with a plate of cookies and the house could not have looked any worse. I am being so serious! But the cookies are tasty so I guess it was worth the embarrassment!

Nein

2011-12-20T21:59:00.000-08:00

I took two years of German in high school... but that pretty much means nothing. However, I do remember that the word 'no' is roughly translated to 'nein' which sounds like nine in English.

Sooo.... what I'm getting at it that we did 'no'thing for the ninth day of Christmas.

But we did find Dad's old iPod (that only holds a charge for a few songs) and we rocked out. Everett LOVED putting the earphones up to his ears... every time he did he would open his eyes really wide. It was awesome. My favorite was when he would move my hair out of the way and put the earphones in my ears. He's such a sweet little boy.

And then we pretended it was a phone.

I love this little boy and his fascination with music. Now he only watches cartoons for the very beginning when they sing.... and then he makes me start the cartoon over again on the DVR so he can hear the songs again.

He also loves our neighbor's Christmas lights. They blink... but very slowly... so when they turn off he will turn his palms up and shrug (like saying, 'where did they go?') and when they turn back on I say 'BOO' and he laughs so hard. It makes the best entertainment and his laughter warms my soul.

So I guess we didn't do nothing after all...

Day Ate

2011-12-19T23:01:00.000-08:00

On the eighth day of Christmas we ATE a lot of food! I roasted my first chicken ever... and almost died.

They were BOGO at Safeway a few weeks ago so I stuck this one in the freezer. I made tomatillo chicken with the other one but made Jake cut it up because I didn't want to touch it. Well, I decided that it was time to get tough and roast this sucker. Just touching the skin had me all gaggy. I rinsed it off and discovered that there were body parts inside of the thing. I almost lost it. I was getting all sweaty and queasy. I didn't want to touch them so I turned the bird and shook it until the parts fell out.

I had to dig pretty deep to get tough enough to rub the chicken down with olive oil. I seasoned it up and then roasted it.

It was totally delicious. I was so proud of myself. I even made homemade mashed potatoes and gravy.

Then we went to the Webb's annual bunco party and ATE so many goodies. We had a blast and I'm pretty sure it was the best bunco party yet. They always have a white elephant gift exchange and Jake ended up with an air horn. Sweet.

Five, Six, Seven

2011-12-18T14:15:00.000-08:00

The fifth day of Christmas was hilarious and depressing.

Friday was Jake's work party. We went out with FIVE other couples to Duke's Chowder House. We had a good time- I haven't laughed that hard in so long! But I wasn't laughing earlier that morning when I discovered that the scale was FIVE pounds heavier than normal. Yikes!

Apparently I got over it because on the sixth day of Christmas I made SIX different cookies and delivered them to SIX friends.

I made two different kinds of brownies. The first kind was supposed to be in the shape of a tart with a pecan glaze on top but ended up being more like chewy, square brownies with pecan pie on top... lol... but they were still delicious (to me at least!).

The second kind of brownies had York peppermint patties chopped up in the batter with melted chocolate and candy cane pieces on top.

I made my favorite holiday bark (white chocolate, pretzels, and Christmas M&M's) and almond toffee.

Christmas tree sugar cookies with mint frosting and sprinkles....

...AND Oreo truffles.

It was intense. Making six different treats that all had multiple steps/stages was quite a task. But it's the season of giving, right? Well, I was so eager to deliver these treats that took me FOREVER to make and the two neighbors I wanted to give them to were both gone and two of the friends were out of town for the night... so we only ended up giving two plates out. I was Mrs. Mcscrooge because I worked so hard to give and nobody was receiving.

Then we went to our ward Christmas party and one neighbor was home when we got back. We'll drop the other three plates off later today... after we watch this SEVEN minute Charlie Brown Christmas youtube video to celebrate the SEVENTH day of Christmas!

Bread Bowls and Bible Videos

2011-12-15T20:09:00.000-08:00

On the fourth day of Christmas we, very ironically, received FOUR Christmas cards in the mail (and my name was misspelled on two of them. Lol, it never gets old!).

Then we had some super delicious bread bowls and watched the new bible videos on mormonchannel.org that are about Christ's life. They are wonderful.

Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Little Boy Elf

2011-12-14T23:13:00.000-08:00

On the third day of Christmas the THREE of us took funny Santa and elf pictures.

I can't get enough of these pictures! I love them so much! I giggled the entire time I was making the props because I knew they'd be so much fun.

And to make the third day of Christmas even better... some of our bestest friends dropped of a delicious assortment of homemade Christmas cookies! I love this time of year!

TWO Gingerbread Houses

2011-12-13T23:58:00.000-08:00

On the second day of Christmas we made two gingerbread houses.

I grew up in a house of practicality. We always had the "Adidas" with two stripes instead of three, we hardly ever went out to eat, and we always snuck our own candy into the movie theater. Sometimes it's more practical to buy the off brand, it's almost always cheaper to grocery shop and cook vs. go out to eat, and $8 for bucket of popcorn is a little outrageous... but sometimes you just have to be impractial! So we made our gingerbread houses from scratch again this year.

Everett helped me mix the dough... I mean watched some cartoons from the stove top while I mixed the dough.

Then we rolled out our dough, cut out our house pieces, baked them, and assembled the frames last night.

Tonight we started with our bare houses...

...added a little candy, creativity, and Christmas music...

...and ended up with the best gingerbread houses yet!

This little beauty is mine. Complete with a Hershey kiss fence, a golden street lamp, and a Ritz walkway!

Not to mention the Cinnamon Life shake roof, the Red Vines shudders, and the gum drop wreath.

But even with all of my bells and whistles it doesn't even compare to Jake's Christma-saurus house!

He is so creative! And check out that Hershey's tile roof... my house is jealous of the Christma-saurus house.

We had so much fun building and decorating our gingerbread houses even though it took two nights and lots of wasted candy!

We love our very impractical gingerbread houses!

*I'm often misunderstood on my blog. I don't hold grudges to my parents for being practical. They did the best they could to provide a great life for me. I'm just saying that sometimes it's totally fun and worth it to be impractical.... like making gingerbread when you could just buy a kit and wasting a lot of food for a little fun that you're just going to throw away in a few weeks!

First Day Of Christmas 2011

2011-12-12T23:54:00.000-08:00

Way back in history the 12 days of Christmas were celebrated December 24th-January 6th.

But we started the 12 days of Christmas today. We started it by watching the First Presidency Christmas Devotional.

It was great. I loved everything about it. It really started the 12 days of Christmas off right and illustrated why we celebrate Christmas.

I love Christmastime and I love the reason why we celebrate. (Click on the link to watch the video. It's totally worth it regardless of your religion.)

Coming Soon!

2011-12-11T23:12:00.000-08:00

This weekend was a good one. Most of them are. I'm a little sad that it's over but I'm pretty excited about these maternity pictures I took of my sister-in-law with her boyfriend, Myke.

It was freezing cold AND it was raining the entire time but I think it was worth it. I love the pictures and I'm sure Baby Maleah will be happy to have these pictures in her baby book someday!

Sweater Turned Hat & Mittens

2011-12-09T22:19:00.000-08:00

I'm barely buying Everett new clothes. Most of his 0-18 month clothes came from the thrift store or they were hand-me-downs from friends... like this cute little sweater.

The problem with thrift store/hand-me-down clothes is that sometimes they don't fit right. This sweater was short sleeves on him and his belly was hanging out the bottom (it's size 18-24 mo.) but there was plenty of room on each side of the sweater for all of that Holiday weight he might gain... : )

So the only useful thing to do with the sweater was to donate it, give it to someone else.... or turn it into a cute hat and matching gloves. I chose the latter.

I took a hat that fits him well and used it as a pattern.

Then I made up a pattern for mittens (now he won't have to wear socks on his hands!)

I sewed 'um up and now he has the cutest hat and mitten set in town!

Everett has recently discovered T.V. He loves it so much! So these were the best pictures I could get of him in his new hat... because he was soo busy watching Chuggington.

Trying to look around me:

Cute face. Rubbing hands. Angry face.

"Mom, I'm going to ask you one more time to get that camera out of my face or else..."

And that's how you turn a sweater into a hat and mittens for your T.V. watchin' toddler!

I Heart Vintage

2011-12-06T23:41:00.000-08:00

My grandparents had a huge set of Reader's Digest condensed books in their house and I've always loved them. I've also always loved thrift store shopping and yard sailing...

There's a nasty little thrift store not too far from our house and I'd never dared to go inside until a recent wave of desperation hit me. I was trying to find some specific things for Everett's room (and we all know that the thrift store is NOT the place to be looking for specific things)... but I thought I would give this crusty ol' store a visit.

The inside was much worse than the outside let on... but I fell in love. An old, hoarder-type man runs the place and he has PILES and PILES of stuff everywhere. It was like a goldmine for the useless stuff collector. Just mounds of stuff everywhere. Everett and I got to digging. Everett found some little toys that the old man gave us for free and I found some of those Reader's Digest books that I've been coveting all these years! I bought all the books I could find... they were scattered all over the store.

They all have the original paper covers too! I'm in love with the designs on the books.

I also found a vintage children's book that I adore.

I didn't find what I was looking for but I found a whole lot more!

This past Summer I was at a yard sale and picked up two vintage Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books for two dollars. They were just mixed in with a bunch of other books for $1 each.

I don't know what it is about these books that I love so much. Maybe it's how cute and colorful they are... or maybe it's just the history behind them. The inside covers have dates, addresses, and names of the previous owners... I'm assuming three siblings.

(The date says May 26th, 1947)

Part of me feels obligated to find and return these books to one of the siblings (because they were definitely not who I bought the books from) but then part of me just wants to keep a little bit of history on my bookshelf.

I'm so glad I was able to find a few books that I love and that remind me of my grandparents and my childhood. It might not be too long before I venture into that crusty ol' thrift shop again... you never know what I might find!

He Loves Me

2011-12-02T23:16:00.000-08:00

I wear big (fake) pearl earrings almost everyday. I love them.

Yesterday, Everett took this ornament off the tree and held it up to my ear. "Eh?"

It took me a second to figure out what he was doing... but when I got it I thought it was the cutest thing ever. (He was trying to put my 'earrings' on me.)

Everett helps me get ready for the gym everyday. Today he got himself ready, too.... he wanted to make sure all of his hair stayed out of his face : )

Then tonight he did the sweetest thing of all. Everett was laying on the changing table while Jake was putting a new diaper on him and I asked Everett where his head was. He pointed to it. Then I asked where his nose was. He pointed to his nose and then he pointed to my nose. I smiled and said how cute he was. But then he reached up, pulled my face in closer to his, and gave me a nose kiss (something Jake taught him). I almost died. It was so cute.

It's moments like these that make all the late nights, early mornings, slaps in the face, screams, worries, sacrifices, and frustrations all worth it.

It's all worth it to know that Everett knows me and that he loves me. He recognizes me (and what I wear). He loves me unconditionally and there's nothing more I could ask from him than that.

Reason #827 Of Why I Love Jake

2011-11-30T23:37:00.000-08:00

Reason #827: He's funny.

He's been asking me what I want for Christmas and I keep telling him that I've gotten enough lately. But he keeps asking. So I came up with a list and texted it to him...

LOL! He makes me laugh everyday!

Paint Colors

2011-11-29T21:53:00.000-08:00

He loves to help pick out paint colors!

One Point Five

2011-11-28T22:55:00.000-08:00

Yesterday officially marked Everett's 18 month birthday.

Here's a little bit of what I want to remember about 18-month-old Everett.

He LOVES his pacifier and won't hand it over for anything.
He throws his dirty diapers away for us.
Loves to wash his hands with soap and loves to put lotion on.
He really doesn't say much at all. Pretty much just 'ball'. He points at the Christmas tree and says, "baw? baw?" while pointing at the ornaments. It's pretty cute.
He's been kicking me in the face when I change his diaper and is constantly hitting everything/everyone. Any emotion (other than happy) is followed by hitting... especially mad and scared.
He screams at the highest pitch possible for a human kid voice. (seriously) It leaves our ears ringing. Hitting and screaming are usually combined when he gets frustrated.
He prefers to play with really small non-baby-proof items. (like screws, nails, marbles, little Lego's, cd's...)
Favorite food is syrup... I mean pancakes and french toast.
Favorite things to drink are orange juice and milk.
He is mighty handsome.
Still has major poo problems.
Likes for us to clap our hands when he does something good.
Still loves to play in/with water and to be outside.
Won't sit though more than five words of a book.
Really, really likes to play with cars, trucks, and especially trains...
Dances to music and likes to stomp his feet. He'll run into his room and turn the radio on and stomp his feet.
Is obsessed with taking the batteries out of the remote and trying to put them back it.
LOVES to flush the toilet.
Favorite cartoon is Chuggington and favorite movie is Cars.
Favorite meal is breakfast. Can anyone say Cinnamon Life cereal?
He understands pretty much everything we tell him.
He knows what buttons to push on the microwave when he helps Dad heat up his milk and MiraLax before bed.
He knows when to say 'amen' during prayers... but just says 'ehh' instead.
He likes to rub, slap, pinch his tummy when his shirt is off.
He pretends to sneeze and cough after we sneeze or cough. He'll also make the "Mmmmm" noise after I try to convince him that the food it good.
He still makes my heart explode with love every once in a while.

-Trying to put a train together on Thanksgiving day-

Jake and his dad were working on our house on Black Friday. They were taking out the dropped ceiling in our kitchen and re-vaulting it (and putting in can lights)... so we didn't have any electricity or heat and the front door and windows were open because there was a lot of construction dust... so basically Everett and I hid out in his room, the bathtub, and the gym all day. To pass the time I let Everett open a Christmas gift early... Elefun.

He was WAAAY more interested in putting the batteries in, putting the trunk on/taking it off, dumping out the butterflies/putting them back in... than anything else. Which is typical Everett.

Once, one of his battery-operated toys wasn't working and he took it to Jake. Jake told him it was broken.... so Everett went into the laundry room (where the tools are) and brought back a screw driver. He took the toy back from Jake and started to try and unscrew the battery plate. We looked at each other and smiled. He is so smart!

We love little Everett so much! Sometime he's a little too much for us and we don't know what to do for/with him... but eventually we'll figure it out. Hopefully.

I Love Thanksgiving

2011-11-26T08:33:00.000-08:00

I'm a big fan of Thanksgiving. I know there's a lot of people out there that might think it's a silly holiday... but I love it.

I love watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, I love making the pies, I love setting the table, I love the family drama that always happens, I love the eating, and I love the leftovers, I love the day after... I just love everything about Thanksgiving.

This year I was in charge of the ham, dinner rolls, pies, and setting the table. I did my grocery shopping a little late and I couldn't find pecans at three different stores so I opted to make a chocolate pudding pie instead. As I was looking for the chocolate pie ingredients I found a bag of pecans, so I made pecan pie too. (My favorite pie ever because it basically has three ingredients. Butter, pecans, and sugar. Mmmmmmm!)

I woke up Thursday morning and started on my pies and rolls right away (while watching the parade, of course). If there was one thing I had to pick to eat for the rest of my life... it would be my Mom's homemade dinner rolls. Oh baby, they're goooood. But I haven't made them enough to figure out how to make them the same way as her. I have the recipe... but not the touch.

My problem this time... I think I let them rise too much.

And then I made them into the size of miniature loaves of bread.

Oh well. I have the next 20 years to figure it out. On the other hand, the pecan pie was AMAZING and the homemade chocolate pudding pie was pretty tasty if I do say so myself.

Thanksgiving dinner was great.
(That is not my plate of food in the picture. #1 I could NEVER let my food touch each other like that, and #2 I would NEVER let my food touch each other like that.) The ham was delicious, by the way, and check out that monster dinner roll!!!

Everett laid down for a nap right as we were about to eat and slept long enough for us to play a few rounds of Scribblish with the whole family. I love small miracles.

Thanksgiving definitely delivered this year (even the family drama) but it was so worth it. I love Thanksgiving!

I'm Grateful

2011-11-25T12:51:00.000-08:00

Last Christmastime, I read a book called The Glass Castle. It changed the way I look at my everyday life and the way I looked at my parents and childhood.

A few months later a friend gave me a book called The Heretics Daughter and it also caused me to be grateful for my life and every convenience I enjoy.

I feel like I've always been a grateful person but these two books really illustrated how easy and enjoyable my life is and now I feel like I'm even more grateful for everything that surrounds me. You might not understand what I'm talking about if you haven't read one of the books... but either way, I'm so grateful for my life, my family, my experiences, my comfort, my faith, and my health... I'm so grateful to be me.

Things aren't perfect but they are so much better than they could be.

I'm grateful for my loving husband that goes to work everyday and works hard to provide a good life for our family. I'm also grateful to be a mother. The experiences I've had being a mother have humbled me and have caused me to be more compassionate towards others. I'm grateful for Everett... some of the sweetest moments in life have happened since his birth.

I'm grateful to live in America and enjoy the freedoms that I do.

I'm grateful for friends. I feel like Jake and I have been blessed with the greatest friends. Friends make life so much easier and so much more enjoyable and I'm so grateful for the fun times we've had together.

I'm grateful for Christ and the hope I have because of Him.

I'm grateful for this time of the year and the opportunity we all have to see the good in our lives.

Saturday Snow

2011-11-21T21:33:00.000-08:00

We woke up to snow Saturday morning.

I'm pretty sure Everett thought it was amazing!

Gotta love the socks on his hands... and the snow on the front tires!

This next picture makes me laugh so hard. He kept getting stuck and he was getting so mad. Serves him right... it's our neighbors yard and I told him not to go in it. (But our neighbors don't mind)

We had a pretty good time in the snow. It didn't stay long though. It was all melted by noon and then the sun even came out for a second during senior pictures.

Gorgeous Girls- Senior Pictures

2011-11-19T20:57:00.000-08:00

I took my SIL's senior pictures today and they turned out amazing. I had been stressing about it and losing sleep over it... but they seriously turned out so good! I guess all the sleepless nights were worth it because here are my favorite 10 UN-EDITED pictures of Brianna.

Isn't she beautiful!

I also took her friend's senior pictures. Candais has the most gorgeous blue eyes. Here are my favorite 10 of her.

Look at those amazing blue eyes! (I didn't edit any of her pictures either.)

I feel so accomplished! I'm so pleased with the way these pictures turned out. These two girls are so beautiful and I'm so glad they asked me to take their senior pictures.

Fun Mom

2011-11-18T22:13:00.000-08:00

Just in case I ever become a 'not-fun-mom'... this is proof that I was once a 'fun mom'.

I hope our neighbors didn't mind all the noise we were making at 7:30 in the morning.

Everett had a blast. He kept looking back at the cans. I think he was amazed that something could make more noise than him!

Timber!

2011-11-17T11:20:00.000-08:00

Monday morning brought quite the excitement. By 7 a.m. the tree guys were already to work on our beast of a tree. My favorite neighbor (Sandy) called Jake on his cell phone and said how jealous she was of our new front yard.

One guy climbed the tree and cut the branches as he went. Two more were on the ground shoving the branches into the shredder. They had to make three trips to the yard waste dump from the branches alone.

When they cut that last section of the tree down I thought it fell right on top of our house. It was SO loud and the ground shook. It was intense. Thankfully it landed perfectly in our yard.

While one guy was grinding the stump in our yard... the other guys were cutting down three trees in Sandy's yard! What can I say, we're trendsetters! The neighborhood looks SO much better already and the sunshine in our house is amazing.

We have sawdust everywhere. Our front yard has huge piles everywhere, our roof is covered, and we even have sawdust on our back patio.

Monday night Jake called a friend to help him roll the logs into our backyard.

The biggest piece is 43 inches across and I counted 55 rings on it!

Jake is going to split the wood and hopefully we'll sell it next year and make some of our money back.

All I have to say is goodbye tree...

...hello house!

Although this was a huge step in making our house look better, we're still going to paint our house a different color, paint the front door, add shudders, built a front porch, and plant new bushes. It's going to look great... one step at a time.

In Other News...

2011-11-13T21:57:00.000-08:00

Everett got a haircut (see above) which was one of the many reasons why Friday was an unlucky day. He was pretty much in a headlock the entire time. And then trying to give him a bath afterwards was like trying to bathe a mountain lion. A big one. With hair all over it.

Despite my satisfactory decorating skills, I'm TERRIBLE at picking out paint colors based on the tiny paint swatch.

All of my jeans are too big. I never thought this would be a problem.

My 17-year-old sister-in-law asked me to take her senior pictures. AND her friend wants to pay me to take her pictures, too. I stressed all night last night second guessing my skills. By 3 a.m. I vowed to stop stressing and have some fun with it. Then I fell asleep.

I have insomnia.

I'm c.r.a.z.y. sometimes.

I've been a much better cook lately. The other day I made tomatillo chicken out of the Martha Stewart cookbook. Martha Stewart takes the scenic route on everything... no shortcuts for her... so I was pretty proud when it turned out delicious. Today I made some pretty bomb turkey burgers with spinach and avocado for lunch...

...best turkey burgers I've ever had.

My Dad sent me birthday money last month and made me promise to only spend it on myself. (No problem, I said) So I signed up to run the Portland and Seattle Rock n' Roll 1/2 marathons next summer.

I want a mac. And an iphone.

My goal for tomorrow is to wake up to an alarm (I'm hoping that this will help my body/brain wake up at the same time every morning and hopefully fall asleep around the same time every night).

My other goal? To not eat sugar for one whole day. That will be hard. I'm a sugar addict. I seriously have diabetes in a bowl every morning for breakfast, something random for lunch, lots of snacks/granola bars/M&M's/cookies/Nutella throughout the day, dinner, and then some sort of insulin nightmare before bed.

We need a family picture taken for a Christmas card that I may (or may not) send out.

We are getting a GIGANTIC tree cut down tomorrow. It's right in the middle of our front yard. It's costing us Jake's arms and my legs... but we couldn't be more excited.

Can you even see our house?

I can't wait for the occasional sunshine to shine INTO our windows! Hallelujah!

Unlucky Number

2011-11-11T22:39:00.000-08:00

Today was a very unlucky day. Quite crappy, actually.

It started early, too. At 4:30 Everett woke up and ended up in our bed. He played bulldozer for an hour before he fell back asleep. Then, this morning when Jake asked him to give me a kiss, he leaned in and clawed my face leaving an inch long scratch that stung for hours. I know I sound a little over dramatic... but he's kind-of a punk.

Parts of me want to fast forward through the next few years... you know, the terrible two's. I'm declaring that they've started.

The sad thing is that nobody really knows what he's like except for Jake and I. I'm sure this is true about most kids... but he was a totally different kid when my mom was here. In fact, he wouldn't even show my mom his tricks when she was here.

"Where's your head?"

"Where's your mouth?"

"How do you say more?" (his version of sign language)

And, of course, his foot is on the counter the whole time. He does that a lot... he's been doing it since January.

Nobody likes to complain (or read complaints) but I have to be honest and portray how I feel sometimes. I'm a little nervous for the next few years... especially if they're anything like today.

:-)

2011-11-10T22:07:00.000-08:00

Tana And Trains

2011-11-07T23:34:00.000-08:00

Because my mom was in town, my sister rode the train up from Portland Friday night. She brought with her a homemade gift for Everett (from Lucy, her girlfriend).

He LOVES his new blanket and I totally adore it. Lucy even included his initials on it.

Everett not only loves his new blanket... he loves his Aunt Tana! The only other time they had met was when he was 6 weeks old.

Montana couldn't stay for long. We took her back to the train station Sunday morning. We took a family picture before we left for the train station.

It didn't take long to get to the train station where we said good bye.

It was a beautiful sunny morning so we went to Ruston Way to take a walk.

We found a giant star fish...

An albino starfish....

And an interesting little sea creature... (right in the middle of the picture... it has like 100 legs)

Then we saw Montana's train head back to Portland.

It was so good to see Montana. I'm going to miss her and know I'm not the only one...

Fall Photoshoot

2011-11-06T23:39:00.000-08:00

My mom has been in town for the last few days. She came to visit us and to spend time with Everett.

We've been having a good time eating my mom's delicious food, shopping (at Ikea), and lounging around. On Friday we decided to take a few pictures.

There is an old, abandoned lumber yard near our house so we stopped there first for a few graffiti pictures. Then we went to Point Defiance hoping to find lots of pretty Fall leaves.

It was a super dark, overcast, and rainy day but we managed to get a few good pictures.

(Everett gives real kisses now. It's the sweetest thing!)

The next picture just cracks me up. Everett is always making funny faces or just being a punk and this time it was pretty funny.

We went by the duck pond and Everett went into a trance. He would not look at the camera for anything... he was obsessed with the ducks!

The clouds couldn't hold the water back any longer and it started to rain. I'm so glad we were able to take these pictures because I know I will treasure them forever.

Little Football Player

2011-11-02T20:04:00.000-07:00

Everett went trick-or-treating this year and it was so much fun. All year we wanted to dress him up as a ninja turtle but (for the second year in a row) we just moved and time slipped away. Last minute we dressed him up as a football player and it was the cutest thing ever.

(Everett was a football maid for a minute... haha!)

I love the next 4 pictures. I think he was trying to figure out why his shoulders were so big!... or maybe he was practicing his mean football face!

Halloween night we got invited over to our friends house for homemade chili, cornbread, and pumpkin pie... and some trick-or-treating.

Everett loved it! He loved seeing so many other kids.

Jake and I took turns taking Everett and Audrey to the door.

(Audrey, our friends' daughter, was Rapunzel. I think it's so weird how Everett disappeared in this picture! You can see his shoes by Jake's bum... but that's about it.)

Everett was getting so heavy to carry but all the candy we got was worth it!

We had a very happy Halloween this year!

Pumpkin Pictures Take 2

2011-11-01T22:11:00.000-07:00

We made it to the pumpkin patch on Saturday for the second round of pictures and we actually got a few good ones this time!

(He went searching for the mud puddles)

He was so mad when Jake picked him up...

...and so happy when Jake put him back down!

(I love this picture... it's like I was telling him a secret or something)

These were some of the good ones from last time:

We went to see the baby farm animals first and he was amazed. He loves the animals.

Then he played around the baby pumpkin patch and climbed up the tower a few times with Jake. It was an Alice in Wonderland theme this year.

On our way to the big patch, Everett found some mud puddles and we let him splash in them for a minute because he had his rain boots on. He slipped and fell in and it was disaster from there. All he wanted to do was play in the mud. It was a major battle just to get him to sit in the wheelbarrow... (note the chocolate granola bar...).

We didn't stay long after the mud puddle incident. I was so discouraged and mad that we traveled 30+ minutes to get to the pumpkin patch just for Everett to play in the mud... so that's why we went twice this year.

Boys Trip 2011

2011-10-28T11:55:00.000-07:00

For the last 3 years Jake has been invited to the dunes with his friends. He looks forward to the trip every year and I look forward to the video afterwards! They went to the dunes in Oregon and rented a house/cabin instead of camping (Jake was headed to Oregon as I was headed home from my race).
.

Well, here is the video! Jake is the one with the black quad, black/white helmet and gear, the one flying the kite, oh... and yep, the one with his shirt off. And I think there is a swear word in the music so don't get offended because I told you so... AND make sure you watch the very, very end- so funny!

Dunes Trip 2011 from ernie lay on Vimeo.

Boys Trip 2010 and 2009

(P.S. Ernie, I LOVE LOVE LOVE the videos you make. It totally makes 3 days without Jake worth it!)

Caramel Apples

2011-10-26T22:25:00.000-07:00

So I got this totally cute text from a friend today who wanted the "recipe" to the caramel apples we made. I told her that she'd die when she found out how easy they were. So here is the "recipe".

6 Granny Smith apples

2 T water

1 lb of caramels...

like these bad boys I got from the bulk candy section at Winco:

You'll also need sticks, toppings of your choice (crushed into pieces), and chocolate. (A good way to crush candy bars/cookies/graham crackers is to put them in a baggie and smash them with a rolling pin. Works every time!)

You unwrap all 10 million of the caramels and stick them in a bowl with the 2T water and melt away. (Melt however you like to melt. I chose to do the double boiler method... put the bowl over a pot of boiling water and stir. But don't let the boiling water touch the bottom of the bowl.)

Stick a stick (we used kabob skewers because that's what we had) into the apple and then dunk it in the melted caramel. (We spooned caramel onto the top of the apple to get the whole thing covered.)

Then (while the caramel is still hot/melted) you roll it in your topping of choice. My personal favorites were the crushed Heath bar and the crushed Oreos. (We also spooned the topping onto the top of the apple.)

If you want chocolate on top of all that.... just melt some chocolate in a baggie, cut off a tiny bit of the corner and go crazy all over your apples! (It looks the best that way ;-)

Easy, easy. Totally fun. And very delicious.

Mud, Apples, Pumpkins

2011-10-25T20:57:00.000-07:00

A few Saturday's ago we went to the pumpkin patch. I like to go to the pumpkin patch for the pictures... and the fudge, pumpkins, gourds, corn, and festivities.... but mostly the pictures. Within a matter of minutes it was a repeat of the tulip festival...

I was a little upset but I've become used to it. So we don't have any good pictures of the pumpkin patch because Everett played in the mud the entire time AND he was a monster. He cried and threw fits and wouldn't cooperate for one second. (So this is life with a toddler boy? Sweet.) I'm trying to convince Jake (and myself) to go again this Saturday for the sake of having pumpkin patch pictures...

But a few days later Jake and I made caramel apples and carved our pumpkins after Everett went to bed. The caramel apples were thebomb.com. So delicious.

("Apple pie" {graham cracker crumbs with cinnamon and sugar}, Snickers, Oreo, Heath {MY FAVORITE}, coconut and mini chocolate chips, and a Reece's one just for Jake)

And here we are as a pumpkin couple! Aren't we just adorable!

I love Jake. And I love that he loves to do crafts in the kitchen with me. Now, if only Everett loved taking pictures with pumpkins we'd be all set!