Potato Bugs...not cool.

This has to be said, for those of you who are not fully aware of the somewhat gruesomeness of many of God's creations... I personally think God must have a sense of humor, otherwise, really, WHAT WAS HE THINKING??? 

I was talking to a friend a couple of days ago and she was telling a story about her son looking for "potato bugs" in the back yard.  As soon as I heard the words "potato bug", I had to stop her with a "Say WHAT? There are POTATO BUGS in Utah?!?!?"  She looked at me like I was loony, no argument there.  "Of course there are potato bugs in Utah.  Aren't they everywhere?".  Suddenly it hit me that our definitions of "potato bug" were not jiving.  We went straight to the internet and Googled "potato bug".  She quickly understood why I was horrified at the thought of her son playing with potato bugs.

She was talking about these innocent little creatures, appropriately called "Rollie Pollies".  Everyone has childhood memories of playing with these silly little bugs that roll up into balls in your hand and look like a tiny version of an armadillo. 

Of course her son was playing with these.  WHO HASN'T??

Wanna know why I almost passed out at the thought of a POTATO BUG??

Scroll down...

From www.potatobugs.com:  The common Potato Bug is also known as the Jerusalem cricket. Our Native American friends call him “Woh-tzi-Neh” (Old Bald-Headed Man). In Latin America, he’s “niña de la tierra” (child of the earth). Other names include: Satan's fetus, the Devil's spawn, the Devil's child, the Devil's baby, the Devil's fetus, evil fetus, bald devil fetus, bald fetus of Satan, and earth fetus.

Do you get it now??  Maybe you have to be from California.  Most people from central or northern Cali have come into contact with them.  They don't hurt you, they just scare you to death.  These things can get really big and when they walk across hard surfaces...you can hear them!  They have opposable thumbs for crying out loud!! Not cool.

When my family first moved to the Central Coast in 1990, none of us had ever seen one.  None of us knew they existed.  They burrow in the grass so if you wanted to find one, they are really easy to come across.  My first experience with one was seeing/hearing one run across the linoleum kitchen floor and I screamed a scream that my mom was sure would be my last.  From that moment on, I never went barefoot in our house or across our lawn.  Warning:  if you see one, DON'T CRUSH IT!  It's a sound that you will never get out of your memory...EVER!

They are ungodly.  In short, they could easily be one of the top reasons why we left California.

To my good friends, William and Kate. Congrats!

This historical day has to be blogged about for the billionth time.  I will admit I am sort of a closet Royals Obsesser...  I am a so intrigued by the grandness and tradition of it all.  What would be like to be born into that kind of life?? 

Prince William and Kate on the day they announced their engagement.



The Happy couple after the reception.  I think this was the 3rd dress of the day. Kate is so gorgeous yet so simple.

  

The dress.  Not what I expected but so perfect for her



Westminster Abby.  Just a simple little afair...ha.




Princess Diana on her wedding day back in 1981.  Its a little sad that she wasn't there to see her son get married, in body anyway.



PS- I am sure my invite probably just got lost in transit.

Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday Morning proved to be an Easter Bunny SUCCESS for 2011!  That silly Easter Bunny hid their Easter Baskets and made them WORK for their reward.  Can you believe it?? 

Turns out it was all worth it for them.

Braiden got a giant chocolate bunny and a new tie and tie tack.  Apparently the

Easter Bunny (and the dentist) thinks that Braiden does not need a ton of candy anymore...

Somehow Paige ended up with a Justin Beiber CD...silly Easter Bunny!



After the Easter morning activities we put on our Sunday Best and headed to church.

Cameron was not happy that I put gel in his hair so he had a bit of a meltdown.  Thus, this year's Easter Sunday picture.  Cameron was not about to smile for me.

On the other hand, Braiden and Paige were all about the Kodak moment...

After church we headed to my sisters house for our annual Easter BBQ and egg hunt in their enormous back yard (something we don't have).  As luck would have it, it rained all day so the egg hunt was a little wet but the kids had a great time and ate way too much candy in usual Easter fashion.

I have an amazing knack for thinking of things to complain about on a regular basis.  But on Easter, I find it impossible to not focus on the blessings in my life.  I have a wonderful family.  My kids and my husband are the light of my life and I am so grateful for a "reason" like them to work to be a better person.  We have a great home and live in a beautiful place surrounded by good people.  I have a job that I love and Eric and I are blessed to be able to support our family with a stable income as many cannot right now.  With all that being mentioned, I would not have any of it if I didn't have the Gospel of Jesus Christ in my life.  I am utterly grateful and humbled by the sacrifice that He made for all of us...for me, my children, and their children....and for the ability to live eternally with him as a family.    This is my testimony.

Go BIG BLUE- Blue and White Weekend

Braiden had and exciting weekend on April 10th.

 

On the 9th, we were invited to an awesome b-day/tailgate party where some BYU Football players

were invited to be the center of attention to 30+ prepubescent boys, including Braiden (there were a few grown men that were pretty excited to be there too).  Braiden was completely impressed and

inspired that evening. He loves football and he especially loves BYU football.  These guys were really awesome to Braiden and all the other boys there that night by signing footballs, t-shirts and

other stuff and taking hundreds of pictures.  Its great to have local role models for my son

that have achieved goals that he thinks in his young mind are impossible.

He left that party feeling completely on "CLOUD 9".



BYU QB Riley Nelson and Braiden



The next day, BYU had their pre-season Spring Blue and White Scrimmage at the Cougar Stadium.

Although the weather was cold and wet...a typical Utah Spring day, Eric and Braiden went to watch some of the players he had met the night before play.

He was so excited to see one player in particular that he spent a while talking shop with...Riley Nelson. 

That was a good weekend for Braiden.

Go Cougars!

I am so there!

The Disneyland TinkerBell Half Marathon

January 29, 2012

I am so there!

Adios to my favorite calories...for now.

I am now 30 weeks pregnant (3/4 of the way, 75% done, mostly baked, however you want to put it)!  Its reason to celebrate for sure as I am on the "homeward stretch" as they say. 

How am I feeling, you ask?  Do you want the truth or the watered-down version of the truth that I feed every person that asks me with a big smile on my face.  "Feeling good!", "Taking a day at a time.", "Slowly but surely", and so on and so forth.  I try so hard to appear positive and upbeat and grateful for the miracle that is occurring in my womb, but they know I am lying.  I cant hide it.

The truth is I am so glad to almost be done.  I need to be done.  I feel icky, not myself, cranky, tired, swollen, annoyed, stressed, and so on an so forth.  Dang, if only there were another way to get them here,  I might have 8 kids!  I love babies, just don't love having them invade my body.  I need my personal SPACE!

SO ANYWAYS...last week I had to take a 3 hour glucose tolerance test since my 1 hour test was elevated.  If you aren't familiar with the 3 hour GTT let me elaborate:

You fast for 8-12 hours, get you blood drawn, drink a solution that contains 100 gms of glucose.  If you want to know what that tastes like, put 2 cups of sugar in a Sunkist Orange Soda and then gulp the entire thing down in 1 minute.  Ugh!  Then wait and hour, get your blood drawn, wait an hour, get your blood drawn, wait another hour, get your blood drawn.  So in the end, you get 4 needle sticks, have to starve and sit there and try not to vomit up the orange death or you will have to START OVER!  No way.  A migraine and near black-out were on the menu for that day.

That was last week.  I got the results online this week and saw that they were a bit elevated so now that's all my nurse brain can think about.  I have been avoiding all sugar, watching carbs and trying to be a bit more active after having scoured the Internet to find all the effects of Gestational Diabetes. I am not sure these hips can birth a 12 lb baby.

This time of year it is especially torturous when my FAVORITE candies are readily available and staring at me from all corners. Never mind the fat and calories that these little babies contain that would, under usual circumstances, cost me 7 miles on the treadmill. These will cause a certain glucose spike!

 

Oh how I love Cadbury Mini Eggs....and you may be surprised to know that I am a candy snob.  I don't waste calories on just any candy.  It has to be WORTH IT and these little beauties are worth it by the handful!


MMMMMM.  Doesn't  that look good?



There is an upside:  I don't have to feel bad or weird about about the fact that I think I am the only person in the world that hates these:

I HATE PEEPS!  These might possibly be the vilest things ever made.  I shudder at the thought.



Badly needed haircuts...

 So I am admittedly NOT very good at making sure that either I or my children get regular haircuts like they (or I) should.  When it comes to my hair, I have always waited to the point that I cant stand it any more then end up making a hasty walk-in to Fantastic Sam's or Great Clips for a $10 haircut.  Not that there is anything wrong with those places...or a $10 haircut, but I, inevitably, walk out less than satisfied.   I mean really, how much can you demand for $10? 

So I was performing my daily torture ritual with Paige (doing her hair, in other words) and finally decided that she needed about 4-5 inches of the hay growing from her scalp trimmed off.  I couldn't stand it anymore and neither can my neighbors. 

At the same moment, I see my sweet little girl, I mean boy, Cameron, walks in and that seals the deal.  How can any mother let their child get so shaggy? 

So we did what mommy does and walk-in to Great Clips for some cheap hair cuts.  They did a great job and my children walked out looking groomed and happy with hairy suckers hanging from their mouths.  Success..until about 6 months from now when they get their next haircuts.  Do you think that these are the stories my kids will be telling their therapists 20 years from now? 

Lace up your (running, walking, sleeping) SHOES!

The Salt Lake City 2011 Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure is going to be May 7th, 2011.  I hesitated at first to register my team this year as I just didn't think that I was up to the task but some people at work have offered to help and I realized that this cause is worth the effort...even if I am too tired, pregnant, swollen, blah, blah, blah .  So here it is.  The 4th year in a row that I have organized the HCI's Pride for Pink Race for the Cure team.

So far we have raised about $2200 between registration fees and cash donations.  I am so excited for our team and for race day (even if I might need a stroller to get to the finish line).

The statistics for breast cancer are amazingly shocking.  Everyone knows someone that has either had or been effected by breast cancer.  I don't know if its my infinite love of the color pink or if I will at some time be personally effected by this disease in one way or another, but I feel a certain responsibility to be as involved as I can to do my part in helping to fight breast cancer.

Please join my team or make a donation here.

Apparently I am the fool...

As you know, last Friday was April 1st and, therefore April Fool's Day.  It started out as a normal day for me.  I took the day off of work as we had friends coming into town and I had some serious work to do on our house. 

It was a quiet morning.  Then the clock stuck 11am and bam!  My cell phone started ringing over and over and over and over and...you get the point.  I didn't recognize the numbers so naturally I didn't answer at first, but by the 5th caller, I had to find out what was going on.  I answered:

Me:  hello?

Lady:  Hi, i am calling about your elliptical.  Is it still available or is this an April Fools joke? 

Me:  (confused) OH!  I didn't know that my husband had listed the elliptical but yes we still have it.

Lady: Can I come get it?

Me:  Sure. (still so confused)

I hung up assuming Eric had just listed the elliptical machine without telling me and figured the price must have been really good or something.  I was, admittedly, a little annoyed as I was thinking "Why did he list it that low and why did he put my cell number on there??"  I called Eric at work and told him what had happened.  He was completely confused because he said he listed it for $150 (seemed reasonable) and he had listed his number not mine.  My phone continued to ring and a started receiving texts: "Do you still have your elliptical?"  "Can I come pick up your elliptical?", etc, etc.  I finally replied to a text:  "Sorry. Its sold".  Reply:  "Was it really free or is this a joke?"  WHAT??  I was so confused. 

I decided to get on KSL and find out what was going on with this ad.  Since Facebook is my homepage, it opened for me to see a post from my beloved bro-in-law.  "Anyone know where I can find a Free Riding Lawnmower, Pool Table, Elliptical , BBQ, or baby jogger, or Jazz/Laker tickets ?? I have been looking ALL day."  WHAT IS GOING ON HERE??  I call my sister, explain my woes and confusion of the day and ask if she knows whats going on here.  After a little sad lying and meager "I have no idea"...she admits it!  I have been DOOPED!!!  The victim of a very ruthless prank.

Ashton, my dearest brother-in-law, thought it would be HILARIOUS if he listed a bunch of fake stuff in the local classifieds and put various people's numbers on the ads...including mine!  Little did he know that I really had an elliptical machine that I really was listing....OH CRAP!  I have someone on their way here to pick up this elliptical and she thinks its FREE!!!  Ashton must DIE!

At this point my phone was still ringing and dinging with calls and texts and there was no way I would figure out the ladies number in time.  DING-DONG!  There she was with her huge husband and truck, ready to take the FREE elliptical off my hands. 

I had to shamefully explain the RUDE joke played on me and explain that they were also victims of this unfortunate series of events.   Needless to say, THEY WERE NOT AMUSED...and they know where I live.

The moral of this story is...if you have a rude brother-in-law that has no fear or shame and loves to play jokes on the innocent and unsuspecting...don't let him have your cell phone number!

HAPPY APRIL FOOLS DAY!