Mom's 50th Birthday

50 things mom loves

February 13th, 2011, Mom celebrated her 50th birthday. We celebrated it by having the family over for a homemade Cafe Rio meal followed by a video montage of mom's 50 years as a wife and mother.

Later, Dad took Mom for an overnight stay to Waterton and to attend the temple together.

Mom wanted to express her gratitude to everyone for their hard work in gathering photos, preparing the montage and planning the meal.

Family Garage Sale

Yesterday Mom and Dad cleaned out the garage (a huge undertaking to say the least) and put on a great garage sale this morning. The garage sale was a product of Alison wanting to make money to buy herself some toys in the summer time since her birthday falls right around Christmas. Who can blame someone for wanting that right?

She went through her toys and was a tough saleswoman (even to her own sister who had to buy the Dora Castle off of her) as she earned her new toy money. money. She even thought of a really cool way to collect money from people all on her own. She had two jars, one labeled dogs and one labeled cats. When the customer was ready to pay, they were to place their money in the jar that was their preferred pet, a cat or dog. By the end of the garage sale Alison would have a little neighborhood poll based on a dog vs cat preference. I told her there was just one problem. She needed a jar that said "neither" so that I could put my money in that one.

Alison had a few conditions with her earnings. First she had to pay tithing, then she had to decide how much to donate to someone in need, and then she had to put some in the bank for savings.

The Taurus was parked on one half of the driveway and a neighbor jokingly suggested we put a price tag on it. We thought it should say "comes with two sons and a half eaten, melted Dairy Queen Blizzard"

Alison enjoying her paper money (above)

Pregnancy

It's true what they say that "every pregnancy is different." With my first pregnancy I didn't have THAT bad of nausea, but I carried so high that by 6.5 months on I was so uncomfortable. I couldn't sleep and it didn't matter what angle I stood or sat at, it just felt like my sides and back were being torturously stretched and pulled.

Pregnancy #2 has sort of been the reverse. I was so sick and wiped out for much longer in the beginning, but because I'm carrying a lot lower I haven't experienced nearly the discomfort that I did with Charlotte. Up until a few days ago whenever people asked me the question, "how are you feeling?" I could honestly answer, "great!" I've had energy and much less discomfort. I do however, get the normal aches and pains and lugging around a 30 lb toddler hasn't been super fun these last few weeks.

Speaking of toddlers, it hit to me a couple days ago that very soon it's not just going to be me and my little sidekick Charlotte together every day. Since realizing that I've been relishing in and reflecting upon the one on one time that we get to spend together singing songs, reading stories, playing dress up (she always wants me to be winnie the pooh. I think it's because of my big tummy), running errands, and going on fun outings. I love that we have had so much time together to build our relationship and I've always had a feeling that she is going to be such a joy, blessing, support and friend to me throughout the years.

We are slowly but surely getting ready for the arrival of baby #2. I can't wait to find out if it's a boy or a girl and to be absolutely 100% honest I would be thrilled with either. There were times in the pregnancy that I leaned more towards wanting a boy or girl but I really am just so excited for a genuine surprise. For the record though, I've been thinking that it's a boy this entire time.

Out of curiousity I pulled out a picture of me 1 week before I gave birth to Charlotte. I'm around 36 weeks along in the picture below.

Here I am currently at around 36 weeks

Is it just me or do I look ready to have a baby in a week?

I can't wait to meet this new little member of our family. I feel so grateful for all that we've been blessed with, and am really loving this stage of life.

Summer

I have been waiting forever to get pictures from my father-in-law's camera from Dave's grad so I could post those before anything else. Well June, July and August have piled up and my pregnancy nesting brain is panicked that if I don't post now, I'll never post again. I'll try to keep things short and sweet, but I also treat this as a family journal so stop reading now if you don't have a few minutes to spare :)

JUNE

I entered my late 20s. Who am I? I don't picture myself as someone who is closer to 30 than 20 or 25. There's no stopping it though.

The Tinkerbell birthday hats were to please Charlotte. At every party she asks about party hats. The dollarstore had either Cars or Tinkerbell to choose from, it was an obvious choice.

Between grads, and mine and Dave's families there were so many birthdays/celebrations in May and June that I was all caked out. I decided to go with cake pops from Starbucks for a smaller/lighter version of the birthday cake. I just stuck them in some foam in the shape of 27 and it was the perfect little treat to have on my birthday.

June also was the month of packing as we were moving July 1st. I took pictures of our cute little apartment because we made such good friends and memories while living in "The Hamlet Spot"

Our toys spilled into the hallway. Luckily for us the people across the hall were our good friends and have a daughter Charlotte's age so it became a common play area for the girls and a great chat area for the moms :)

Charlotte's little reading area

June also included a girl's trip to Idaho to visit Cherisa. She was there for a semester without Jordan (sad) in a tiny little apartment and she kindly let us all pile in for a visit.

You know it's a good trip when by the end of it you are completely exhausted.

Charlotte doing her makeup with me

JULY

Oh how I love Sundance Lake. We spend as many sunny days there as possible. Charlotte loves it and plays in the sand while I sit and watch her. Totally made pregnancy in the summer doable!

Another day at the lake Charlotte insisted on bringing/wearing her pink tutu over her swimsuit.

Thank goodness for 7 year old sisters. Alison was the perfect playmate/helper/beach beauty whenever we had a day at Sundance Lake


We also were invited to my sister-in-law's cabin for few days. It was just the moms and the kids (not to mention a very helpful and fun grandma Wendie) which made for an funfilled, noisey, wonderful time

As you can tell, July has the fewest amount of pictures. There's a reason for that, July was a tornado. Not only did we move that month but Dave also started his residency. After having Dave off for June I had to relearn how to be a residency widow. His schedule is so busy and he is currently averaging anywhere from 60 - 100 hr work weeks. On top of that is hours more of studying per week. He is perpetually sleep deprived while he juggles residency, studying, a pregnant wife and a two year old. He sacrifices a lot and doesn't have really any time to himself. We've realized the importance of communication, putting yourself in the other person's shoes, planning ahead and how to make our time together really count. Not to mention that a weekly date night is a must if at all possible.

AUGUST

I was hesitant to post this picture of us in Waterton since pregnancy has officially taken over my body, but it's the only chance we had in August to spend a couple consecutive days together. We love Waterton and enjoyed going for walks, getting ice cream, going to the park, and visiting with family. We wish we had more time there since there is so much to do. There's always next summer...

I finally buckled down and potty trained Charlotte. I know I know, they say not to do that too soon before a baby comes. Whatever. She got super excited with her little potty party, sticker chart and treats and with the help/advice of friends I can officially say that she is potty trained. Way to go Charlotte!

We finally have most of our moving boxes unpacked and put away which allowed me to break out the old sewing machine again. I'm mostly self taught which means all my projects have mistakes, and some I've had to redo. With that being said, here are a few of my latest projects. I would even venture to say that I'm getting faster and better. It's such an exciting feeling to see something that I actually sewed all by myself :)

One project was a pelmet box for our dining room. Thanks to mom and an online tutorial I think it turned out pretty cute

Next project was the drapes. Those I did all on my own and they took a lot longer than I thought, but again, I love how they turned out and you can't see any mistakes when they're hung up :)

The most recent thing I sewed is my pride and joy. I know they're only pillows but the fabric was expensive (and I'm obsessed with it) so I was really nervous to cut it up and then have it turn out terrible. Somehow they turned out exactly how I wanted. This was my first time trying piping and I LOVE the look of it. I don't know if I'll ever sew another pillow again without piping, it really takes it to the next level in my opinion.

Hopefully the next post I won't have to catch up on 3 months! The next post really should be documenting this pregnancy since I'm 36 weeks along haha.

1 Year of Marriage

We both can hardly believe one year has gone by. It went by so fast! Its so fun to think about and look back on the last year. We have had so many good fun times. I enjoy being able to spend so much time with Jordan. It rocks! He is my best friend and I am so grateful to have him in my life. For our anniversary since we were going to Jamaica the next week, we didn’t do anything spectacular, but it turned out to be super fun!

First we went to our favourite breakfast place, Coras for some delicious food. Then we came home and chilled for a while after being extremely stuffed.

Then we went rollerblading by the Glenmore Reservoir. I had only gone running there a few times and only went partway. But this time we just kept following the path, which maybe was a bad idea because it went on forever!!! But we had fun even though we were tired and saw some wonderful view and went down some very steep hills. It was memorable :)

That evening we went out for dinner at a Greek restaurant called KEFI. It was really cute and charming. The food was great too. In the middle of our dinner they started to play some music and a few people went and danced in the middle of the restaurant and then smashed a plate at the end! Classic..... haha it was cool.

We ended the night by going to see the movie “The Help”. I finished reading the book that same day, so I was so excited to go, but of course, the book was a million times better! But still a great movie.

I can’t wait for many many more years to come!!!

Crypt Lake- Waterton

I always say that I love hiking, and I do, but I rarely ever get my things together and plan a hike. Thankfully Jordan planned one this summer! It was a 17km hike which makes up for all the other times I didn’t go hiking, and it had a lake at the top! What a reward! We went down to Waterton with Jordan’s parents and his sister Amanda. We had to take a ferry out to the starting point and from there the fun began! And the whining... haha

I wanted to get a good workout so I tried to carry our pack most of the way, but it was so far up, that I eventually passed it onto Jordan. But I was impressed with myself for carrying it for so long. Unfortunately our subway sandwiches got totally squished and soggy, but we were able to salvage some of it and still got a good lunch.

Once we got to the lake, me and the girls were tired and wanted to just sit and eat our lunch before heading back down. But Jordan and Kelly decided to hike around the lake after spotting some snow further down. We get enough snow in the Winter, I just want to forget about it in the summer!