the last 2 months in photos - not in order

 watching jake on my phone.

 playing outside during a november snowstorm

 snuggling dada

 mama likey the "fidge" as mikey calls it. he likes it too. 

 now, it is on the ipad. we might change his name to ted. 

 heather's, holly's and mine @ st. george temple

 thanksgiving afternoon during a rough game of hide and seek, hayden came down bleeding from the head. 

 i adore hannah. she's a lovely, sweet, beautiful teenager - a rare treat in my opinion. and not just because she was rubbing my feet. 

 me at 32 weeks preggers (yesterday), desperately searching for an outfit to wear to church. i texted this to holly for permission. i wore it, so don't tell me if it didn't work. 

 mckay and sindi got married at the beginning of november. 

 halloween - it was a lovely day.

 one sunday afternoon i think in october, we went to a park. it was a nice day.

 my mom, sisters and the ladies from "our best bites" during time out for women, our little over night/weekend away/ to celebrate my mom's birthday. it was so much fun to be with the sisters and parental unit.

mikey wanted to wear his costume over to show grandpa right before halloween. 

notes on austin

• i don't understand how 10 days can go by so fast. especially while living out of a suitcase. but they did. we're home now and trying to get unpacked. i might still be living out of a suitcase for another 10 days.
• hanging out with heather and just doing whatever is still so much fun. with a husband and a baby. although the husband worked. when i was single, i made it to her house about once a year for a long off track visit. i've missed those visits.
• austin is hot. hot. HOT. i had sweaty lip mustaches way more often than one should. i had sweaty everything.
• i got stung by a scorpion twice. then looked down and saw that it was sitting on my chest. 
• my "scorpion on your chest" removal process is very different from scott's. i froze in fear. scott moved. 
• garrett got stung, too. but only once. 
• mikey never got stung, thank heavens. 
• getting stung by a scorpion isn't fun, but it isn't that bad. they're just creepy.
• i ate a lot of good food there. chuy's. rudy's. mighty fine. the mighty cone. double dave's. round rock donuts.
• mikey LOVED rocky. he also loved his cousins.
• i loved watching his cousins play with him and love on him.
• i finally accepted the fact that hunter isn't sick and that he's just got a deep voice. that was a hard one, but i like 15 year old huntie. he's a cool kid. who rocks vans & nike. 
• we're still working on his sock situation. :)
• it is kinda nice to have a niece willing to stay home and be there when he wakes up from his nap to watch him while we ran errands. 
• speaking of chuy's... i might have to make "the dip" tonight. 
• i loved getting to see garrett every day. 
• loved going on little late night runs to CVS with him, too. dates with your husband - no matter how simple... fun.
• i didn't take enough pictures! stink!!!
• james avery is still one of my favorite stores. 
• mikey pooped up his back in james avery. that wasn't chaotic at all. 
• there were a couple of things that happened on this trip that we laughed about so hard. but we will keep to ourselves. as hannah said once, "what happens in this house, stays in this house." probably better for us all.
• 2 flights = 2 extremely interesting rides. 2 psychos. one in front of us, one in back of us. that might be a whole 'nother blog post. 
• mikey did pretty good on the planes. he was tired and squawked a bit... but it surely could've been worse.
• i heard hopey say "i don't care" a lot. and i keep hearing it in my head now and i miss that girl.
• austin was bad for my eating better and exercising more. i wanted to eat nothing but junk. cold junk. and i wanted to sit as possibly still under a fan. while sipping ice water. oh well. there's always september.
• i love my sister's kids. they're all growing up. way too fast. they're good kids though. i enjoyed each one of them... i hate that i don't get to see them as often as i'd like. not only do i love them, but i really like them, too. 
• hayden very generously gave up his room for 10 days. no complaining! he also melted my heart on a daily basis with his getting down and playing with mikey. it was so sweet. hayden was sooooo good to mikey. 
• i was looking forward to sleeping in my own bed. and mikey seemed happy to be back to his toys today. but that's about the only thing i'm happy to be home about. i mean, i'm happy to be home, but i wasn't dying. i wasn't wanting to be home... i felt so at home there. that's saying a lot for a long trip like this. 
• and now, after writing all of these memories out, i sigh and try not to cry. good memories. heather, thank you.

we had a lovely independence day!

 mikey and all of his cousins [that are born so far... one more on the way.]

 you can see how beautiful she is here, but you just can't understand how adorable she is until you talk to her. last night i heard her offer to babysit mikey for us... goodness. i love her.

 we were posing. looking at these pictures bring on a new level of disgust with my fatness. but i won't go into that here...  i'm supposed to just be reminiscing about a nice holiday.

 rylie was lovin' on mikey. it was sorta a hard day for him. he missed out on a nap and then had to stay up 3 hours later than normal. we're making up for lost naps today!

thanks, nana for the shirt!

monster jammies make my world go round

•  garrett had a business trip to austin last week. i am so jealous that he gets to see heather and her kiddies so often now. one of these trips, mikey & i are going with him. 
• i still hate being away from him. we're joined at the hip & i wouldn't have it any other way.
• i went on my first trip with mikey. alone. to holly's in st. george. we had a grand time. my mom also came to town. connor and will loved mikey. he loved them. now mikey is getting a little cold. slight fever. runny nose. a little congestion. still smiley. just extra tired. 
• yesterday, shawnie was driving through town and we met her and her boys for lunch. i love that girl so much, so thankful she was one of my roommates freshman year. 
• last night, we met megan and cory for dinner and then went to the provo library for an evening with markus zusak, the author of one of my all time favorite books, the book thief. [if you haven't read it yet, you clearly don't love me. and something is definitely wrong with you.] he was charming and witty, and i could've sat and listened to his australian accent forever. thank you, thank you, thank you megan. another one of my favorite people - another one of my roommates from freshman year. 
• i really lucked out with roommates @ ricks.
• friday night, i got some new nail polishes. i painted my nails. it is all part of my start-looking-better- program. next week, i'm going to get serious about a gym membership. i also got a cute new shirt at costco. i'm going to try to fancy up my style just a tidge. i always wear very plain shirts and jeans. not super femme. at holly's this week, i was impressed on how cute she looked just for going to target. part of my problem is that i literally have 4 shirts that fit that aren't stained right now. so. aside from doing a lot of laundry, my choices are limited. i'll never be super fancy like hojo, but i can jazz it up a little. 
• i'm reading pioneer woman's book. i'm enjoying it. she's funny. i love the heat in that book.
• i decided to corner round project life. getting caught up was in itself a little project. but i'm sooooo glad i did it. 
• i woke up this morning with body aches and a headache. i'm skipping church because mikey is still sleeping and it is half way through our first hour. i feel that when your baby is sick, you shouldn't wake him up. even for church. we're both having a relaxing day. i am pretty sure we won't regret it.
• my dad got home from moscow. thank heavens, no injuries this time. i like having him on american soil.
• today is my punky's birthday. my niece. she's 8 now. i can't believe it. through the thick and thin of the last decade, she's always been nothing but a source of pure joy for me. when i was down, all i had to do was be around her and all of my problems just slipped right away. when she was a baby & someone knocked on their doorbell, she shook in anticipation that it might be me. nowadays, we mostly do special sleepovers... i still just love her.

dino shoes

my days away from turning 14 year old neice, Emma, made these for my baby. they reminded her of the dinosaur from one of her favorite board books as a little girl. i can't wait to put them on my lil' dude. she also gave us the book. what a thoughtful, talented girl. i love my family.

"i kiss it better"

[thanks for the picture, holly.]

we went to st. george last weekend. it was great fun. we celebrated will's birthday. that baby turned 3. and he's not so much a baby anymore, although i do still love a good cuddle time with him. i can't believe how big he's gotten, so fast.

i was sitting on the couch at one point & holly's dog came over and plopped his foot down on top of mine and proceeded to stretch. my little foot got squished and pinched by that dog's claws. it wasn't my favorite part of the weekend.

what was one of my favorite parts was when i yelled out in pain & will dropped his toy he was playing with nearby to come check on me. i told him what happened & he bent down and before i could stop him [cause as sweet as it was, i wouldn't make anyone kiss my feet] he kissed it better. he looked up at me with a smile on his face, expecting that to make the sting go away. he said, "i kiss it better." his sweetness did make me feel better. i miss that kid.

things that are making me do the "good cry"

i find that i'm crying a lot. either cause i'm way too sensitive, or cause some dumb dancer danced to a song that touched me, or cause i miss someone. sometimes it is a bad cry. the kind where my face goes in my hands and i can't stop. that eventually gets to the you've-cried-all-your-makeup-off stage-best-start-over-for-the-day stage. sometimes it is a i'm-so-happy-i-can't-stop-myself-from-being-a-giant-boob.

here's a few things that are making me do the "good cry" - the kind i'm still embarrassed over, but not worried that i'm suffering from borderline personality. or maybe i've always been borderline. who knows.

• a sweet phone call with connor yesterday. he seems so big lately. and he was in the cutest mood. he liked talking & was engaged in what we were talking about. and we weren't talking about anything all that special. he was just so conversational. and he teased me a little, it was great. and he said on his own free will a time or two, "i love you hayley."
• i also talked to my mom and hopey yesterday. hope was trying to get my mom to turn on a dvd for her. neddie, of course, couldn't. so she said to hope, "you need to go find somebody to get this on for you, cause i can't." hope promptly turned around and said, "hey somebody! i need you!" my mom and i died laughing at how cute she was, so then, of course - hope milked that "somebody" for a good couple of minutes.
  
• my husband posting about me being a good teacher. he's generous.
  
• getting texts from holly like this.
• after enough nagging phone calls, i got heather to send some pictures of her 2 younger kids. they melt my heart. look at hopey's hair. i wish she'd send hopey out for a week this summer to entertain me. the only reason i'm not really pushing for it is cause i fear that i'd bore hope to death cause i might not be able to keep up with her. now i just have to nag heather to send pictures more often & of all the kids. baby steps.

"hims talking to you"

that's what the text i got from my sister said.

this is will.

he's on a play phone down in st. george.

while relieving himself, being such a big boy.

and apparently thinking of me.

and it makes my day. cause he thinks of me when i'm not with him. he misses me, too. that makes me feel good. cause i know it is far from balanced - the amount of time i think about him vs. the amount of time he thinks of me when we're apart - but he does in fact remember me when i'm not there.

hims, i love you.

drums, karaoke and bouncing.

connor begged all weekend long to play the drums. and then he wanted to just sing. we obliged. well, i sat there with the camera, while garrett did all the set up, take down - basically all the work. go figure. that's never happened before.

will wouldn't stop bouncing and being cute during karaoke hour. i couldn't help taking the video, i'm just unselfish enough i had to share with the world. they've both got cute little tushies.

dehydration sucks

saturday, jared and liz were having a yard sale. we had my sister's boys, connor and will for the weekend, so we brought them with us. we spent from about 7:30 am to 2:00 pm outside. the boys played in their awesome backyard. i was careful to put sunscreen on them, cause i didn't want to be responsible for them getting a sunburn. then i proceeded to try to stay in the shade as much as possible. wasn't enough. my arms got fried. my face got a little fried. my neck got a little fried. luckily that's all that got crispy on me.

by the time we sat down to a lovely little bbq lunch, i knew something wasn't right with me. i felt weak and shakey. i left with will right after lunch and we went home and napped. i'm not sure who needed it more, but we both slept for a few hours.

the trots started pretty quick after that. i woke up at about 1:30 in the middle of the night and puked. not fun. luckily, that was the only time i barfed. but the other stuff stuck around all day sunday. i managed to sleep most of yesterday and today away. i read a book today. i semi watched a few movies. i couldn't even make it to bookclub tonight. whoa!

being dehydrated sucks. this is my second time this month. luckily this week, i just need to work on friday - if it takes me all week to recover, fine. i don't have to stress out about missing work. and sub plans. ug. i hate sub plans. i've been drinking lots of water. i was sick of gatorade, so i had garrett get me some pedialyte. big mistake. that shit is nasty. i'd rather drink gatorade only for the rest of my life.i long for being able to clip some coupons without feeling completely exhausted. or more, but i'd start with that.

my advice: don't get dehydrated. especially not when pregnant. recovery is a b!tch.

[hopefully at some point i'll have the energy to get pictures off my camera to share that i took from the weekend with the boys. we had so much fun. me especially. i kinda miss them to the point of tears today.]

captain me up

• we had madeline and bradley for about 24 hours this weekend. both kids handled being away from their parents very well. i had fun playing with them. i've never been unimpressed, but i was reassured that garrett's going to be a fantastic dad - when that baby started crying at 3 o'clock in the morning, he was up before i was to comfort him. he even let me sleep in in the morning. i'm a lucky lucky girl.
• we dragged the kids around to many a stores while we bought new furniture. the kids were amazing, i know i wouldn't have been as well behaved. i'm so excited about our new stuff - too bad we might have to wait a few weeks for it to come. i've been one tracking big time, i fear that i've worn garrett out talking about what will go where, etc. getting new furniture is definitely taking the sting out of not being able to sell our house.
  
• everything we bought - debt free. we used some of what we were going to use as a downpayment. that's a good feeling, i gotta say.
  
• i'm off track now for 2 weeks. then i go back for 3 more weeks of teaching. then, i'm done. my emotions are so mixed about this, but right now i think i just can't get over the shock of how fast it is all happening.
  
• i've been enjoying hummingbirds lately. i loved pointing them out to madeline and bradley. bradley's facial expression made my day. then, he'd go to the window and yell at them to come back. it was adorable.
  
• we are going to have more miniature guests at our house this weekend. connor and will. i'm pretty dang excited about that, too.
• among our new furniture, we ordered a king sized bed this week. and a bed frame. and got new bedding. on sale. i can't wait to put it all together. seriously, can't wait.
  
• my mother in law, DeAnne offered us an amazing little blessing last night - to store some of our furniture that we don't want to get rid of in their basement. we were going to use our garage as storage space, cause i don't want to pay for a rental storage space every month. this way, my car will get to stay in the garage - especially nice during the winter months with a brand new baby. thanks for your generosity, DeAnne & Brad.
• plus, last week, we found some goodies at target & garrett now has an orange bathroom. read about it here if you wanna.
  

here's a picture of the new bed frame. a captains bed, if you will:

trying to catch up

my very own little kung fu panda. he's adorable.

"give me money, mom."

you can't help but be totally in love with him. both hims.

guess who is sporting a big belly? will was checking out the bees

someone was too cool. he needed to have the cool tickled out of him.

"why in the hell are you taking a picture of me?"

2 funerals last week. lots of family in town. then the stomach flu of 2010 hit & well, i nearly didn't survive. in between barfing and saying goodbyes, there were some good times to be had. i got lots of snuggle time in with little will. that's enough to make my weekend, regardless of the barfing that followed. apparently it is super easy to get dehydrated when pregnant. well, i mean, after you throw up for 12 hours. and being dehydrated when pregnant can take days to recover. i've learned the hard way. last night, i finally got some electrolytes in me and have felt much better today. but my house is still a mess. i tackled the kitchen today and was pooped. had to take a nap after. i had grand dreams of tackling my bedroom today, but i'm going to have to settle for getting some laundry done. thank heavens for a husband who helps. he's probably more tired than i am lately, but you'd never hear him complain. life went a little crazy a week ago. still trying to catch up. and stay hydrated.

that's a darth vader ring on his toe

this week, garrett had a business trip. and since i was kinda depressed at the thought of spending 4 days alone after just spending 10 whole days with him, i roadtripped it down to holly's house. these pictures are just a few of the ones i took. boy, are those boys adorable. they're growing up way too fast & i already miss them so much.

a few pictures about my saturday

video will come shortly.