Preparing for Babies

When it comes to preparing for babies there are a lot of things that need to be done. I had a list of the "must get done" and "would really like to get done". I know there are still things on the "would like to get done" list but I am happy the my main ones are finished. In addition to some cleaning and extra freezer meals some things I wanted to do were to finish the baby quilts and also make some wall hangings for the nursery.

Baby quilts: I went with giraffes and hippos for our nursery theme. The hippo one my mother helped me make before she left on her mission, that was before I even knew if I would have any babies. The other I made to match since I need two!

Shelves and gifts: I got some really cute gifts and wanted to get the shelves hung for the bears and shoes. Also LOVE LOVE LOVE my giraffes that a dear friend made for me. She is so talented!

Here are the wall hangings in a row above the cribs with their quilts.

Close ups of the two sides, baby boy top and baby girl bottom. The ones with just the dragon fly and butterfly will contain their initials once we decide what their names will be.

The center one combining the two. :)

Now that I got everything completed and hung we have moved one of the cribs out and into our bedroom where they will be together for a little while. So funny I had to get this done so I could move things around and not use the room right now. OK, not entirely true, the changing table and clothes are still in their room. :)

And for those of you wondering how I look at 36 weeks with two babies in me, here is a random picture of me. I did not really plan to take it so ignore the messy hair and such.

A Christmas Project

I love Christmas! Christmas has now past and we are a few weeks into the new year, but I it was my goal to share some of the reasons why I love Christmas so much. I decided to share some links on my Facebook to videos that referenced Christ and remind us of the true meaning of Christmas.

I also enjoy the other parts of Christmas, like lights, trees, social gatherings and all the things that go with the spirit of Christmas. Last spring my sister and I started a quilting project. We decided to do Christmas as that is what was on clearance. Although I started it in the spring, as the months passed I realized it was slowly getting finished and I really had to set a firm goal for myself to finish it by Christmas and I did!

Here is the quilt I finished on Christmas Adam (you know the day before Christmas Eve.

The back says Merry Christmas in many different languages. I am really pleased I finished it and how it turned out!

Random

WARNING: This post is does not contain punctuation suited for those who are particular on proper punctuation practice.


Random story...the other day I was out for a walk when a woman, with some kind of realtor sign on the side of her car, stopped and rolled down her window. Of course I expected someone asking for directions or something of the kind, but this is kind of how the conversation went...

lady: it is so crazy, these posters of the lost cat (I had noticed the posted signs but didn't really pay much attention to them) and can you believe it?!, the cat's name is boots. My daughter had a cat that looked just like that, named boots, she lost him several weeks ago. Wouldn't it be amazing if it was the same cat and now they have lost it.

me: hmm

lady: (more rambling about cat and similarities of her daughters missing cat) Or maybe if the cat is returned it will turn out not to be their cat and the vet can track it back to my daughter... they have her number

me: yeah

lady: (more cat talk, followed by): isn't it a beautiful day, you are doing the right thing

She then drove away.

THE BIG REVEAL

I never thought I would do this. Ever since people started taking advantage of the fact that we could identify the gender of a baby months before birth I have said I wasn’t going to be one of those people.

I don’t care if people do it. I understand the convenience of knowing and preparing ahead of time, I mean who wants to pick room decor or make baby blankets or blessing outfits without knowing if you are preparing for a boy or a girl. I understand some people can bond better when baby has a little more identity, and I get the ease of figuring out a name when you have half as many of the millions of options of names to choose from.

On the other hand I love surprises. I know it is still a surprise even if you find out early, but I know myself and I like the suspense of waiting. I never understood people who shook their Christmas presents to try to figure out what they were before Christmas day. I wanted a total surprise on the day of.

That having been said, sometimes the things we say we will never do are the things we find ourselves doing and I found that despite all my years of saying I wouldn’t, I have done it. So for all of those who are curious what we are having, here goes…

Some of Our New Neighbors

Marriage has brought many changes including move to a new house. It has been fun to start our life together in our place and whe have had some fun meeting our new neighbors. Here are the pictures of some that I didn’t feel like I had to get permission from to post.

Georgina, we first met her hanging out by our pine tree, she wouldn't leave when hollered at and ran quite slowly and was kind of fat when she finally did move on.

The reason Georgina was so fat, one of her babies, hiding out under our porch when scared by the lawn mower.

Gracie's two babies. Hard to see but they were always in our yard, I don't know how I didn't get better pictures since they were here so much.

Of course Tom the Turkey. He was actually at the local Y where I would go all the time. I don't know why wild turkeys in our neighborhood still amazes me.

Parker the turtle, coming to visit at our back basement door. I thought it was Lucy, until I got close and realized there was no way this could be a Lucy.

Other neighbors not pictured are Edward the Fox, Bartholomew the Squirrel (likes to run on our roof), and Penelope and her baby (I am almost convinced Penelope is one of Gracie's babies from last year). I feel like I am forgetting some but there you are our neighbors right here in the suburbs.

Bitter Sweet: Closing a Chapter

I should have written this post over a year ago. The memories and emotions would have been a little more expressed when fresh. I have gone through two new starts to school without going back to work and even well over a year later, I still feel it.
So when I started writing about various distractions and fun things I was waiting for last year, a lot of it was tied to teaching. As I had mentioned in my post about the post “Looking Forward to the Next”  I discussed my gratitude for a good job yet the struggle I had with it. Again I am very grateful for that time in my life where the Lord blessed me with what I needed. These things supported me and built me up to become a better person and more prepared for my future as a better servant of the Lord, daughter of God, future mother, self sufficient person…The list goes on and on when it comes to the things that job gave me.

I know I have never been afraid to tell people that I did not care for my job. I couldn’t stand the apathy oosing from those kids and often parents and on occasion co-workers, but not so much the co-workers. Overall teachers love what they do and are usually pretty good at it and they get a bad rap far more often than they should.  Sorry for that side note. That is the beauty of writing a blog, I can ramble all I want and probably not even do it grammatically correctly. ;)

So, back to what I was saying. I had a very hard time with teenagers not wanting to do anything they simply didn’t feel like doing. I could go into all the beliefs I have about why I think this is and how society and broken homes feed into this entitlement and "I don’t feel like it so I won’t do it" attitude, but this post isn’t about that either. I was frustrated with this part of teaching and sometimes the politics, although I usually just ignored this aspect of the job and stayed out of it.

But at the end of the day I really like teenagers. I could sit and chat with them all day. I like hearing about their lives and understanding what they are going through I like to help them see the world can be hard but there are things to  look forward to. Although, I had a hard time teaching some of these principles without saying “hey, you have great potential, you are a child of God!” And I think that is one of the things that added to my dislike of the job.

So when I became engaged we were both on board to start a family soon and teaching, while maybe I could have done it for another year, was one of the things I gladly let go of to become a homemaker and prepare more to be a mother. I really was tired of the aspects of teaching and was ready to be done.

I counted down the days and I looked forward to so many distractions so I could get myself from one point to the next. But then the day came when it was time to leave. It was one of the most happy and sad moments I have ever experienced. I didn’t tell most of my students until the last day. I got a lot of disappointed reactions and I knew that I would be relieved and sorrowful to not be returning.

The last days of the school are spent doing finals and once your grades and keys and everything were turned in you could leave and summer vacation began. I had the fortune of having my last class be my planning time so when it was time for the last finally I simply had a couple more tests to grade and turn in. I remember going and turning in everything, saying a few goodbyes to some teachers and secretaries and sneaking off campus before the last finals were completed. 

As joyful as the moment was I cried. It was a hard eleven years of my life but all very cherished and quite frankly the kids that made it so hard were also the sweetest part of it all and I while I don’t miss my job I miss them and thus it has been a bitter sweet chapter for which I am truly grateful!

THE BIG DISTRACTION

So I suspect I am way overdue for a post and especially this one. Of course there were many things I was looking forward to while finishing out my teaching year but the biggest one was Spring Break! Ok, lets be honest, it wasn’t just spring break, it was what was happening over spring break, OUR WEDDING!

I think rather than tell you all the details I will just include some pictures of the wedding day and maybe a few of our Hawaii trip. Note a new temple added to my list. :)

 I realize not the greatest pictures of us, but look at the views behind!