Flashback

I was realizing this last weekend how much I appreciate my friends. I have some of the best friends ever and I just love it when we all get together. We always have such a great time, even if we are just sitting around. (You know, like at Tyler's house in high school). They are good people, good friends, good influences and just good to have around!! When we were at my house Sunday, it made me think of when we did this two years ago when Jen came to visit. Here's the pic from then (July 2005): Amy is not here, but Roni is and Tyler and Lisa weren't here because they are at Dental school in Oregon.And we got together last year in June 2006 for Tyler and Lisa's wedding. Here I am with Roni, Beka and Jen. All but Roni were pregnant in this picture. Little did Beka know there were TWO inside of her!!Obviously some people don't get that the people you don't see in the display picture won't be in the picture! The two Trevors are on the left, then us, then Matt in the back (him and his wife, who wasn't able to make it, are in California for Optometry school (I think, or maybe Opthamology, still don't know the difference, sorry!), the bride and groom, Beka and Danny, Roni, Jen and Curt and then Rob (at BYU now) and his girlfriend. Oh so fun, who knows when the next time we'll be together will be. Regardless, I'm greatful for my wonderful friends.

Noble Novel

We had a fabulous weekend! Jen, Curt and their baby Cache were visiting from Colorado (or "the OC" as Jen refers to it), hence the naming of this blog in honor of them. They came on Thursday and left Monday. I already miss them. It is fun having a friend to talk to 24/7. Hopefully one of these days we can go visit them in Colorado. On Saturday we went to the Whipples to visit Roni. She loved Cache and Clara and I'm pretty sure they loved her. How can you not love a Whipple? Kind of like Disneyland is the happiest place on earth, Whipples are the happiest people on earth. Trevor visited with us for a bit too but we didn't get any pictures of him... next time... Happy Roni with Cache and Clara. They are happy as can be in this picture and have their little arms interlocked. And then about two seconds later, Clara decides to scream and poke Cache in the face. Sorry Cache! I will work on teaching Clara how to play nice. She likes to bully the little kids. Insteat of crying, Cache just got a look on his face like, "What in the world is going on"?After we made our Whipple stop, we went to lunch at Rosa's. We went here last year when they were in town and they wanted to go back. I guess there aren't many good Mexican food restaurants in Colorado. Clara started getting a bit restless so I was feeding her some ice (Curt got this great picture of her with a little chunk of ice in her mouth). A bit later I realized it had been a while since I fed her so she was probably starving.After that we went to visit Beka and her twins. Our four babies are all very close so it is fun to have that in common. Especially since we are best friends from HS. Here we are with our kiddos. Clara is 6 months, Cache is 4 months and the twins (Braden and Landon) are 5 months. It's fun to see what you learn about your kids personalities as you take pictures of them. Clara can't keep her hands to herself, that's for sure! We decided Jen needed to see what it was like to have quadruplets, so we piled all the kids on "Aunt Jen". The twin on the left is about to lose it, Cache can't figure out what is going on and Clara her mouth open wider than I thought possible. And Jen is just calm as ever.

We had to take one of just the kids, no adult supervision. Clara was posing for every picture. It helped that I was dancing around making a fool of myself trying to get all of the babies to look but also making sure Clara didn't attach any of the younger kids.
On Sunday, we had what few friends from HS that have stuck around AZ over for dessert. We all at a little too much sugar and started acting, well, a little like in HS. Trevor doesn't seem to like to take serious pictures. After I gave him his plate of treats, I tried taking a picture and this is the look I got. Maybe once he realizes how many pictures I post on my blog he will start smiling at the camera. :)
Here's me with Beka, Jen and Amy. It's a little weird to think we are all moms now because it kind of seems like we just graduated from HS. It's always fun to get together, reminisce about the good old days and talk about our crazy lives.This is when the night started getting out of hand. Beka put her twins on the pillows and they looked so cute. So I get this great idea to get a picture of all the babies together doing it. The problem was it was late so they were all hungry and tired. But we all know how much I like pictures! So we snapped a few, none of them turned out well, and then they all started rolling off their pillows and SCREAMING (see next picture). It was funny. We were all just laughing at the chaos we created. What was really out of control was the idea that we could all lay on pillows like the little kids. Sure enough, we did (hence, my previous post). I was looking at the picture realizing how dumb we look, but hey, what is life without moments like that? :) I'm just glad we are all secure enough to post things like that online. HA!
Here's everyone. We miss all of our friends that are away at schools out of state. Top L-R: Trevor F., Danny, Curt and Jason. Middle L-R: Beka, Amy, Jen and Anna. Bottom L-R: Braden or Landon, whichever one the other isn't, Cach and Clara. Clara in her pretty little nightgown before bed. And some random thoughts about Clara's sleeping habits for the record. Up until last Monday, we swaddled Clara to go to bed and she would never cry herself to sleep. If she fussed, we'd just give her her pacifier and to sleep she'd go. So last Monday, she was SO fussy. I put her to bed and she wasn't swaddled and I just let her cry and after about 8 minutes, she was fast asleep. Tuesday, she was asleep within just 2 minutes or so. So the swaddling days have come to an end after six months and so has not being able to cry herself to sleep.
On Monday, we tried out Shabu Fondue in Chandler. We just got the cheese and chocolate courses and I was less than impressed with the cheese. It was not good and I will probably NEVER go back again for that. The dessert was a little better, really, how can you screw up chocolate? Although the chocolate didn't seem anything more than semi-sweet chocolate chips you can buy in the store. I would probably go back for the dessert, but mostly it would be because of the atmosphere. Anyway, I didn't think it was great. I've never eaten fondue in a restaurant, so I have nothing else to compare it to though. But at least it had neat decor and I was with Jen and her family to keep me entertained! :)

After that, we went to the Temple so Jen could get some pictures and we took some in front of a cactus. That's right, there are Sagauro all over, but I doubt I have a single picture in front of one. Well, now I do and so does Clara. Jen 'needed' to go to the scrapbook store so Curt patiently waited in the car while we shopped. Curt and Jen left that afternoon. They are such great house guests. Jason wasn't able to do much with us, but Curt was always helping me out with Clara. Thanks for staying with us and remember, you are welcome anytime!Oh look, Jason does exist... :) I'm telling you, I am curious to see what's going to happen when Jason is done with school and he's around us more. Now, there are some days Clara never sees him. When he is home, he is usually doing homework so we don't see much of each other. It'll be like falling in love all over again...

Tummy Time for Adults... HA!

twin's 1st birthday

tomorrow lucy and elsa, ryan's twin girls turn ONE. their party was tonight at ryan's. we swam, ate and just had fun watching the girls open presents and eat cake. of course, their favorite presents were from clara, the tag blankets. actually, i think the best was one of their little cousins wrote them a little note (or told his mom what to write) and said for their birthday he was giving them one of his toys and sure enough, he wrapped up one of his toys and gave it to them. how sweet is that?? kay, now for the pictures... here is angela with lucy and me with elsa sporting these AWESOME sunglasses.here's angela, daniel, me and clara. daniel will be a senior. he has grown like six inches this year so he's cuter than ever. awwww... we love him. i love watching kids do funny things and i don't know if all kids do this, but the twins crawl SO funny in the grass. they use their feet not their knees because i guess they don't like the feeling and it just looks absolutely hilarious! so here is elsa in action. and how cute are angela and clint? they are the best neighbors ever and they are just such good looking people, so naturally they make a fantastic couple. ope, and we can't forget dad in the background chatting away. oh, so that's where i get it from...clara took a little swim in her diaper because i was too lazy to go put a swimmer on and her swimsuit. afterwards, her cheeks were all red from being so hot so i left her clothes off and put some of the table decorations on her and angela got this darling little picture of her. lucy and elsa with mom and dad opening their favorite present. lucy took her blanket, put it on her head, rubbed it on her face and then lost interest. and elsa? well, i don't think she was ever interested in the first place. hopefully someday ryan can teach his kids how to be appreciative of people's hard work. :)and now the fun stuff. elsa, left and lucy, right... before they discovered what frosting tastes likelucy after:elsa after:

aren't they cute? they sure are fun and we hope they have a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

jen's in town

my good friend jen noble, her husband curt and son cache came into town yesterday and i am the lucky one they chose to host them while they are here. i LOVE having visitors, so if anyone ever needs a place to stay, let me know. it's nice and cozy in our humble little abode, but we make it work. someday we might have more room to accomodate, but for now, this works. clara tried to grab cache and today they played steam roller... if curt wasn't protecting cache, clara would roll right over him. he's six weeks younger and such a calm baby. clara is SO high strung. but today they were playing on the floor together and jason took clara and cache started fussing. curt moved so cache could see clara and then he was content again. i'm pretty sure he's in love with her. HA! oh, and they wouldn't look at the camera and then clara kept rolling away. jen calls her a little gymnast.

tag blankets

so here they are, the tag blankets i made for my twin nieces. i really like them and can't wait to make one for clara. i thought hmmm, these are cute, maybe i will sell them, but NO WAY. they would cost way too much. i took some up-close pics to show the cute stitching. it's the first time i have used that setting on my sewing machine, which i have had for oh, about five years or so. :) anyway, if you can't tell from the pics, one is pink and one is purple and both have the same black with white polka dot satin back. the purple fabric is great but it sheds like crazy where you cut it (which is why it's all over my carpet). but it was much easier to sew with than the pink fleece.

there is sunshine...

oh, but my day didn't start out that way! it began with a 30 minute phone conversation with our realtor in utah. she didn't seem real positive about our home, which was COMPLETE opposite of her approach before we actually hired her. anyway, the conversation made me sick to my stomach because i worry so much and just when i think things are starting to pan out with this investment, it doesn't last long. then, i took clara to the dr. to find out she only weighs 14 pounds and is in the 14th percentile for her age. GEEEZ! you'd think i'm starving the poor thing. my dr. says it is not reason to be alarmed, we just need to monitor her weight gain so i have to take her in every week to have her weighed. since she needs to gain, that means i have to feed her more. she goes to bed around 8, wakes up around 7ish, so that means i'll have to feed her every 2 1/2 hours or so to get six feedings in. then, after we come back from vacation, i'll start her on cereal so that should help. to top the appointment off, she had to get her shots. she's actually pretty good, but it's still sad to watch her little face turn from a worried-concerned look to a pained look just moments after the shots are given. i'm just glad i don't have to give them to her.

when we got home, i just wanted to cry, so i opened the curtains to let a little SUNSHINE in and sang, THERE IS SUNSHINE IN MY SOUL TODAY... it made me feel a wee bit better. then i sewed two tag blankets from my twin nieces. i don't sew much and when i do, it's nothing great, but i do have to say, i am REALLY proud of these blankets. they turned out SO cute. i'll post pics later, for now, i have to get to work and i'm too lazy to go get my camera in the kitchen. plus, i should be cleaning my house for jen, not blogging. but it's like therapy... when i used to keep a journal, i expressed so many of my feelings that it became therapeutic and now it's blogging. :)

jerk of the day

for any of you that know me, you know i am a firm believer that horns are in cars to be HONKED. :) sometimes it is a "you idiot!" honk, other times it's a "wake up!" honk and sometimes it's just an "are you paying attention?" friendly honk because even i occasionally don't pay attention when i should. today, i was driving to ribbons and lace (i'm pretty sure that store is the COOLEST) and i was turning left onto lindsay rd. and this person in front of me was yielding to oncoming traffic... and then... there was no oncoming traffic and they still didn't turn, so of course i give the, "are you paying attention?" honk. at least 20-30 seconds went by (a long time when waiting to turn left) and they turned. of course, that 20-30 seconds threw my whole schedule off so i zoomed passed her and thought wouldn't that be great if she was going to the same place as me. as my fabulous luck would have it, she turned in right after me. and sure enough, walks past my car as i was getting clara out, gives a little smile and goes into ribbons and lace. now, any fellow ribbons and lace fans, you know that store is NOT big, so i can't exactly hide. i decided to let down my pride and apologize to her and let her know it was just a "hello, are you paying attention" honk and nothing rude (after all, why would they put horns in cars if they weren't supposed to be used?). so yeah for me, everything is good, right? well, it gets worse. the girl, who, by the way, happnes to be this little young sweet girl that probably has never done anything remotely rude, procedes to tell me, the cashier and another girl that was in the store that we both knew how last week she got in an accident when she was turning left and so now she is paranoid to turn left. she was trying to decide if she had enough time or not when i honked. wow, did i feel great! lessons learned: 1.don't judge, not even when driving. we never know why people do what they do or what their situation. as this girl's were, their actions could be completely justified. 2. after you honk at someone keep going if you think they might be turning into the same place as you. 3. jerk of the day: me. :)

new computer... no naps... messy house... house for sale

so i did it, bought a new laptop. well, jason bought it because i got a stress headache everytime i thought about having to make a decision involving so much money. what does that mean for all of you? definitely more blogging from me. ha! just what you are all looking forward to. so here are a few pics of the new computer. my last one was a gateway and i'm not sure i am ready for a change to dell. i guess i better make up my mind real fast though! the keyboard feels VERY nice, not like my cheap dell i had for work. we'll see if it is up to my standards.

also, clara is real fussy and won't take her naps. i'm guessing teeth but she has been SO high maintenance. maybe it's because the only time we left the house yesterday was to walk and get the mail, but who knows. when i lay her down to wrap her for her naps, she instantly starts screaming. she has been asleep for less than 30 minutes and i hear her talking to herself... and now screaming and her pacifier isn't appealing to her. i don't know what to do because i will go crazy if she doesn't take her naps. last night, she cried herself to sleep (don't worry, it took less than 8 minutes and was more of an intermittant whine than a cry). anyway, she's been sleeping until 7, so that is good. on father's day she slept until 8, so that was a nice treat. but if any of you have suggestions on her napping routine, let me know. oh, yesterday, it was so bad i thought i'd rock her to sleep. she pretended to be asleep after like 15 minutes of rocking and my singing and when i laid her in her bed, it was the instant high-pitched wail as if i was the meanest mom ever. hopefully it's a phase... otherwise i might need some help. she just screams all of the time and pushes her pacifier out with her tongue. hmmmm, suggestions?

so my friend jen, her husband curt and baby cache are coming to stay with us this weekend, which means i've been trying to tidy up my house. the only problem is i am ocd about things and if i can't do it perfectly, i'd rather not do it at all. this means i like to deep clean and organize, however, by the time i have pulled everything out of a drawer or cupboard, i'm too exhausted (aka lazy) to put everything away. so my house looks like an even bigger mess than it did a few days ago before i began "tidying" up.

one last thing. we are building a BEAUTIFUL spec home in utah. here's a picture. it should be ready to move in in less than a month, so if any of you know of anyone that needs a fabulous home in utah, let me know. seriously, if i wanted to live in utah, i would buy it in a heartbeat. it is huge, on a 1/3 acre and has beautiful mountain views from the breakfast nook window. i have never seen it so that is what i have heard and gathered from pictures. here's a picture from the county's website. hopefully i can get some pictures when it's done before it's sold. oh yeah, it's also in a REALLY nice community that has very restrictive covenants, so the subdivision will stay nice and upscale. blogs have helped people start businesses... why can't mine help me sell our house? :)

post bath

two of my obsessions are: blogging and taking pictures of my sweet baby. combine those and you get me, the blogaholic. so clara loves taking baths and it is SO cute to watch her hold still and then go crazy kicking in the water. when i take her out, we say goodbye to her toys, bye to the wash rag and then i put her in the towel and she ALWAYS looks over to watch me pour the bath water out and say bye to the bath water. it's funny that she already can remember things like that. then, when i put her in her crib in her towel, she gets super hyper. it's great and just makes me want to grab the camera every time. so i did and took some pictures of her fuzzy after-bath hair. i also got a video of her thrashing her little legs around and doing her new trick: holding her tongue slightly after her mouth and blowing out making bubbles in her slobber and spraying them, ya know, like a thllllllllll sound, but juicy. she'll do it back and forth with me every now and then. oh, and have i mentioned that i think she is so cute and oh so SWEET! one of these nights... i'm going to sneak into her room and get her out of her crib and just hold her. and now i finally understand motherly love. it can't be explained but it's unlike any other. eeeeeeesh! i want to squeeze my sweet baby!! :)

i love shopping

i don't know why, but every day i get older, i love shopping that much more. the funny part is, now that i'm not working full-time and jason has cut back to working part-time as he finishes up school, we are making less than we ever have since we've been married. so, this is an odd time for me to develop my more-than-normal obsession with shopping. when i go, i have every intention of buying great clothes and shoes for myself and always end up with nothing for me and stuff for clara that she certainly doesn't 'need'. yesterday, i went and met angela and my friend karen for a little shopping adventure. everywhere is having GREAT sales, especially all the kids' stores (the children's place, baby gap, gymboree, nordstrom). so clara got more clothes and i got nothing. it is just much more enjoyable to buy her cute little clothes. and let me just say, nordstrom has the greatest mother's lounge (i discovered this in san diego). so no more having the mean lady in jc penny tell me i can't nurse in an empty dressing room, i have to use the nasty bathroom.


oh, and a couple of months ago, jason showed me the soles of his dress shoes and i was a bit embarassed. there were huge CHUNKS out of them. so he's been wearing his docs from his mission. hmmm... so i bought him some nice shoes thanks to nordstrom having their half-yearly. hooray! i love sales. the only bad part about shopping is clara is in her car seat/stroller for way too long. i had to go do payroll yesterday so she was in her carseat for the beginning half of the day before we even went shopping. sometimes i feel like i neglect her... but maybe that's why i have SO many pictures of her in her car seat. or maybe that's because when she's in her car seat it's much easier to get her to look at the camera.

cutest baby ever

i'm pretty sure, until i have another baby, clara is the cutest baby ever. and when i do have another baby, there is sure to be a tie ;). i knew i would take a lot of pictures, but i didn't know i'd take this many. every day i get clara ready for the day and i think, she is so cute, i better take a picture. i don't always do it, otherwise we'd need more than a 500gb hard drive, but i do take a lot. she has also gotten very good at smiling for the camera. at first, she was good at smiling. then, it didn't take long for her to start to squint and blink real fast when i pulled out the camera because my red eye light is very bright. lately she hasn't been blinking as much and her initial reaction is typically a smile. she also loves to grab the bottom of her dresses to suck on them and lift/grab her feet, which is evident in some of these pictures. lately, she has been sucking on her bottom lip. i really think she's about to sprout her first tooth soon because she's always rubbing her gums and chewing on things. last weekend she started opening her mouth really big when i go to stick her pacifier in so she can gnaw on the thicker, harder rubber outside of the pacifier. but we will see... back to pictures: taking pictures makes me want a better camera though so i can blow some pictures up for the wall. we've got to hang some of her up before we have another one! just ask my mom about how good i am at that. angela got married almost three years after us and it was after that that i got my mom a wedding picture for her wall. wooooops!