Three (3)

My sweet little baby turned THREE last week. How is that possible??

We celebrated in the traditional way: family, cake, presents, and pizza.

She was mesmerized by the cake.

It took her 4 or 5 good blows before she got the candles out.

Two burning questions are in my mind as I look at these two pictures (above and below):
1. How long will these toys last? (Garrett has a tendency to throw small toys away if he gets tired of seeing them around the house)
2. Do I ever wash my daughter's face? 

(seriously... do you know how many pieces were in that box??)

Back of the shirt

Baby's got a new pair of shoes!

We had a great time celebrating with Garrett's parents and brother Rylan.  It was a fun day!

Happy Birthday, Abby - we love you!!

To rip, or not to rip

So, I started doing the P90X workout.  I'm really enjoying it so far.  It's about an hour a day, and it varies between cardio and strength training workouts.  My only complaint is that I need some 12 lb weights because the 10s aren't doing it for me on the arm sessions.  I also CANNOT, for the life of me, do a pull up.  This has been the case for my entire life.  I just hang from the bar - seriously, I can't even move up an inch!  It's pretty embarrassing and pathetic but that's ok, I don't really mind.

My real problem is the ab workout, called "Ab Ripper X". (sounds so intense, right?  It is!).  I really like the routine - it's only 15 minutes and you do it twice a week, in addition to the hour long session.

The first week with the Ab Ripper was okay, because I was only doing, oh, 10% of the workout.  Mostly I was just laying on the floor cursing and writhing in pain.  Needless to say, I wasn't too sore afterwards because I just couldn't do most of it.

However, week 2 was another story.  When I first did it last Wednesday, I was so proud of myself because I felt awesome afterwards!  I was able to do about 50% of the workout - a huge jump from week 1!  I was on my way to flat abs!

But that night, around 3 a.m., I woke up with terrible nausea.  I spent the next 2.5 hours in the bathroom, trying to throw up.  I thought that it was something I had eaten (I've been getting sick pretty frequently these days for some reason).

On Friday I did the ab ripper again, but I didn't really put all my energy into it because Abby was climbing all over me and then the phone rang when I was about halfway through, and since I'm always looking for any excuse to quit exercising, I answered the phone and never got back to finishing the workout.  Sure enough, that night I woke up around midnight, and was up for about 90 minutes with nausea.  It wasn't as bad as Wednesday night, but that's probably because I didn't work as hard on Friday.

You know how when you work out really hard, you feel nauseated afterwards?  I never knew it could be that delayed (about 10 hours later), but apparently it can be, because that's what was happening to me!  So, here's the question: how long will this last?  Will I eventually become fit enough that I don't feel nausea after each session of Ab Ripper?  I'd prefer not to wake up in the middle of the night with nausea.  It's the worst!  I'd rather have a headache or practically anything else besides nausea.  Plus, I'd rather sleep through the night! I'm exhausted the next day.

So, the more I think about it, I don't really care much about having amazing abs.  No one sees them except for Garrett.  I'd just like to get rid of my love handles and my baby bulge (cardio).  My abs don't have to look amazing.  Should I give it up altogether?  Should I push through the pain (please say no)?

This is the issue that is on my mind.  I look forward to your input (you telling me that it doesn't matter, and that in fact I should just give up exercising once and for all and eat more cheese and pasta).

Just hit "next"

I read a lot of blogs after my kids go to bed, and while they nap.  For the most part, I read a blog to:

1. learn something (crafting/quilting blogs, DIY blogs, etc)
2. stalk someone (this means YOU!)
3. get inspired (healthy eating, fitness, spiritual, etc)

I also really like to make comments on blogs because I always love to get comments on my own posts.  However, since I follow all my blogs in Google Reader, I wasn't getting to see anyone's actual blog page because I was reading it in a format similar to email.  So, if I wanted to make a comment, I had to click on the link to get to the blog page, then click on another link to get to the comments... you get the idea.  It was exhausting on my poor little fingers. :)  Plus I had a dinosaur laptop and it was taking forever for pages to load.

A couple months ago I learned about Google Reader's "next" button.  It's a button you can put in the toolbar of your webpage (that's the top of the page, Mom!), and it just takes you through all the websites in your reader (the ones with new posts).  It's great - now I don't miss out when someone changes their blog design or layout, and it's much easier for me to make a comment and/or read comments that other people have left.

All you have to do is log into Google Reader, click on "Settings", and click "goodies".  It explains exactly how to add the "next" button to your toolbar - it only takes a few seconds.

Next!

Winter Fun

By some small miracle, Garrett was home one evening in mid-December, so for a family night we bundled up the kids and headed to Candy Land.

What little girl doesn't love Candy Land?

She wanted us to take pictures of her standing next to each lollipop. 

Playing on the wooden train

Got to love the "half blink" on Abby's face. :)

We went on a hayride through the woods, where there were light displays and nativities. That's something I love about living in the South - there were Bible verses and symbols of Christianity all over the place!

Castle made completely of lights, reflecting in the water.

Abby has never seen Cinderella but she still loved the carriage.

The girls on the wooden train.

We had a great time; my only regret is that we didn't know about this place sooner!  It was the perfect place to bring kids and to get us in the Christmas spirit.  It was also c-o-l-d, which was ideal for an activity like this!

What I Want from 2010

End goal: To be more "in the moment", especially where my children are involved
Action: Turn off the TV and computer and just spend time.  Quality time and quantity time.  Especially since this is probably the easiest that parenting is going to get.  Sure, some days I want to pull my hair out, but I do believe that parenting will only get more stressful as my children get older.

End goal: Read more classics
Action: I'll admit: I like "lite" books.  When I read, I usually don't want to think too hard, especially after a long day of being "mommy".  I like beach reads. It's not that I don't like classics - it just takes me a while to get into them sometimes.  However, I'd really like to be more "well read" and I don't think that lite books are getting me there.  So, I want to read at least 6 classics this year.  Any recommendations?

End goal: Understand Isaiah again
Action: Hands down, one of the best classes I ever took at BYU was "Understanding Isaiah".  It was incredible, and Isaiah quickly become my favorite book in the Bible.  I've forgotten pretty much everything, though.  It's time to pull out the class notes and get re-acquainted!  I'd like to focus on a couple chapters a week.  I'd also like to type out my notes so I have an electronic copy.

End goal: Fit back into my pre-prego clothes. (I HATE the word "prego", by the way. I don't know why I even used it)
Action: The usual: diet and exercise.  I just finished the first week of P90X Lean and I'm really liking it so far.  I don't think I'll really be able to lose all the weight until I'm done nursing though - that's what happened the first time around, in any case.  By the way, whoever said that nursing burns 500 calories a day is a liar.

End goal: Be more rested
Action: Go to bed before midnight once in a while.  I am a night owl and it's really not a big deal for me to up until 1 a.m. night after night.  It's awful!  I'll be realistic and just start shooting for 11:30 in bed (meanwhile... it's after midnight as I write this post).

*The headband in the picture was made for Abby by my sister-in-law.  Garrett didn't think it would fit on my head so I had to take a picture for proof.

Christmas+

We had a great Christmas break in Savannah this year.  It was a full house but that's the way it should be!  We played games, ate yummy food, watched movies, went for walks, played outside when it was warm, smoked a turkey, got haircuts from my awesome SIL, and watched Garrett's little brother go crazy in the yard with his new  battery-powered car (you know, the kind that we all wanted when we were his age).

We also got really good at MarioKart Wii... especially Garrett, if you know what I mean.  Garrett also conveniently "forgot" his razor, which I should have expected. :)  I actually kind of liked his scruffiness this time, though.

Don't really have many pictures to share... the problem with having a fancy camera is that the pictures I take generally don't turn out, so I delete them and we come out of a vacation with virtually no photographs.

+ We have a lot of exciting things on the horizon.... Match Day is in 2 1/2 months, and our rank list is due in February.  Garrett still has a few more interview trips ahead of him but for the most part they are winding down, thankfully.  It was a crazy December and he was gone pretty much all of this week, too, but finally things are starting to slow down.  I'm looking forward to enjoying our last couple of months here.  I am extremely sad to be leaving our friends and our ward at Church, but excited and anxious to find out where we will be spending the next 5 years.

You win some, you lose some

One the left sidebar of my blog I listed some resolutions for 2009.  Let's see how I did.

Read at least 2 book/month - Done.  I read probably a book a week.  I love to read.  I read while I'm nursing, before I go to sleep at night, and whenever I can sneak in a spare minute.  Actually, Abby loves to read too, and often she'll go get a pile of her own books if she sees me reading.

Master Artisan bread - I don't know if I can really say I mastered it, but it's pretty darn good!  This year I need to branch out and try some other recipes in the book.

Take Abby to the zoo - Done!

Update blog at least weekly - I think of this blog as a fun way of sharing our "happenings" with our family and friends who don't see us often.  I also would love to start printing it up at the end of each year, which is why I want to have regular entries.  I didn't post every week, but I did have 49 posts in 2009... pretty close to averaging out to every week.  Hopefully I'll do better in 2010.

Complete at least 5 quilts - Done!  Four are right here, and I also made several baby quilts and a couple more quilt tops that are just waiting for backing/batting.  I would love to quilt more, but it's so expensive.  I'm tempted to start telling people that if they buy the fabric and batting, I'll make them a quilt.. just so I can do it more!  We'll see...

Make all gifts - no store bought - I probably made 75% of the gifts I gave this year.

Open an Etsy shop - nope.  I think this is a confidence issue.

Complete 72-hour kits for all - not done yet, but I'm closer than I was last year.  How bad is it that I have a blog encouraging people to get prepared, and I haven't even finished my own kits?? :)

Get a 2-week water supply - no. This will have to be added to the 2010 list.

I'll be adding my 2010 resolutions to the sidebar as soon as I get a chance to sit down and think of them!