most joyous joyfulness!!!!

Seriously, if you could see how big my smile is right now....my cheeks are aching!  

I just won a label maker from this super cute blog I've been reading.  Honestly, I don't win anything, and to be honest, I've always wanted a label maker, but when I'm in the store holding one, I just can't bring myself to spend the money.  Well happy happy joy joy I won!  My house is so excited to finally get organized.

six things about me!

My gorgeous friend Catherine just tagged me, and at first I thought, oh, I just did one of these.  But I checked and it was over a year ago!  Too bad I already put the most interesting stuff on the other one.  But here we go:

1. --- there is no rule one. 2. Post the rules on your blog 3. List 6 random things about yourself. 4. Tag 6 people at the end of your post. 5. Let each person know they have been tagged and leave a comment on their blog. 6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

I think this is just going to be a list of embarrassing confessions.

1.  I could live off of carbs!  Candy and bread mostly.  And when I say candy, I don't mean chocolate, because I DON'T LIKE CHOCOLATE!  But I'm so pathetic that last week I bought a loaf of French bread and ate the WHOLE thing before dinner.  Keep me away from the bakery.

2.  

This is my natural hair color!  You may not be impressed, but it's been about 13 years since the hair on my head was all my natural color!  And I'm proud to say that I have yet to find a grey hair.  Knock on wood.  But I've had the itch reallly bad lately to add some color to it.  I can't decide if I want to go back to high maintenance color again.

3.  I made lingerie for a sewing project at BYU! 

4.  I peed my pants running the 1/2 marathon last week.  At mile two!  And it wasn't intentional, but I'm sure as most of you mothers know jumping, running, laughing, they all require a little more concentration after babies.  But in my defense, the lines for the porta pottys at the start were really long, and I knew there'd be more along the way.  I just thought I could make it more than two miles.  But I was running with Jasmyn and we laughed a lot.  Whatever, I'm a real runner now.

5.   When I get really excited or nervous, my fingertips and toes itch.  I have to curl my toes tight and scratch or bite my fingertips.  And when I'm super nervous/excited, my nose tingles too.  Imagine giving a talk in Sacrament meeting while it feels like your nose is going to wiggle right off your face.

This one I have to put up a PG-13 lable.  You've been warned: 

6.  This is what I always use as my most embarrassing moment story.  Ryan and I were caught being "newlyweds" by our BISHOPRIC!!!!  Right after we got married we lived in a basement apartment.  The only way to get to the door is going through a gate, into the backyard and down a stairwell.  Nobody knew we lived there (so we thought).  We forgot that we had our records transfered and the bishopric came to welcome the new couple to the ward.  We just happened to have the door open because it was a nice autumn day.  

Now that I have made a sufficient fool out of myself, I have to tag six more, and the least you can do after I spilled the beans is do it too.  :)  

Katie, Nicole, Rushele, Nikki, Allison, and Monica. 

"MOMMY MOMMY guess what?!?!"

Seriously, Gwen could hardly contain her excitement today as she told me that she met "Jolly Fingers"!  The excitement was learned from watching her dad's reaction to meeting Rollie Fingers.  Growing up Ryan was an A's fan, so today one of his childhood dreams came true!  

Also today, Drake learned that

+= MAD MOMMY!!

New house rule:  KIDS ARE NOT ALLOWED IN THE OFFICE!!!!!

  

some 3 day weekend highlights

• Dinner with our good friends the Andersons. CPK BBQ Chicken pizza? Yes please!

Joel, Kaden, Gavin, Jasmyn, Kristin, Gwen, Ryan and smiley Drake

• We had our friends the LaPortes over for a super duper fun game night.
• An afternoon at the park.  
•  Attending Dave's  baptism.

• Running my first 1/2 marathon!  Thanks for your support Jas!

Before the run.

After the run.

• Completed a goal.  10 min miles.

My darling husband has brainwashed my kids into thinking I'm a good runner, so they were so proud of their mommy.  How cute!

• Our super rad friends Laura and Aaron Elder had us over for yummy dinner and the Cardinals game.  Onto the super bowl!!!  Go Cards!
• Civil Rights day BBQ with family.
• Late nights of Rock Band with Ryan.  Living it up before he starts school again tomorrow.

day six

This little boy is a jabber box!  He's constantly talking and copying people too.  One thing about him that he does really well, is saying prayers.  He LOVES to pray, and usually has to pray at every meal even if somebody else has already said the prayer.  And his before bed prayers are so sweet because he prays for mommy, daddy, and sissy.  Drake, you're doing fantastic!  Keep up the good work.

day five

If you know my Gwenny, you know that generally she's not too shy.  I love it! 

 Well she's really using it in a good way.  This year, Gwen is no longer a Sunbeam, but is in CTR, and she has the ring to prove it.  She wears it all the time and loves telling people what it means.  Including all the boys that she plays with at the gym.  When I pick her and Drake up from the kids club, Gwen shows me all the boys she has told to "choose the right" that day.  What a good little missionary!

day four

I will sing praises to the world for my fantastic hubs!  And this praise might surprise some of you.  I'm proud of Ryan having the courage to go to ASU.  I know he was scared to tell me that I had quit my job and we moved our family to Sacramento for nothing.  But rather than stick with a decision that he felt was not so good, he got it right despite what wrath I might have brought upon him. 

day three

Buster Brown. From when he was a little baby to now, he has always been such a tender hearted cuddler. As I mentioned earlier, he always is coming up to me with his arms up saying "want you". When we're watching tv he loves to be laying down with someone or sitting on their lap. He just loves being cuddled, and I love him even more for that. Good boy Drakey Boy!

day two

My sweet little Gwenny bum! I can pour out the praise! But today I am going to tell you about how helpful my Gwenny Gwenny gumdrop is. After meals she always brings her dishes from the table and puts them in the sink-with out being told to! She is a master of please, thank you, may I be excused, excuse me, etc. She recently has learned how to help mommy clean the bathroom, and is so excited when she gets to brush the toilet. When we're around others who have babies, she goes gaga entertaining them and making sure the babies needs are met. And when we ask her what she wants to be when she grows up, she says a babysitter!

a week of praise, day one

As a resolution this year, one of the things that I am going to become superb at is praising my family.  

Today is an easy one to do since it just happened.  

One of the things that is so sweet and thoughtful that Ryan does is he always calls to let me know when he's on his way home.  As a mother of two crazy kids, any kind of heads up is appreciated, but the really great thing that makes this call sweet, is that Ryan always asks if I want him to stop and pick anything up.  Ahhh, thank you Ryan.

behold

Ryan in all his glory!

Like I said, our camera was outta juice, but Devon to the rescue, had hers and got these great pictures of Ryan.

 Gwen and Drake's pants are pants we picked up form DI and water-proofed.  And you can't really see, but I found some way hot purple Aladin style snow pants.  What a motley crew!  But we had so much fun.  And Ryan and I had this great idea that the next time we're in the snow, we should bring our snow clothes!

VAYCAY!!

We just got back from our NorCal vacation, and whew, was it busy and fun!  The day after Christmas we packed up, left the kids presents and drove up to Sacramento to spend time with Ryan's mom and Molly, Darren and their three girls.  After staying a few nights there, we stayed a couple more nights at my sweet Desi and Josiah's house.  Thanks guys, we love you!

From there we went with our awesome friends Jesse and Devon up to their condo in Tahoe.  It was awesome because our kids have NEVER seen the snow and they loved it!  But they were so shocked at how cold it was.  One of the best parts of Tahoe was that Ryan borrowed this teal and purple, one piece snow suit from Des to wear up there.  He loved it so much he wore it the whole time, including to dinner!!  Everyone would see him and then whisper to their friends to look at Ryan because he looked like he was straight out of Dumb and Dumber.  Unfortunately my camera battery died, so I didn't get any pictures of Ryan in it.  :(  But trust me, it was so funny!!

After Tahoe, we drove to the Bay area to spend New Year's with Tara and Andrew. We went to a fun New Year's party, then spent a couple of days hanging out, letting the kids play, and going to San Francisco. 

Now we are so excited to start 2009!!  We hope this new year finds you all happy and healthy. 

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