Girls Just Wanna Fun!

My side of the table ...

The other side of the table ...

Katie and Me

Last night a few girls from our ward got together for a "twilight girls night out" dinner at the Claim Jumper.

I had a lot of fun. Sometimes it's nice just to get a break from the routine.

There was never a dull moment and the girls happily blabbed the night away. I shamlessly copied these pictures from Susan's blog. Thanks Suze!

When I got home, Dustin and Ian had cleaned our CRV inside and out! Thanks hungies! That's what I usually drive, but I had taken Dustin's truck instead last night, so they could have the car seat. Ian was pretty excited that our "van" as he refers to it (probably because Grandma used to have a van), was clean. It was a pigsty, I admit. Dustin is definitely neater than me, unfortunately for him.

Notable Quotes from our GNO:

{... or do you want it now so you can spend the night with Edward?}

{Don't you go around looking at people at church and think - ooh, they don't match ...?}

{That's how we ended up with 5 kids ... I don't trust that thing anymore ...}

{My parents are 9 years apart and now they look the same age ... it's so not fair}

{I go, what kind of idiot pays $200 for a pair of jeans?? and he says ...but they work every time}

{Have you heard about the 'Potty Whisperer'?}

{so long, sucker!}

You girls are hilarious! We should do that again sometime :)

A Quick Note About the Recent Changes ...

As I disclose more and more personal information here, I've been debating whether or not I want to make it private and have friends sign up in order to read this blog. I don't think I want do it yet. So instead I've moved all posts from my old blog here, and then deleted the original. The only difference is that this one doesn't show our last name anywhere. I've enjoyed reading all your great comments on my old blog (yes! all three of you) and I'm sorry to have lost them on the transfer. Thanks for reading!

Officially Washingtonians!

Last week both Dustin and I finally got our drivers' license and WA license plates on our cars.

Dustin's truck's tabs had expired 8 months ago. A new record. He usually takes care of it at least within 6 months AFTER they've expired. He's managed to miraculously NOT get pulled over or have his truck impounded during that time.

On our way back home from the Department of Licensing, we may have been the cause, albeit unintentionally, that the driver of the car in front of us got pulled over.

It started out with us talking about how happy we were to have finally taken care of it and how we didn't have to worry about getting pulled over anymore. Then Dustin noticed that the yellow truck in front of us had its tabs expired since March 2007. That's a year and five months! We must have been pointing at the truck because the police car right next to us sure noticed and pulled over the yellow truck a few minutes later. Point taken!

We both agreed that we liked our UT driver's licenses better. The Washington ones look cheap, as if they were a gym membership card or something. Plus, we look about 30 pounds heavier than our already chubby selves. Cheap camera! On the bright side, I did lose 4 pounds recently and was happy to update that on mine :)

Sleeping is NOT Optional

Ian fights being tired and avoids going to bed (or taking naps) like the plague. I guess he figures he's having too much fun to sleep. He usually ends up crashing on a chair or on the floor after he gets really tired ... like this:

or like that - After his birthday party earlier this year at Grandma's.

Especially if we have people over ...

This one was 2 nights ago...

We love that silly kid!

I've Been Tagged

... by my cute sister-in-law, Jen. I'm supposed to write down 3 joys, 3 fears, 3 current obsessions/collections, 3 surprising facts about me and then tag 5 other people.

Joys:

1. Spending time with my family

2. The Gospel

3. My piano

Fears:

1. Losing my husband or son somehow

2. A horrible death like being eaten alive by an wild animal or being attacked by someone

3. Not fulfilling my most desired dreams

Current Obsessions/Collections:

1. I collect dust bunnies around the house - my only collection to date

2. Watching the olympics

3. Twilight series

Suprising Facts:

I'm not sure how surprising these are, but I can't think of anything really surprising.

1. I'm a Elvis fan. Last saturday - August 16th - marked 31 years since he died at Graceland and the maker of Barbie came out with these first ever Elvis and Priscilla Presley dolls. Cute.

2. I'm the opposite of a pack rat, I'm always trying to get rid of excessive stuff

3. I turned out fairly normal despite being my parents' child :)

I tag Cecilia, Fernanda, Leslie, Sara, and Beth.

Beating the Heat

These past few days have been sweltering hot! Yesterday we were forced out of house because of the heat. I had checked the weather online that morning and the first thing I saw was a big warning in bright red letters that read: Excessive Heat Warning - During excessive heat episodes..drink plenty of water...avoid overexertion...try to spend time in an air conditioned place... and check up on relatives and neighbors. Below that, a non-threating 86 degrees was displaying. I thought, today will be hot ... I didn't know it was going to get so hot so darn quick.

By the time Dustin left for work, poor Ian was sweating so much already. His hair soaking wet! The most comfortable place in the house, temperature-wise, is the garage. Since we didn't want to hang out in the garage all day, we got into our car and left for Target. I wanted to get Ian one of those inflatable pools to cool him off. After walking up and down the aisles, I realized they were all out of those. It wasn't so bad, Target's air conditioning felt nice. After that, we tried a couple other places and but couldn't find any.

O-kay. On to plan B: find an outside swimming pool. We knew of one by Dustin's work, so we went there - relief was in sight! We stayed in the pool for 4 hours. The temperature kept climbing up and I knew our house would be an oven by then. We couldn't go back just yet, even though I had a million things to do that day.

We've had lot of firsts this year, and this is also our first summer in this little rented house. I thought this house was such a great find when we first saw it. It was built fairly recently in a new development with no mature trees. I thought "Great! No tall scary pine trees to fall on our heads" - Well, those "tall scary trees" come handy to provide much needed shade in the summer so we don't roast in our own home. To make matters worse, it has lots of small, decorative, blindless windows throughout, which, are high up and very pretty but they let ALL the sunshine in - great in the winter - not so great now. Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention, we have no air conditioner! Most people around here don't. They say we only get a few hot days a year. I get the feeling most people without a/c also don't live in a fish bowl in a treeless area. We might not be in this house next summer.

Today is another blazing hot day, but we've managed okay so far! Can't wait for FALL :)

Family Pictures

These pictures were taken in June in Seattle near the University of WA campus.

Our photographer was a girl who I met back in Utah, the super talented Andrea.

She's such a joy and did a great job!

I'll post her photography website here in case you want to book a session with her. You won't be disappointed: http://www.youreverycolorphotography.com/

These were our favorite shots.