Gone Again For The Weekend

I'll be going to the funeral this weekend, leaving tomorrow morning. Just wanted to let you know that I won't likely be able to post again for a couple of days.

This week's been crazy, so much to do and so little energy. I left DH with his family when I came home the other day and I'll be happy to be back with him. He's got this serenity around him that gets me through at times. I need it.

Have a nice [cooler] weekend. It's boiling here.

Life is Tenuous

For the first time, I hesitate in using my blog to share information because this isn't necessarily my news to share, and so I will be careful in what I say so as to protect those who have been most affected.

My family experienced a most unexpected and senseless death yesterday morning. Not in my immediate family but still very, very close. This individual was so alive, and had his roots so deeply entrenched in life that it shook our whole family to the core that he could pass so easily.

My heart is wrenched for those closest to him. We're all in shock and will be for a long time probably. My consolation is the Savior's Plan of Salvation and knowledge of each of our roles within that.

Something I Forgot

I'm allergic to cats when I'm pregnant. Neat, huh?

As Promised

It's been hard to get Mickey to settle down long enough to snap a pic so that's why it's taken so long to get one of him. But SP (that's Supreme Princess to you!) finally got him on her lap for long enough to get a good shot of them both. Sorry for her hair - we have a hard time getting started in the morning (lol, it's noon!)

Baby's First Toy

It's not too early is it? Just the first of many.

Pioneer Day Fireworks

Whenever we go to the fireworks, there's always one or two people there selling those glow toys (bracelets, necklaces, swords, etc) to kids. It's fun to watch the cool glow-in-the-dark toys flash through the dark as you look out over the stretches of grass where families are sitting waiting for the fireworks to start.

Last year, Kim and I decided that this year it might be fun to sell those things too since it seems like every kid has one and as a parent, it's hard to resist buying a little toy for your kid when it obviously brings them so much pleasure (and it with it an element of peace for yourself, lol).

We bought a bunch of random glow toys and jewelry and treked out across the grass waving our swords, wearing as much glow jewelry as we could possibly get on. We glowed like the North Star. It was so funny!

Some of our toys were duds and didn't sell at all but we sold a crap load of those little bracelets for $1 a piece! We bought those suckers 6/$1! But we did sell most of the toys we had brought, and even a bunch we weren't even planning to sell. But, because of the duds we didn't make the expected profit.

We met a guy who told us that last year he was selling glow toys too and the police arrested him, took him downtown and fingerprinted him. I'm not sure I believe him because although it might have been more legal to have a business license or permit to sell, the police didn't even look twice at us and we walked by them like 40,000 times. I'm pretty sure we were just too small-time for them to bother with.

Can We Go To The Fun Side Now?

No News...Good News?

Ellen drank castor oil yesterday afternoon and called me around 6pm and said she was on her way to the hospital to have her baby.

It's now 11pm and I still haven't heard what's going on. I can only assume she had the baby seeing as it's been over 24 hours but maybe they're exhausted. I hope it's all good and nothing bad but I hope my mom would have called by now if there were problems. She's up there helping out with Ellen's kids while mom/dad are at the hospital.

Incidentally, an old friend from high school, Todd and his wife just had their 3rd baby boy today also. Congratulations to Todd and Jen!

Cool Cats

Well, not really cool cats, but we're cool...and we have a cat! DH is such a marshmallow!

I got home from work today to a wonderfully cool house - the air conditioner was installed while I was gone. What a glorious feeling. I no longer have to deal with the front door slamming shut each time I open it due to air pressure, doors warping so much they don't even close, humid summers when the swamp cooler doesn't work - and last but not least, the noise! It's blissfully quiet and cool (even a little cold!) and I'm loving it! I realized this morning as I was getting ready for work that the warm air makes me nauseous (what doesn't, right?)

And so then I got home and the fam went by the pet store to look at automatic fish feeders (thanks Kelly, for not letting the little guys starve!) and SP fell in love with the kittens. It doesn't take much for her to talk DH into things but I thought he'd hold out for longer than that considering how much he hates cats!

I'll post a pic of the cute little bugger when he comes out of hiding. He's under the couch right now assessing the situation. At least he's not hot!

Bear World

Bear World was NOT a disappointment! It was a really fun place for SP (her mom & dad loved it too).

We took the tour in their truck where you stand on top and they drive through all of the bears and when they stop, you get to throw stale dough-nuts, muffins and bread to them. All the bears stand on their hind legs up against the side of the truck trying to get the food and you are actually really close to them! It's so cool!There are amusement rides for little kids and a petting zoo which was cute. But the best thing was for $53 a pop, you can help feed the bear cubs with a bottle. We let SP do it and it was awesome. Those bear cubs are pretty huge to her, so she was very brave I thought! We weren't allowed to go in with her so we were surprised she even did it at all.Somehow we suckered the Red Lion into giving us the most awesome room on the top floor next to the Presidential Suite. We have this view - it's so beautiful! I love the view of Idaho Fall's beautiful temple from my bed. I can even see the falls from my bed! Have you seen the falls here on the Snake River? Not quite as spectacular as those in Twin Falls, but still pretty incredible!

Outta Here

We're leaving in the morning for a few days. A quickie road trip up north to see some bears up close in Yellowstone. DH found a place where you can even feed bear cubs with a bottle in Rexburg. We have a few days and so, why not?

We will be back on Monday in time for the guy to come install our air conditioner! Yeah!

But for today's happenings, SP ate something that gave her food poisoning (I think the culprit was granola - weird huh?) and she's been puking all day long. She can't even keep down Pepto or anything so she's just having to deal with it herself. She's finally asleep now but I hope she doesn't wake up puking again. I just don't think I have anymore spare sheets!

See you Monday!

I love good hair days. They just make it all seem better.

It's 5:30 AM, And All Is Well

How I longed for these early, spontaneous risings 6 months ago when I was wanting to go running at 5 am.

I've been awake for an hour and a half. I finally decided to give in and just get up. I thought the swamp cooler clicking was an isolated middle of the night sound, but no - tonight (which was the night I just woke up from - stay with me here), the alarm started making low battery beeps at 4am. I was actually nodding off again though when it started beeping. That resolved, I went back to bed.

I did the only thing one can do when lying there restless, and I said my prayers for an hour. That was nice. As I finally started to fall back asleep, the freakin' phone rang! What the H! Nothing breaks the silence like the phone - dang wrong number, blasted long distance freazazoid.

When it was clear I was destined to be awake, I decided to blog. Hope you're all still asleep.

Swamp Coolers Blow

literately and figuratively.

I woke last night around 4am which is becoming a habit. As I lay contemplating the myriad of things that I had to do today that I'd never get around to (and ha, I didn't even touch 3/4 of them) I was suddenly made aware of this annoying and continuous clicking in the otherwise still house.

I tried to ignore it but as I started to fall back asleep, the clicking intertwined itself into my dreams and made for very strange insect embedded visions.

So I got up and wandered around until I sourced the noise which of course is our ancient swamp cooler. I hate that thing.

We'd already scheduled to have central air installed next week but if this swamp cooler goes out before the air conditioner goes in, I'm going on revolt and moving into a hotel.

Do you realize that I haven't lived in a house with an air conditioner since I was in high school? What is with Utah and older homes?

Stuff I Don't Like to Think About

like the manner in which I lost an incredible job when I was 22 because I was losing my mind during my divorce...

or embarrassing moments that haunt me forever...

But today it's got to do with pregnancy. And why not? That's my life right now. I feel like I'm sinking again into this oblivion that is so familiar to me. No, not depression this time...yet. Although it's close.

When I got pregnant last time, I had so many people that were so excited for me. Friends, neighbors etc (I lived in that bungalow from yesterday's post) couldn't wait to be part of my "new life" being a mom. But as a person without kids, my life was pretty different from what it became as a mother (of SP, that is).

First of all, my life turned upside down. I mean literally. I can only explain it in terms I can understand but probably lots of 1st time moms get it. I felt like a different person. My social life was not the same again for a really long time. And in that time, I would get mad at people for calling because it would wake my fussy baby. I also wouldn't go outside because she'd cry and it made me so anxious so all my neighbor friends wondered what had happened to me and didn't get what was happening. I was anxious and depressed beyond any reasonable explanation.

I lost several friends during this time because I changed so much.

And I wasn't necessarily worried about having another child and how I would function until this pregnancy threw me so much for a loop! I can't get my crap together! I run out of milk. I sleep all of the time. My laundry's never done. My pool is out of water. I don't exercise, at all! I don't care if I don't say my prayers. My flowers are dying. I can't make dinner. I'm apathetic about everything! I'm losing my resolve to stay interested in anything and yet my tasks spread out before me and I am panicking. DH would say to stop worrying but he never takes me too seriously.

All I can hope is that it will get better. But if things go the way they're going, just like they did last time I worry about the next year. I know it's worth it but I lose so my of my identity, and then friends, that that depression that always lurks beneath the surface seems too awfully close for comfort. I'm sort of freaking out in my apathetic way.

Sorry guys. This is one of those posts I was warning you about. I just can't seem to be "up" - I struggle with that sometimes even when I'm not preggo. I wanted to put this out there for my friends who undoubtedly understand but I worry about it anyway. I'm still here somewhere but it may be a long time before you see the real me again. It makes me sad.

My Recurring Dream

We moved to this house 3 years ago from a really cute, little bungalow in a sort of trendy-ish part of Salt Lake. It was so perfect for 2 people because it was small. And the moment I saw it, I knew I had to have it! It was exactly what I was looking for.

The master suite was awesome. The attic had been renovated and spanned the whole upstairs with huge windows on either end and a little bathroom in a corner.

Lots of charm to this little place and seriously, it sold in 1 day without having to even put a sign up. Word of mouth strictly!

But we originally thought the girl who bought it was super cool and she turned into a super witch, and made our move really difficult. Whatever!

But I guess I'm not over it because I keep having these dreams about the house and her. Of course for a long time I still had a key to the house because who doesn't have multiple keys to their house? We were so mad at her and got petty and wouldn't give her all the keys. Ha!

So now I dream about going to the house while she's not there and going in and hanging out! I dreamed last night that me and my sister and a bunch of our kids, and some we were babysitting, went there to eat and as a "meet back here" place while we went out and shopped. We were even using her car!

And the whole time I knew she was going to find out this time and she did...she came home! But she wouldn't come in. She just stood outside with some friends and talked about us until we were sneaking around to get out and then we sped off! Can you believe how mortifying that would be if it really happened?

What's the Proper Etiquette?

You may remember I went to a lot of effort to create a cozy spare bedroom for my guests where they could feel welcome and comfortable.

My take on this room is that it is ALWAYS clean and ready for someone to come stay there. The sheets are ALWAYS clean and I change them each and every single time someone stays. I don't ever want anyone wondering if they are sleeping on someone else's sheets. This is something that's important to me when I stay at someone else's house but maybe I'm just weird.

Is this normal? Do you change your guest room sheets like that or am I cuckoo? I'm just getting the feeling that maybe other people don't care as much as I do?? I don't know.

Enlighten me!

Buncha Birthday Parties

We went to two different birthday parties today. The first one started at 2pm and the next one started immediately after about 4 miles away. We just barely got home and it's 10pm.

Both of the parties were for kids that belong to the our Friday "play group". One of the kids was turning 4, and the other one turned 1.

But, despite what it sounds like, it was a great day because all of our friends were at both parties which meant we got to spend the day with some of our favorite people just hanging out, bbq'ing, and letting kids do kid stuff.

Someone made a train out of a bunch of old barrels, and an old riding lawn mower and the kids got rides up and down the street! Somebody decided it would be funny for all the moms to get their picture in the train too.

Finally, all the moms went down to the local "Oasis" snowcone station and bought snowcones for everyone. Have you had one of these delights? Oh. My. Gosh. My girlfriend Korina has been literally going OFF about these things for a long time and now I know why. Guys, they are not typical snowcones - they are absolutely fantabulous! I'm pretty sure the only one in the whole state is on the corner of 7200 South and Fort Union Blvd. in the Dan's grocery store parking lot (north side). If you're local and happen to be in that area, really - it is worth your while to get this:

Tiger's Blood & cream (yeah, real cream)

You won't be sorry.

Rummaging

After 2 hours of rummaging at yard sales (a favorite past time), SP and I found only a handful of items we just could NOT live without.

They are:

3 kitty beannie babies
1 lamb beannie baby
1 string of large pop beads (for the baby)

I think this was partly because we didn't leave the house until 10am. Everyone knows that proper rummaging begins at 6:30am on Saturday mornings.

O-well. SP had a blast...obviously.

At Least THAT's Done!

Life has a way of making sure that whatever it is you're avoiding, smacks you in the forehead when you're not expecting it.

Turns out SP left the freezer open a few nights ago when she went to get a popsicle. I have slacked in my duties of teaching her the proper way to shut a door!

DH very empathetically reminded me, when I called him to insist we buy a new frostless freezer (DENIED!) that I had "defrost freezer" on my TO-DO list since, um let me see, oh - November! and if I had DONE it, this wouldn't have been the nightmare it turned out to be. See what I mean? Life - just giving me that little extra umph I need.

Had I not made a pit stop at home to drop off some chicken nuggets in the freezer before I did some more shopping for things I don't need important errands, I'd not have noticed the debacle. I also was planning to spend my afternoon pool-side, baking in the sun. Turns out, Carly (saved the day) came and took SP to the pool instead leaving me wallowing in my misery, but at least not tripping over her too.

Have you defrosted a freezer when it's 428 degrees outside? I suppose that it's better than doing it when it's 428 BELOW but still, I'd rather be oh well, nearly anywhere.

The good news is I found many lots and forgotten foodstuffs locked away under ice back in the depths. Yeah, too bad they got chucked due to freezer burn. I took inventory of what's left and am now prepared to go buy more food to put in there and forget about. Costco anyone?

Oh Crap!

My deep-freeze has been thawing for about a week now un-checked in the hot garage and I just found out! Guess what I'll be doing this afternoon!

Tacos - the right way

So my girlfriend, Carly and I were discussing tacos yesterday (well, I was craving them). Her daughter was practically gushing about Carly's tacos, and I said, "no, my little friend - you haven't had good tacos until you've had mine!" I bragged realizing as I spoke that these folks have actually had my cooking and are probably thinking, "yikes!"

Anyhoo, I wanted to know what the "perfect" tacos were so we started comparing notes. Honestly, anyone who has ever had my tacos (as in my family's tacos that were passed down through the mommy's), always comes back for seconds. Always.

So Carly said that she fries her ground beef and then adds a bit of enchilada sauce to it. Hmmm. I add a smidgeon of taco seasoning but that's only because it's the way DH likes it and really it's an amendment made only in the last ten years.

Then, she said she fries her corn tortillas in oil. A-haa!!! Now we're on the same wave-length! That's exactly what I do! And if you don't do that - you're eating those crunchy pre-made wastes of tortilla. Yuck! Sure, it's less healthy but I'm not talking about health - I'm talking about taste!

I'm sure all the rest of it was the same - lettuce, tomatoes, onions, blah blah. Fry your tortillas. You will not regret it!

But don't take MY word for it since you know how I am with cooking! Carly's a GREAT cook!

I Can't Wait for Peaches

I caught a little clip on TV about pruning your fruit trees to make the most of harvesting. This was new to me and really interesting!

I have 3 peach trees and a huge apricot tree on my property and so I usually get a pretty good harvest of fruit, if I take advantage of it.

I followed the instructions of the pruning today, and thought I'd share it with you since now's the time to do it. This goes for apples, peaches, pears and apricots too although my apricot tree is too big to prune entirely.

Look at the fruit and see how most varieties grow in clumps of several fruits together - like at least 2 or 3, but sometimes as many as 5 or 6 fruits? To make one nice, fat peach, or whatever, you need to get rid of all of the other ones. That's right - all of them. Or else, you'll have a bunch of puny little fruits instead of nice, fat ones. This is how the experts do it!

So I did it. The top pic is what I'm talking about. See how there's a couple clumps of 2, and then a few solitary ones not far away? I got rid of the solitary ones, and then left only the biggest fruit in each clump. I did this all over all 3 peach trees. Any fruits that are more than 3"-4" together should be cleared away leaving only the largest and/or healthiest.

You'd think by all the peaches I "destroyed" that I got rid of most of my harvest. But actually, there were literally tons still up there, and I'm sure that what is there now has the energy to create great fruit instead of masses of tiny ones. This is the same theory with roses or other flower varieties.Check out how many I actually pulled off though! I think this will be my best peach year yet!

Say Good-bye to the Amy We Know & Love

...at least for a while. It's come to my attention that my intolerance is breaking the surface, rearing it's head so to speak.

I know it happened last time I was pregnant and my family just sort bore with me ignored me. It's probably the best way.

So, to all my friends and family who are, and will be, experiencing my raw emotions, forgive me. My former personality will be back in a few months. I'm doing my best to remain cheery and pleasant but some days it's all I can not to rip my hair out and chew off my arm (not to mention contain my melodrama).

Ok! So, moving on!

The Weekend

I know I never mentioned I was leaving for the weekend. I found myself describing myself recently as "disoriented" lately and that's the truth. I just can't seem to stay focused for very long and even my typical and favorite activities are displaced. So, sorry.

We went, of course, to the wastelands of the in-laws. The 1-horse town where DH grew up. It served to be very typical of most other trips there. I amuse myself by bringing books, my computer, and contemplating suicide.

It's nearly a 2 hour trip to their house and we stayed 2 nights. DH packed up our bags this morning as I finished my breakfast. He brought my bag full of necessities (that would be my computer bag) and set it by the back door. All the OTHER bags, he put in the car. Of course I didn't see it there. I assumed he'd packed the car. I didn't realize it wasn't among our possessions...until we were home. This wasn't his fault. I should have been more concerned about my most important worldly possession.

In the bag was my laptop, my clipboard with ALL of my paperwork for work (completed and needing to be submitted Monday am), the 3 current books I'm reading, and a few other odds & ends. When DH told me he hadn't put it in the car, I seriously thought he was joking - this is exactly something he'd joke about. I literally went to the car to make sure he wasn't. He wasn't.

Perfect.

The Other Boleyn Girl

I watched this last night and LOVED...loved it!

I have always loved movies from this time period where the dress and speech are equally fancy.

Natalie Portman is absolutely incredibly beautiful. She was sort of a seductress in this movie; a role I've never seen her play but she was amazing. Scarlett Johansen played a fantastic nice-girl.

The worst part about the movie was that I watched it with my 14 year old niece who had lots of questions. Come on, the movie is about adultery, sex, and um, more sex. I had lots of explaining do such as terms like "consummate a marriage", and why the King needed to be"diverted" and what the heck "diverting" means in that context, and why the parents were encouraging Mary to cheat on her husband with the King. Interestingly, she didn't know that this was a true story. Wow! I thought everyone knew this story! I even know what happens to these people's kids but then I'm not 14.

I'm not sure my sister would want her daughter delving into these complicated moral issues at such an early age (not to mention me explaining them to her). I'm pretty protective and I know I wouldn't want SP wanting it at 14. But it was rated PG-13, how was I to know?

Lots of Changes

My house has 3 bedrooms upstairs and 3 down. The upstairs bedrooms are occupied by the Master, SP and my "office" (discussed here).

The downstairs bedrooms are the recently redecorated spare, my workout room, and the other "spare", massage room, gift-wrapping room and catch-all crap room for anything we want behind closed doors. It's a disaster in there right now and so, the door is closed to all inquirers.

I've known since we moved to this house that should another baby come along, I'd have to give up my lovely space upstairs, which is also conveniently located right down the hall from the kitchen and across the hall from my bedroom. It really couldn't be a better location for accessibility, and usability (for an office as well as for a nursery).

But I'm losing it - willingly, no lie. But I have to give it up for Baby #2. I am being relocated down to the catch-all room which will have to be completely cleaned out. The bed's gotta go and so has much of what's in there.

What I hate is that my current "office" has a built-in desk, drawers and shelves above. The new room has no built-in desk, no built-in shelves and no built-in drawers. It's going to be an organizing nightmare, at a time when that kind of thing just makes me want to take a nap.

The good thing in all of this is that I really think I'm going to say good-bye to all of my scrapbooking stuff. I've fallen in love with digital so much that there's just no use for these hundreds of dollars of supplies that I'm sure will bring in a chunk of change on e-bay or Craig's List. That, in and of itself, will be a load of work but will free up tons of space.