Happy Anniversary!

This year marks our 3 year anniversary. CRAZY! I feel like it couldn't possibly have been 3 years already, and yet, at the same time, I feel like it has been so much longer! I can hardly remember being single... I am so glad to be married!

This year, Ane and Mark offered to keep Aaron over night so we postponed festivities to the weekend. That didn't stop me from making a nice dinner for Eric on the 26th. Nor did it stop Eric from picking up my favorite shake on his way home from work! Both were surprises :)

Our plans for this weekend were to have a picnic on the beach, grab a hotel by the beach, eat a fabulous breakfast, pick out some fun presents for each other, visit the Tillamook factory, have a great lunch, and then pick up Aaron ... however, somebody decided to have several ridiculous contractions throughout the night on Thursday making Eric nervous to take me too far away. (p.s. still pregnant, sadly) So Eric decided to take me to the Cheesecake factory for dinner. He made sure the evening would be special even though we were staying close to home.

He got me 3 gorgeous crystal roses that he had shipped to work (I assumed that since we were going to pick out gifts for each other on our date that he hadn't gotten me roses this year...) so I never saw them. He then stopped by the restaurant before picking me up to drop off the roses so the waitress could surprise me with them at our table. So romantic.

The rest of our evening was quiet. We rented a movie and stayed at home. We didn't pick up Aaron till 4:30 this afternoon and that was heaven. I missed the little guy, but it was so nice to have time just with Eric, especially knowing that time with just Eric will be few and far inbetween once we have this little girl!

Happy Anniversary my love! Thank you for making it so special and for making me feel so special. I am truly lucky to have you in my life. Thanks for choosing me. Thanks for marrying me for time and all eternity!

Playing the Parents

This story is just too good to not put down on record:

On Sunday, I was making breakfast in the kitchen - bacon and egg burritos. mmmmmmmmmmm. Aaron came up to me with a bag of snacks and asked if he could have some. I, of course, responded no, he needed to wait for breakfast. He then gave me a strange huffy look and declared, "ask Daddy!" He then proceeded to walk to the other side of the kitchen to ask Eric if he could have the snacks. After choking down a laugh, Eric told him that he needed to wait for breakfast, to which Aaron responded with a loud sigh and drooped shoulders as he went to put the snacks away.

He tried this same method to get the same snacks while I was finishing up dinner last night. What on earth? I thought kids didn't learn to play the parents till they are older... I guess we had better prepare if he is starting this early!

Love

Eric's Guilty Pleasure ... Twilight Imperium

36 Weeks!

According to the doctor, I am now 36 weeks! So close!!!

I am so beyond ready to meet this little girl!

Quiet Book

Sometime last year (I don't actually remember when ... I just know both of our boys were over a year old at the time), my friend, Emily, approached me with the idea to make a quiet book. Her thought was that we would go in on the project together - each making half of the pages, twice. Genius, right? We may have been a bit over eager as we decided to make the book about 22 pages long (including the covers). I was so gung-ho about it in the beginning but then it got put on the back burner since I had no work space, and then I got pregnant (if anyone is bothered that I milk this pregnant excuse, I dare you to get pregnant with a toddler and then I double dare you to not use it too! anyway...) and, well, you get the idea.

But recently, I jumped back on the wagon! My craft room is a disaster - but that is why I have a craft room. It's so I can make a mess and simply close the door. :) Sometimes, given how it used to be (at the apartment, I would pull everything out, make a mess, and then leave it seeing as I would need the mess again the next day), I think Eric appreciates my craft room even more than I do.

I mentioned to a friend of mine the other day that I am working on a quiet book for Aaron and she said that, if I ever felt the urge to make another one, she would pay me to make one for her little girl. I simply chuckled nervously and changed the subject. I didn't have the heart to tell her she couldn't afford me. Seriously, I would charge like $200 for this puppy! Given all the resources, time (oh goodness, so much time), frustration (felt stretches, no matter what you do, therefore nothing comes out straight *sigh*) and love that goes into making one of these, $200 is actually a fair price. Luckily, if I ever do decide to do this again, I made patterns for each page with detailed instructions (I am opening an etsy shop to sell the patterns. Contact me if you are interested!). But really, I don't plan on making another one anytime soon...

Here are some pictures of the pages I made! If you want to see the ones Emily made, go here! They are absolutely adorable!

Here is a shot of all the pages done by me

Here are the spring/summer, fall/winter pages. The flowers button on and off (notice the adorable blanket stitch on the flowers and fish), the fish are a matching game, you can dress the snow man, and the leaves are velcro.

Here is the clock, Mr. Potato Head (again, cute blanket stitch!), and a page with matching shapes and weaving.

  

 This page was fun - it is a road with a car attached for them to drive at church. No more hunting down the cars Aaron loses under the pew!

 The dryer page won't be on my etsy shop because I used someone else's pattern for it. The dryer opens and has clear vinyl on the center. The boys can then pair the socks :) 

And I am rather proud of my barn page. You can braid the horse's tail, there is a rooster hiding under a flap in the top, and there are 3 finger puppets.

 Each page had sooooo many moving pieces and parts to it ... it is no wonder it took so long! Now I just need to serge the pages together and bind them :) I look forward to giving this to Aaron for his birthday!

Father's Day

I know this post is late, but with my family in town, things were a bit crazy.

I want to tell you about the lesson Eric taught his Priests on Father's Day. He taught about Priesthood Worthiness -- what it takes to be worthy to hold the Priesthood. One of the items was to treat women right. They then went in-depth about what this means - what it means to respect women. After this, Eric then very solemnly told the young men that it isn't simply not treating women wrong; it goes beyond that. He said that if they don't do everything they can to build up each woman around them that they were not worthy Priesthood holders.

That is the man that is raising my son and will raise many more of my children. That is the man I have been blessed to meet, date, and marry. The man who knows what it means to be worthy to hold the Priesthood - who knows how his life should be lived and strives to live it that way.

Go ahead, be jealous. It's ok. I would be too if I were you. :-)

For Father's Day, Eric got this framed for his desk at work:

He also got this awesome shirt made by Aaron! Aaron loves to go up and put his hands on the hand prints he made. It says, "World's Best Dad, Hands Down!"

I love this man so much. He is honestly the best - it is as though he was made just for me.

Couple Cute Shots

 What will he do when this convenient pillow is gone?

 

 Helping the boys set up the game :) 

 After Thomas' birthday party on Friday, the kids played for hours. Aaron played for a long time but took a cute break - content to just sit with Gramma. Also, Aaron LOVED the chocolate cake!

When Eric is on the computer late at night, we move the couch cushions into the office for me to lay on.

Today, after using the potty, Aaron bolted before I could get his underwear on ... this is where I found him hiding.

Surprise Family Visit!

My Mom texted me at 1am last Friday informing me that they would be leaving for Oregon in the morning. Surprise! Grams, Tom, Mikayla (Aaron calls her Booky), Kestra, and Anna all drove out and arrived around 1am on Saturday and stayed till this morning.

We mostly stayed around the house, though we went to the water park on Saturday and made a (very long) shopping trip on Monday.

The pictures are pretty self-explanatory. Enjoy!

Aaron was very sad when he realized they were leaving and he didn't get to go with.

Good thing we will see them again soon!!!

The last night they were here, Eric got onto a game called XCOM and everyone got a character.

 The "black dude" is Thomas, Mikayla has the purple hair, Kestra looks like herself, as does Eric, and I have white hair and tan skin. Not sure how I feel about my character being "heavy" but I guess it fits ... ;)

 A little explanation on this last photo - apparently Eric had a habit of taking Mikayla's drink unknowingly, so Mikayla made it blatantly obvious that it was her drink...