We think we're funny

This year, Carmen was actually old enough to appreciate stories about Santa.  I'm not exactly sure how I feel about the whole thing.  When I was 5 or 6 years old, my sister came bounding down the hall and informed me the Santa wasn't real.  Somehow, even though she was 2 years younger than me, she figured out about Santa and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy long before I did.  I guess I just never thought to question it.  I bet she asked where babies came from first, too.

Anyway!!!  Our family went up to Salt Lake this past Christmas to stay at Grandma June's house (Dad's mom).  She was actually spending Christmas in Maryland with Uncle Bart, so it was kind of funny staying at Grandma's house with her not there to spend time with the OTHER side of the family. :)

We didn't find out the gender of our baby until a few days before Christmas, so Grandma June gave her usual gift of gender-neutral baby blankets.  She also bought this gorgeous crocheted heart blanket (maybe I'll get a picture of it some day, but right now I'm lazy.)  The most precious part of this gift, though, was the note she left behind:



(Carmen had fun coloring on it before I could take it home and scan it.)
"No need to rush ..." .... It's just so Grandma!!!


We decided to start some Christmas traditions ...

When I was little, sometimes we'd leave notes to Santa or give him cookies and milk.  One year we gave him carrots and celery because he might think he's getting too fat.  This year, none of us wanted to eat any cookies so we only left him a letter.  It's kind of funny having a bunch of teenagers and a 2-year-old at Christmas time.

Mark started out by writing a sweet note to Santa about Carmen and how good she had been that year.  Then Torrey, my 13-year-old sister, wrote a more interesting, personality-filled letter that reflects our family's twisted sense of humor.  It was a whole-family effort.



None of us were sure whether or not Santa would write us back or anything, and on Christmas morning I woke up with this GREAT IDEA of how Santa could respond.  So before the rest of the family got out of bed (which was late - they're teenagers and Carmen didn't know she was supposed to wake up excited at the crack of dawn) I threw together a note (er, Santa wrote a note) and left it for the family. :)


Well, we think we're pretty clever. ;)

We're trying to figure out other Christmas traditions.  We're thinking although Santa comes with some presents, he won't necessarily give our kids the BIG COOL PRESENTS.  We want to be the awesome ones!!!  We had no idea what Santa would give Carmen this year, so we just kind of threw things together ... We gave Carmen "Rainbow Bear" before Christmas.  If you press her leg, there's a recording of Mark and me singing the beginning of "Twinkle, Twinkle."  It must've been a good present, because she still shows it off to her friends and announces that it sings!!  Anyway, Rainbow Bear helped deliver Santa's presents - an Ariel figurine, some lip gloss, a coin bank thingy, and a pretty fan.  (Ooh, fancy, I know.)  .... Santa's choice in gifts had nothing to do with our non-desire to find a way to wrap them or put them in a gift bag.  *shifty eyes*

Events to blog about

This is a personal list of things I'd like to remember to post about (with pictures!):

• Moving to Austin and living out of a hotel for 2 weeks because our stuff was late (I would never hire movers - we only had them because Mark's company paid for it)~Our annual Oregon Coast trip (but Mark's family is switching things up in 2012 ... we're going to Lake Michigan instead!)
• Maybe something about Washington, but it was less exciting than expected because I was busy being a hibernating first-trimester pregnant lady
• Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas - whatever I happen to have pictures of.
• Our random semi-impulse cruise we took this week because Mom had to cancel her Disney World plans and I'm exactly as pregnant as you can be while they'll still let you get on the ship. ;)  Wednesday (yesterday) also happened to be the 6th anniversary of us meeting.  Awwww <3 ~~ !

Then I will be caught up enough to not be embarrassed about whatever I write. ;)  You'll probably hear a lot about Strawberry Shortcake, Care Bears, and Disney movies.  OH YEAH MY LIFE IS AWESOME.

Too embarrassed to write

September was a little busy because I was preparing to go to Washington to house-sit while my parents took my oldest younger sister on a Mediterranean cruise.

Then I found out I was pregnant (yay!) shortly before going to Washington.  When I'm pregnant, I spend approximately 6 weeks unconscious on the couch like I have mono, only with nauseousness instead of the sore throat.  I had secretly been hoping to write all sorts of blog posts about our summer adventures and moving!

I was tired and nauseous out of my mind until a few days after Halloween, then I got food poisoning or something and threw up for a whole day.  I'm one of those lucky people who doesn't throw up while pregnant ... but sometimes I wished I could just throw up to make that constant nauseous feeling go away.  Oh well. :)  My mom was sick and barfing the whole 9 months; I can handle being sleepy and nauseous for 6 weeks!

By the time I thought about blogging again, I was too embarrassed by my long absence to come back.  "What would I write about?  Do I have pictures?  I have so much to catch up on!"  So instead, I just continued writing in my semi-private LiveJournal, which I've kept for about 10 years (on a few different accounts).

But you know what?  Darn it, it's the end of January and I'm going to have a BABY BOY in MAY (when I got my 8-week ultrasound, they moved my due date to Carmen's 3rd birthday!) and I'm to the point where I don't particularly enjoy walking because it makes me feel like my pelvis is going to split in half (it seems so early for that!) so hey, I should do something useful and start blogging again.

So that's my goal.

I love Austin, I love Texas, I love my ward, I love Carmen, we have tons of fun, and I will take the last six months' worth of pictures off my camera and post some kind of blog about something some time soon.  This has been the best six months of my life, and I'm really excited to see what this new year brings.

My Little Mommy

Today, it was quiet (nap) time and Carmen didn't really want to go down.  I let her not sleep as long as she stays quiet in her room for at least an hour.  Usually I hear her playing for a little while, then come in and find her asleep somewhere.  Sometimes it's in her bed, sometimes it's on the floor.  So cute!!!

Anywho, today I was really tired and decided I would nap during her nap time, too.  We were laying in her bed reading and she leaned over, sang a little song, kissed my face, put one of her little blankets on me, and went outside and drew pictures of the kittens.  I had a good hour-long nap.

IT WAS SO CUTE.

I called Dad and told him about it, and he said, "It's good to know someone's taking care of you while Mark's at work!"

2-year-olds are hilarious

I love talking to Carmen and hearing her talk.  We had a blast on the Oregon coast with all of her Dewey cousins and aunts and uncles.

Mark's sister, Karen, has a sweet husky named Koda.  Carmen fell in love with him and figured out how to get along with him.  They snuggled a lot and did a lot of chase, and the most common phrase I heard from Carmen was, "Ohhhhhhh, he give me kisses!!!!"

On one of our last nights there, we had the following exchange:
Carmen: Koda's my doggy!
Me: Actually, he's Karen's doggy.  Karen is Koda's mommy.
Carmen: *thoughtful pause*  No, he's my doggy.  We'll buy him!
Ben (Karen's husband, happens to be walking outside at that moment): SOLD!!!

They had offered to trade their dog for our two-year-old.  I'm sorry to say the offer wasn't the least bit tempting. ;)


Another time, we were doing a final load of laundry before packing all of our stuff to go home.  We got some clothes from Mark's parents, and Mark's dad decided that this might be a good time to sneak off and take a shower.  Carmen walks past my in-laws' bedroom and goes, "*gasp!* Grandpa Larry is naked!"

I nod my head a little and try to talk about something else, hoping she's done with her announcement for the day.  Sometimes they'll stop if you don't draw attention to it.  But this is an exciting deal to her.  She continues.  "Mommy, Grandpa Larry is naked!  HE'S NAKED, MOMMY!  Grandpa Larry's NAAAAAAAKED!!!"

Finally, my father-in-law manages to stand up for himself and he squeaks out, "Carmen, I'm not completely naked!  I'm wearing a towel!"

"Oh, he's not completely naked, Mommy.  Grandpa Larry's wearing a towel!"

"Thank you." and he scurries off to the bathroom without further incident.


You just can't hide anything from a 2-year-old.

Creatures of Habit

In high school, my AP Psychology teacher didn't assign seats.  After the first few weeks of school, we all pretty much sat in the same seats anyway, because we are creatures of habit.  We like familiarity.  There were a few times during the year when either I or my best friend, Ross, would try to sit somewhere else, and we thought it was exceedingly hilarious when another student would get indignant and go, "Hey, you're in MY seat!"  We were tempted to respond with something cheeky, like, "There are no assigned seats, remember?" ... but we were unpopular enough as it is, and returned to "our" seats if someone didn't like us mixing things up. =p

Anyway, I've noticed that I've quickly formed some habits after moving to Austin.  My friend Jocelyn started working in the day care at the local Gold's Gym so I gave her a ride home yesterday.  I went on autopilot and started heading back to my place instead of her apartment.  It's amazing how quickly habits form: We arrived in Austin in the afternoon of July 8, our stuff got here July 19, and we got our garage on August 1.  We finally got Internet at the end of July.  ("I see you scheduled for this day because we said it was available, but we actually can't do it for another 2 weeks."  ... yeah, I know how it goes. -_-)  So to me, it feels like life here officially began about two weeks ago.  Three and a half, if you start from when our stuff got here and I actually met a few neighbors.

Do you go to the gym?  Have you developed workout habits there?  Do you feel possessive of some of the cardio machines there?  Is there one you always work out on, and when you get to the gym and someone else is working out on it, you feel kind of awkward, like, "Oh, great, now I have to go work out on a different machine.  One I don't love so much."  And maybe ... or maybe not ... you can't decide whether you should take the machine right next to yours, or space yourself away from the stranger who is unknowingly using your machine?

Okay, so I think too much when I work out.

In American Fork, there was a particular elliptical machine I always used - the one on the end.  I don't like the treadmill because my knees get achy.  Here in Austin, I quickly found a machine I've used just about every time I've worked out.  It's the fourth one in, because it's exactly where the fan on the wall hits my head and helps me cool down while working out.  It's also right in front of the TV, so I get to .... watch .... ESPN .... because ........ Well, no, there's nothing great about the TV my machine is in front of.  I just read books anyway. ;)

Do you guys have funny habits about things you use in public places, too?  Like is there are particular chair at the pool you always leave your stuff by?  Is there a machine at the gym that's "yours" too?  Or am I just crazy?

I wouldn't mind just being crazy. ;)

We're in Austin!

It's been two months and I've been too lazy to post a blog update.  Why?  Maybe my pictures aren't interesting enough; I don't know!  But now I'm going to buckle down and sum up the past few months.  My immediate family came down to Utah at the beginning of July to celebrate the Fourth with my grandparents and cousins in Richfield.

Carmen had a lot of fun goofing around with her cousins.  This is Portman, who is about a year and a half older than Carmen.

We went to some horse races and left after about an hour because 1) my uncle and his family didn't come like they said they might and 2) it was really boring.  In an hour they had a single race (maybe two?) and the guy droned on and on about nothing to fill up the space.  And it was kind of toasty, but at least the stands were in the shade!  Carmen was happy to see the horsies.

In the evening, we went to a rodeo in Salina.  Carmen also enjoyed watching it (and it was Mark's first rodeo, too!) and we had to keep her away from the fence when they brought the bulls out and stuff ... because you never know where they'll go ...

We bought some fireworks from the grocery store.  Carmen *loved* the fireworks.  This is how she reacted whenever she wasn't with one of us when the fireworks went off.  She'd run back to us going, "Wow, wow, it's loud!"

After returning from Richfield, the moving began ... and I think I'll save that for another post to be posted SOON ... you know, in less than two months. ;)