Jared's Birthday

Saturday was Jared's birthday. As much as he protests and tries to keep his birthday a secret I refuse to let him be overlooked. He has always hated his birthday being so close to Christmas so I vowed when we got married that I would make sure his birthday is special every year and not just an inconvenience at this busy time of year. As my mother pointed out there is one perk to the timing of his birthday. We can get him great gifts that we wouldn't otherwise be able to afford thanks to Black Friday. This year his big gift was a Dewalt drill. Since he already knew what it was I had to add some element of surprise to the day. 

At breakfast I gave him the start of the quest he would be lead on through out the day to various activities and presents. It was a series of reasons I loved him, in each reason was a hint to the next activity or gift.

 And so the day begins

 Here is my handsome husband and birthday boy sporting his new shirt. 

From here we went to see Sherlock Holmes. We loved it! 

The next clue was back to the car where I had hidden some BYU cuff links. 

From there we went to Tucanos for lunch. You could even say it was dinner since we never actually ate anything for dinner that day. That place sure is filling, even when we felt like this time we did a good job at not stuffing ourselves to the point of being sick.

 Here we are at Tucanos. 

From Tucanos we headed to my parents where he got the drill, some drill bits from my parents and IBC rootbeer from my brother. 

The drill led him back home to some new ties. 

 

The final clue lead to the dessert hidden in the baby's closet. 

 We finished the night off by hanging out with one of Jared's old roommates and best friends and his wife.

This was the next morning and one more reason I love my husband. It can get very uncomfortable for me to bend down long enough to paint my toes. He insisted on doing it for me.

37 Weeks

Here I am on Sunday at 37 weeks. Yes, that means if he comes on time we only have 3 1/2 weeks left.

For a quick update on life we moved to a new apartment last weekend. I needed a little more stability in knowing that we had control over where we were living and the owners of the house we were essentially house sitting needed a place to come back to for at least two months so we oppted to move. Now I am so excited to finally feel a little more stable and be able to prepare a room for our growing little boy.

We are still looking to buy a home, just not quite as actively since it's not as urgent and we have pretty much exhausted the options. At this point we figure if none of the homes we have already put offers on don't come through by the spring we will start actively searching again when more people are selling and our baby is a little older.

"Love is Cristmas"

I was so excited for the holidays to come this year. To be able to spend time with family, make treats, read by the light of the Christmas tree, and most of all make sure we have everything we need for this baby to come in approximately 5 weeks. Then life happened and more stress came. The only reason I remember it's Christmas time is because even though we were uncertain when we would be moving or even to where I insisted we put the tree up. Now that we are moving in two days I still refuse to take it down, we will move it to our apartment fully decorated. I came across this song on my friend's blog this morning. It's exactly what I needed. 

No matter what happens or how hard life gets I am so grateful for my Father in Heaven who loves me and is watching over our little family. We have always had food to eat and a warm place to live. No matter what building we live in it can still be home because that is were our family is. I have no doubt Heavenly Father loves me because he gave me Jared who truly does everything for me and won't rest until he sees a smile on my face and knows that I am taken care of. When I was younger (and still sometimes today) when I felt alone I would pray that I would be able to physically feel my Heavenly Father's arms around me. I knew my Heavenly Father loved me but all I wanted was to actually feel his arms around me and have his shoulder to cry on. He has now answered those prayers and given me a husband who I know loves me more than anything and has the best shoulder to cry on while he holds me tight.

We may not have had time to do the fun Christmas activities I had imagined we would do but it is still Christmas because I know I am loved and taken care of.

31 weeks

As of tomorrow I will be exactly 2 months from my due date!

This little guy is definitely getting bigger. I feel like every day we have some sort of shoving battle. He sticks a limb out causing a lump in my belly and discomfort so I push it back in. No problem right? Wrong! He must think it's funny to stick that same limb out in the SAME place ALL day long. The next day he will choose a new spot and we do it all over again.

My favorite is when we are sitting in church or watching a movie or something and Jared says "I just wish he were here now so I could be holding him." instead he settles for rubbing and holding my stomach. That might sound odd but I think it is so sweet to see how excited Jared is for our son. 

 

life lately

Do I start with the biggest changes or the projects? 

How about the biggest news first.

The home we have been living in is now on the market for a short sale. This means we will need somewhere else to live when the deal goes through, which could be anywhere from 2-5 months from now or even longer. There is already an offer on this house and we have a baby coming in two months so we are feeling a little pressure to quickly find a new home.  Our days now consist of house hunting.

Jared's job is going very well. He has an amazing boss who has come to trust Jared with a lot of responsibility. A lot of that trust has come with Jared showing his willingness to invest his time in the company. After only being there for a few months Jared came up with a great strategy for the company to help them have more focus in everything they do and to unify each department. His boss and the president of the company loved it so much that Jared went from being a copy writer fresh out of college to Content Manager and Senior copywriter. I'm pretty proud of my husband!

I just recently got a job as a substitute teacher for the Jordan School District teaching all ages and subjects. I love that I can work as little or as much as I want a long as I work once every three months to keep my status active. This will hopefully keep me busy and give me a way to get out of the house until our little one comes. I subbed a first grade class and 7th grade math last week and loved it. 

On to the projects...

Jared's aunt and uncle were so generous and gave us one of their old dressers and desks. They were both dated and a little worn down but the structures are in great condition. Jared has been having fun sanding, stripping, and staining to give them a more modern look.  

 

 It's hard to see the color in these pictures but the dresser was a cream greenish color with an awesome 80's aerodynamic feel (notice the "wings" on either side of the dresser).

Stay tuned for the after pictures. The dresser is just about done and looks great!

 I saw a cake similar to this online and had to make one of my own. I made it Monday for my little sister's birthday.

Again I found this idea online and just had to make one for our little boy. Jared had an old shirt he never wears so I cut it up to make this faux vest and will soon be making pants to match.

Cornbelly's

Neither Jared or I had ever been to a corn maze so we decided that this year we needed to indulge ourselves in that fall tradition. 

We bribed our friends, the Turners, with some home made peach pie afterward if they would come along with us. Of course they agreed because who couldn't resist homemade pie and a night with the Heaths. 

I think we finished the maze in just under half an hour and that was supposed to be the more difficult one. 

Since we finished the maze so quick we were able to explore and experience all the other fun activities around. 

We all got our leg work out for the day on these things. Definitely not as easy as they look. 

Just before the pig races they asked the audience who had the prettiest mom. Jared raised his hand to volunteer me. Since we were on the front row I got picked to kiss a pig. Yes, that is a real pig and yes, I really did kiss it. At least they didn't make me kiss the snout. Don't worry I gave Jared lots of kisses right after to thank him for giving me such a memorable experience. Oh, and they rewarded me with a pig nose.  

Pumpkin teatherball. Being tall is definitely an advantage in this game.

Our very best pig faces. Since I had the nose I just had to do what I'm best at, smiling. 

The slide was not made wide enough for adults let alone pregnant ones. 

I definitely felt better when Jared didn't fit either. 

Giant Lincoln logs 

Tire Horse swings which were very uncomfortable. 

they had these wood structures as play sets all over. I thought they were pretty cool. 

Sitin' on the giant cornbelly's chair

My cute husband

My first attempt at both a peach pie and a lattice top. It was a hit. 

27 weeks

Here I am on Sunday at 27 weeks. We only have three months to go! 

Many people had told me that being pregnant with out first child will be the longest nine months of my life. So far I can't believe how fast it's gone, it has not been six months since I got pregnant. I went to the doctor last week and he wanted me back in 3 weeks not 4 and after that it would be every 2 weeks. It took me back, I thought the closer appointments were for the end of pregnancy. Then I realized I really am that far along.

I wonder if this next three months will be the longest (even longer than the sick months). In the last couple weeks Jared and I have bee getting very excited, more than before. I think it's tarting to become even more real. Good thing we have the holidays to keep us distracted. If that's even possible with my growing belly and a little boy who is constantly kicking me.

More Fun Babysitting

My parents made it safely home late last Thursday. Since then we've been pretty busy catching up on the things we weren't able to keep up with while gone.

I am grateful we were in a situation where we could serve my family in that way. We learned a lot and are grateful for the opportunity we had to see how we work together as a team in parenting before we even have children of our own. We know it won't be easy but I do know that our children will have a wonderful father. 

Here are several pictures of my cute siblings and the activities we did to keep us all in good spirits while anxiously awaiting the arrival of my parents and two new sibling. 

One night after dinner the kid hooked up my iPod to the speakers on the piano so they could sing along with the microphone, dance, and show off their cool tricks. It sure was fun watching them.

  Saturday we bribed the kids with funnel cake from the farmers market if they could clean the house really well and quickly. It was so cold we ended up piling back in the van to finish our treat.  

 The kids sure were spoiled that day. After we had already promised them funnel cake Uncle Mark called to let us know he was in town and wanted to take us all to McDonalds for dinner. After McDonalds the kids got to play with what they thought was one of the coolest toys, Uncle Mark's remote control car. This isn't just the kind you buy at Walmart. This is the kind you can buy separate parts for and make a hobby out of. I thought it was pretty great. The kids always love when uncle Mark comes to visit. 

 My parents were gone for three weeks and in that time we didn't have any big issues. The day they were coming home of course Pierce had to go split his head open. He was jumping down the split level stairs and hit his head on the ceiling. We cleaned it up as much as we could then he sat on the couch playing game boy for a couple hours while periodically icing it. He seemed to be doing just fine and the bleeding had mostly stopped so we continued with our plans for the evening and took the kids to get pizza and play at the park. It was a much needed outing as all of us were a little on edge knowing Mom and Dad would be home soon.  

After the park we went to get ice cream again from Macey's. I had to sit in the car with a couple kids who had been giving us grief so Jared was sweet enough to bring me one.

I definitely married the right man!

 

Bria (3yrs) and Hyrum (4yrs) the newest additions.