February and Valentine's Day Festivities

February started out like any other normal winter month... trying to figure out fun things to do inside while it was too cold outside to play! I've started making some routine adjustments with Charlie, preparing him for baby sister to come. One adjustment is having him eat in the adult chairs and use his utensils more often. He's actually getting pretty good at eating cereal with milk... with minimal milk spilling each time ;)

The week leading up to Valentine's Day, we had our new backsplash installed! Finally! It took me forever to decide what type of backsplash I wanted, but I'm happy with the way it turned out. Here's the before and after pictures (and I can't believe how different everything looks with the lights turned on and turned off... the wall colors, countertop colors, and cabinet colors all stayed the same, even though they look so different!):

The day after we got our backsplash installed, and two days before Valentine's Day, Trevor lost his job. It was completely sudden and unexpected since the FTC just busted in and shut down operations instantly. It's never fun to lose your job, but Trev took it extra hard because he put so much of his time and heart and soul into his work for the last two years. It was also scary thinking about having all of our regular expenses to pay, plus losing our health insurance with a baby coming, without having much income at all. I wished I could help out in some way... get a part-time job or something... but I was feeling pretty worthless being almost 6 months pregnant. Anyway, I'll update more about all of that later... but it definitely put a damper on our activities for the following weeks.

Valentine's Day still came, as planned! :) I helped Charlie make homemade cards for his Daddy and Grandparents, and I even went to a girl's night where we made cards for our husbands!

Here's the front of my card to Trev, and the envelope of the card from Charlie to his Daddy:

Here's Trev's stash of cards and goodies, my two dozen BEAUTIFUL roses from my sweet husband, and a little treat and stuffed animal for Charlie:

I even decided to try my hand at baking sugar cookies from scratch! I found an excellent recipe online and the cookies were soft and delicious! Charlie was excellent at helping me press out the cookies. He kept saying "hahts" for hearts and counting them! :) I did cop out and buy the frosting, colored it pink, and then decorated the cookies with some help from Chandler (my brother Mike's girlfriend at the time... they were in town visiting!).

As evidenced by the above collection of photos, Charlie's becoming my little copycat these days. Both in facial expression and with his words. Gotta start watching what I say even more carefully! ;) We also had a couple days where it was warm enough to visit the neighborhood park. Thank goodness for FREE activities that help run my kid ragged! :) We spent quite a bit of time watching the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Charlie even tried his hand at figure skating in our living room (aka spinning in a circle!). So cute, little mimic! :)

Here's a picture of my pregnancy progress at 25 weeks. I was feeling so big and always had pains from stretching. The second picture is pretty self-explanatory... Dads make pretty good horses! Haha :)

Despite the job loss, we decided to go forward with our plans to add a fireplace and wainscoting to our living room, since we had just sent in a check for half the cost of the fireplace about a day before his company was shut down. Plus, I had done so much planning and picking out features for the fireplace that we figured we might as well just get it done. (Thank goodness for having some savings!) At the end of February, the process got started as we had contractors route the gas line, move the electrical, and start building the fireplace!

The weather started warming up just enough that the neighbors have been coming out of their houses and spending time outside! It has been SO nice! One of the neighbor girls even took Charlie for a ride in her battery-powered police car. Honestly, I'm the type of Mom where I get a little nervous when Charlie does something new for the first time... and I just hoped that he wouldn't try to stand up and get out while the little car was moving. Fortunately, he didn't, and he really enjoyed his ride! :) Maybe I need to learn to relax. Haha

March updates coming soon!!!

In's and Out's

Life has been changing a lot lately. There are lots of new things happening and it's been really fun. I wanted to show you some of these changes in terms of things that go "out" and things that come "in".

Things that go OUT:

1. My belly, of course!! :) Yesterday I was officially 23 weeks along! And boy is that belly popping OUT fast now! Along with my belly, my belly button is making it's way OUT. It hasn't popped yet, but over the last couple weeks I've watched (to my dismay) as my once very deep "innie" belly button has sneaked closer and closer to the surface. It's only a matter of time at this point until it becomes an "outie"...

2. My brother-in-law, Troy, who was OUT like a light during our family vacation to Las Vegas this month. Sadly, this is the only picture I snapped while we were there, but it definitely deserved a spotlight on my blog, don't you think? He was so out that we were able to decorate him with a pretty little bow :) .... Blackmail much!?
But anyway, Trevor and I made a quick trip to Las Vegas on June 18 & 19 for my nephew, Caden's, baptism. He is the second oldest of Mical's kids and it has been fun, so far, to make a tradition of attending their baptisms when they turn 8 years old. For more pictures of the baptism day, you can see some pictures that Mical put on Facebook here. We had a lot of fun just eating, talking, sleeping (as you can see), and just being with family. Trevor got to go to a local baseball game with all the guys and I had a chance to lay out by the pool for a little while. It really was a fun weekend! But way too short!!

3. My poor old car, Ethel, has made her way OUT of our family. I was hit by another driver while driving to work on June 9th, and I'm pretty sure that the insurance adjuster is going to call me any day to let me know that the damage exceeds the value of the car (Blue Book estimates probably around $1,500 with the current condition and mileage of my car). So, here's my old friend sitting in a little junk yard, waiting to be taken to... umm... car heaven? The dump? Where do old cars go? I have no idea.
Anyway, you can see where the other car ran right into my front driver's side wheel area. Tilted the wheel (probably bent the axle) and caused pretty good damage to the area all around the wheel well. My driver side door wasn't able to open after I was hit because of all that "crunchage" either. Here's a closer look:
While I am a little sad to see Ethel go (I mean, she did tote me around for 4.5 years... even if she was the least reliable car I've ever driven), her absence means there is room for a new car to come in... and that brings us to our IN list. :)

Things that come IN:

1. We have recently welcomed (as of Monday) a new car INto our family, to replace Ethel. This car is a pretty little 2007 Honda CR-V with about 57,500 miles on it. It may not have all the bells and whistles, but it drives beautifully and we got it for a great deal! Here's a picture I found online of one that looks exactly like the one we purchased. I haven't had a chance to take pictures of our actual car yet, but they probably wouldn't be much different than this one:
Anyway, we haven't named this little beauty yet, but I am so glad to have finally gotten through the car buying stage and now I have a nice, smooth, safe, reliable car to drive - extra important for when baby boy gets here!

2. Baby boy is IN my belly. And he will be coming INto our family in just about 4 months! I can't believe how quickly time is flying! I can't wait for him to arrive, but I'm glad I have time to get some things together.

3. We will be flying IN to North Carolina two weeks from today for our big summer vacation! Oh, and did I mention that my brother, who has been on a mission for two years, will be flying IN to the RDU airport the day after we get there!? I'm so excited to see him and welcome him back!

4. About a month ago, the company I work for went through a split, and we recently moved IN to a new office just down the road. I once again have my own office (instead of just a cubicle yay!) and I love the change of scenery. I can even see the bank of the Provo river outside my window. Nice :)

5. There are lots of other things that we are expecting to see come IN throughout the coming months (i.e. baby furniture, Trevor's diploma, income from Trevor's businesses as he has a chance to really work on them, etc.). I'll be sure to keep you all updated!

California in Feburary

Argh. I really am a binge blogger. Here I go missing another month, practically! Shame on me! I'll try to catch you up on some of my recent happenings! On February 23 and 24th, for work, I got to go on my second trip to California. It was definitely nice to escape the cold and snow for a break of moderate temperatures and sunshine!

We flew into Long Beach airport on Wednesday the 23rd. This is the smallest airport I have EVER been in. Seriously. What you see in the picture below is... the whole airport. You get on and off the planes by walking out to the tarmac and going up the steps! It was awesome! But it's a good thing it was sunny that day!
After we met with our client, we had a few hours to kill before our flight and we were able to travel down to Long Beach to see the ocean. Oh man. It's been way too long since I last saw an ocean (okay, maybe only last July, but it seems like FOREVER!).

Here's us driving through downtown on Ocean Drive:
And me out by the Pacific Ocean. They had two or three of those facilities you see behind me... I'm still not sure what they are. The water was cold, but I was just happy to feel the sand between my toes and the wind in my hair and sun on my face!
And yes, please excuse my nice business pants rolled up for the occasion ;)
Ahh.... water, sand, and sunshine.
Walking back to the car along the sidewalk high above the shore level. You had to walk down a ton of stairs to get to the actual beach. Almost sunset time. This is heaven on earth:
That night, we said goodbye to SoCal and got on a plane up to Oakland, CA and went straight to sleep. The next day, we had a mid-morning appointment with a client in Tracy, CA (about 45 minutes east of Oakland), so we drove out there. On the way, we saw some of the most beautiful, unique scenery. There were green rolling hills dotted with windmills and grazing cattle. I just couldn't believe it was so green in February! See?:
About mid-afternoon, I returned to Oakland and waited (aka napped in the hotel) until our third appointment later Thursday night. By this point, it started raining, and the slow, persistent storm continued until we left northern Cali on Friday morning. Right at dusk on Thursday night, we got to drive over the 6 mile long San Mateo Bridge into San Mateo (imagine that!) on the other side of the bay. In this picture (sorry so blurry!) you can kind of see where the bridge takes a left turn and raises up for ships to pass under:
I had so much fun in California. I hadn't been to Northern California in a really long time, but I have decided I think it is just GORGEOUS. It's got a different vibe than any other place I've been in the U.S. and I seriously think I could live there if it weren't for the outstanding taxes, house prices, gas prices, and oh yes, taxes!

For now I'll just enjoy the memory from the pictures. And I hope you enjoyed them too! :)

Trip Back East

So, with the new year came a new job title for me! I have been promoted, in a sense, from the "Client Relations Manager" to the "Client Success Director". What does this entail, exactly? Well, for one it means I no longer have the responsibility of listening to clients' concerns and problems and having to figure out to remedy these situations. Hallelujah! A year and a half of that will just do you in. So, now I work directly with our successful clients. I get to speak with them, get testimonials from them, and sometimes I get to meet them in person!

That's where my recent trip back to the east coast comes in! On Friday, January 28th, I was able to fly out to Raleigh, NC (yay! my hometown!) to meet a client. LUCKILY, this client lives 10 minutes from my parents' house, so I got to stay with them for the whole weekend while I did some work on Saturday! Hooray!

It was so fun to see them, talk with them, go out to eat with them, and go to church together at my old home ward. Lots of awesome people and memories! I didn't get many pictures from the occasion, but I have some awesome memories of just laying in front of the gas fireplace and talking for hours with my parents. I love how you just become friends with your parents as you get older :)

After NC, I got to fly up to Connecticut to meet with a second client. I'd never been to CT before, so that was another awesome adventure! The stories and feedback I got from these two clients that weekend will soon be posted on my work's website. They aren't up yet (as of today), but if you want to check out the awesome company I work for, you can visit our website: Property 23

Anyway, I wanted to share with you a couple of pictures that I took from the plane as we originally took off from SLC the morning of the 28th. It was a really foggy morning in the valley, and as soon as we broke through the very low clouds, I could see why:
Yes, those are the tops of the mountains in the background. The layer of clouds was so thick and low that the mountains popped out from above them and you couldn't see one spec of the huge Salt Lake Valley that's hidden below those clouds.


It's crazy - almost like you'd never even know there's a large city underneath all of that! It was even more awesome in real life! I just had to share!!

Long story short, I really think I'm going to enjoy this new job. I rather like traveling and exploring new places! Next stop is probably CA before the end of the month! Hooray :)