Bored

78 words

Speedtest

Can anybody tell them I'm bored at work today! Thanks for the fun test Aleisha!

Cheap Pictures!

If you are looking for a cheap place to get all your digital pictures developed you've got to check out http://www.clarkcolor.com/ They only charge 8 Cents per photo! You can't beat that. The shipping isn't too horrendous either...it still beats Walmart. And the pictures get sent to your door. I've been using it since Owen was born. They do a really good job on developing the pictures too. I know we all can stand to save a few pennies here and there!

Happy Birthday Dad!

Today is my dad's birthday. I didn't want him to think I forgot. So I thought I would wish him a happy birthday on my blog since I didn't get him a present yet! I know, I'm probably the worst daughter you have dad, but I can't help feeling that maybe I'm your best daughter too. Thanks for being a great dad, and a wonderful grandpa to Owen. And don't worry, we will figure out something to get you for your birthday. You didn't give us any hints this year though! Maybe we'll change Holly's name to Zoe for your present! I wouldn't hold my breath though if I were you.

My Look-Alike Meter

My mom is always trying to tell me that I look like my dad's side of the family. Other people say I look like my mom...with blond hair. So who is right? It looks like I resemble my mom more than my dad! I'm happy every day that I at least got my mom's nose, and not my father's nose! No offense dad.

MyHeritage: Look-alike Meter - Family tree search - Printable family tree

Owen's Favorite Book

Owen thought that since everybody is blogging about their favorite book I should blog about his favorite book. So here it is, Owen's favorite book. It's "Oh, The Places You'll Go!" by Dr. Seuss. Owen is obsessed with this book. We have to read it to him, on average, 4 times a day. As soon as I bring him downstairs in the morning he will run and find it. Then he brings it to me and says, "Book? Book?" So we sit down and read it. As soon as I'm done he hands the book back to me, "Book? Book?" So we read it again. Then later on in the night he will get the book and bring it to Scott to read it to him....twice. I think it's great that he likes being read to, but sometimes another book would be nice. Last night Scott was reading it to Owen and I could pretty much say all the words along with him. It's a great book though...at least he doesn't want me to read, "I'll Love You Forever" or whatever the title of that book is...you know, the one where the mom rocks her son every night and says, "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, As Long as I'm living, My baby you'll be." I mean it's a sweet book, until the son is grown and living across town and the mom uses a ladder every night to sneak into his room and rock him to that little poem. Now that's a little creepy...I would have a serious problem with my mother-in-law if she ever tried to do that! But I'm getting a little off topic here...

Speaking of Dr. Seuss, we live really close to the place he grew up. They have a Dr. Seuss Memorial Garden, and when my parents were here in April we went to see it. Here are a few pictures from the trip.

The first one is Owen standing in front of a giant book with the words to "Oh, The Places You'll Go" written on it. I actually read the words to the book for the first time on that giant book a few years ago. I liked it so much that when Owen was born I had to get a copy for him.


And the next picture is Owen with my dad...Grandpa Chuck...standing in front of the "Horton Hears a Who" Statue. We took Owen to see "Horton Hears a Who" when it first opened up, he seemed to like it OK...until he fell asleep.


So there you have it...Owen's favorite book. It's a great one...if you haven't read it yet he would highly recommend it!

A Throwing Problem

Lately, Scott keeps telling Owen that he is going to be the next Tom Brady. I think Owen is feeling the pressure, because he's really been working on his throwing arm! Come over to my house anytime when Owen is home and you will see something flying through the air. Usually it's a ball. Owen loves to play catch. But it's not always something as nice as a ball. He will also throw pots and pans, spoons, toys...pretty much anything he gets his hands on is going to be leaving his hands by way air travel. On Sunday our lovely Relief Society President who sits by us and helps keep Owen entertained during sacrament meeting was going to give him these cute little rocks to play with. They have cute sayings like "Persist 'ant'", and "Obedie 'ant'". They would have been great to keep a child distracted, as long as that child isn't mine. I quickly let her know about his bad habit though. I could only imagine a cute little rock saying "Obedie 'ant' " being chucked across the room and hitting an innocent person in the head. That would be bad.

Probably the worse thing he throws is food though. At dinner time there is always peas or mashed potatoes flying through the air. He threw a grape in sacrament meeting a few weeks ago, we never found it. Last Sunday he threw cheese in sacrament meeting. At least that is easier to spot than a grape. And yesterday was probably the worse. We were eating breakfast and he decided he didn't want his yogurt anymore. So guess what? He threw it...at me. It's not very nice being covered in yogurt first thing in the morning. Especially when you have a very limited maternity wardrobe!

I have no idea how to get him to stop. We've tried telling him to stop, but it's hard to reason with a 19 month old. We've tried ignoring it to see if it would go away, but it's not. I really have no idea how to stop him. Maybe only time will break him of this bad habit? If anybody has a suggestion I would welcome it...and so would our kitchen floor.

Noises in the Night

To fully appreciate my state of mind in the following story, you must know what I was reading last week. I was reading "Bag of Bones" by Stephen King. In the book, the main character returns to his summer home after his wife dies. When he gets there he discovers he is not alone, there are some ghost living in the house too. One of the ways he communicates with the ghost is by asking them yes or no questions, and then they will knock on the walls...once for yes, twice for no.

So last night at about 10:30 I was crashing...I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore. Owen and I had spent the day at our ward's Pioneer Day celebration. So Owen had taken a later than normal nap, 3:00 - 6:30! I didn't expect him to just fall asleep easily, and I was so tired I didn't want to try to wrestle him to sleep. So I did the best thing I could think of, I brought him up to bed with me. That always works like a charm...he falls asleep fast in our bed, and sleeps so soundly. Scott wasn't ready to go to bed though, he was up working on writing something on the computer.

Owen and I feel asleep fast. Neither of us usually have a problem sleeping. I was having a weird dream...I seem to have a lot of those lately. People tell me it's the pregnancy hormones. I don't remember what was happening in the dream, I only remember somebody banging on a box really loudly, so loudly that it woke me up. I was laying there in a sleepy haze trying to remember if the banging I heard was just in my dream...or in real life. I have a few boxes next to the window in the bedroom, and it sounded like somebody had been banging on those. I convinced myself that it was all in my dream though, so I should fall back to sleep. All of the sudden "BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG!!!!" Yikes! Those were not in my dream....they were coming from the boxes next to the window, somebody was banging on the boxes. Scott had closed the door to the bedroom so the cat wouldn't bother us, so I knew it couldn't be the cat. Scott still wasn't in bed yet. So of course my next logical conclusion was that we had ghost. Ghost that knew what I was reading too. They had figured out the best way to communicate with us was to bang on things, like the ghost in the book. I was freaking out! I decided to lay really still...maybe I was going crazy...but no. "BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG"! I sat up and turned on the light really fast. I rationalized that it couldn't be ghost because they aren't real. Our cat Peter must have got in somehow and his tail was banging against the box! But Peter was nowhere to be seen when I turned on the light.

I had to go get Scott and let him know we had a ghost problem. Owen was sleeping on the bed though. I couldn't leave him upstairs with the ghost...who knew if they were friendly or not? All of the sudden "BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG"! The sound was still coming from the boxes! I was just going to have to call down to Scott to come upstairs. Then all of the sudden I heard Scott's voice, "HELLO!" He must have heard the banging too and though I was trying to get his attention....but wait, he was outside. I went over to the other window in our bedroom, the one not by the boxes. I cautiously peeked outside. Scott was out there! What was he doing outside in the middle of the night? "Let me in, I'm locked out!"

I guess Scott had gone outside to bring Owen's stroller in (we had gone for a walk last night). When he tried to come back in, the door was locked! So he decided to throw pebbles at the window to wake me up. That only works on cheesey romance movies and commercial though. So then he decided to bang on the house underneath the window. Hence all the banging! Mystery solved...we have no ghost.

Of course...how did the door lock itself from the inside after Scott went out to get the stroller? Maybe the mystery isn't solved at all.....

Saving Money

This is one of Owen's favorite toys...if you can call it that. Before he was born I bought him this coin bank at the Big E (which is pretty much a state fair for all of New England). You put the money in the mouth and it winds its way down to the belly which holds all the treasures! Whenever Owen's acting naughty I can always show him a penny and he'll get all excited to go and put it in his bank. Of course I don't know if rewarding him with money when he's bad is a great idea...but sometimes I get tired of telling him "Don't do that!" all day long. So this is another option that isn't as tiring! I figure when the fall comes we can take all the coins and buy another bank for his sister Holly! I'm sure Owen isn't going to want to share his. Hopefully his love of savings will last a life time...it never hurts to be a little frugal.

Thunder and Lightning and Rain, Oh My!

Everybody who lives in Western Massachusetts with me knows that we have been getting dumped on with rain for the past few days. We've been having quite the lightning and thunderstorms too. These got a little too close for comfort last night though. I was laying down around 10:30 trying to get to sleep when all of the sudden I heard the LOUDEST thunder I have ever experienced in my life...KABOOM, KAPOW, KAZAM!!! And the house was filled with the white light of lightning! I think my heart stopped beating for about 15 seconds, it was pretty frightning. When the sound finally died down we were left in complete darkness. Our power was out. My heart finally started beating again. Scott and I got up to go look out the window to see if we could see anything. What we saw was that all of our neighbors had power...and all the street lights were on. So we figured our house had been hit somewhere. I was worried that all the wires in the house were going to be fried...not something I was overly excited about. But Scott went into the basement to check the circuit breakers. I guess the main switch to the house had flipped off. So he flipped it back on, and thankfully the power came back on too. There wasn't much else to do, so we went to bed.

This morning we woke up to a dead phone and a DVR that won't turn on. Nothing too major. We've probably just lost 30 episodes of "Little Einstiens" that were saved on the DVR, but we can resave them all again! I took a walk around the house trying to see where and if we had been hit by lightning. I didn't notice anything. I called the phone company and the satalite company to get everything up and working again. Then as I was sitting at the table eating breakfast with Owen I noticed that the chimney on our garage didn't look quite right. Half the bricks were missing, and the rest were all out of chimney shape! So I went outside and sure enough there were bricks all over the yard and on top of the garage's roof. Our garage isn't attached, so I hadn't even thought to look at it during that morning's inspection. So I'm guessing the chimney got a bolt of lightning through it. I'm not terribly diappointed. Who needs a chimney on their garage anyway? I hope I never have to live through that again though. Thunder is really loud when it's only 30 feet away.

And Owen slept through the whole thing....

My Favorite Series

I have been hearing a lot lately about how great the Twilight series is by Stephenie Meyer. It seems like a craze all of the sudden. How I'm I just learning about these books? My friend Andrea pointed out to me that she told me about them back in February at book club. I kind of remember her talking about them...but all of the sudden the book is popping up every where and it's hard to ignore! I've been reading blogs about them. My coworkers are suddenly circulating the books throughout the office. I saw a huge sign at Walmart last night about the upcoming 4th book. I can't seem to get away from all this talk of the Twilight series. So I'm giving in...I can't resist a great read and everybody says they are a great read. I got a note from the library telling me the first book is ready for me to pick up and read. I just have to finish the other 2 books I'm trying to read right now. Why is there never enough time to read all the books out there?

But, the purpose of this post is to tell you all about my favorite series of books. I think they need to be getting a little bit of attention too. I started reading them about 8 years ago, right before the 5th book was set to come out. It's the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon. Back when I picked up the first book I found it in the Romance section at Barnes & Noble (They have since been moved to the more respectable fiction section). I was instantly hooked! It's the story of Claire, a nurse from the 1940's who accidentally stumbles back in time to 18th century Scotland. There she meets our hero Jamie, who is a young 23 year old Scot who she ends up married to. It wasn't a short book either. "Outlander" the first book in the series is about 800 pages, and every book after has been longer. I think the last one was about 1200 page in hardcover form. So if you like a lot of story, these are great books. Right now I'm anxiously awaiting the 7th book, but it probably won't be out until sometime next year. The books in order are:

"Outlander"
"Dragonfly in Amber"
"Voyager"
"Drums of Autumn"
"The Fiery Cross"
"A Breath of Snow & Ashes"

By the last book Claire and Jamie are in their 50's living in America getting ready for the Revolutionary War. So, if you are looking for something great to read that will take up a lot of time, these books are great. The only pain is waiting for the next book to come out.

7 Layers of Disappointment

The other day my friend from college, Amber, reminded me during the Memory Lane game that we use to eat a LOT of 7 Layer burritos from Taco Bell. I don't think I have had one since I left college, maybe not since the last time I saw Amber! I had to go and get one. So, I "accidentally" forgot my peanut butter and jelly sandwich that I'm suppose to eat for lunch and headed to the nearest Taco Bell instead. I ordered a 7 Layer Burrito and a water. I didn't want to overdue it. I was all excited to try one out again. Afterwords, I couldn't believe that we use to eat these all the time! I'm just hoping that I got a really bad one. In the picture from Taco Bell's website, the layers are neatly stacked one on top of the other, so you get a little bit of each layer in each bite. Mine was not like that. First...there was about 2 inches of tortilla just sitting at the top with nothing in it. I tore that off, who wants to eat a plain tortilla? (Unless it's one of those cook 'em yourself kind that my parents get in Utah...those are so delicious!) On my first bite I got guacamole and a little bit of sour cream. Then came the tomatoes and lettuce. Finally, at the bottom was a huge blob of beans that were way too thick and sticky. It was awful! They need to learn how to layer their burritos a little better. I'm sure they were just being in a hurry, and what can I really expect for $2.00? But if I worked at Taco Bell I would make sure all my burritos looked like the one pictured. Of course I probably wouldn't be working there for too long because I would be really slow. But at least people would like my burritos!

Memory Lane Game

I found this on two of my best friends from college's blogs, so I guess I'm going to have to participate...I have such a horrible memory though so it will be tough for me!

Here are the directions:

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you. If you don't want to play on your blog, or if you don't have a blog, I'll leave my memory of you in my comments. HAVE FUN!

Saturday Night

One of the nice things about living outside of Utah and in the mission field is that we get to have to missionaries over for dinner more than once every 10 years. I think that's about how often my parents get to have them over. If we really felt like feeding 2 hungry boys once a week I'm sure we could. I'm not that ambitious though. I try to have them over once a month. I figure it can't hurt to have their sunny personalities around my husband...and I want my kids to grow up with the missionaries in our home. Maybe they will look up to them and strive to be like them....crossing my fingers!

So we had the missionaries over for dinner last Saturday. Everybody seemed to be having a good time...except for Owen. The whole time the missionaries were here he didn't crack a smile. He just sat in his high chair with his fingers in his mouth and looked at them with "angry skepticism". At least that's how Scott described it. I wish I could have gotten a picture. It was actually pretty funny...and our fine missionaries didn't take any offense though, they though it was funny too. I guess my plan to have my son admire the missionaries isn't working out too well right now, but hopefully it will as time passes!

Sense of Humor

I'm happy to report that Owen has a sense of humor! It's so hard to go through life without one...so I guess he's all set now!

The other night we were running around in the backyard. Owen had a sippy cup full of water and was running around showing it off for the camera...hence the picture below. At one point he dropped the cup, which he does quite often. We don't have fancy sippy cups where the caps screw on though...we just have the cheap ones with the snap on lids. They are the only ones he'll drink out of. So after he dropped the cup and picked it back up he decided to take a drink. Bad idea...the lid had come loose after being dropped, so when he went to take a drink the lid came off and he got showered with lots of water!

Instead of crying and getting upset as some kids might do...he just started laughing hysterically! It was so stinkin' cute. I'm glad he doesn't get upset by life's little accidents...he can just laugh them off. Of course he's still 19 months old...so hopefully he'll hang on to his sense of humor as he gets older.

I also thought this picture was cute. We went out to Applebees for dinner a few nights ago (same night as the cup incident) and Scott got some ice-cream for dessert. As soon as Owen saw it he opened his mouth so wide letting Scott know he wanted some. He looked like a little bird waiting for a worm! It was too cute not to take a picture! And he kept on doing it after he swallowed his ice-cream, so there was plenty of opportunities!

Widget Fun

Widgets are just way too fun. My old boss sent me this one...some of it's true, some not. It's hard to pick you favorite out of 15 pictures!

Pretty much you just go through about 12 sets of pictures...15 pictures in each set and you choose your favorite picture from each set. Then it tells you about your personality from what you picked. I don't know why I need a computer program to tell me about my personality though. Shouldn't I already know this stuff by myself?

Look-Alike Meter

Jocelyn and Kelly can't have all the fun can they? I guess you were all right, Owen does look more like me...but only by 15%

MyHeritage: Family tree - Genealogy - Celebrity - Collage - Morph

Popsicle's Take 2

I'm happy to report that my son is not the communist we all thought he was when he wouldn't eat an Otter Pop. Turns out that he's not too fond of the plastic covering it comes in. The other day I found some actual twin popsicles...the kind on sticks that I use to love as a child. I don't know why I couldn't find any at Big Y. Maybe they are too high and mighty for them, or I'm just blind. But yesterday after we played outside and got hot I decided to give the real popsicles a try. Owen loved it...as you can see from his happy face and thumbs up.



Maybe he has fond memories of these types of popsicles. The last time I had one was when I was in labor with Owen. I was in labor for a LONG time...and of course you can't eat or drink anything during that time. But the nurse said I could have a popsicle. Oh my goodness...I don't think I have ever tasted anything so good as that orange popsicle when I was in labor. I wanted to cry when it was gone! So maybe Owen remembers too...his last meal before coming into the world!

Day Trip

Last Saturday we got to take a nice long road trip to visit Scott's cousin Brian. OK...it was only an hour away...but with the price of gas it could have been a long road trip just a few years ago. We don't get to see Scott's cousin much, which is too bad since he has two little kids Owen's age. They are Owen's only cousins out here that are close to his age. His two other cousins out here are in their 20's. So I like when we can get together.

The weather was beautiful, even though they predicted heat and humidity. There was a nice breeze and we had a fun time just hanging out in the yard, chatting and eating lots of food! Owen was having a great time because his cousins have tons of cool toys that he doesn't have...like a kiddie pool! I told you, we have got to get one. Owen decided to dive in, clothes and all! Thankfully I had taken his shoes off when we got there. His cousin Eli had poured bubble bath solution into the pool though...so it was a bubbly mess. Owen kept trying to climb up the little plastic slide they had put into the tub and wasn't getting too far with all the bubbles coating it! He had a ball though!


His cousins also had one of those cute little plastic cars...and since Owen is obsessed with cars he was all over it. I really feel like I deprive my child when we go to other people's houses! They have all the cool toys. But if we had them, they wouldn't be so exciting to him when we went to other people's houses.


I brought a change of clothes for Owen, but I didn't want to put them on until we were leaving. I didn't want two sets of wet clothes. So he got to run around in his diaper with his cousin Cordellia. They had fun playing at a toy kitchen set. Another toy we don't have at our house! Talk about depriving a kid of all fun toys.

Here is Owen with Eli and Cordellia. What cute kids! Owen looked pasty white compared to his two cousins though. Maybe we should let him out of the house more often!

The day was over too soon. Hopefully we will all get together again soon.

Oh...nursery update...Owen did a little better yesterday. When there was about 15 minutes left he peeled himself away from me and started playing! Hopefully that time will move up next week...and the next until he can finally stay the whole time by himself. I'm aiming for October!

No More Popsicles

My child doesn't seem to like popsicles. He never smiled while eating it...and he actually only had a few bites before throwing it on the floor. I guess we won't need to buy any stock in Otter Pops!

Top Ten Books to Read Before You Die

I came across this article on AOL today. "10 Books to Read Before You Die" I love to read, so I thought I would check it out. Here is what they had:

#1 - The Holy Bible - Good that it's number one and one I should really get to reading. I'm embarrassed to say that I'm 28 years old and haven't read the whole Bible yet...just The Book of Mormon. One of my goals though is to read the scriptures from The Bible to the Pearl of Great Price to my children. We are working on it, one chapter a day...

#2 - Gone With the Wind - Good book...I don't know if you need to read it before you die though. It's more like a soap opera to me...but I love to read long books, so I enjoyed it.

#3 - The Lord of the Rings Series - I read "The Hobbit" and wasn't overly excited by it. I didn't enjoy watching the movies that much either. So I don't know if I will ever read these books before I die...plus it's 3 books...how can 3 books count as 1?

#4 - Harry Potter Series - I also read the first book in this series and wasn't that excited about them. I just don't think I'm into the whole fantasy genre of books. Maybe when my children are older they will be fun to read together though.

#5 - The Stand (Stephen King) - This was a long book...I read it...I thought it was pretty good at first, but it got to be too long towards the end. Again, not really a book I think anybody needs to read before they die.

#6 - The Da Vinci Code - I enjoyed this book. Nothing earth or faith shaking though....just an entertaining book.

#7 - To Kill a Mockingbird - This has always been one of my favorite books! I can't remember when I first read it, but when I first found out that Scott hadn't read it (and he owned a used book store at the time) I had to send him a copy. I haven't read it in a long time though...maybe we can read it as one of our book club books next year!

#8 - Angels and Demons - What? Another Dan Brown book? I think I will pass on this one. Who came up with this list anyway...Dan Brown's publisher?

#9 - Atlas Shrugged - I think I do need to read this book...I hear it's a long one. Has anybody read it? Should I read it? I've heard Glenn Beck talking about it...he recommends it...but I'm not sure how much I want to take advise from Glenn Beck.

#10 - The Catcher in the Rye - This is my father's favorite book...or at least it was written by one of his favorite authors. So I gave it a read a few years ago. Interesting book...but I think one reading was good enough.

So that was the 10 book we all have to read before we die....I found out it was based on a survey of 2,413 adults who were asked to name their favorite books. I think I'm going to think about what my top 10 books would be to read before you die are...that will have to be for another post though. Does anybody out there have a top 10 list of books I should read before I die? It can't be any worse than this list...unless it has 3 Dan Brown books on it. I think he's only written 2 so far though....so it can't be worse. Here's a link to the article if you want to check it out....
http://shopping.aol.com/articles/2008/07/08/10-books-to-read-before-you-die/

Hazy, Hot and Humid

This is my home. I bet you can tell that the picture wasn't taken recently. I took this back in December after a lovely snow storm! I could do with a snow storm about right now. For some reason it can't just be hot in New England, it also has to be humid. It's actually not that hot, only in the 80's. I'm sure my family in Phoenix would love to have a nice 80 degree day. It's really the humidity that makes the summers so unbearable here in New England.

If you can't tell, my house is old too. It was built in 1910. Scott and I thought it would be so charming to buy a big old house. Not too charming in the summer though when you have no central air conditioning! I really don't want to pay to cool the whole house down either. It cost so much to heat it in the winter that I like to think I'm saving a little money for a few months of the year.

Until Owen came along we pretty much just endured the hot summer nights. But once we had Owen I knew I couldn't let him sleep in a hot bedroom. So we came up with a solution. We put one air conditioner in one of our downstairs rooms that doesn't face the sun all day. We then put sheets up on the doors and turned the air conditioner on...so we now have one cool room in the house to sleep in! I slept on the couch, Owen slept in his play pen, and Scott...he got the floor...lucky guy! So we decided to give that a try again this summer. We only sleep downstairs on really hot nights, and we haven't had too many this summer. But being pregnant and sleeping on a couch is not much fun. So last night I made Scott bring the mattress down from the guest bedroom so we could sleep on that. I figured it would be a win-win situation for both of us! The guest bed is only a full size mattress...but it's what Scott and I slept on for the first 4 years of marriage. But we didn't have a child crying in the middle of the night and wanting to sleep in between us. It's hard to believe that such a small person can take up so much space on a bed. Finally after almost falling off the mattress about 20 times I got on the couch and slept much more peacefully. The fall wouldn't have been too far...but the floor is still harder than the couch. So Owen and Scott cuddled up for the rest of the night. Scott said he woke up a few times on the edge of the mattress himself...I guess Owen is ready for a bigger bed! Hopefully tonight he will stay in his playpen, because it's suppose to be another hot night!

Back To Work

So, after a great 4 day weekend I had to go back to work today. We didn't do anything too exciting for the most part. The fireworks were cancelled in our city because of projected thunderstorms (there weren't any, but I guess they have to play it safe). So we just had a little bar-b-que at my sister-in-laws house and watched "Underdog". Other than that Owen and I went shopping a little...we went out to eat one day at a new restaurant and we hung out around the house a lot.

Probably the highlight of the weekend was when we drove up to Greenfield to see a concert in the park. I love concerts in the park because they are free! I remember growing up my parents use to always drag us to the concerts in the park to watch some banjo playing family, and we hated it of course. But now I love taking Owen to hang out with all the old people and watch the banjo playing families. This concert was a little more fun though...it was put on by a indie folk singer that I have grown quite fond of. Her name is Erin McKeown. I have some of her songs playing on my music player on this blog. This was the 4th time we've got to see her...but it's been almost 2 1/2 years since we last saw her. We took along one of my friends from work and we all had a good time. Since it was at a park Owen got to run around and be a kid for a while. They had this cute little wooden train. The park was actually really small...it's between two railroad tracks, and during the opening girl's act a train went by. It was pretty interesting! Here are a few pictures I took at the concert....

So that was the highlight of the weekend. I've also decided that Owen hates the nursery at church! He was great the first week, but he seems to be disliking it more and more each week! I think it might be easier just to take him to Relief Society with me...but he needs to get use to nursery. Maybe next week will be better. Nursery does fall in the middle of his usual nap time, so maybe that's the problem? I don't know...I just hope he gets use to it by October when Holly comes along!

Pool Time?

I think it may be time for us to get a pool...at least a little kiddy one. Every time it rains we get a huge puddle in the section of our unpaved driveway. It's been raining a lot out here for the past few days! A few days ago Owen and I went to the store, and as I was carrying in 4 bags of groceries he decided to start splashing in the puddle. I was not too happy about that and brought him in the house before too much damage could be done. Well, tonight we went out to dinner with my mother-in-law, and when we got home Owen saw that tempting puddle again...obviously from the below picture he couldn't resist! Except this time he decided to sit down in the puddle to get a better splash! Also this time I just let him get muddy...I figured that's what kids do...and he was already wet. So I let him have some fun.


I also made sure he realized that a nice clean warm bath is much more fun than a muddy old puddle! But I guess time will only tell if the novelty of the puddle has worn off...I'm guessing it hasn't!

Yummy Cookies

I love cookies! I found this new recipe for Banana Oatmeal cookies and just had to try it out. I had two brown bananas and had to do something with them. They were really good, so I thought I would share the recipe with all my blogger buddies. They are kind of a cake like cookie...which I love, but if you don't I wouldn't advise making them. So here's the recipe..ENJOY!

Banana Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup white sugar
3/4 cup shortening
1 egg
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 3/4 cups oatmeal
1 cup mashed ripe bananas (I only had 3/4 cup, but it worked fine)
1/2 cup chopped nuts or raisins (I used chocolate chips...I don't like raisins and nobody in my husband's family likes nuts...they were really good with chocolate chips!)

1. Cream together sugar, shortening and egg. Add all other ingredients and mix well.
2. Drop by rounded teaspoonful onto ungreased cookie sheet.
3. Bake at 400 degrees for about 10 minutes or until light brown.

Happy 4th of July!

Birthday Celebration

Here are some pictures from last nights huge birthday bash at our house! Ok, this is about as much of a bash as we usually have. Sometimes Scott's family comes over, but not today. Scott runs a meeting the first Tuesday of the month in Northampton for Comic Book writers and artist. I thought maybe he would cancel it because it was his birthday, but no...he went. He said he would be home by 8:30 though. So I got busy as soon as I got home getting dinner and everything else ready. First Owen and I had to run to Big Y to get some potatoes and brocolli, Scott loves steamed brocolli. So of course Big Y had no fresh brocolli to be found. So we settled for the frozen varity. Then we went home and put the potatoes in the oven to bake. Meanwhile Owen and I started the cupcakes. Owen was a big help! He put the cupcake liners in the cupcake sheet...he always wants to help out! Halfway through the mixing of the cupcake batter I realized that I had no oil...I had used it all a few weeks ago to make fondue! So I grabbed a shoeless Owen and ran out the door to Stop & Shop...thank goodness we live a block away from 2 supermarkets! We got our oil and ran back home to finish the cupcakes. From there everything went pretty smoothly. Owen helped me wrap Scott's present. Dinner was done at 8:30, and of course Scott didn't get home until 9:00. So it was a late birthday party, but we had a good time. These are the kinds of nights I like, just staying home with my little family....who could ask for anything better?

Here's Scott eating his dinner...steak, brocolli, califlower and twice baked potatoes. It was very yummy if I do say so myself!

Here Scott is blowing out his "candle". We didn't have any candles, so I improvised with another match.

Owen mainly liked the cream cheese part of the cupcake...he left most of the chocolate part on his tray.

We got Scott a Twilight Zone book for his birthday...how exciting! Scott is obsessed with "The Twilight Zone". This weekend there is a Twilight Zone marathon on the Sci-Fi Channell and it will be on all day and far into the night. I don't know why we have to watch it because we have every episode on DVD...but every 4th of July and New Years Eve they have the same marathon and we get to have it on the tv non-stop. The book we got him is actually the 5th book in a series that started coming out about 4 years ago. They are scripts from the show and they have notes on them that Rod Serling (the director, sometimes writer) made. Rod Serling died a while ago, but his wife signed them all. I think there is only 600 copies of each book. So he was happy!

Baby's Name

Well, I think we have it. At least I'm 95% sure we have it. I'm sure most people will hate it, but I love it...and Scott is on board with the name. We've chosen a name that I think is very cute and feminine, but not trendy. In fact it only ranked #339 last year for girl baby names, but it's easy to pronounce and everybody has heard it. It is actually the name that we had picked out for Owen if he was a girl. He was due around Christmas time, and it's a great Christmas name. So when we found out we were having a girl Scott wanted to carry over the name...but I was a little reluctant since it seems like a Christmas name. But I had a dream the other night and in it our little girl had this name...so I figured it was a sign and I've been very comfortable with the name since then.

The name we've chosen is Holly. It's not glamorous...but I love it. And EVERYBODY I have ever know named Holly has been a WONDERFUL person. I've never met a Holly that I didn't like. That was important to me. There were a lot of beautiful names out there, but if I ever met somebody I didn't like with the name it was off the list. So her full name will by Holly Colleen Sheaffer. If you don't like it, that's OK. We like it and that's what's most important. Of course as I said before...it's only 95% certain that Holly will be her name. We still have 16 weeks to change our minds.

Oh...and Happy Birthday to Scott today! It's his 3?st birthday!!! I would tell you exactly how old he is, but I don't want to embarrass him!