mikey has started sleeping in later now that he's not napping in the afternoons. there have been a few mornings where we wake up before he does.

saturday morning, we were laying in bed talking and mikey started to stir. garrett was either reading his book or getting his morning update on his phone. but i started taunting him about going to get mikey before he did. sometimes we race. yes, we are that kind of dork nugget. he wasn't taking the bait of the taunts. so finally, as i was getting up, i said, "you're kind of making this boring."

all of a sudden, he sprang at me and growled, "i'm going to clobber you!" and tried to beat me out of the room. well, he very nearly did because i was laughing so hard.

i love that man. i love how he can ignore me when i'm being ridiculous and how he can feed into my silliness when it is appropriate, too. i'm so glad we have so much fun. i don't think everyone has it as good as we do.

i'm thrilled that he now has 2 weeks off of work and that we get to spend every day together, playing. we're going to watch shows [arrested development marathon already underway] and play wii games - most of these are after mikey goes to bed - and play with our little boy. i love it, just having a lot of family time, our little family and both sides of our families. i'm looking very forward to it all.

i got mikey out of his bed. and then he immediately wanted his dad. can you blame him? and garrett changed his poopy diaper. boo-yah.

day 9: someone i love

i apologize for not posting this yesterday, i did take the picture yesterday. it was just an awful, busy day... mikey had a 102-103 degree fever yesterday. in the morning, he was happy spirited, maybe just wanted to be held more than normal. by evening - he was lethargic and cranky. it had me really nervous. mikey wanted nothing but his daddy. he loves his daddy so much. i love the kind of dad garrett is. i tell mikey all of the time that he will probably never know how good he has it. 

He's wonderful!

I love Garrett. Yesterday was his birthday. I tried very hard to make it special. He makes everyday so special for me. I feel like the luckiest girl in the world, because I have someone like him taking care of me, looking out for me, loving me every day. He even cleaned up his own party last night because he knew my stomach was hurting. Wonderful man, I tell you!

you put your arms around me and i'm home. [or you are. whichever]

i love this song. and when my man has been gone for 4 days, i get super sappy.

garrett, thanks for seeing through my walls. i miss you. i'm so glad you come home tonight.

hogwarts math

so, i'm reading harry potter - the whole series - right now. i'm at the end of 3. yesterday, for some reason, i started thinking as i was reading about how many kids are at hogwarts. i was thinking about it and reading at the same time. trying to do too many things at the same time. 

here's my mentality:

5 boys joined Gryffindor the year Harry did. Probably about 5 girls joined, too...  Although, I can only think of Hermione, Lavender & Parvati. 

So about 10 new kids per house each year. 4 houses. 7 years. What I really meant to say was "7 times 4 is 28, right?" keep in mind that i'm still reading as i'm doing this mental math. but what came out was: "what's 4 times 10?" in a yell. so really, it was, "WHAT'S 4 TIMES 10?" garrett didn't even skip a beat before he yelled right back at me "FORTY!"

we both laughed so hard. in fact, i laughed so hard i drooled. the way it came out of me, garrett knew that it was a mistake, but he couldn't help but give me some sh!t about it.

what is wrong with me? poor mikey. his mom is a loon. 

p.s. i highly recommend what i'm doing. reading all of the books again. after i finish each book, i watch the movie. and move on. i am loving it. it might become a summer tradition.

here's a little picture i just found when i google searched "hogwarts" images...

oh and this post by my friend, jori - LOVED IT.

growing up

last night garrett and i had a little "come to jesus" talk about a few things. no, we have not been fighting. no, we are not struggling with getting along. 

it was more about how we're living our life. planning for the future. how we sometimes don't act like adults about certain things.  both of us are still sometimes caught in the ol' singles days habits. 

we want to do better. as garrett put it - we need to grow up. we're parents now. we need to stop being compulsive about silly things and make responsible decisions.

i am going to do better. i'm going to try so hard to stop being lazy about the things that i am being lazy about. i've been really good about talking big... but putting those things into action. not so much. when i quit working, almost a year ago, i made a list of daily "chores" that i would do throughout the week. sadly, i'm confessing here that i have never once followed the list. sure the jobs get done most weeks eventually. but i've been very undisciplined. maybe i need to revamp that list. i don't know. but i want to start doing this simple little thing. i used to [tooting of my own self horn here] be an amazingly, productive teacher. i met deadlines, i succeeded. i just need to find my homemaking groove. 

in our talk, we decided to make some cut backs. because we're trying to be more grown up. do we need a dvr? not during the summer. so, we're going to get rid of it for the summer and see how we feel about it in the fall. we might be over our shows. we might be done with letting the tv rule our evenings. i kinda hope so. besides saving money, i know this is going to lead us to a more productive, healthy lifestyle. do we need jumbo cell phone plans? no. do we need netflix? yes. because we have a very basic plan already and we don't want to go into depression and deprivation. do we need 2 cars? maybe not. 

we have two houses. if we ever want to be able to put a down payment on another house after we sell a few of the ones we have - we need to just be better.

the biggest thing we are planning on doing: stop eating out. i'm a big fat lazy butt way too often. even if it means we resort to a frozen pizza, we will not be frequenting the in n out anymore. i might cry sometimes, but i will survive.

so garrett, i shared these thoughts because i want to have it written down. so if we start to slip up or indulge again, we can look back and remember some of the things we're feeling right now. i pledge to do better. for you, for mikey, for our future.

a happy sick boy & dinner pictures

 mikey will stop fussing or squawking anytime i turn my camera on my phone on & let him look at himself. i adore it. he does too, clearly. is he vain or what? [p.s. you should check out his youtube channel... new video with him looking at himself in the mirror.] today, we had quite the wait at the dr's office. yes, i took him to have his ears checked. yes, i realize i'm a paranoid mom. but he has a rash & a fever.

monday's dinner: homemade chicken cordon bleu, roasted asparagus and a caesar salad.

tonight's dinner: spinach & strawberry salad with a homemade vinaigrette dressing, creamy chicken & bacon pastry puffs. heaven on earth. we're having those leftovers for lunch tomorrow. i can't wait.

recently, my dad has given me a little grief about how much cooking garrett does around here. and believe me, i know how much garrett does around here. i do. i appreciate. i do. but i got a tidge defensive when my dad was teasing me. it made me realize that if i'm sensitive about it, it is probably partially true. maybe i do feel a little guilty about the amount of my work that garrett has done in the last 6 months. so this week, i'm stepping up my game plan. no frozen meals so far. even homemade salad dressing tonight. 

those pastry thingys - you need to give them a whirl. divine.

so, take that dad. i aint afraid of no kitchen.

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.

my fantasies revealed

i'm reading a book right now where the author talks about fantasies. she talks about how fantasies are almost always better than the actual event. that thought got me thinking. i grew up fantasizing about marriage, about having kids. then it didn't happen for a long time & i spent a lot of time in my own screwed up relationships and observing others in their relationships. by the time i was an independent adult, i expected marriage to be work. 

then i met garrett and fell in love with him and just began having the time of my life. our relationship wasn't work. it was exciting, entertaining, fun... so many good things. we're only 2 years in now, but we're still having fun. i know for me, it still isn't work. [i hope it isn't for him, either.]

sure, we work at it. we do things for each other, we spend time doing things with each other... we try to keep the romance alive. and i'm not going to lie here and say that our relationship has always been perfect - we've had a few fights [come on, i'm a jones girl... i've got a temper. and it has almost always been me getting upset about something. thank heavens for a calm man in my life.] but they get worked out. and there really haven't been  many.

basically what i am saying is: being married to garrett is better than the expectations i had as an adult, heck - it is even better than the fantasies i had as a kid. i mean, i didn't think back then about how great it would be to laugh til i was crying or peeing. or both. or how much it would mean to know that there is someone who would do anything for you.

i do know one thing: i fantasized about being a mom all of my life & i can honestly say that real life motherhood is even better than i imagined. and it is this way because of garrett. because he helps. because he supports. because our little boy looks just like him. 

garrett, i love you more today than i did 2 years ago. happy anniversary. i love living our fantasy.

why twice?

have you ever noticed that when you learn a little vocabulary - all of a sudden - you hear it all of the time?

when garrett and i were dating, he said, "duly noted" a couple of times. it always threw me off. i always felt like a complete jackass. one time, before i could stop myself, i said, "why twice?"

my then boyfriend is a smart person. he's usually very gentle with me when i prove myself to be developmentally stumped much beyond grade 2. [hence the reason i was a fabulous 2nd grade teacher... yes, i keep telling myself that...] it is not every day that he comes across a moron, but he does frequently encounter people who are less than him intelligent wise. and like i said, most of the time, he handles it very well. 

but this time... when i said, "why twice?" he smirked. i knew it. i'd shown too much. i think if he wouldn't have been busy falling madly in love with me, he would've ripped me a new one. but he forgave.

he had to explain what duly means to me. and i wish i could say that it was the one and only time. it hasn't been. see, sometimes, i have a little glitch. if something doesn't make sense to me the first time, often, it never really sticks. that's how i feel about duly. i think i know what it means now. i know how to use it in conversation contextually correct. but i'm not quite sure exactly what it means. 

but i hear "duly noted" ALL of the time now. and we always look at each other and smile... 

this week, garrett taught me what proprietary means. that one stuck, i get it. and since we've talked about it, we've heard it used in tv shows no less than 3 times. no exaggeration. duly might not have stuck, but proprietary has. yay for me. my brain hasn't turned to complete mush.

the funny look

garrett and i like to laugh. we like to make each other laugh. we like things that make us laugh. a few tv shows really entertain the you know what out of us. modern family & 30 rock are some of them. we both laugh out loud at least once during each episode of those shows. i think we both really appreciate "intelligent" humor. something quick & witty - if you're not paying attention, it'll totally go over your head. my favorite part of watching these shows with garrett is when we both do a quick look at each other, cause the show is so funny that we have to make sure the other one caught it...  its so funny that a look says it all. i love those shows. but more, i love my husband.

the big 3 oh

HAPPY 30th BIRTHDAY, GARRETT!!!

I love you so much. I'm glad we get to spend the next 30 years together. [and more!] you make every day wonderful for me, i hope you've had a good day so far.

he was right... again!

• garrett knew i was pregnant when i didn't think i was. he didn't say much because well, he's smart. he's learned me. he knows when it is a good time to argue with me and when it is not. besides - in the long run, he ended up being right. so burn on me, right?  
• when we went in for an 8 week appointment, the nurse heard a fast heartbeat & said "oh, its a girl" and garrett said he knew deep down that mikey was going to be a boy. again, he didn't say anything because of the what-if-i-was-wrong? thought. again though - he was right.
• around july, garrett started predicting that mikey would be born on september 11th.  this one he voiced. when i was scheduled last friday for an induction i thought finally i would have him beat! i didn't think it was possible that i'd be in labor til the next day... and technically i wasn't. around 11 pm friday night they turned the labor off & called for a c-section. only there was one more person in line before me... so ours was scheduled for a little after midnight. which meant that mikey was born after midnight. on september 11th. he won again. he's always right! at this point, i don't mind. 

garrett is a wonderful daddy. i love watching him hold his boy. his little mini me. 

2 things:

i have been doing a lot of thinking today. i'm excited. nervous, too. but mostly just excited. my world is about to be rocked. and i can't wait.  but there are 2 things that i just absolutely can not wait to see:

• non swollen feet. i know that might sound awful, but they have been ridiculous. i want puffless feet back. i want more than a crease for an ankle. i want my toes to not look like they are about to pop off. [my toes are already ugly enough. swollen feet is only cruel and unusual punishment.]
• garrett getting to hold his son. sure, i want to hold him. i can't wait to hold him, in fact. but this husband of mine, is the sweetest, most wonderful person i know. and i can't wait to see him love on his son. he's going to be an amazing father. it will just make my heart swell & my life will be perfect.

i'm a freak on a leash

go read about garrett's interpretation about what happened this morning... here.

i've snorted and tinkled. i have no shame. i admit it because it makes me laugh so hard. i'm the world's biggest dork.

at least no stretch marks yet. burn marks, yes - but stretch marks - nope.

me whining about being pregnant... again.

last week, my blood pressure hadn't gone down as much as the dr wanted it to, so he expressed the seriousness of the situation...  and i'd done some things better, but i wasn't being as careful as i should've been about the salt content in my diet. i'm happy to report that after 1 week of really "being good" it is better. that's a relief. and i'll keep sleeping in and napping everyday. 

i won't get into how useless i feel most days. garrett basically does everything around our house right now. and he doesn't complain, but i feel guilty. but i'm not supposed to be doing it, so... it can just be a little depressing sometimes. i'm trying to not feel worthless... but besides reading, computering, napping - what else do i do? not much.

i burned my belly last week when garrett was making dinner. 3 inch burn right above my belly button. he was making dinner & i was on the phone with my sister. he asked me a question, instead of answering him, i got up to get what he was looking for. forgot that the pan on the stove was hot & immediately started crying. not fun. it hurt, but i think it was also a little emotional breakdown, too.

yesterday, i was feeling cooped up. i've been avoiding being outside like crazy because of the heat. but i just craved being outside. last summer, we spent some time with jared and liz up big cottonwood canyon doing overnighters and little campout dinners. i'd never enjoyed being outside, up in the mountains like that before. in fact, if you asked some in my family, they'd tell you i'm the most non-outdoorsy person ever. anyway - we talked jared and liz into a drive up the canyon and roasting smores. it was beautiful up there- cool, lovely in fact. the treats were tasty. the company was wonderful. and i got to enjoy being outside without sweating like a stuffed pig. when we got home last night, i was so refreshed. and happy. and even though my eyes stung a little from the campfire smoke, it was all worth it.

oh...  and at my dr appointment today, i got checked. and while that part wasn't fun - when i got home, i kinda got a little freaked out. or excited. or something. this was the first time that they were checking my body to see if it is getting itself ready to have this baby. the end is near. i'm so looking forward to him being here.

i'm also so thankful for a husband who doesn't seem to mind. he doesn't seem to mind doing all of the dishes and laundry. he asks me all the time if i need anything & he's quick to do thoughtful things before i ask for something, like my water bottle being filled. i really am the luckiest girl alive to have ended up with him.

"you know, cause you won't let me wash my shorts anymore"

how often do you wash pants/shorts/trousers/what-have-you?

shirts - i wash after 1 wear. pants, not so much. i mean, i don't wear them til they're grey... but i wear them probably 2-3 times before washing them, pending they don't get something on them. if they get a dirty spot, i wash them. and since i'm my father's daughter, i always do a smell check before i wear them, to make sure they're safe.

since i've stopped working, laundry has been one of my chores. [honestly, before i stopped working it was a shared duty, but garrett tended to do the wash more than i did.] and when i do darks, i notice that the majority of the load is shorts. boy shorts. garrett shorts. i typically do one load of darks per week and i had noticed that there were probably 5-7 pairs of shorts every time. one load of darks per week = one pair of shorts for pretty much every day. of course, i made comments. along the lines of "do you even wear them before we wash these bad boys again?"

apparently i made enough comments for long enough, cause the last time i did a load of darks, there were no shorts in there. i didn't say anything to him, but i noticed.  i even thought to myself, "see, you can teach an old dog new tricks."

today, we were getting ready to leave for lunch. [we had previously set up a luncheon with one of garrett's old friends from work and yes, i did do a low sodium lunch. it wasn't as fun as it could've been. but i survived.] he came out in a pair of shorts and there was water spots all down his right leg. i looked at him funny and said, "did you have an accident?" 

mr. sassy pants said, "no, i had some spots i needed to clean up, you know, cause you won't let me wash my shorts anymore." i laughed myself silly. seriously, there was snorting and drooling involved.

he completely missed the point. it is a good thing he is so dang cute. alls i know is he better figure out the rules quick, because i refuse to do the smell test on his shorts.

i'll save the story of how he was shouting/screaming in demonstration of how he got scared by a training video yesterday. i think that was one of those you-had-to-be-there moments. but know that i had to hold myself to keep from peeing & i seriously think that this baby is going to be severely traumatized when he's born and hears his daddy's voice.

and too bad for him, cause the dr. said that i'm not supposed to be doing any lifting. not even to carry in groceries. so. the laundry is pretty much his task now. [again] maybe i should go put all of my skirts/pants/anything-i-can-fit-into-right-now  in to be washed. teach that guy a lesson!

do NOT shop at furniture warehouse!

friday our bed came. the delivery people set it up [wrong] and put the mattress on top for us before we could inspect and realize there might be a problem. friday night we got home late and sat on the bed to watch a show before going to sleep - it came crashing down around us. garrett was livid. more mad than i have ever seen him. my immediate reaction was to laugh. cause i laugh when i see things like that - even when it is my own little accident & i'm not too hurt. then i started crying, as garrett dragged the mattress out into our living room. sad cause "now what?" - we waited an impossible amount of time for the bed to actually come, now how long would we have to wait for the morons at furniture warehouse to fix this problem?

we were ready to send everything back and get our cash back from them. just be done and start over. but - in 6 weeks, i could be having a baby & getting rid of all of our furniture now is too risky. why punish ourselves even more. we decided that garrett could fix it. he came up with a plan to repair the stripped sides and build reinforcements, so this problem doesn't happen again.[for the record - furniture warehouse's consolation prize to us - a $200 gift card to use at their store. yeah, cause that is exactly where we want to go spend our money now.]

so he spent his saturday measuring, buying, cutting, re-cutting [the wood] and repairing [the bed] & saturday night we slept in our new bed finally. carefully. i am not going to lie, i was scared if we both turned over at the same time, everything would come crashing down... but it hasn't yet.

did i ever mention that a few weeks ago when garrett called to complain, one of the receptionists got mad at garrett and hung up on him?!? don't shop at furniture warehouse! don't support those people. i have been nothing but disappointed with them and their customer service.

and yes, that is a bowl of peanut m&m's that i brought in to him while he was working. i'm pretty sure that he didn't eat any, but i managed to finish the bowl by the end of the afternoon.

sometime i'll post a picture of our new bed actually put together and made. and guess what mom and dad - i made the bed again today. [yesterday when i told them both individually that i made the bed, they both laughed at me, not believing. rude.]

the fourth was a bust here.

well, the 3rd wasn't. we had a nice day with garrett's family. movie. bbq. fireworks. by the time 9 o'clock rolled around though, i was feeling off. i hadn't quite pinpointed what was wrong, i just knew that i was tired and not right. i woke up around 2 in the morning and "the sick" started. that lasted most of the morning, along with miserable body aches. apparently - and yes, i confirmed with my dr this morning - i am sensitive to lots of "activity" and need to have plenty of water. i will confess saturday i didn't drink enough water. and paid dearly for it yesterday. ["the sick" is a polite way of describing: barfing, diarrhea, or if you're super lucky - a combo deal of both at the same time. i had all three this lovely weekend.]

dr says: my blood pressure is "good" - and the swelling is due to probably a combination of too much salt, too much on my feet time, not enough taking it easy time. which is good, cause the last 3 weeks were definitely rough with moving out of my school. but that's done now. i won't have to be outside if i don't want to be. i can put my feel up when i need to & try to stay cool as much as possible. i will, too. i will have more time and energy to eat healthier. and i'll never leave home without my water bottle again.

i was so worried that i had killed garrett's 4th. i kept apologizing for it. i think he thought i was silly. he kept saying "you aren't ruining my holiday." and i said, "well, this is ruining mine!"

today we're going to go to the pool with garrett's siblings. i'll stay in the shade with my water as much as possible, considering i still don't feel 100%. i feel much better, but my energy is low and i've still got some of the aches and pains. yikes.

i'm done with school. thursday afternoon was really hard. friday morning was hard. but i pulled it together and survived the day. i love teaching. i will miss it indeed, but i know this is a better choice for my family. and i can't wait for this baby to come along. i still can't believe i'm done. 9 years is a long time.

i'm off to enjoy the last day of this long weekend with garrett. yesterday doesn't count cause i was puking most of the day. this day needs to end our weekend with a bang.

p.s. i love my country.

the saga of the dvd shelves

so... new furniture is coming. some has already been bought & built. which left us with a little reorganizing of a few things. dvd towers just weren't going to cut it. and i had a little vision. shopped at all of the possible stores i could think of that would have any sort of dvd organization. nobody had what i wanted. so last weekend, i whipped up a little picture of what i was thinking. even took some slightly inaccurate measurements. while garrett was putting together my desk, i kept talking & he kept looking at me like i was smoking a crack pipe. then monday night we needed to run to lowes and i suggested we look at wood... again, he gave me a look that said, "you're still hell bent on that?" i really only think he agreed to my suggestion cause he was looking forward to being able to prove me wrong. he didn't think he could do this. i believed. and while jared helped & greatly improved the building situation, i know he could've done it on his own. it would've just cost more money and frustration. he has worked most nights this week on staining and sanding. and after we left jared's house that first night, he was excited about it. he'd gotten over the disbelief. now, i'm pretty sure he's so proud. i'm proud - these shelves turned out way better than i had envisioned. thanks jared for your help and expertise. and thanks garrett - you rock.

bringing the shelves in the house. yes, his glasses are foggy & he's got sweat rolling down his face. it is hard work being a lumberjack mr. fix it man. but look at that adorable proud smile.

garrett declamping the palsy.

look at how nice it looks up there.

fully loaded.

now... anyone want these to towers? there's nothing wrong with them. they're about $30 a piece at target... we just didn't have room for them. we'll do a first come first serve basis. (not selling, giving away here.)