Photo a Day: Inside your Wallet

I once heard you can tell a lot about a person by looking in their wallet, or their garbage can. I really don't know if either of those are true. But here's my wallet:

Pretty empty. Minimalist? Boring? Plain? No personality? Hmmmm.

On the left, my checkbook. Also on the left, in a little side flap, are pics of my kids. In the middle, the change holder (it currently has 26 cents in it), and cards: temple recommend, health insurance cards, my library card. On the right, my license and debit card.

Every once in a while, there's actual cash in there. But it's usually 5s or 1s for kids' allowances. (Which, they don't get paid unless they do their chores. So I don't know if that's called an allowance or a payday.)

I also used to have a credit card, until I realized that having that in there made me spend more money than I should. So now I don't even carry it so I'm not tempted.

And, I'm still old school in the fact that I still write everything down in my check register, including debit usage and auto drafts (even though it's all on my bank account online, which I check every few days). And I have to know where I'm at to the penny (I've tried rounding, it doesn't work for me).

My wallet sits in my purse, which is equally empty. Sometimes there are receipts in my purse-until I get them written in my register, that is. I also have two pens, lip balm, hand sanitizer, keys, and breath mints.

Yeah, I'm going to go with minimalist, to make myself feel better.

Photo a Day: Green/Hair/Funny

Okay, I need to preface this with telling you that I think that what we did was funny. Probably this was more dorky than funny, but I'm a dork, so there you go.

My cute little nephew loves a lot of girl things, like painted nails, My Little Pony, etc. Part of the girl things he loves includes long hair. Here he is, in the middle of my two kids:

Which, I must point out, he's Ivy's age, but I think he's taller than Troy. My sister makes really tall kids. (Also, Jakob in the background is a spaz and a half.)

Anyway, Micah doesn't have long hair. In fact, he has short, platinum blond hair that's so, so cute. So to make up for it, he wears "hair" around, which ends up being an old T-shirt. Lately it's been a green tank top that I think belongs to his older brother.

So Micah's "hair" got left at my house. We decided to take ransom pictures of the hair for my sister for our Family Home Evening. You know, instead of having an actual lesson about love and kindness or something. So here we are, modeling the "hair".

Jakob's spazzy model face:

I was going for a picture that was more like the shirt had its hands up, but this is what we got instead:

Again, I was going for a beard for Pete, but it was too small. So it's like a bank robber instead:

I just realized that none of my ideas turned out as planned. I have vision, but not execution. I was going for three-headed monster, but again they didn't all fit quite right:

 I can wear little boy clothes!

 A skirt for Ivy:

 And a kangaroo diaper:

We sent these pictures to my sister, along with a ransom note about bringing us Black Dutch Fudge for its safe return, but then we ended up going over there and taking it to them right afterwards.

We would make crappy kidnappers.

Photo a Day: Something You Wore/Red

This is me and Ivy. This Idaho spring has been a lot warmer than usual, and fairly mild. A couple of weeks ago as spring break was starting, it was nice enough and warm enough for my sister and me to take our kids to the park, and only have jackets! My kids ran, and ran, and ran, for about 2 hours.

So for now Ivy and I have matching jackets. The other day she said, "Mom! We both have REDS!" Hers is a hand-me-down from one of her brothers. Mine is a hand-me-down from my grandma. We both love our red jackets.

Photo a Day: Reflection/Younger You

Whenever I look at my Troy, I am reminded of my younger self SOOOO much. So essentially, he is my reflection. Here is some photographic evidence to prove it.

Here's Troy, about a month ago. A company did eye screenings at his school, and we got a letter home saying he needed a doctor to check his eyes. And what do you know-he needed glasses. I think he's so SO cute in them. I probably needed glasses when I was 5, too, but it didn't happen until I was about 7.

When we were driving home after he got his glasses, he was all, "Mom! There are mountains over there! Mom! There are WINDMILLS on the mountains over there!" Yep, definitely needed the glasses.

And here is 5-year-old me. Check out that expression. Is Troy my reincarnate or what?  And just to prove that it wasn't a one time shot of that weird "smile", I included another picture of 5-year-old me.

So silly.

Are You There, Eyelashes? It's Me, Nat

Well, got my laser eye surgery done.  It's absolutely amazing.  You wanna hear all the gory details?  Okay!

So, you get a Valium, so you don't care about anything.  Then you go lay on a table and hold a teddy bear.  You look at a little green light, and then it gets dark.  They move the table to another area, then back to the green light.  You stare at the green light for about 10 seconds, and then you're done.  Rinse and repeat for the other eye.

Seriously.  It didn't hurt, it wasn't weird.  I could almost instantly see better.  (Right now everything looks as if I am still wearing my contacts.  Cool, huh?)  For a couple of hours following my eyes stung, but they told me to try and sleep.  NOOOO problem there-the Valium made me really tired.  And really, as a mom, when am I not tired?  So I slept most of the rest of the day, putting eye drops in whenever I woke up.  And they felt fine after I slept a little.

The next couple of days I had a hard time with sunlight and with headlights.  But I've been totally fine ever since.  If you're thinking about getting it done, DO IT!!!!  So, so worth it.

There is one downside: I haven't been able to wear makeup from three days before the surgery to a week after surgery.  It's a small price to pay for, you know, VISION.  But.  My eyelashes are really light, and when I don't wear mascara I feel like my eyes disappear.  My brother-in-law said I look "washed out".  Which is true.  I don't think I would want to be wearing mascara right now, anyway.  There are some eye drops you have to put in 4 times a day, and if I were to have makeup on and do that I would look like, well, her:

But in a few days I'll be good to go AND I'll be seeing 20/20.  Oh, and my eyes are a lot less bloodshot without contacts.  I even bought some new mascara to go with my new eyesight.  Fancy, huh?

In other news...well, not much going on.  Just kind of the same old.  Work, work, and more work.  Work at home, work at the office, work at teaching piano, work at keeping things, you know, working.  There are days that I feel like the hamster on the wheel-you just keep running, with no end in sight, and for what?  So you can keep running, with no end in sight.

I hit kind of a lull the last few days.  I'm very project/goal oriented, so now that I got my eyes done, I'm like, what next?  There is plenty to DO, but nothing that I'm really aiming for.  Monday and Tuesday days I felt kind of "meh".  Today I feel better.  Of course, I have all the ongoing things, but they're the hamster wheel kind of things.  Which are important as well, but... I don't feel like I have to constantly have entertainment, per se, but it IS nice to look forward to things, too, right?

Of course, Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming.  I like to do my Christmas shopping in November.  I find there are just as many sales but far less crowds.

Halloween was fun. Last year we were all matchy-matchy, which I loved doing, but this year the kids were all different things.  Ivy was "Gumpunzoh" (Rapunzel), Troy was Batman, Brock was The Count/a vampire, and Jake was a ninja.

Ivy's wig itched her a ton, so she didn't wear it all that much.  Brock's makeup, though very cool, was also very time consuming.  And there were about 20 other ninjas just like Jake.  I told him it was like a Ninja club, but I don't think he really liked that.

Next year the kids will all be different things again.  Brock already told me he wants to be Spiderman.  And today I went to the store and got some costumes for 50% off.  Even though I HATE keeping stuff around (it goes against my minimalism tendencies), I'd rather spend half the money on costumes now for next year.  Cheapness 1, Minimalism 0.

Well, that's about all for now.  I'm off to work!

In One Month From Today...

...my vision will no longer look like this without contacts/glasses:

(This picture was titled "blurry mess".  I find that to be a very apt title, for both the picture and my current eyesight.)

Yes, that's right.  After much saving, and whining, and setbacks, and extra work to get the money, I have finally succeeded in accumulating enough money to get my beloved laser eye surgery.

Say it with me: WOOOOOO HOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Because I have astigmatism, and have to wear toric lenses (which kind of help the shape of your eyeball), I have to abstain from wearing contacts for three weeks so my eyes...unshape.  Or something.

Today is day 1 of wearing my glasses again.  Since I got contacts in...8th grade, I've pretty much worn them and NOT glasses.  Here and there, sure, but not constantly.  So after all day of glasses-wearing my ears hurt, because they're not used to having large thingies hanging out behind them.

Also, putting on my makeup this morning was really...exciting, since I couldn't really see what I was doing.

But what is for reals exciting is the fact that I'll be able to see my alarm clock in the morning, and not have to have it 6 inches from my face and I'm still squinting to read the numbers.  It will be exciting to not have to stick my finger in my eye twice a day and blinkety-blink a little clear disk around.  It will be exciting to actually be able to see the big "E" on the eye chart, instead of just knowing that it's down at the end of the room, and only see a big gray blur.

Speaking of "E": my brain, after setting the appointment today, went "EEEEEEEEE!" with giddiness.  (That doesn't sound right.  With "gid"?  Hmmm.  Happiness?  I mean, I would say "excitement", but now that's just overused in this post.  But you know what I mean.)

Let the countdown begin!

Ramble, Ramble, Back to School, Ramble, Ramble

Well, now that school is back in session, I'm almost back into the swing of things...almost.  Here's the rundown on how things have gone thus far:

Jakob

On back to school night, we took Jakob’s school supplies to his class and got a chance to meet his teacher.  She seems really nice.  There’s a girl in his class that he’s buddies with.  She is just a little doll and a half.  She came up to him and said, “Hey, Jakob! Are we going to play at recess?"  Jakob, with a shy little smile, replied, "Yes." She said, "What are we going to play? ....Zombies?!?!?"  And Jake got a huge grin on his face and said, "You KNOW it!"  It was just so cute.  I'm glad he has some friends in his class.

I think he’s doing...okay so far.  He wants to be able to do everything right the very first time he tries something, and if he can’t then he gets frustrated.  We talked about it, and I told him that if he already knew everything, there would be no reason for him to go to school at all.  He really is a smartie pants, though.  He hasn’t had homework so far, which has been nice (for me).

Brock

I got to meet Brock’s teacher the week before school started.  She called parents and had them come in individually with the student and school supplies.  She’s a thinker, that one.  She is also very much on top of things-she didn’t miss a beat in asking me if I could come in to help in the classroom.  I told her I would try-my only hiccup is how Ivy is doing when she is with me.  Sometimes, when I’ve gone to help at the school, Ivy has been great-she just sits there quietly and plays.  Other times, she’s wanting to run up and down the halls.  So we’ll see how this year goes.

The first day of school, Brock lost his lunch box.  I swear it went to the Phantom Zone for a while, and this is why: he forgot to put his lunch box in his room’s basket.  At the end of the day he realized that, and so they went to the lunchroom and found his box, and sent him on his way with it on the bus.  But then his box was exactly like a girl’s box that rides the same bus, only she’s in 3rd grade, and somehow he had her box.  So he came home and was in tears because he lost the box.  We went to the school, to his classroom, to the lunchroom, and called the bus, all to no avail.  The next day, voila!-the lunch box appeared…in Jakob’s class’s basket.  Hm.  Very random.  But we got it back.

Brock loves school.  His homework has taken the most time so far, because he wants to color everything meticulously.  Grr.  I’m like, just scribble, child!  But he is a SUPER artist, and wants everything to look right, so I have to hold my tongue.  He’s getting better and better at reading, but still wants to guess at words.  If I stop him, though, and point at the word that he guessed, he’ll read it the right way.  I think he’s just trying to go fast or something.

Troy

Troy is just so cute.  He’s a dawdler, so I worried about him being on time in the morning to catch the bus.  But he’s done great so far.  The first day of school we were walking in to the front doors with a bunch of bigger kids.  Troy’s eyes got wider and wider.  But once we got to the classroom I think he was okay.  There are a few kids in his class that he knows from church, so I think that helps.  And he plays with his neighbor friend at recess that’s in the other kindergarten class.

This week for homework we had the Mom Scrapbook Project, as I like to call it.  Each of my kids has had this: it’s a packet that asks questions about your child, like their favorite color, a cool trip they have been on, what they are scared of, etc.  (Incidentally, Troy said his favorite trip was “when we went to Wyoming”.  He doesn’t say when we went to Lexi’s wedding, but that’s the only time we’ve been in Wyoming.  So random.)  So you answer the questions, and then you have to find things to show the answers, like pictures, and stickers, and dye cuts, and on and on.  When I did it with Jakob, I think I put a lot more time and effort into doing lots of different…mediums?  Like, stickers, and yarn, and I had him color a whole bunch.  This year, I did almost all pictures, because it’s just that much easier.  We got a few stickers, too, but that’s about it.  Oh, and I had Troy draw a couple of pictures.

Troy is just so eager to learn - he wants to know everything, and how things work.  He’s constantly asking about what words start with what letters, that kind of thing.  The other day he asked Pete to explain how waterfalls work, and ate up every word.

Ivy

I thought about trying to do a little group school thing for Ivy this year.  And then I remembered how much I hated doing the neighborhood preschool for Troy when he was three, so I quickly changed my mind.  So far, she mostly just wants to play with toys while “da brudders” (translation: “the brothers”, which is what she collectively calls Jakob, Brock, and Troy) are at school.  Sometimes she wants to be with me, so she’s at my mercy-she helped me do laundry, and put away dishes, that kind of thing.

Twice a week my mom and I are walking - outside right now while it’s still nice, and then we’ll start mall walking when it gets cold.  So Ivy rides in a stroller with a blanket over her.  She thinks it’s the best thing ever.  Which takes us to…

Nat

Have I been productive? Yes.  Am I busy? YES.  But do I have down time?  Yes. 

During the summer we slept in, and kind of took our time doing things during the day.  It’s amazing how much more one can get done when one gets up and gets moving.  After I get the boys out the door, I’ve been exercising for the first time in YEARS, either walking with my mom like I mentioned, or doing yoga.  I bought this DVD of 20 minute yoga, and so far I really like it.  The dude on it talks about how people go to bed too late, and then get up with a huge to-do list and rush through the day.  His philosophy is to go to bed earlier, and then start the day right with down time, to set the mood for your whole day and get you in a peaceful mindset.

My other morning routine is reading my scriptures.  This has been a wonderful way to start my day.  We read together as a family at night, but it’s just one page.  Reading on my own has been hit and miss, but now it’s part of what I do, and it’s been great.  It does the same thing as the yoga - it gets me in a peaceful mindset to start off my day.

Another great thing about school is the lunches.  I came up with a rotation of sorts for school lunches that I send with the kids.  It’s not fancy, but it helps break up the monotony of a PB&J every day.  I’ve been trying to include healthier sides, like carrots and celery, or little fruit cups.  So, when Troy gets home, I make the same lunch for him, me, and Ivy that I did for the other two.  So I’ve been eating a little better as well.  The other day I was like, Ooooh, celery!  I don’t normally chop up celery for my own eating, but since I had already cut a bunch of sticks it was easy to grab and eat.

After school, I teach piano.  I have 14 students this year.  Every year, before I start teaching, I get really nervous - about if I’m teaching well, if I’ll have enough time to get everything done, that kind of thing.  Last week was my first week, and it went really great.  Well, at least it went great for me – I hope it’s the same story when my students get home.  I really love teaching, and all my students are awesome.

And then at night, of course, I clean at my dad’s office.  Luckily, I’ve been doing that for a couple of months, so that’s really second nature now.  I’m glad things have been adding on little by little or week by week so I didn’t get inundated all at once.

So, weekdays, doing okay.  Weekends, however, are a different ball game, especially Saturdays.  On Saturday, I just want to sleep in, and relax.  But what I NEED to do is grocery shopping, and cleaning at my dad’s, and cleaning my own house with my kids.  I wish my kids were old enough that I could just set them to it, but I know we’d end up at the hospital with bleach in a kid’s eye or something.  So I help them out, which takes longer than if I were to just do it, but they need to learn at some point. 

This last Saturday we were cleaning after dinner and clear up till bedtime, but at least it got done.  So that’s something I need to think about.  I could try fitting one chore into every day of the week (like Monday is dusting day, Tuesday is windexing day, something like that), but I don’t know if that would be better or worse than what I have going on now.  My other thought, and I REALLY need to do this, is go grocery shopping on a different day other than Saturday.  It would be less crowded on a different day, that’s for sure.

Well, I think this post is long enough now, so I’ll be off.  But don’t worry-I’ll be back to ramble another day!

Bir-Cay-Ding, Part 1

We just got done with a many-evented extravaganza: my birthday, a mini vacation, and my sister Lexi's wedding. YAY!  It was all so much fun!  And the best way I can think of to tell all about it is...just to start at the beginning.  Or maybe I'll mix it all together, like I did with my title. Eh? Eh???

July 27: my birthday

Last year, I only got one picture of my birthday, which kind of sucked.  So this year I took lots and lots of pictures.

In the morning, I took all my boys to get their hair cut.  The boys were getting fluffy, and Pete had major beast neck. Look at Troy being all super important:

 Then we went shopping a little.  We needed a few things, plus I picked up a new dress (yay!) and the movie "Chicken Run", which I have always loved.  We also went looking for a new fridge, because ours is fritzing out again.  I think it's time to let it go. *sigh*  Here are two of my cuties, though, being all posh while shopping.

 Then I got a pedicure with my mom.  I didn't have my camera with me, so I don't have a picture of that.  But we both got orange toenails for my sister's wedding.  They're so cute!

After that, Pete and I went to the temple and did a session.  I hadn't gone since February, so it was really good to go.  So refreshing!

Then we, my kids, my mom, and my sister and her (then) fiance Chris went out for dinner at Sol Rio.  I LOVE their salsa that they bring out with chips-yummy!  And then we got really yummy food.  I ordered the Burrito Supreme, which I kept telling my kids was as big as my arm.  When they brought it out, I got photographic evidence.  SOOOOO good.

 Here's my mom and Troy.  Troy loves grandmas.

 After dinner, just my little family had dessert.  Instead of cake, I made rice krispie treats.  Which, I really do like cake, but we have two more cakes coming to our house really soon, so I opt for an alternative.

 Then I got to open gifts.  On top of my new dress and movie, my parents had taken me out a few days before and got two other dresses, which were much needed.  My kids all drew pictures of me with a cake. I'm a princess on all their pictures, which is very sweet.  And Pete got me a Slap Chop, which chops up your veggies or whatever else really well and easily. I can't wait to use it!

And here I am with my sweet kids.

My birthday was very nice, and very relaxing.  I am so blessed!

Okay.  Onward.

July 28: campfire night

Pete had been wanting to take the kids out and build a campfire somewhere.  We aren't really the outdoorsy type of people: in fact, we have a total of one sleeping bag.  But I think Pete's inner Boy Scout - or maybe it's his inner pyromaniac - wanted to come out and shine.  So, no sleeping in a tent for us this night, but playing with fire was definitely part of our fun.

We went out to some camp sites just past a ski hill called Kelly Canyon that's not too far from home.

Here's Pete with three future Boy Scouts/pyros:

This was my "cooler" for the night.  Because we did hot dogs and smores, and bought drinks on the way up, I didn't really need anything else.

My cute clan with our drinks:

Ivy and Troy.  Notice Ivy's cheeks-absolutely stuffed with hot dog!

Besides eating and playing with the fire, my kids ran around and whacked down big weeds. And then they threw those in the fire.

We also played Hide and Seek. Mostly I helped the younger two hide while someone did the seeking, though everyone took their turn being the seeker. There were trees and grass and huge rocks to hide behind. It was way fun.

And, of course, there was dirt to play in.  Lots and lots of dirt!

We had a blast, and I'm sure we'll do it again sometime.

Okay, friends, this post is getting long already.  So I'm going to have to make this a two-parter.  So stay tuned for the rest of our birthday/vacation/wedding adventures!

What Happens in Vegas...

...stays in Vegas.

That's why I can't tell you anything about our recent trip to Las Vegas.

JUST KIDDING!

We didn't do anything crazy, so I can totally tell you about our awesome trip!  It was just me and Pete, and my mom watched our kids, which was wonderful of her.  We left on a Friday night via plane and flew straight from our home town to Vegas, which took only a little over an hour, which is SO awesome. 

We had a shuttle take us to our hotel, and after we got all checked in and found our room, it was about 11 p.m. Mountain time, and we hadn't had dinner.  The awesome thing about Vegas is that there are restaurants in the hotels.  There was a Baja Fresh on the ground floor of our hotel, so we got it to go and ate it in our room.  I got a chicken burrito thing, with mango salsa and avocados on it, and it was to DIE for!  SOOOO yummy.  Mmmm, just thinking about it makes my mouth water.  It was so huge, like the size of my forearm, but I ate the whole thing in, like, 5 minutes.  YUM.

Here's a pic of Pete by our room's door, room 20166.  The 20 part means the 20th floor, and the 1 means the 1st tower.  Each "tower" was actually two towers, because the even-numbered rooms of tower 1 were in a different segment from the odd-numbered rooms.  So really, there are four towers.  Also, where we caught the elevators had one side that went just floors 2-17, and the other side of elevators was for floors 18-28.

Now, I've been to Vegas before, but it was a really long time ago.  I had forgotten how BIG everything is.  Oh, and they gave us a little (deceitful) map of the Strip, so it looks not very big, but in all actuality, it's so super huge and spread out.

We found that out the hard way the next morning, as we went in search for our breakfast.  We found a Denny's (which there's at least five along the Strip), which was just across the street.  But to get across the street, you have to go through the casino/maze on the ground floor of the hotel, down some steps, up an outside escalator, across a bridge thing, and then back down and over.  We could see it from the other side, but it took us, like 15 minutes to walk there.

While there I had a yummy drink, of orange juice, peach juice, and Sprite all mixed together.  At first it tasted like Gummy Worms.  That's my best Gummy Worm impression that my finger can make.  After I stirred it up a bit, though, it was really good.

So, because we're idiots, we decided to walk from our hotel (Excalibur) (well, actually, from Denny's on up), which is on the southwest side of the Strip, and go pick up our Phantom of the Opera tickets in the Venetian, which is northeast.  Again, the little map was all deceitful and was like, "Look how close it is!  That's not bad!  Just walk the strip!  YAY!"  Stinking map.  By the time we got there, I was a little tired, but it wasn't too bad.  And it had warmed up outside, so it was nice.  However, we decided, after getting our tickets, to walk back, down the other side.

One word: stupid.

Going up the strip on the east side wasn't all that bad.  It was actually a pretty straight shot.  Going down the strip on the west side, however, was entirely different.  On the west side, you still have the escalators and all that, but it's like, jig in, go up, go across, go down, jig out, walk down a little, jig in again....yeah.  Like a big ol' zig zag.  About halfway down my knee started feeling weird.  And I felt all wimpy, because hi, we were just walking, right?  It just felt like it needed to pop or something, but it wouldn't.  So that was fun.

We stopped and got our picture in front of the Bellagio fountain.  Which of course wasn't going off at the time, and I have no idea what its schedule is.  I was under the impression that it goes all the time, but guess not.  It was still pretty, though.  And notice the short sleeves and sunglasses.  Ah, to have warm weather...

We went back to the hotel to rest, and by that time my knee was killing me, as well as my feet.  Good times.  While Pete slept, I watched a couple of awesome TV shows.  One was called "The Stranger", about this guy that started hanging out with a family, and he was all nice and calm, but it turns out he was on America's Most Wanted, and he had killed his wife and set her on fire.  Nice, huh?  The other show was called "A Twist of Fate", where these two girls who totally look alike went to the same college and worked together, and got in an car accident.  One was killed, and the other was in critical condition, but they got the identities mixed up, so the girl in critical condition belonged to the family that thought their daughter had died.  Eventually they figured it out, but weird, right?

We got all dressed up, and after managing to pull ourselves away from the TV (read that last phrase sarcastically, okay?), we had a late lunch at Rainforest Cafe, which Pete pointed out tastes a lot like Chilis.  And because we like Chilis, that was a good thing.  Luckily, Rainforest Cafe was in MGM Grand, so we only had to go through our hotel maze, up and down and around across the street, and then into MGM Grand's

Here's Pete all pimped out.  We didn't pack his dress shoes, though, so he wore his tennis shoes.

After that, though, we caught the monorail thing up to Venetian.  The monorail thing is kind of behind the east side hotels, and starts at MGM Grand.  And the Deceitful Map was all, "Look!  There's a stop at Harrah's, which is totally right next door to Venetian!  No more walking for you!  YAY!"  So we got off at Harrah's, but then we had to go through that hotel's maze, and out to the road, and then there were five million shops between Harrah's and Venetian, and then into the Venetian, and through its casino/maze, until we finally reached the theatre.

Oh, and I was doing all this walking in heels.  So not only did my knee hurt, and my feet hurt, my ankles also hurt.  Good times.

However.  Phantom of the Opera.  PHANTOM OF THE OPERA!!!!  That was the whole reason we wanted to go down to Vegas, because the Venetian has a permanent Phantom stage.  I bought tickets beforehand, and we sat on the VERY front row.  I wanted to get a picture of me in front of the orchestra pit, which was about four feet in front of our seats, but there was a worker there that was a Camera Nazi.  I got down in front of the pit, and she came over and was all, "NO CAMERAS!!!"  I was like, I just want a picture of how close we are.  And she's all, "NO CAMERAS!!!!"  So, I didn't get a shot of us in there.

Since I don't have a picture of how close we were, let me describe how close we were.  We were so close, we could see their mics on their foreheads (it was a little peach bump).  We were so close, we could hear Christine's dress rustle as she walked around.  We were so close, we had to look behind us to see the chandelier fall.  We were so close, that we could feel the heat from the flames that came up on stage.  We were so close, that when the singers turned from singing to the back of the stage to the front again, we could hear their actual voice (instead of just hearing it through the mic).  We were so close, we could hear the conversations of the orchestra members prior to the show starting.  We were so close we could see their eyeliner lines.

Did I mention that we were close?  The tickets were a little pricey, but TOTALLY worth it.

Afterwards, we walked (well, Pete walked, I hobbled) to the Cheesecake Factory.  I had a super yummy salad, and we got cheesecake to go.  We totally grabbed a taxi on the way back to our hotel, which was worth every penny (and really, it wasn't super expensive).  Note to self: next time I go to Vegas, I'm taking a cab everywhere I go, even if Deceitful Map tells me it's not very far.  My cheesecake was so good, but I could only eat about 2/3 of it because it was so rich.  That made me really, really sad.

While we were there, I made Pete gamble a dollar.  That's right-one smackaroo.  He went up 50 cents, then lost it all.  NO!  Not our dollar!

So Sunday morning, we totally got sucked in to going to a time share pitch.  In exchange for our time (a couple of hours) on Sunday morning, we got a free lunch and a free ticket to the Tournament of Kings, which is the dinner show that Excalibur puts on.  We took a shuttle out to "the future of the Strip", which is further south.  And the condos were nice, but SO overpriced it wasn't even funny. 

What was funny, though, was the saleslady.  We were all, sorry, it's too expensive.  And she's like, well, let me check and see what they have going on right now.  And she'd come back with this SUPER AMAZING DEAL that must be a typo and we can't pass it up!  We said no about 4 times, and she got the message after slashing the price to about a third of the original price.  We went downstairs, and went into another room, where we met with a guy, and he was all, "I can offer you this same deal for half the price."  We were like, dude, no, and where is our free stuff?

We finally got back to our hotel via shuttle.  I guess if you signed to buy a condo timeshare, you got to ride back in a limo.  So we started joking with all the other people on the shuttle that it was the Loser Bus because we didn't get timeshares.  But in all actuality, we were the Smart Bus, and I don't mean that as a joke.

Was it worth it?  Hard to say.  Because we got a ton of stuff out of going to the presentation, but we wasted a good three hours there.  Would I ever go to a timeshare presentation again?  Probably not.  But if you're into getting free stuff, and are great at saying "no" about 50 times, then you should totally do it.

We ate our FREE buffet lunch, which was like glorified cafeteria food, then hung out at our hotel room again.  And this time I slept and Pete watched who-knows-what on TV.  Then we went to the Tournament of Kings.

If you don't know what it is, it's a show about King Arthur and the different kings from different countries.  You eat your meal (chicken, potatoes, roll, broccoli) with your hands, and watch as the kings fight each other.  We sat in the France section.  It's so fun.  You get to yell and cheer for your guy, and boo at the bad guy.  They joust and sword fight in the arena right in front of you.  I had gone to this before when I was in high school, but Pete had never been.  I couldn't believe how well-trained the horses are.  And the guys are SO good at their stunts!  So, so fun and entertaining.  I'm sure my boys would have loved to see it.

Afterwards, we decided to walk again (you'd think we had learned our lesson, but NO), mostly to find souvenirs for the kids.  But it really wasn't very far this time, and I wasn't in heels, and my knee was feeling better.  We went to the Coke store.  I had my camera out, and a lady in there was all "I'll take your picture with the Coke bear!"  But I thought she was yelling at me like the Camera Nazi had the night before.  So I was all, "I'm putting it away right now-sorry!"  But then I heard her the right way.  The bear kept taking Pete's hat off.  I loved the Coke store.  But I love Coke, so, you know.

After that, we had to go back to our hotel room to sleep.  We're boring and old that way.  We had to get up to catch our shuttle and flight the next morning anyway.

Here we are in front of our hotel.

And...that's it.  It was a fun, albeit short, trip.  But it was nice to get away, just me and Pete.  I don't know when I'll be heading back to Vegas, but when I do, I'm getting taxis everywhere I go.  And I'd see Phantom again.  And eat my yummy cheesecake before my yummy salad.  And not listen to Deceitful Map.

White and Nerdy

I don't know if this falls under "geek, dweeb, or spaz", or all of the above, but I have a confession to make...

I LOVE these:

They're called logic puzzles.  They give you clues, and then you have to figure out what belongs to whom by process of elimination.

I seriously, seriously love them.  I could probably do them all day long.  I have a little book that I take to my kids' gym class (more on that later).

Here's another type.  Very much the same, but it works with the picture at the bottom of the page rather than the grid:

Also?  There's an online site that has these, but they get predictable.  They're also a tad bit easier than the book I have.

Another, very closely related nerdy thing that I love is called logic art.  It's kind of like the logic puzzles, but when you're done, you end up with a picture, again using process of elimination.  I first was introduced to logic art when I took a nerdy extra math class in high school called discreet math.  (And, I actually really enjoyed that class.)  Anyway, I couldn't figure out a great way to explain it, so I scanned in the directions:

And here are two puzzles, for your enjoyment...um, or repulsion, to look at.  Because let's face it- this isn't everyone's cup of tea.

Here's an online site of logic art, called Griddlers.  I could spend all day doing these, as well.

And now you know!  (Um, like you didn't know before that I was a nerd.  Come on.)

P.S.-There's a nerd site I've recently found, called GraphJam.  Embrace the nerd within!

Memory Monday: Engaged

This post is a shout-out to my cute sister, Lex, who just got engaged on her birthday two days ago!  YAHOO!!

Lex and Chris

After years of drama, of him liking me, of me not being ready, of us flirting and trying to leave each other alone but not able to, of us being best friends and then even enemies, Pete and I finally got our act together and started dating.  Sure, it was long distance, but dating nonetheless.

We started dating in October of 2001, and really weren't sure where it was going, or how fast.  We would chat online till all hours of the night, every night.  After one trip down to visit Pete in January, I felt all squirmy inside-just... really uneasy.  Until that point, I kept holding Pete at arm's length, not ready for the next step.  I liked where we were at, and I wasn't quite ready to move forward.  But we were at the "fish or cut bait" point-we either needed to commit all the way to our relationship (marriage), or say goodbye and part ways.

I thought, and prayed, and realized, I don't ever want Pete out of my life.  I felt the most like myself when I was around him.  He took care of me, and I took care of him.  I could talk to him for hours.  When I was with him, I felt like I was home.  You know?

So, the next time Pete and I were talking on the phone, I basically told him that I needed to get proposed to.  I think it took him a bit by surprise, especially since a couple of weeks before that I was telling him how I wanted to take a road trip and live back east all summer.  But he had been ready for the marriage step of our relationship for a long time.

Anyway, we started looking at rings.  It took about two seconds to find the one for me, but Pete was a little more picky.  Pete came up one weekend to talk to my dad.  It ended up kind of being a group talk (my dad, my mom, Pete, and me).  Pretty much my dad asked how Pete was going to take care of me (what his major was in school, what the plans are, etc.). 

The next week was Valentine's.  Pete sent me a dozen long-stemmed red roses.  They were SO pretty!  I love getting flowers.  Two days after that I went down to visit Pete.  He was going to school at USU (I had graduated the year before).  On Saturday, February 16, we had plans to go down to his parents' house.  I hadn't had anything to eat that day.  After Pete was done with work, we headed down.  I told him to stop and get something to eat on the way out, and he insisted we stop at a gas station about an hour down the road.  I was so hungry, but all they really had were some nasty hot dogs, with even nastier buns.  Seriously, the bun tasted like sawdust.  Blech.  Pete kept saying, "Oh, we'll eat with my family when we get there."

When we got to his parents' house, they had already eaten and cleaned up.  I was like, "Pete, let's go get something!"  And he's all, "No, no, we'll get something pretty soon."  I was STARVING at this point.  He went upstairs, came back down, and blindfolded me.  He put me in the car, drove around for about 10 minutes (like I knew where he was going in the town that I had been to all of twice before-he could have driven straight to our destination and I wouldn't have known where we were), and then we got out and walked into his brother's house.  He had a candlelight dinner all set up, and his brother Jim was our waiter.  His other brother (Pete has 5 brothers, and 2 sisters) Jeff had made a menu for us.  We ordered the chicken (I think his mom cooked), and the meal was topped with sparkling apple juice.  Jim had also made a romantic songs CD that played while we ate.  It was awesome.

At the end of dinner, Jim brought out two little boxes-one for each of us-that contained an after dinner chocolate.  I suspected the ring was in there.  Sure enough, when I opened my little chocolate box, there was my engagement ring!  I went "Awww, awww," a few times.  Pete and I stood up, and he asked me to marry him.  I said, "Of course!" 

And the rest, as they say, is history.

Thirty-One-Derful Day

As if we needed ANOTHER thing of ours to break, my camera decided to stop taking pictures yesterday! And...it was my birthday. YAY for perfect (comedic?) timing! Oh, it still takes pictures, but they look like this:


And...because I was fiddling around, thinking/hoping it was just some button that got pushed, I accidentally erased all the pictures that were on my card at that time, including one of my dear friend Steph and me together. (I see her once every year or two. Grrr.)

My camera came back to life for a brief moment, and Pete caught this gem of a picture.


So, that's my one record of my 31st. YAY! But, I still wanted to blog about my beautiful day, so we're going to do a little Paint recreating. Hold on, it's about to get ugly.

So, here's me and Pete at the Playmill Theater Friday night. We're saw "The Foreigner", which was hilarious! I had seen it once in high school, but didn't remember much about it. I LOVE the Playmill-they always do an amazing job.

(Yes, he looks a little pale and a little hairy. Just trying to keep it real, yo.)

And here I am yesterday at lunch with my kids and Pete, at Chili's. YUM! I'm sitting next to Jake, and we had just taken a way super cute picture right before the camera died, that-yep-got erased.

(That would be a burger and fries, and a blackberry lemonade.)

After Chili's we went to the temple visitor's center, and watched the movie about Joseph Smith. It was really good.

And here's a picture of me opening gifts. Jake made some airplanes for me, my parents got me a willow tree for my backyard, Kar got me some couponing supplies, Arin gave me some super yummy fudge, and Pete gave me the first part of Glee on DVD and an external hard drive for my digital scrapbooking stuff.

Oh, and I'll be getting a new camera for my birthday as well.

I decided to have cookies instead of a cake for my birthday. We stuck a couple of candles in the cookies. Betcha can't guess what I wished for!

I liked turning 30, but 31? Not sure how I feel about it yet. Although I can say "thirty-one-derful", which reminds me of one of my favorite movies, "That Thing You Do!" At first they try to spell their band name, the Wonders, like Oneders, and everyone calls them the "Oh-Need-ers". Liv Tyler is all, "Look! The Oneders!" and Steve Zahn is all, "It looks like the Oh-Need-ers", and Liv holds up her finger, and says, "No, ONE. The ONE-ders." And Steve says, "Got it. It looks like the Oh-Need-ers."



So anyway, that about sums up my birthday. It was really great, in spite of the camera gods shunning me. (Go here for kicks and giggles.)