the second annual hope christmas video

remember last year? if you need your brain refreshed click here.
if you do remember last year and you have been waiting for your christmas wishes to come true, the moment has finally arrived. sorry to have kept you waiting. merry christmas! and happy sleigh riding!



note: dan is amazing. seriously, he rocks! he is why we have a video.

the culprit

"nova, who put my rugs on the couch?"


"i don't know."

"ok.....i forgive you...."

seriously....i can't keep the rugs ON THE FLOOR.....nova is constantly dragging them around...weird...and dirty...good thing we vacuum them everyday too.


in other news, i have been working on 'christmas-a-fying' our home....and yeah, that's a word. it means, to make your home feel warm, cozy, happy and christmas-y and/or to make your home TOTALLY AWESOME!!! seriously, go ask webster.....

anyway, i made a couple of wreaths that i found online here:

mine looks better than i anticipated....my bow could use a little help....but it was pretty fun.

then also i did this one which is pretty psycho, but i like it oddly.....i found the tutorial here. super easy and cheap... anyway.....so to sum up:
i love christmas
i love rugs on my couch and the little girl that puts them there.
i love dan for being excited with me when i take on projects like wreaths made out of cheap materials.

here is also a video of nova watching her favorite thing of all time these days: cinderella.....particularly bibbity bobbity boo. all she wants to do is sing and dance to this show.

don't you judge me.....

so apparently it has come down to this: i only blog on holidays. don't you judge me.

we had a great thanksgiving. we spent it with dan's family in j-town. we ate a TON of delicious food, went to a movie, dan and i hit the black friday sales together, played some games, watched some football, went to the temple and took a few good naps. all in all, a great holiday. today we all have been hit too hard by the reality that the regular mundane must return and nova is wondering where all the people are to dote on her. what....am i not good enough anymore? apparently not.

previous to the thanksgiving holiday, we have enjoyed relatively good weather. we went on some drives, went to the park, dan's parents came for a visit, my parents came for a visit, my brother and sister-in-law and nephew came for a visit, canned some potato stew, diligently attended story time. amongst other thngs and have just really been busy apparently.

one highlight of the month is that we took nova to the discovery museum. that is a really fun place and nova had a complete blast. we went their and were able to have a PKU friendly breakfast, get current info on PKU, and then mingle with other families and adults who have children with PKU. it is always reassuring for me to go to events like this and see other people dealing with the things that i am. i leave feeling uplifted and encouraged every time they have a function like that.

and we'll end it there for now. here are some pics to share. tis the season right?

nova at the discovery museum. they have a little kids sized grocery store and nova filled her cart with bananas. ----side note: they have this section in the museum where everything is 'kid sized'. as nova was playing in the grocery store area, i thought to myself. 'self, i wish i was little, so i could do this (grocery shopping) too.' and then i thought to myself, 'self, you do get to do this (grocery shopping), and it isn't THAT fun.'......i guess everything seems more fun when it is fun-sized........

black friday: mission: hard drive---success!
ok, i know this is insanely late, but i was proud of my costume this year......
dan made a robot out of a diaper box for nova
bundled up for a brisk walk......dare we leave the baby and bear behind.....nay i say.nova and dan's favorite spot: up in the tree reading books.

do i even need a caption for this pic? i love this girl!

Nova's First Halloween

Apologies to any of those coming here for witty banter or funny stories. This is strictly a post for pictures of Nova in order to keep her two grandmas from strangling her parents for not posting pictures of her often enough. At this point you may be saying, "But you already post so many pictures of that darn tyke even when you do bother to write something." Obviously, that's just not enough pictures for those grandmas.

Most of you nodded your head at that last sentence. If any of you thought, "Good grief, how could they possibly need that many pictures? She looks exactly the same in every one!" I can only conclude you either don't have kids or you don't have parents.

And you should consider yourself lucky.

Haha, just kidding.

Well, 95% kidding anyway.

Okay, fine mom, I'm just kidding about the 95%.

It's 98%.

So for any of you still looking for anything other than pictures of Nova, flee while you still can. I promise Suzanne will return in a few days to give one of her hilarious posts. In the meantime, it's nothing but baby cheeks from here on out.

Front cheeks, not the rear ones; just in case that warning alarmed anyone.

First up, some pics of Nova enjoying the fall leaves. She loves them.

Next up we have Nova in her Halloween costume. Suzanne's cousin had a cute lion costume that worked out really well, and Nova didn't seem to hate it, which is actually a big deal for something with a hood.

We took her Trick-or-Treating, but she didn't really get the concept until near the end. We tried to get her to extend her bag to people to get candy but she just looked confused. Somewhere around the second-to-last house she suddenly realized that the stuff people had been tossing into her bag was candy (or NUMMIE-NUMMIEs, in her words). You can imagine the change of character that came over her. We were worried she'd have an aneurysm when we told her "This is the last house."

Don't worry, she survived, and we kept our sanity.

Well, 98% of it anyway.

FINALLY.....

hooray for october...i realize that october is in fact nearly over but it is just beginning for me since until just recently life has been super busy and crazy. i have been busy stressing over a plethora of things, and now they are all over and i feel a huge sense of relief and excitement that i can focus on somethings that i have been really wanting to do, blogging being one.

so for today's post rather than boring those who grace my blog with their presence with the oh so common 'i haven't blogged for a while, here is what we have been doing,' i want to write today about why i love october oh so very much.

1. hello, the main color for the holiday is orange......sweet mercy....need i say more.
2. the air celebrates the holiday. it smells SO good outside. (its probably the smell of orange.)
3. their are so many ways to decorate and celebrate. creative things to cook, and so many reasons to party....and i love parties.
4. you get to dress up, and i love to dress up.
5. now that i have a kid, we get to walk around the neighborhood and gather candy from people......ha!
and the last reason why i love october......drum roll please.....the leaves....i LOVE the leaves, and raking them and jumping in them and driving through them and looking at them and......sigh......they just start falling this time of year and you get to step on them and crunch them and its just beautiful orange-ness swirling everywhere....the world is simply orange-a-fied.....and that's they way...uh-huh-uh-huh i like it, uh-huh-uh-huh......

and pics for the grandmas...
nova after her nap with seriously crazy hair...this picture doesn't even do it justice. i love her face in it though.....'seriously look at this hair...."
















the H.A.L.L.S retreat that was a total blast. we all were asked to work on a 'grandma z' project this past year and then report at this year's retreat to honor my grandma and they way she took on and finished projects. my amazing aunt barbara made aprons for everyone using my grandma zelma's old fabric. they were retro and SO cute....and as always the retreat was SO fun!
















mom and nova's first crazy face picture together.....success! i have been working so hard!















nova in her blue suit staying warm
















nova after playing in the garden














johnny appleseed day 2009














i took this picture from inside. dan is so good at stopping and showing nova ever bug and crack in the sidewalk. its so cute.

is it true?

we have had several calls questioning the validity of my last post. it is true. dan really does have swine flu. he really did catch it in seattle last weekend. he really is wearing dust masks. and yes, we did eat pigs in a blanket.
and we are doing good all things considered. thanks for your concern. we feel loved! :)

when dan is feeling blue about having the swine flu i simply have to remind him that at least he doesn't/can't take the garbage out wearing my pink camouflage capris. hehehe....(this pic was taken a few weeks back when dan remembered that it was his turn for garbage duty at 11:30 pm and he wore my pants.....and i caught him in the act.)

oink *cough* oink.

tonight we are having pigs in a blanket.

here is my pig in a blanket.
















i know....i have a sick sense of humor.

dan caught the swine flu in seattle.

(and i realize these aren't surgical masks....that was a bit of non-thinking on my part when i went about purchasing my swine flu/pandemic supplies for my food storage. now all my fellow blog friends know what a dork i am. whatev.

i wish, i wish not.

it goes without saying that it has been a long time since i have posted. let me simply say that nova has started walking and i have been chasing. i have been canning like a mad woman, and actually enjoying it. we have been cramming in all summer activities such as swimming, going on a million walks, throwing a back to school party, attending a temple dedication, attending a fireside with Elder Ballard, plotting to refinish our dining room table, going to my mother in laws for a few days and canning again like a mad woman--(72 bags of freezer corn, 18 pints of beans, and 18 pints of carrots......whoa....) and in the process have upgraded our computer and i can't figure out how to upload pics or vid...crazy month.

in a totally unrelated bit, sometimes i wish i was nova. and sometimes i don't.

on saturday when we were once again chillin (literally) in our sweet inflatable pool. she was playing in the pool and i was feeding her some honeydew. (that's a type of melon, for those of you who may not know the deliciousness of honeydew.) and i thought to myself, 'self, why aren't you the one in the pool being fed a melon?' ya, i wish i was nova.

later we went on a walk, and she was chill-laxin in the stroller with a sippy full of kool-aid, and crackers, while i was sweating up a storm walking up the monster hill. (i may or may not have snagged a sip from the sippy....but that's irrelevant...) ya, i wish i was nova.

also on saturday i watched nova run into the wall twice, fall 5 times and hit her head on the table within 10 minutes....ya, i am glad that i'm not nova.

she plays with the same toys and reads the same books everyday...ya, i'm glad i'm not nova.

i make nova eat green beans---almost daily.....i am VERY glad i am NOT nova.

she gets put to bed at 7:45pm...i really wish i was nova.

so i guess this dichotomy will never be put to rest.

you have a giant hole in your life.

let me let you in on a little secret. i recently discovered that a part of my life has been missing, and being the sharing person that i am....i will share my secret with you so you will not have a giant hole in your own life, as i did merely weeks prior to this blog.

eclairs. over. the. fire.

WHAT? you say?

i repeat: eclairs. over. the. fire.

OH BABY! heaven in your mouth and down your chin, and possibly on your shirt.
seriously. so. delish.

here are the instructions:

HOW TO FILL THE GIANT HOLE IN YOUR LIFE/COOKING AN ECLAIR OVER THE FIRE

STEP 1:
go to home depot and buy a wooden dowel that is approx an inch in diameter.....if you ask them if they have them, they will ask you "what for?", and you will tell them that it is a mere piece of lumbar that will complete your life.....ok, seriously though, the lady asked me what i wanted it for, and i told her it was to cook a biscuit over the fire and she looked at me like i was CA-RAZY....whatev...i get that look all the time from family and friends ALL the time....didn't faze me. anyway....purchase a dowel. its about 3 bucks....you might want to get more if there are more people partaking of the goodness.

STEP 2:
go to your local market and purchase chocolate frosting, vanilla pudding (i got the fun snack packs) and those crazy shot gun biscuits....i don't know what they are really called.....the biscuits in the roll that you open and it sounds like a shot gun and it makes you want to scream everytime you open them......ya, you want those.

STEP 3:
build a fire. cook some hot dogs and let it die down to smoldering coals.....














STEP 4:
rather than explain in words, here is a video that shows you how.

STEP 5:
cook slowly over a fire--BE PATIENT....didn't your mom ever tell you good things come to those who wait? it is true in this instance....yes, she was right, cook until the biscuit comes off easily from dowel














STEP 6:
fill hole with approx 1/2 snack pack pudding. this is symbolic of the hole that has been present in your life without ever partaking of an eclair. then frost the top or side or a portion of the filled eclair.

STEP 7:
eat. now you can die happy....














dan....you have a piece of heaven on your chin....


also, we did sparklers last night with nova. she loved them....and apparently so did dan from the look on his face right here.

skittle a rink a dink a dink....

i won't even bother playing catch up. we have been reunion-izing, girls camping, celebrating birthdays and trying to recover from the weeks of being gone. here are some pics and video of the last month of enjoying the summer. (the pics are in no particular order.....whatever though right?)

this picture is dan braiding my hair before girls camp.....what a man huh?















here is nova before our hike at the hope family reunion.














here is nova during the hike.....














and here is nova right before we got home....she was WIPED!















here is nova on her birthday before church....we were going to take some more pics after church, but we raced off to a reunion...so this is what we've got. happy birthday novs!














here are pics form our second trip to the zoo this summer. we went with elisa and also met up with our old neighbors the bennions.



















here is nova and i after the 5k....she is sporting my groovy glasses















to preface the 5K---i convinced 2 girls in our ward in the young women to run a local 5K with me the end of june. we decided that we would have matching sunglasses and socks to intimidate the competition......even though you can't see our socks in the picture....oh, well














the day of the race was a local celebration for founders day. they have fireworks at night and here is the picture of the fam before we went outside. by the time they started nova was WAY to tired to be interested.
















this picture takes us back to half-mas day. the glasses were part of the ornaments on the half-mas pine tree in our back yard.














here is nova with crazy hair on half-mas day...what a ham!














here is nova eating her cake and blowing out her candles....low protein cupcakes.....weren't necessarily her fav.















here is nova blowing out her candle. we have practiced the last few weeks and i think she did a really good job....what you don't see on the video is that we did the whole candle thing again in another cupcake......and she burnt herself.....

merry half-mas to all, and to all a good night!

merry half-mas everyone! what is half-mas you ask, AKA as june-mas. it is the celebration of 6 months until the actual holiday of christmas. indeed, 6 months from today is christmas day! K-razy. and so, we celebrate. yesterday for half-mas/june-mas eve, we had a water party of sorts. i had a huge roll of plastic that we tried to make a slip'n slide out of.....didn't work so well, but when we spread it all out, it worked awesome, and since we have a slopped yard, we flew....seriously. the only think i would change for the next time we do this, is....check the bottom of the tarp for thistles, my thigh is PRETTY scratched from the thistle friend we had hanging out at the bottom. ouch....

anyway, tammie and her kids and her mom and nieces stopped on their way back from the pageant as we were trying to figure it all out. it was fun to see them too. i'm pretty sure our neighbors think that dan and i need to grow up.....they can keep on thinkin that if they want, cause we aren't gonna.

here are some videos. of our june-mas eve bash. before our lil family bbq. it also shows nova's stellar crawling skills.

dear jon and kate

dear jon and kate,

i just wanted to say thank you.

thank you for ruining my day.

thank you for proving to america why reality tv bites.

thank you for giving up and showing everyone who may be in a similar situation, that when the going gets tough, separate, and divorce.

thank you for showing your kids that a marriage isn't worth fighting for.

thank you kate for getting caught up in what is NOT important, and thank you jon, for showing me what loyalty is, and that what is most important in life is making yourself happy.

thank you for disappointing your kids, for disappointing me and the 9.8 million viewers who used to really care about your life and enjoyed peaking in on you from time to time. you once made me laugh and now i'm depressed because you think you can't do it anymore.

COME ON! marriage is work, and so are kids! you two, of all people should know! why are you giving up! (not that i expected anything less, with the 'big announcement', ) but i was merely hoping you would prove everyone wrong and say YES, we are going to work it out. YES, we will learn to forgive. YES, we want to do what is best for our family. and YES, we are a team.

thank you for joining the reality morons like jason mesnick, who disappointed me by brutally dumping melissa and running off with molly. and mike who somehow let helen win the biggest loser, and the many others that have conned me in through the reality tube of despair. seriously.
thank you again for nothing. you are no longer on a reality tv show, even though some people may say that you are. what you have done is not reality. in my opinion, marriage is a reality that you stick to and make it work to make it the best thing in your life. way to go and screw it all up.

sincerely,
not your fan anymore,
suzanne

dear plus 8,

i'm sorry. be strong, and wear blinders the rest of your life in the grocery store line so you can't read the tabloids about your parents, or yourselves on how the decision your parents made affected you psychologically.

sympathetically,
suzanne

holla

its been so long since i posted that i have:

ran a 10K with my sisters and mom....(minus tammie)














met with the gibbs (friends from DC) who were visiting....SO GOOD TO SEE THEM!!...which i don't have a pic of them and us, but here is nova's face of sheer delight on the slide at the park where we had our bbq with them.














ran to the grocery store a million times among other places.....which i need to vent. i hate it when people use the exit to enter and the enter to exit. read the signs people. keep the flow moving. its enough that i have a jinx that i will inevitably pick THE LONGEST grocery line to get through. i don't want to wait to go out of the store because people are NOT reading the door signs and there is serious congestion. honestly. BIGGEST PET PEEVE.

and done a jillion things that i don't take a picture of....for some reason i feel as though i have done a million things that are blog worthy....but apparently not....man, i am a loser.

so i guess that leads us to fathers day and a rockin 80's party.

first i have the best father. he has taught me so much about hard work and integrity and by living by the rules. meaning, he never accepted anything but my best in school, sports, or standards. he is always wonderful to give advice and give a good joke. i love that i have many of his characteristics. i also have an awesome father in law who has a strong testimony and is also a hard worker who has been so accepting to me as another daughter. and of course dan, who is super dad to our super nova. i couldn't do the parenting thing without him. nor would i want to. nova's favorite time of the day is when her dad comes home from work.

and lastly, we went to a neighborhood 80's party, which was, totally, like, cool. me and dan were convinced to do a lip sync performance to an 80's song, and pretty much we were like, groovy. i am so glad the 80's are gone, because the combo of big hair, leg warmers, layers and spandex leggings are not helpful in keeping your body temperature at the desired level......the off the shoulder sweatshirt wasn't enough to ventilate my overheating body. but other than that, it was fun. here is a video and pics of the performance......and dan made the guitars........and i am glad dan DOES NOT and WILL NOT EVER have a mullet. seriously....gag me with a spoon.