fun weekend

This weekend we got to see Jan, Jill, Christian, Annette (Jill's mom) and Carson. They came Saturday night, then we went to "Love Joys" (a really good restaurant in Laramie) to eat and then swimming at the Holiday Inn!! So fun. Stetson really likes the water and his mom REALLY likes the hot tub, so it worked out great for everyone. I absolutely LOVE the picture of Matthew, Stetson & Carson.

Singing time went awesome today. I made 3 faces, a sad face, a "medium face" and a happy face and put them on the board vertically in that order, and the "Judge" (me or one of the teachers) drew a line from bottom to top depending on how good they sang and they did AWESOME. I wish I'd thought of it earlier. Our primary pres. said she could hear them from down the hall. Yay!
Tonight Michael's grandpa is going to stop by. He has monthly meetings in Cheyanne so he gets to stop by and visit for a while.

I love facebook!!

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<-Northern California
So, some buddies from high school apparently found me using the "friend finder" and added me to their list, which is great, because now we can keep in touch and share pictures, so I thought maybe I could find some of my old buddies from Santa Rosa, and I DID!!

Can't even tell you how excited I am. I started with Jenna Swaney, one of my best friends in SR. I just typed her in and voila, there she was. Sa-weet. So I clicked on "view friends" (it shows all her friends) and I ended up finding another way good friend from SR, Amy Richardson, then 2 more friends. Anyway, I ended up finding like 10-15 friends from SR (one of them was Jamie Funk Cook), so now I can catch up with them and get their numbers and be friends again!! Wew hoo!!

I have been so blessed with good friends. It makes me think of a quote that goes something along the lines of, "God knows us and he knows our needs, but it is usually through the actions of another person that he meets those needs." A wise high school basketball coach once told me during state bball tournament in Casper, WY "...remember these times, these memories you're making, because you'll never get to do them again." I remember thinking, oh whatever, type of thing, but now I miss some old times with my friends SOOO badly, especially friends I don't see anymore.
I was telling my dad the other day, that when I look back on my childhood, I sometimes can't believe I had it so good, and that it wasn't all a dream. I miss Santa Rosa so bad. :(

spring break slideshow

So for some reason, whenever I download pictures from my camera to my blog, the picture becomes an "Incompatible format" and I can't print it off my camera, so basically I lose the pictures I put on my blog. I tried it a different way this time, so we'll see if it works. If not, my blogging days might be over :( because I would rather have my pictures safe on my camera than on a blog. Well enjoy my first slide show :)

Well we're back from spring break in Cowley/Lovell. We had SUCH a great time and I cannot believe how fast it went by. We spent the first half in Cowley with my dad an the last half in Lovell with Michael's fam. We did so many fun things...when I was in Cowley we got to go to the temple (hadn't been for a while) so that was way nice. I also went to see the new house Michael & Rachel bought..they totally "gutted" it out and are going to re do most of it. I'm so excited for them, I think it will look way nice when they're done, and they'll have much more needed space AND I went to see Todd & Emily's new house (I hadn't seen their kitchen or front deck yet) and it looks AWESOME. I also got to go see Shannon and her cutie pie kiddos, SO cute. Her little girl has the biggest blue eyes and longest black eyelashes I've ever seen on a baby, I wish I'd had my camera with me, and she of course gave us more clothes for Stetson (thanks Shannon). Dad made my favorite thing he makes, spaghetti and we got to see "No reservations" with Catherine-Zeta-Jones, way good. Plus, dad took us to eat at China Town and for blizzards at Dairy Queen. While we were in Lovell, the highlight of our visit was probably "the races." You'll have to ask me for details next time you see me but it was way funny and good times were had by all. Other than races, we died Easter eggs, ate really good food, scrapbooked, hung out with Janw while everyone worked on the farm, and pretty much just relaxed and had a really good time. I'm having issues with my camera, so there's only one pic. I'll try to make a slide show tomorrow. Hope everyone had a great spring break. As always though, its so good to be home.

Fatherhood

My dad sent me this quote today and I wanted to share...

"Someday you will know that a father is much happier in his children’s happiness than in his own.

I cannot explain it to you; it is a feeling in your body that spreads gladness through you."

Honore de Balzac

mohawk and survey

What were you doing 10 years ago? Well I was 14 and a freshman. I don't know. It would have been bball season, but the season would just be winding down.

5 things on my list today:
1. Well its the end of my day, so I'll say 5 things I already did: went to Wal-mart to print pictures off so I can scrapbook when I got home for spring break.
2. Took Stetson to story time
3. Went to dinner at Chauncy & Kelly's.
4. Went to the half acre
5. Put Stetson's jammies on

5 snacks that I enjoy:
1. croutons
2. cereal
3. wheat thins
4. yogurt
5. fruit roll ups

3 bad habits
1. twisting and breaking my hair
2. sleeping in
3. blogging (too much)

4 If I suddenly became a billionaire: Pay off car, put enough away for Michael's medical school, put enough away for Stetson's college, spend a chunk on new clothes and invest the rest, oh and I'd take a buddy and go to a waaaay nice spa for a day and get massages, facials, pedictures, ALL THAT. I've always wanted to go to a spa

5 places I've lived:
1. Cowley, Wyoming
2. Santa Rosa, CA
3. Rexburg, ID
4. SLC, UT
5. Laramie, WY

5 jobs I've had:
1. administrative assistant @ CETCO/American Colloid
2. lifeguard
3. Minchow's Food court expert sandwich-taco-hamburger-maker and ice cream scooper
4. fitness instructor
5. waitress

5 things people don't know about me:
1. I used to be and still am sometimes obsessive compulsive about dumb things/kind of a perfectionist, but being a mom has helped me put things in perspective.
2. I like folding laundry
3. I can't go to bed until I put chapstick on
5. I love taking really hot baths

I tag everyone who reads this because I want to know what everyone else says

Our neighbors, Kelly and her daughter, Elise made this happy birthday on the blacktop right outside our complex. So cute. :) Here's some pics of the remainder of Michael's day. Michael was really busy today with tests and such, so while he went off to school, Stetson and I went to a WIC appt. He's 30" long and 22 lbs. After that I was supposed to do music at the daycare, but Michael couldn't watch Stetson so I called Patricia and asked if I could bring Stetson. She said that would be fine. It went really well for the most part. He loved the music and the VERY WIDE assortment of toys to play with, but by the end of the hour, he'd had it. It was getting close to his nap time and I think there was just too much chaos (I totally know what you mean now, Kim). So we probably won't do that again for a while. After that I did my noon step class, came home and started cooking Michael's bday dinner (we had it at 5 because Michael has a 7:00 pm class that he ended up not even going to). We had chicken enchiladas, chips w/ salsa, homemade guacamole, a delish salad that Amyntas brought, sprite and chocolate cupcakes. I was supposed to make his mom's cheesecake (his request) but leave it to me to lose the recipe. Whoops. Maybe next year. :) Anyway, it ended up being really fun, but I'm excited for life to get back to normal, and to see everyone next week for spring break. Wew hoo. I try to put captions under the pics, but it never works right, so I'll tell you who is in the pics. The second to the last pic is of Aspen, Jacque & Stetson. Those girls are SOOO cute.

Happy birthday Michael!!

Today Michael turns 25. Wowzer. The pictures below are from a little birthday party barbeque we had for Michael and Jeffi (one of our friends whose bday was last wed.) We had SO much food..ribs, hamburgers, baked beans, salad, mashed potatoes, cream soda, chips, and for dessert, cake, icecream and crepes (sweedish pancakes). One of our friends that was there served his mission in France and learned how to make awesome crepes. They definitely put mine to shame. Anyway, we had so much fun. We're going to celebrate again tonight, and I'll post some more pics of that.

Happy birthday Michael, I love you!

democratic candidates in the cowboy state

Bill Clinton was on campus today, here in humble Laramie. Michael said the Mrs. was in Casper and Cheyanne. Obama is coming tomorrow to speak at the half acre at 7:15 pm. We'd have to stand in line for hours, so we might not make it, but it'd be fun to go listen...and maybe get on t.v. (my real motivation) jk of course.

Fun times

Our neighbor friend, Jenna came over to play for a little while today and spelled her and Stetson's names with the blocks. We didn't have enough letters, so her name got compromised. :) The other pictures are of Stetson in our other neighbor's new "truck" last week. Notice most of the snow is melted. It was gorgeous last week. I was so excited for spring. Now its cold again and there's more snow on the ground. :(

You have to try this

O.K. friends, here's the deal. So you've all been to Johnny Carinos, right?? It's like the Olive Garden. Well Johnny Carinos serves that warm bread w/ oil and those yummy crunchy things, right? Thats what I thought they were, but they're crisp roast garlic and I bought some today at Wal-mart in the spice section. I also bought some artisan garlic bread (any grocery with a decent bakery will have some bread that would be good for this). Well I brought it home and re-created the Johnny Carinos appetizer. It was so good. You just drizzle some olive oil onto like a butter plate, sprinkle some crisp roast garlice onto it and voila! Just dip the bread of your choice into the mixture. Its so good.

Among other things, Stetson has recently graduated to one nap a day. He used to take one at 10 am and 3pm, but now he's just taking an afternoon nap, right after lunch. Well today on the way back from Wal-mart, I was trying with everything I had to keep him awake so he'd take his afternoon nap. Well he might have slept for like 15 seconds, I don't know. His eyelids were pretty heavy, but I was trying to keep my eyes on the road. I KNOW he wasn't asleep for that long. ANYWAY, so we came home, had lunch, I brought the groceries in, (yes in that order, in Wyoming you can leave your groceries outside for a while because its like a fridge outside). Then I laid Stetson down, (he usually is EXHAUSTED by this time and just goes right to sleep) he cried for like a minute, then nothing. Silence. Phew!! Is what I thought at least. Then like 5-10 minutes later, I hear this weird sound. He was rolling his hands against the rails of his crib or something. So yeah, no nap because he slept in the car for 15 SECONDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm over exaggerating of course and not really that upset about it, but it boggles my mind.

Anyway, all I have to say is, for the love. Thats what our old high school buddy Shmadam (Adam) Clark would say and it was hilarious (does he still say it, Ranee'?). Shannon and Shayla will appreciate this if they're cool enough to read my blog. I just have to add one more thing..I rented Pride & Prejudice on Friday. I won't tell you how many times I watched it, but I LOVE that movie!! I think you have to watch it a couple times to pick up on the lingo, among other things, but I think its such a good movie. The scenery is beautiful and its just a good flick. Does anyone else love it as much as I do??