Camping and Singing

Weston and Ian had a fun time camping with the scouts. Weston was so tired the rest of the weekend though. They didn't really hike or anything, but Weston said he had fun throwing rocks in the pond near their campsite and making a candle.

Here's Weston and his buddy, Oliver.
Blowing out his "candle."
The boys got home around 11:30 on Saturday and got the car unpacked. I had to be at the stake center by 1pm to take the bus to the Conference Center for the Relief Society broadcast. We rode school buses up. It was the first time this Fall that I was bummed it was so hot since being on a hot school bus in a black skirt and nylons is not very fun. I was pretty sweaty and gross by the time we got there. We went through security and gathered in the little theater backstage. We discussed logistics then got up to the choir loft for rehearsal.

We had to do a little extra practice on Carry On with the french horns. The First Presidency listened to our dress rehearsal recording from last weekend and decided the horn part had too much fanfare, so the horn part was re-written to be more legato and soft. The problem was that the composer who wrote the horn part was in London on a church assignment, so he had to re-write it and email it. The horn players didn't get the new part until Thursday night. Yikes! I thought they did a great job adapting. I also found it interesting that the First Presidency would pay so much attention to detail like that.

Anyway, after we ran through all the songs with instruments and cameras and mics and everything we grabbed sack lunches backstage and had about an hour to eat, use the bathroom, freshen up hair and makeup, and get our corsages on. Then we filed back into the choir loft at 5:30pm for the real deal.

The Conference really was wonderful. I enjoyed all the talks, especially President Monson's message about not judging others. I felt like the music sounded nice and everything went smoothly. It was such a different experience being up in the front. I couldn't see the speaker or anyone in front of the choir loft until the audience. They had a couple screens for us to look at to watch the speaker, but I kept getting distracted by the teleprompter. It was hard to look away and not read what was coming up next. I also had a hard time sitting still for so long. I am fidgety I guess. I am so glad that I had the opportunity to participate in the choir. It was such a cool experience. I may never get to sing in the Conference Center again, so I was trying to take it all in. Luckily we had a photographer in our stake who did a great job capturing us all. Mostly during our dress rehearsal last weekend. See if you can spot me!



When the broadcast was all over we headed outside and onto the buses. By the time we got back to the stake center and carpooled home it was 9pm. I was exhausted. My mom texted me to tell me she saw me during the closing song, so I put on my pj's and watched all the songs on the re-broadcast (that I had recorded). It was fun to see all the ladies from my ward and to see myself too! I say it was a grand success!

Sunday was our primary program. Weston had a couple parts and he was so good about memorizing them. He did a great job! I always get nervous to play the piano in front of an audience. Luckily I have been playing the program songs all year, so they were very familiar. I only made a couple mistakes and they weren't too noticeable, so I was happy about that. Unfortunately Davin isn't feeling too good and has a cough, but I couldn't leave him home yesterday, so by the end of church he was sad and more than ready to go home and rest. Poor kid. I'm hoping he will have time to heal up this week and not pass his cough on to anyone else.

Now I feel like I can relax! Well, sort of. We are leaving for California on Friday afternoon, so I do have that trip to get ready for. Weston has a full week of school and tee ball, and I'm sure Ian will be working a lot to get ready to leave too. Today is library and haircut day. I've been putting Disney movies on hold at the library since there are plenty that we don't own. Today we get to pick up Hercules and Mulan 2. I also have some cleaning to do, but I swear I am still worn out from the weekend. It's 10:30 and I could already use a nap. We shall see how much I actually get done this afternoon.

Date Night

Tonight I got to go on a special date with Davin. Ian went camping with the scouts and took Weston with him. I knew Dav would be disappointed to be left behind, but we made sure we had plenty of fun. When he woke up from his nap I went in to get him and he was up on Weston's top bunk. "Weston? Gone?" is what he said. He asked to watch Buzz, so we started Toy Story 2, but around 5pm I asked him if he wanted to go on an outing with Mommy. He was all for that, but a little confused that we didn't have Mommy's car.

We went to Chuck E. Cheese. We got $10 worth of tokens (which ended up being 50) and I let Davin run around and do whatever he wanted. Interestingly he was NOT interested in the rides. He tried one or two but wanted to get out pretty soon after they started. He liked the games. Especially ones with balls. It was so fun to just let him do whatever he wanted. He won a couple ticket jackpot games and had over 200 tickets when he ran out of tokens. I got a few games of skeeball in, but mostly I let Dav do the games he wanted. It took about an hour to blow through 50 tokens and he wasn't really done playing, but I was not going to buy more tokens and it was starting to get crowded. We went and got a few prizes (he mostly wanted candy). He even picked out a prize for Weston. What a good brother. I was too busy following Dav around and helping him with games to take pictures, but we did use a token to do this little "sketch" booth.
On our way out the door he started to fuss a little and point at the games again. Luckily I distracted him with the lure of his tootsie rolls. Next we went to dinner at Cafe Rio. I had been wanting a pork salad for awhile, but Ian never seems to want Cafe Rio. Davin was a charmer in line. He flirted with everyone and pretty much stayed by my side. He ate his entire (not kidding, every bite) kid quesadilla (FYI did you know they are free?) while I munched my delicious salad. Seriously, I can't get over how adorable Davin is. He talks and makes funny faces. He is inquisitive and playfully mischievous. I told him to stay in his chair, but he slowly slipped off it while giving me this sneaky smile then started playing peekaboo with me from behind it. How could I resist?
Needless to say we had a fun time. We snuggled up and watched the rest of Toy Story when we got home, then it was bedtime. What a fun Mommy and Dav date. We will have to do it again sometime. I feel like I used to do stuff like this with Weston all the time, but Davin doesn't get the same one on one time with me. I hope Daddy and Weston are having just as good of a time on their camp out!

T.G.I.T.

If you haven't heard, Thursdays are the new Fridays. Weston's last day of school is on Thursday, so there's the excitement of being done with another week. There's the anticipation for whatever is happening over the weekend. Thursdays are good days.

Today is even a short day for Weston, so he only has preschool for 2 hours instead of 3. I am going to pick him up and take the kids to the mall to give my new Sit N Stand stroller a test run. If we happen to pass See's, all the better. :) I am also still on the hunt for a long maternity skirt. Not that I really expect there to be anything new at Motherhood, but it's worth a shot. The only downside to the mall that has See's and Motherhood is that it doesn't have a very fun play area for kids. It just has a bunch of those lame rides. You know, a school bus, a train, a motorcycle. We don't put money in those, but there is always kind of a secret (or sometimes not-so-secret) wish from the kids that we will. And the mommy in me always feels a twinge of guilt that I always say no.

By way of an update . . .
Things We are Into This Week:
-The animated Spectacular Spiderman episodes. Weston picked out a DVD of them from the library and can't get enough. I'm not a huge fan of any of the superhero cartoons, but I have accepted that I have boys and they love this stuff.

-No bake cookies. Ok, mostly I'm into them. I don't think anyone else in my family really likes them much. I only like them when it's been awhile since I had them and they are winning as my snack of the week. Yum.

-Buzz. Davin is so into Buzz at the moment. He flies him around saying in a deep, slurred 2 year old voice "To infinity and beyond!" He also wants to watch the Toy Story movies most days.

-Work. Well, Ian's not really that into working non-stop, but that is what he's been doing this week, so I guess we'll say that's his thing.

-Feeling the baby move. Weston and Davin will both put their hand on my belly for about 3.5 seconds and then look at me all excited and say "I felt her move!" I know they didn't really since I didn't feel her, but they think it's great. Weston will sometimes be more patient and actually wait until he feels her squirm or kick, but Davin, not so much. This last week or so she has started to get big enough that her squirms and kicks hurt and make me gasp if they are unexpected.

-TV! Fall shows are back and it makes me happy. It gives me something to look forward to at the end of a long day. So far How I Met Your Mother, Glee, Castle, and Modern Family have had their premiers. Tonight is another good night with Big Bang Theory, The Office, and 30 Rock coming back. I haven't started watching any new shows this season, but if any of them get amazing reviews then I might check out a few pilots. What's your favorite show that's new or back?

Busy Bees

September continues to fly by while we stay busy busy. On Friday I let Weston pick a fun outing. We had worked hard all week keeping the house clean, so Friday was our "day off." We had such a good time playing at the dinosaur museum. It was pretty empty, so the kids just did the whole thing at their own pace. Afterward we went out to lunch and the boys got to play on the playplace at Carl's Jr. They were starving too, so they ate really well. The Carl's Jr. we went to was in the same little shopping complex as a See's Candy shop. On our way back to the car we had to walk right past See's, and you know I can't do that without stopping in for a bordeaux. :) It was a fun outing and we all came home ready for naps.
Friday night was our ward game night. Weston got to play Hullabaloo with some of the bigger kids in the ward. It was a fun game. I might have to add that to my list of stuff he would like. I am always out of Weston gift ideas by the time his birthday rolls around in January. I got to play some Bananagrams and Boggle. I heart word games.

Saturday morning was the Relief Society choir dress rehearsal. We carpooled to the Conference Center, got checked in (with our special green security badges), and went and sat in parts in the regular seats. They re-organized us by height and filed us all up into the choir seats. In case you are looking for me this Saturday I will be sitting in the 2nd soprano section (middle left when you're looking at the choir) 3rd row up, 5th seat in. During the entire rehearsal there were a couple people going around shifting people and moving them so everyone could be seen and looked balanced. It was quite the process.

Sister Beck stopped in to hear us for the first 15 minutes or so of our rehearsal on her way to a sealing. She spoke for a couple minutes and told us how much she appreciated our time and talents. She also talked about the preparation everyone has been putting into this Relief Society meeting. I know it's going to be awesome. She went and sat down in the seats with the other RS board members while we sang The Spirit of God. When we finished she jumped up, pumped her arms in the air and shouted "Yes! That's just what I wanted!" It was pretty gratifying.

During the rest of the rehearsal we figured out sound with the organ and special instruments (flutes and french horns), recorded each of our songs for time and to listen back to, and took some group choir photos. It was a long morning, but still such a neat experience to be singing in the Conference Center.

As soon as we got back I ran into the house to change my clothes then drove over to meet my family at Ian's work picnic. It was a lot of fun. They had it catered by Goodwood BBQ. Yum. The boys were happy as clams with their party bags full of treats and toys and the playground to play on. They didn't really eat any lunch, but jelly beans and Pez has to count for something I guess. We have been having really great September weather and it was in the 80's on Saturday! Perfect BBQ weather. It's always nice to get to visit with Ian's co-workers and their families. Today is the CEO's birthday, so we sang to her and had cake too. Good times.

I was pretty exhausted when we got home. Ian watched the rest of the sad BYU game, then he was all kind of productive cleaning out the desk and setting back up our TV hookup to the computer because Fall TV starts back up this week! Thanks babe! It looks awesome! He took the kiddos to Best Buy with him to get a USB hub and brought me back In N Out for dinner. What a good hubby.

Sunday was pretty normal. Ward choir started back up with a new director, so that was interesting. And we spent Primary practicing for the program. Weston is doing really well memorizing his part. He was seriously the only kid who knew his part. Yikes. The program is next week. I know all the songs pretty well, so hopefully I play ok when it counts. I will be glad when it's done.

After dinner I went to my last RS choir rehearsal. It was good to listen to our recording from the Conference Center. We certainly don't sound professional, but it will definitely help that we had last night to fix some of the little things that were noticeably bad on the recording. Participating in the RS Choir has definitely been a unique and fabulous experience. I am grateful to have gotten to be a part of it. I'm excited for the actual performance on Saturday too. It's going to be great. Don't miss it!

Spoiled

I have been a spoiled stay at home mom (SAHM). All Summer I got away with sleeping in until 8ish every morning. Not getting showered and dressed until 10am. I had no pressing obligations. I mean keeping my house presentable, my kids fed and in clean clothes, but other than that nothing I HAD to do every day. Some days I didn't even manage to do the basics. Whoops. But I have to admit it was kind of lovely being lazy. Our new school routine has thrown me for a loop.

I have always considered myself a morning person. I like being up and getting going. I am most productive in the mornings. We have been getting up at 7am every day this week and been ready to leave the house by 8:30. On the one hand I love the routine of it, but on the other hand, I'm so tired! I found myself looking forward to Friday this week just so I could sleep in. Friday is our day off preschool and tee ball. And you know I will not be showered and dressed until at least 10 am tomorrow. :) Most mornings we are at this point by 8:30. . . aren't they cute?
On a completely unrelated topic . . . I sometimes get obsessed with the classifieds. You may recall my ill fated compulsive classifieds checking when I was looking for a puppy last year. Well this year I am compulsively checking for baby gear that I don't want to pay full price for. Baby stuff is expensive!

Last week I went and looked at the Sit N Stand stroller at Babies R Us. I wanted to play with it before I bought one. While there I also checked out diaper bags. My friend, Alison, has a diaper bag I really like the look of. It's not too big, is made out of this cool material that is super easy to clean, and has lots of great pockets and compartments. She swears by it. It is a J.J. Cole Collections diaper bag. They had a couple different styles of it at Babies R Us, but they were $70. Yikes. I kind of half heartedly looked at the other diaper bags, but I had pretty much already decided I wanted this one.

When I got home I checked Amazon to see if they had them for cheaper. They had some for $55. Next I checked the classifieds. There were 2 listed. One was brand new with the tags for $50. The other was "gently used" (the listing said it had only been used 5-6 times) for $15. Um, yes please. I emailed the seller, drove down the next day and picked it up. The only flaw was that one of the velcro tabs in the back pouch pocket had mostly ripped off. I figured I could either sew it back on or at least hot glue it back on. :) Yesterday my neighbor helped me fix a hem on a skirt and while I was there she also used her heavy duty sewing machine to fix my diaper bag. Good as new for $15! What a steal.
My next baby purchase will be crib bedding, but since I can't decide on anything I will probably hold off for a little longer before buying. I have been checking the classifieds for bedding sets too, but I think maybe I need to block the classifieds website for a couple weeks. There is just always something on there that is a great deal. Here's the crib bedding I like best from the classifieds. Here's the bedding I like best from Amazon. Which do you like best? I need some outside opinions.

Tee Ball!

This week has been pretty busy and exhausting. And it's only Tuesday! It's our first full week of school and we started tee ball! The coach decided to have a first practice Monday evening. Normally there really aren't practices. They just have 2 games a week and they kind of learn at the game, but I'm glad that they had a first practice. Weston got to meet his coach and the other kids on his team and learn a couple basics like how to catch a ball with his mitt on and how to run to/through first base. He's such a goofball, but he had a blast at his practice. (Hint: he's in the royal blue shirt and navy shorts)
Today was his team's first game. We were excited that the team hats and shirts were ready for the game. The kids all looked so cute. Watching a 3-4 year old tee ball game is actually really comical. The kids were tripping and falling all over the place, running the wrong direction, dog piling the ball, drawing pictures in the dirt, throwing the dirt, and generally being adorable. Weston did really well and had a lot of fun.
He skinned up both his knees falling in the dirt, so next game we are definitely going to be putting him in pants, but he was a trooper and didn't cry or whine at all about his knees. They basically play as many "innings" as they can in an hour. Each inning is when all the kids have had a turn to hit. I think they got in 3 innings tonight since I only remember Weston hitting 3 times. Hitting the ball was his favorite part. He also had a chance to do some fielding with his coach's help. They didn't bother having the kids try to throw to 1st base though. :)
Davin was pretty good about watching. He climbed around the bleachers and stood at the fence. He was good at cheering too. Ian managed to make it in time for the last inning, so he got to see Weston hit and field a little. Weston was stoked that he got a whole pack of Oreo's and a Capri Sun at the end of the game. He was nice to share a couple cookies with his brother too.
Weston's first time at bat . . . (Warning: don't turn the volume up too loud on the videos because I am cheering rather loudly)

Scoring his first run . . . after which he said "Mom I scored a goal!"

Unfortunately the long day and the pain in his knees caught up with him when we got home and he kind of lost it when I put him in the bath and cleaned his scraped knees. By the time I got them all dried, Neosporined, and Cars BandAided though he was fine. Hopefully they heal quickly so that he's good to go for Thursday's game. In the meantime I'm betting he is going to get a good night's sleep!

Date Day

This weekend Ian and I went on an all-day date. It was so fun. I needed the break and we needed the time together. We had already scheduled massages for the middle of the day, so we started with that and went from there. I bought the certificates for the massages on Groupon when they were only $20/hour massage. Pretty great deal. I was quite impressed with the spa too. It was quiet and beautiful. We even got to have our massages in the same room, which was kind of fun. I really enjoyed getting to lay on my stomach (in the belly support thing) for a full hour and my massage felt amazing. Ahh. I will have to do it again before I have this baby.

After our massages we drove up the canyon to Snowbird to check out Oktoberfest. They have it on weekends for about a month every year. And every year we talk about going up to check it out, but had never actually been. The weather was gorgeous, so it was fun to be up in the mountains.

Oktoberfest was a little disappointing, but I was still glad we went. We only stayed for a couple hours. We got some German food and hung out in the big food tent where the "traditional" music was being played. I put traditional in quotes because the band played the Chicken Dance. I don't know how traditionally German that is. :) Outside we watching the Yo Yo Man do his thing. It was impressive. There was a marketplace area with vendor booths, but it was pretty sparse and there was only one really German booth. I guess the big draw of Oktoberfest is the beer, which we did not sample, of course.
We drove back down the canyon and went to the Nickelcade to play some serious skeeball. The crowd at the Nickelcade on a Saturday afternoon is kind of funny. There were a lot of little boys with a mom or two trailing along, a handful of teenage boys with scantily clad teenage girls following them around, a few kinda creepy loner adult men playing the real video games (not just the ones that give tickets), and us. I loved playing skeeball. It's so fun! Seriously, when I am rich and have a huge house with a huge basement I am definitely putting in some skeeball lanes.
There was a Burlington Coat Factory across the street, so I dragged Ian in to look at the baby bedding. He ran out of steam for that pretty quickly. I guess I won't worry too much about his opinion of the nursery decor. We got hungry and headed to the Cheesecake Factory for some food. We ended up just getting an appetizer to share and our own slices of cheesecake. I couldn't finish my white chocolate caramel macadamia nut cheesecake. It was so rich. Ian's was amazing too. His was the red velvet cheesecake. He said that the restaurant is ruined for him now because he will always get the red velvet cheesecake and not want to try any of the other flavors. Finally it was time to head home. I was pretty exhausted actually. I'm not used to being out and about all day long.

Later that night we set up the projector to watch Bourne Identity with some friends out on the patio. It was fun. We should have done it earlier in the summer too, but we were just too busy (and by we I mean Ian). It was a very fun weekend.

Sunday I spoke in church. I always think that I won't have enough stuff to talk about and I will be done in 10 minutes, but this time I managed to take a whole 15ish minutes and didn't leave very much time for the last speaker. Whoops! In my defense I haven't spoken with 2 other people in awhile, so I forgot that I probably only needed to do 10 minutes. Anyway it went pretty well, so that was a relief.

Today has been busy and it's not over yet. I dragged Davin with me on a bunch of errands while Weston was at school. He was ready for a nap by the time we were done and was not happy when I made him put back on his shoes to go pick Weston up at school. Later this afternoon we have our first tee ball practice. The first game is tomorrow. I can't wait to see how Weston does.

Reason #58 I love my minivan . . . I bought our new Sit N Stand LX stroller this morning at Shopko. I have to brag a little about it because it was a great deal. They are normally around $130-150, but I have seen some on sale on Amazon and Walmart for $115. Not too bad for a stroller really. Shopko had theirs on sale this week for $115, BUT I also had a 20% off coupon that was only good yesterday and today. That made the stroller only $92. I love getting a good deal.
After Shopko we also went to Sams Club. I love that I can fit everything so easily into my van. It is seriously the best. I probably could have fit it all with all the seats up too, but the one side was already down, so I just loaded it in that way. I am so glad that we went with a minivan as our family car. It is the most convenient car ever. Now if I can just decide on some nursery decor then I would say we are more or less ready for baby girl!