Wrapped up in you

During the late hours of the night and into the tomorrows I find solace in my husband’s arms. Knowing he has to be awake in a few short hours I try not to disturb him too much as I curl up against him and let him cradle me. For a short moment everything seems to disappear. Every worry about money is no longer an issue. The fact that my house is a disaster doesn’t seem to bother me at all. The fact that we only see one another for a few short minutes between school and work and then late at night seems to slip away into oblivion. The only thing that matters is his soft, slow breathing in my ear and the comforting beat of his heart that penetrates me to the very core. It is in those short moments that I am able to breathe a sigh of relief and let myself be swallowed up in the arms of the love of my life…

My strange and wonderful kid (or lion)

Please tell me I'm not the only one with a strange child. Every time I change his poopy pants (hurry up potty training!) I lift his bum to wipe under it and he lifts his head, and goes "Sniff, sniff, sniff...Hmmm - Nummy!"...seriously? That smells yummy to you? Weirdo!

Today when I got Hayden up from his nap I smelled something foul. I went to pick him up and asked him if he was stinky...(quite the common occurrence in our house it seems) and he defiantly tells me "NOOO!" I said, "Are ya, lyin'?" to which he replies "WRRRAAAWWWRRR".

(If you didn't catch that - he thought I was asking him if he was a lion)

On my way to support hose and wrinkle cream...

Last night I attended a missionary open house for a young man in our ward who is leaving on Tuesday for the MTC. I read the email wrong, so I ended up there about an hour early. We were sitting in the living room talking as a couple of other young men came in wearing gym shorts and flip flops. Elder Alexander made a comment to them "Hey - thanks for not dressing up for me!" in a sarcastic tone...to which I replied "I'm in jeans and tennis shoes and you didn't say anything to me about it"...to which Elder Alexander replied "Yeah - but you're an adult".

Uh...wait...what??? When, I mean how...did that happen??? I guess I always knew I was an adult - but it was in that moment that I realized I'm one of the *gasp* GROWN-UPS! I totally belong in the grown-up room talking about boring grown-up things!

It still freaks me out that I'm older than the missionaries - and I've been older than the missionaries for more than four years! It's going to take me a bit of time to get used to this!

Medicated No More

An acquaintance of mine started a blog about her “journey from sanity, to pre-natal depression, to hospitalization, to a laundry list of meds, to post-partum depression, to craziness, to hospitalization, to addiction, to knowledge, to enlightenment, to understanding, to sobriety, ...and back again to sanity.”

I find it very interesting since I dealt with my own Post Partum Depression battle. I did not struggle nearly as much as she did, but it was still a difficult time for me. If you decide to follow her story, please start from the oldest post and work your way to the most recent, or it will not make sense.

View her blog here:
Medicated No More

Cheesecake, a camera, and a questionable strawberry daiquiri

Last night Timi took me out to The Cheesecake Factory for my birthday (which is Friday). She had book club and, since I don’t read, had Kendra’s enrichment activity to go to last night. Neither of us got through until well after 9pm and Mike was wondering why on earth we were going out at 10pm (you know…since we’re such old women, surely we’d be in bed by then) but when your husbands work crazy weird hours and you are constantly doing things for church – you take what you can get! We seriously spent like 15 minutes just trying to decide on which piece of cheesecake we’d order. After much deliberation we placed our orders and that’s where the giggle-fest began. I had my favorite drink of all time, the frozen iced mango, and Timi ordered a virgin strawberry daiquiri. Here are a few pictures we snapped:

It is quite difficult to take pictures of yourselves...

Thank you Mr. Very-Patient-Waiter
Don't lie - you think we're hot...
Yep - that's me with a spoon on my nose.

And for the record, the strawberry daiquiri was not actually "questionable"...but how else are we to epxlain that we were 25 and 30(ish) year old women with spoons hanging from our noses?

Thank you so much, Timi, for the wonderful night out! You're a DOLL!

Too cute for words...

I went to Enrichment last night in my friend Kendra's ward. She was teaching a coupon class and I thought it'd be fun to go! Plus, it was so nice to be at an enrichment activity where I didn't have to do anything! I took Hayden to the nursery there so that Mike could stay home and get some good study time in. As we were about to leave I told Hayden to say good bye to Leah and give her a hug and Kendra snapped this picture:

I know...right? HOW stinking cute is that???

Papa Scott!

KellyAnn's Dad (who was like a second father to me in high school) flew into Jacksonville on Monday for business. He came in at about 3:45 and had to be at a meeting at 5:30 so he stopped by for a couple of hugs and to meet Hayden! Honestly - I've been having a tough time lately and a Papa Scott hug was just what I needed! It was soooo good to see him - I hope he has LOTS more business in Jacksonville!

Our trip to the beach...or whatever

It had been awhile since our last beach trip with Madison so Nikki and I decided to head out to "Huguenot Memorial Park" (a beach where you can drive right up to the surf). As we were driving up there we noticed the St. John’s River nearly splashing up onto the road – we figured it was just high tide. Meanwhile Hayden is in the back seat pitching a fit like you just wouldn’t believe. Everyone in the car was about to go crazy, but have no fear! We were almost there!! We pull up to the entrance and Nikki pays the $1 to get it with a $5 bill. She gets almost all of her change back in quarters – maybe the attendant decided she looked like a college student who needed to do laundry, who knows? Anyway – we drive around to the beach and, I kid you not, there is about 9 feet of beach between the dunes and the water – there was no way we were going to chance it and end up stuck with two cranky toddlers with no way out, so we decided to turn around and head home. What a nice long, whiny-filled drive it was just so we could turn Nikki’s $5 into change!

With two heartbroken little kids in the back seat because we didn’t get to hang out at the beach, we decide to make the most of the situation and head over to Nikki’s dad’s house and swim in the pool. On our way, the sky grew increasingly dark and looked like the heavens would open up at any minute…so we decide that was a no-go. After about an hour of just driving around, changing Nikki’s money into quarters, entering Merrill Road from both sides of 9A and nearly losing our minds, we decide to park it at Nikki’s house to eat lunch and let the kiddos splash around in a little froggy pool. Hayden’s mood improved immensely after eating his sandwich (and half of mine – guess the poor kid was hungry!)

Thanks Nikki and Madison for a whirlwind of a day! We may not have seen the beach – but at least we were in good company!

Hayden...having a cow

...more cow from HaydenMadison...not happy about the cow having of Hayden
Meet "Huguenot" the frog
All's well that ends well!

Fantasy Football and Frogs

Football season is upon us! Mike convinced me to join his fantasy football league and tonight was the draft. Even though I had to pick tenth (which is not good) we still had a lot of fun just hanging out in the spare room at my in-law’s house for an hour or so. We rarely get a moment to spend with each other lately, so this really was a treat. The first game is Sunday – so let the games begin! And may the best woman win!!!

The fun-ness of the evening turned disastrous as we entered our home and a frog followed us in! The little bugger hopped inside, into Hayden’s bedroom, and under his changing table! My first thought was “Get the vacuum!” but knowing that would not be very humane of me Mike came to the rescue! However, he is just as big of a girl as I am when it comes to these things so he comes running in with my salad tongs! He didn’t want to touch it with his bare hands! Since the thing was hiding under the changing table Mike got strategically positioned as I picked up and moved the table. The little guy hopped away again and tried to hide behind the bookcase in Hayden’s room, but there wasn’t enough room. HA! We had him cornered. Mike snatched him up with the tongs and set the stinker free outside.

PHEW!

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Cabin fever has already begun and it's only noon!!

Mike went shooting this morning and Hayden was particularly obnoxious today since we were trapped inside so as soon as Mike got home I took the opportunity to get a few things from Publix...alone. On my way there, in the midst of a tropical storm, I see three guys off to the side of the road with (from what I could tell) matching black shorts, running shoes and no shirts just out for a jog! It was seriously the funniest thing and I'm grateful I was able to get such a good laugh.

In other news - Hayden is making great progress in potty training! We're not really trying all that hard yet but so far today he has told me TWICE that he had to "pee pee in the potty" before actually going! Hooray!

How's that for the lame post of the week?