Funny story.  A few days ago, I was standing next to Jacob.  He was sitting on his computer chair.  I turned to walk away, and hit him with my belly.  I wonder if I will get used to this belly sticking out so far.  And if I do, I wonder how long it will take to get used to not having such a big belly after Copyright is born.  Time will tell.

Today was a productive sewing day.  I was able to sew a dress, I had already cut it out.  And I was able to turn a t-shirt into a half-shirt (someone makes and sells them as half-tees, I think).  I have heard great reviews on them, and so I decided to make one and see what I think.  I think it will work well for layering.

Little Copyright was not as cooperative as we would have liked.  So, no, we still do not know if this baby is a boy or a girl**.  Copyright kept legs closed and while we did not learn that, we did learn other things.

We learned that this child is definitely ours***.  This child is modest (takes after mom).  This child is stubborn (takes after dad, okay takes after mom too).  This child is healthy.  All the other parts were there, in their proper places, and measured well.  Heart beats properly.

I had to laugh as we saw the baby’s face.  Copyright was sucking, and as a result we saw the tongue go in and out.  It was like it was sticking its tongue out at us for wanting to know the sex.  In all seriousness, it was really cool to watch.

*Unless we can find a way to have another ultrasound somewhere before that.  Preferably not very costly, and if at all possible some 3D ultrasounds would be fun to see.
**Which totally presents us with the enormous challenge of agreeing on names for both a boy and a girl.  We were hoping to only have to figure out one name.
***This child is not a lizard.

You can’t really see it in this picture, but I am wearing my rubber chicken earrings.

FAQs

Q:  How are you feeling?

A:  Hungry.  Tired.  Gotta pee.  So mostly good!  (However, not as tired as I once was.)

Q:  How many weeks are you?

A:  Today marks 24 weeks (LMP) however, gestationally 22 weeks.  It is weird, and can be confusing.  LMP stands for last menstrual period.  Ovulation, and therefore conception does not occur for (an average of) two weeks after that.  So while we are told that we are at 24 weeks, Copyright has only been in there for 22 weeks.

Q:  Have you felt the baby move/kick?

A:  Yes, yes I have.  I thought I was feeling something for a while, and then because I have never been through this before, I was doubting what I was feeling.  And then what I felt was more obvious at 21 1/2 weeks.  A few days later I was trying to hear for a heart beat with the stethoscope, and must have been crowding little Copyright, because there was a strong movement that pushed the stethoscope over.  A week later I was able to place Jacob’s hand on my abdomen and He was able to feel baby movements.  There have been stronger and more movements in the short weeks that followed.  When I lay down, we can see movements with our eyes.  We try to use the stethoscope to listen for the heartbeat, but we are not as skilled at that.  We do have a thing-basically an electronic stethoscope-and we heard the “whooshing” that is Copyright’s heart and last night I decided that we should try again, and we heard the heartbeat pretty strongly.  This time it was more like the thumping of my heart, and less like the whooshing from before, however we know it was not mine, because we could still hear my heartbeat as well.  So that was pretty neat.

Q:  Why do you call the baby Copyright 2010?

A:  Well, this baby is uniquely made from us, and so the “copyright” part.  And this baby was started and will be born in 2010.  And we felt that we wanted a “name” so we are not always calling the baby “the baby” or “it” or “he or she.”

Q:  How many are in there?

A:  We are assuming there is only one in there.  We will find out for sure next week.  This is also the appointment that we will learn if we are getting a he or a she.  Also, the dreaded glucose testing appointment.

So here are some pictures, mostly for my own documenting purposes.  And some of you don’t see mee very often, and for those that have been around for the gradual changes, here is a more distinct view.

On 14 April 2010 I decided I would take a few pictures before I started growing my belly very much.  At that time I was only 7 weeks (lmp) along and was not close to showing outwardly what was happening inwardly.

These next two are blurry, I was not really very focused myself when I took them.  I felt kind of silly since there was no progress to record. But the first here is the most side-ways shot I got.  The second I just felt good in that one since I had not really gotten a shot of how I looked after losing all that weight last year.

I had this grand idea to take a picture once a week and then I could compare week to week.  If I had started it four weeks earlier (we knew close to the day that Copyright came to be) I might have really tried to stick to the plan.  But I had not been taking weekly pictures, and life got a little crazy.  And I figured that I would start to take pictures when I started to notice a difference, the next thing I know I was hanging out with some family and one of the nieces was leaning her head into mee and I looked down and did not see her head.  It occurred to mee in that moment, I missed the point when I started showing (I did take a picture of that view, though I have to search through lots of pictures to find it to post).

The next picture shoot I did was this afternoon.  16 weeks later.  What a slacker (in pictures, I have been sewing and doing other stuff like crazy).  The next picture is a side by side of “7 weeks” and “23 weeks” in the same clothes.

Now for more comfortable clothes.

And lest anyone think I am not excited (cause really it is fun to see the belly grow-in this way).

Frizzy hair and all-I know many of you think it is because of the humidity, it is not so with my hair.  My hair does well in humidity, my hair gets frizzy when the air is dry-the air-conditioner is on and I had been in that all day.

They arrived and I showed them where to find the toy box in this house, and we had our was-a-stove-box-converted-house ready for them to play in.  G3 said, “We love ours house in yours house, Marcia!”  Yay a successful play-house.

Here is a picture of them playing with the toys from the toy box, the hand-cuffs are from our Halloween costumes when we were prisoners.  (We keep the other set out of reach of children, thank you very much.)  At some point during this playtime, G2 told us, “Daddy smokes.  I like him smoking.”  Her daddy does not smoke.

First item on the schedule was to get in the car and travel to a drum corps show.  G3 fell asleep in the car before we left town.

G2 said, “I am not going to sleep, I want to be awake.”  I told her that was fine.

Then not ten minutes later she did not answer when I asked her a question, and this is what I saw.

It was raining when we got to the show location, and we were hoping that it would have stopped, so while the girls and I sat in the car and ate the food we brought, Jacob went to see if the show was going to be cancelled or moved indoors.  (We had already purchased our tickets.)  The answer was that it looked like the rain would stop soon, and we would wait and the show would just be delayed a bit.  So, we went in and waited under the shelter of the bleachers.  We had to entertain ourselves.  Only when making this post did I notice the sunglasses; I did not see them like that when this was taken.

G3 helped G2 fix her skirt (which is a very cute skirt, btw).

They found drips coming from empty rivet holes.

G3 wanted her picture taken too.  And just so you know, that is not a tear under her eye, it is a water drop.

Here is G3 sitting on Jacob’s lap watching the show.

Here is G2 sitting on my lap watching the show.  After a while, she wanted to switch places with G3 because 1) the guy in front of us was very VERY tall and 2) my lap was/is not as big as it used to be, she had to share with her unborn cousin.

Here is a picture of the first corps that performed.  They won their category/class.  And as a special treat that guy there in the front ensemble is/was one of Jacob’s pitt students.  We are proud of Jason, he played good.

We enjoyed this pretty sunset over the performances. ( I just realized that could mean that we preferred the sunset, that is not what I intended to say.)

We had arrived right as the show was supposed to start, and we could not see the corps busses.  We had brought a lot of fruit with us to donate to Jason’s corps and we did not want to take all that fruit home with us, lest it go to waste.  So when the shows were all done we drove around and found where the corps buses were parked, and Jacob went in search of someone we could give the fruit to.  This was after 10 pm and the girls were tired, but very well behaved.  In fact, all the people that were sitting around us were very complimentary of how well they behaved and were impressed that they watched the shows.  G2 at one point told mee that one of the corps was going too slow and needed to be faster and louder.  Both girls were in awe of the flags (color guard).  If there had been any souvenir flags they would have been able to go home with their very own flags.  Fruit delivered, and we started our two-ish hour drive home.  They fell asleep in the car pretty quickly.

The next morning while I was walking (the girls were still asleep when I left, but insisted that they go walk with mee the next morning) Jacob got pancakes going.  After breakfast, the girls took a BUBBLE BATH in my “tiny tub.”

While they were in the tub, their happy-things took a bath too.  A very much so needed bath.  Don’t tell Ronda that I let them have Happys with them at the drum corps show, but I did and they dropped them a number of times in the rain puddles, and may or may not have dropped them on the floor in the (public) bathroom when they took turns before getting back in the car to head home.  Once it was clean, G3 told mee that she was unable to chew on her happy because it was clean.  She makes me laugh!

After the bath they wanted to watch a movie in “ours house in yours house.” (Jacob thinks it is funny that the first thing they did when they started playing with the house was to find the object that was too big and try to get it in the door!  We all do it at least once with our own homes, right?)

What did they watch?  “Mahana you ugly, get down from that tree!”  “Do you want Johnny Lingo to see what a disobedient daughter you are?”

They watched all but the last 3ish minutes of the movie.  Then on to another activity.

I let them paint their own nails with what ever color(s) they wanted.  They had fun. G3, “Boys can’t paint theirs nails!”

G3 first picture, G2 second picture.  (In case you couldn’t have figured it out by the colors they chose.)  I offered to paint G2’s right thumb nail, but she insisted she did not want that one painted. Well, okay then.

Lunch time, they asked if I would make them oatmeal, because G3 told mee, “Oatmeal is ours favorite food.”

G2 had her apple slices and cheese all lined up-I suspect we are related.

G2 right at the end of lunch told mee, “Marcia, I am tired, I want to lay down.”  I gave her permission, and G3 followed her in and five minutes or so later they were out.  About three and a half hours later they were still sleeping, and this is what we saw.

Somehow G2 turned into Dora.  They slept for about four hours and 15-30 minutes.  I guess we did a good job of keeping them entertained.   When they woke up they stayed in there talking for a few minutes and then came out and asked if they could have another bubble bath!  I would have let them if we weren’t headed out the door.  We went over to Jacob’s parents’ house and they had a lot of fun pillow fighting with the adults.  I wish I had taken pictures of that, or even video would have been great!

They went to bed, and before falling asleep double checked with mee that they can walk with mee in the morning with my friend, right?

They walked a mile with us before sitting on the track playing.

I let them take another bubble bath.  They loved that, maybe for a birthday or something they need bubble bath soap.  While making stacks of toys that I let them use in the tub, I heard G2 say to G3, “G3 do you know I love you, you is my best friend.  Don’t put that on mine!”  They got out of the tub just in time to start playing when Grammy, Ronda, G1, and G4 arrived to pick them up.  We all had lunch and then they went on their way.

We really had fun having the girls here, maybe it can become a sort of tradition?  What think you?

Monday the 14th of June (Miss Emily’s birthday) we closed circa 2:45pm (when all was signed and done).  We walked straight over to the post office to mail out our “address change” cards to many people.  This is why we asked for any addresses if people wanted one….  This is what it looks like:

Okay, so it looked a bit different, because on what we mailed out had our actual address.  However as previously stated, we are not posting our address on here.  If you need/want our address, we can email it to you, but only if you ask, otherwise we don’t know we need to get it to you, and if we do not have your address you are responsible for getting it to us.

And for those who were/are unaware that there is a second page to the card, this is what it contains (unaltered):

So there you have it folks!!!  We are very excited and (as one of us likes to put it ) “a little bit terrified.”

It was kind of a sneaky maneuver to announce our news this way.  Especially since I (Marcia) went camping with our young women for the rest of the week.  We acknowledge that.   We had good reason for it though.  Originally we had set the closing date for when I was going to be camping, as soon as we realized that, we changed it for the day before I left.  We also wanted to be sure that we had everything finished with purchasing the house before we announced the pending arrival of Copyright 2010.  (And just because I want to explain my taking so long in making this post) We have been packing/unpacking/moving/cleaning/etc for the last half of June, and only this morning did we finally get around to setting up my computer.  There, I said it, and I feel justified!  And I am pregnant, so don’t make mee cry.

? ? ? F A Q ? ? ?

We get asked many questions with both of these big events happening in our lives.  We have decided to do an FAQ (frequently asked questions) list:

Q:  When are you going to move?

A:  We have moved all of our belongings out of the house we rented and into our new house.  We had our family help us.  This process was started while I was at camp.  I thought that was good timing, and because I have not been too incredibly useful, I figured it would work out better if I could just pack and have as much ready before hand and let them work while I was out of town.

Q:  Are you all moved in?

A:  That is a tricky question.  All of our stuff is in the house, however much of it is still in boxes.  We have been sleeping here and unpacking.  I would not say we are “moved in” yet, I am not sure what the true definition would be for us to be in that state.  Though because most of the boxes are in Copyright’s room, we have to be un-packed enough by the time December comes around.

Q:  When can I come see your house?

A:  Never, the date is past.  We held an Open “empty” House the evening we closed.  So I am partly kidding about the “never” part.  We will not be holding another “open house” and we do request that if people want to come see it, that they set up an appointment (I hate the Tuesdays), so as to allow us to be home, and hopefully a little more moved in. We are after all living here now.  Be considerate about it.

Q:  How much work do you have to do on the house? (Also stated as:  now you get to have fun fixing up the house)

A:  Actually we don’t have to do any work on the house other than unpacking.  We did have to get a fridge, stove, washer/dryer, and that is about it.  The good people we bought it from gutted the house and made it like new with new cabinets, paint, toilets, roof, plumbing, wiring, everything really!  We did get to pick out the carpet for the living room and flooring for the kitchen and bathroom.

That said, there is a detached garage with apartment space above it that needs quite a bit of work before it’s really useful, so that will be fun, but it isn’t something we have to do before we can live here.

Q: Did you buy the house because you are having a baby?

A:  No we are having a baby because we now have a house.  Joking.  We pretty much decided to buy the house before we knew about being pregnant.  This is a house we saw about a year and a half ago when it was in foreclosure, we loved it, we talked to the bank about making an offer.  Then we were told some one else made an offer and that offer was accepted.  Some months later (just over a year ago) we were presented with the opportunity to buy the same house, and it had been “gutted” and was in progress of being fixed up (when it was in foreclosure, the people trashed the house, on top of apparently not taking good care of it at all anyhow).  We thought it over and agonized and had to turn down that offer.  We did not feel like we could live in a “construction zone.”  Earlier this year as Jacob was at the university in his office, he had a visitor and we were again offered the house, this time all the work would be finished and it would be move-in ready.  We verbally expressed interest February, talked over details in March, signed a contract in April, and closed in June.  We knew about the baby in March and test confirmed in April.

Q:  I thought you never wanted to have children. (not really a question, and mostly directed at Jacob)

A:  All bark and no bite.  He claimed that until it happened he reserved the right to say that.  In reality, we are very excited.  And of course there is a bit of anxiety in the unknown.  Will our baby be cute?  Who will the baby look like?  When do they toilet train?  They don’t already know how to tie shoes?  Things like that.  However any person that said that to mee, doesn’t really know mee.

Q:  When is the due date?

A:  December 2010.  Doctor’s office says the 7^th based on LMP. I say the 6^th based on ovulation.

Q:  Is that a really sonogram or is it photoshopped?

A:  It is really a picture from my uterus.  Should it really be called a picture, it is an image created by sound waves aimed at my uterus.

Q:  Are you having a boy or a girl?

A:  We don’t know for sure.  Based on biology and time and the moon and the stars aligning and the atmospheric pressure we suspect it will be a girl.  However we have to wait about ten more weeks before my doctor will check it out.

Q:  What do you want to have? (generally this immediately follows the last question)

A:  A healthy human baby.  I know they mean sex of the baby.  Really though, I will be happy as long as everything goes well.  I would love a son or a daughter. I would definitely be disappointed if it was not human.

Q:  Do you want to find out the sex of the baby? (a number of people say gender, however there is a very important difference in the words, and for some odd reason it falls under my pet peeves category-sex is male or female, gender is masculine or feminine)

A:  I would be okay with either knowing or being surprised, a surprise could be fun, though so could knowing and planning.  Jacob wants to know.  We will find out if we can.  We really are planners and like to be prepared.

Q:  Have you been sick at all? (directed at mee since no one suspected, except in hindsight, and we only told doctors and we were surprised at how people had finally stopped asking when we were going to have a baby)

A:  Jacob responds with, “Have you not been sick at all?”  I have had lots of not feeling well.  I did really well with not vomiting, though there was lots of nausea, still is some, though not as constant.  Then I got a sinus infection, drainage started and the vomiting commenced.  I could probably win a contest for puking on command.  Is there a super hero yet?

Q:  Have you had any cravings?

A:  Hmmm, cravings….  Not too many cravings.  Mostly I have aversions.  Sugar is the biggest offender at this time, unless it is counter balanced with other healthier foods.  I can’t eat lettuce, and the vinegar in most condiments gives me issue.  Yesterday I really wanted garlic bread, it was delicious to mee.  One day I wanted potato chips (I don’t like potato chips, I like corn chips) in three flavors BBQ, Cheddar, French Onion;  I did not get them, but I could taste them in my mind, and I wanted them.  Early on I had a strong craving for Chef  Boyardee canned ravioli;  that stuff is nasty and I refused to listen to that craving.

Q:  Are you (or “you are”) going to have fun shopping for maternity clothes?

A:  If I liked shopping maybe that would be appealing.  However I am short and it has never been fun to shop for clothes, for mee.  Also, last year I lost over 60 pounds, and I did not get rid of those clothes (I know you are never supposed to keep “fat clothes” but I did).  And there were some of those clothes that I like, and frankly I don’t want to spend money on temporary clothes.  And there is the fact that we now have a mortgage to pay, and I don’t think there is a shopping spree in the future of our budget.

If we remember (or any other questions start to come up) other questions we get asked we will answer them.

We (Jacob joined mee last night) went to Wally World again and obtained two more carts full of boxes.  We went some time after midnight, and the really good boxes appear for availability around 1a.m. (so I guess it could be considered this morning).

We have been married for just over three and a half years, and have many times tried to set a scripture study habit.  We have tried to read from front to back, to have a different topic each day of the week, to do some other things that did not prove to be keep-ables.  However yesterday, we finished reading the Book of Mormon, in its entirety, together!!!  The strategy this time, was that I wrote (actually I typed it on the computer and printed it out) each chapter and had them in a jar, that we have been drawing at random for each day, sometimes more than one chapter if it happens to be quite short.  Honestly, it has been very fun to go about it this way.  We already have studied all the stories in there through out our lives, and so as we have been reading this way we end up jumping all over the place.  This keeps all the stories fresher in our minds.  And as an added bonus, we had the privilege a few weeks ago to attend the annual Seminary Vs Bishopric Scripture Bowl.  There is a Jeopardy style portion and a match the scripture with the content portion (for the first time in 10 or so years, the bishopric beat the youth in the jeopardy portion, though they youth won big time with the memory portion).  Anydangways, the point of telling about that event is that as we watched them, it seemed as though we had “just read that story” about each of the stories!  It was a really nice feeling.

And totally not from yesterday, but a few weeks ago…. A bit of back story.  We have two cars.  We only drive one car.  We have had the other car on the donut for a number of months, because we needed to buy a new tire.  Then another tire when flat.  And the battery probably needs replacing.  And some other thing that makes us “afraid” to drive it out of town, or over 35-40 mph else-ways a couple wheels may fall off.  So, it is sitting on the donut, and the wheel with the flat tire that needs replacing, has been leaning upside the porch.  One day I went out to do something, and noticed that it was gone, and there was no plant life growing in its place just yet, so it was a fresh disappearance.  This morning I wanted to use my hand trowel thing, and it was no where to be seen.  I had suspected it missing when the wheel went, though I did not look for it until today when I wanted to use it.  Now we are left with two questions: How do we (or even just “do we”) buy a new wheel? and Who steals a wheel and a trowel?  All I can figure is that some one must have had a greater need for it than us.  And If you see a new plant display in a Honda wheel…well, if I see one, I will laugh.  I think we have been laughing about it too much to find a way to be upset over it.

Karen (Jacob’s mom) had a catering gig for our friend Jennie’s wedding.  She enlisted Jacob and mee to help.  As I was working on part of the dessert selections, the non-stick pan slipped out of my hand and we lost most of that pan, if not all.  We did have fun though.  And next month they will have been married for two whole years!

Speaking of two whole years, today Giuliana Marie turns two!! Wow time flies.  I sure do love that little girl.

Second, or is it third, my face is good.  I no longer hurt.  Maybe we did not need to go to the ER afterall, but I am glad we did  go and find out nothing was wrong, because in all seriousness I was scared and I was in a lot of pain at the time.  And I was mailed a survey on how my ER visit was, I will be sure to fill it out.  Overall it was a good experience, my only complaint is that I did not understand the pain ranking system.

Fourth, Girls camp is coming up in a few weeks.  I (we, but not Jacob) have been working like crazy to get all the fun surprises finished.  We like to have surprises for the girls, and so that he does not have to “lie” we often don’t even tell Jacob what we are up to.  We love the week with our Young Women.

Fifth, Jacob is enrolled in a race this afternoon/evening. The race is from Wapello to Burlington (in Iowa, in case anyone wondered).  We go over and he checks in between 2-4 this afternoon, and then I will drive to Burlington and hang out (with people or at Target or both or a park), hopefully find the ending point, and watch my talented husband finish the race.  Kind of short notice, though if any one wants to join mee as I wait, let mee know!

P.S. I am not sure when I will post a new quiz, it seems that there is less and less interest in it.  Rick wins by default since he is the only one that guessed this last time, and it was up for almost 2 months, so rick here is your imaginarey gold star, or if you come hang with mee this afternoon I can give you a real one!  Or maybe he is just hoping for the prize that we are offering to the 1000th commenter on this here website.

P.P.S.  Many of you know we are trying to secure a mortgage for a house we love.  If we happen to secure it, we intend to close on it in the middle of next month.  With said plan, we will have a new address and will want to mail out address changes, as we plan to not to post our address on the internet.  So if you desire said address from us, please make sure I have your address to mail ours to you.  Plus who doesn’t love getting mail. With that said if your kids like to get mail, or you like for your kids to get mail, make sure you have listed who you want it addressed to with your submission.  One entry per household please.  Submissions may be sent to marcia at twodesk dot com

Last week for Family Home Evening we ate at a place that we like, we may even love it (though we do not call it home, so it should have been called Family out evening).  After we ate we decided to walk around a nearby store and see what we could see.  Not really interested in spending any monies, we just wanted to walk off some of what we had eaten.  Out of the blue, Jacob was pointing and telling mee to “Look!”  It was the basket that I have not been able to find in this town for over a year.  We bought two.  And sooner rather than later they will be marked with our name so that if any leave our house for some reason, they will be able to come back home.

We still are not sure how the old basket walked off, or why, but we have replaced it.  However, if it returns to us, we will welcome it into our home again, just as before.  No questions asked, at least not too many questions asked.

And because there has only been one guess on the quiz from last week, I am leaving it up for one more week.

Oh, I also wanted to share a lesson in keeping the Sabbath day Holy.  Yesterday as we were leaving church the gas tank light came on.  We decided that instead of purchasing more gas on Sunday we would hold out and trust we would be blessed for it.  Even though Jacob had a home teaching appointment to drive to last evening. And I would need to drive across town early this morning before I could get gas.  So after I did my walking thing this morning I went to start the car and it hesitated, but still got me over to Hy-Vee so that I could pay the electric bill and get a 15 cents/gallon off of my gas purchase.  And then I was almost unable to start the car again to get to a gas pump, it was on what fumes were barely there still, but it made it to the pump, and I was able to fill up at $2.74/gallon.  That is the best we have paid for gas in a long time.

This is a sweet little boy sharing Happy with his new baby sister.  Wow, it is an “old” picture!

On December 19th, 2008 at almost two in the morning we heard a noise.  It sounded like something had fallen on the house.  We put our coats on, and went outside to see the above.

We were worried that the branch may have been too heavy to leave hanging on the cable that feeds us our internet.  We also did not like the idea that it might fall on the car.

This branch was about the diameter of a healthy cantaloupe, and was very long.  Jacob went up to it to see if he could just push it off to get it away from the wire.

Upon closer inspection, it was really really big.  He gave a few heaves, and decided it would be best to move the car out of the way so as to not allow the chance of the branch falling on the car.  So, he ice-picked his way into the car, kept the door open to see and backed the car up a ways.  He went back to the branch and gave it some good pushes.

Down it came.  You can see where the car had been.  The sound from the branch hitting the ground was loud, and the vibrations from it hit other places where ice had formed, and we heard lots of cracking and popping around us.  The best we can describe it is to say that it sounded like a battle field.  The apartments across the street had lots of ice on the roof, that (we believe) in response to the branch noise, cracked and slid off the roof into the parking lot.  We hope all the cars were ok after that.

The ice storm really was pretty to look at even though it really was not good for the trees (or likely the animal life either).  This is one of the electric lines next to our house that we saw at that time.

This is a picture taken after getting up for the day.

Tonight as I was trying to feel better**, I curled up on the couch to watch “comfort movies.”  One of which was Annie.  It reminded me how much I loved the music, still do.  And it got mee to thinking about how I used to have an Annie dress, not the one she wears in the movie, but one with her and Sandy and a rainbow, all over it.  I have no idea what the rainbow was about since I didn’t see one in the movie, but I had matching hair barrettes.  I remember being very sad when I was no longer able to wear it.

When the movie was over, I checked the audio options, as I like to do, and was pleased to see that I can watch it in Spanish!  I like the song translations***.

And my wonderful husband**** surprised mee with roses when he returned from Stake meetings this evening.

*So, I may not be obsessed with “bald heads” but I sure do think little old men are adorable, and I love when babies (boys) look like little old men.  Weird I know, but it is mee.
**I am suffering from a crazy sinus infection.  Mostly bothers mee overnight, however it has mee coughing and sneezing and feeling pretty crumby.
***I foresee my memorizing them in the future.
****I sure do think he is swell!

This fall another mouse dared to enter the house.  We set the traps again, and it was caught with-in the hour of setting.

We had one still set along the wall, just waiting in hopes that we would not catch another.

We went out of town for a week, and the trap was empty.

The temperatures dropped, a mouse came in for a snack.  It died.

We went to pick up more traps (because even though it says reusable, let’s be honest here, I am not un-clipping the mouse and using that nasty thing again!) just in case we need them.  The temperature outside keeps dropping, and I don’t want to be outside!

The price of the traps this time was $6.88, I think-once I find the receipt I will know for sure.  This evening we were at the store getting other supplies in that area of the store, and passed the traps display, and this is what I saw:

It is the original price again.  It makes me so stinking mad!!!!!

We figure that because the outside temperatures dropped, many people were having trouble with the mice coming in, and the store (or rather the people who run it) decided that they might as well make extra money off the people who already have enough problems in their lives.  And now that the traps are in less of a demand, the price has dropped back to the original rate.

Now, if I can just think of how to make this work to my advantage….  Any ideas?

On October 12th we had dinner at Jacob’s parents’ house with the missionaries, Elder Pickett and Elder Drake.  Elder Pickett is from Canada and that happens to be Canadian Thanksgiving.  So using our super internet abilities, we found his family.  Jacob called his parents and talked to his brother and his mom and asked about any traditions.  We discovered that Elder Pickett has tried many new foods on his mission. The plate above is his clean plate.

Here he is loading up his plate:

Here he is trying new foods:

He liked it so much, we sent leftovers home with him:

We were very lucky with the driving conditions.  We did see lots of tire marks where cars had gone off in the snow before we got to those points.  We are happy that the weather cleared up for us to make it there and back in safety and with out too much worry.

Now for the fun stats I know everyone is waiting for, knowing that I am mee and I do these things on car trips.  Just remember FOUR days of travel.

December 15th:

I counted up 30 places where cars had slid off the road in the earlier bad weather, not including cars still there.
There were 2 cars still out there, one was a mini-van and looked like it may have collided with a car not there any more.
There were 6 semi-trucks, 3 of which were flipped on the sides.
I just hoped and prayed that everyone was ok.

Watched Indiana Jones:  Raiders of the Lost Arc and Horton Hears a Who ( the newer one, I still prefer the older one).

Now for the Alphabet searches:

Start time 7:50am (finding the words in order)
Avenue Burlington Club Dane Equipped For Golf Hiring It’s Junction Kawasaki Lockridge Melrose National Orlando Peterbilt Quarter Right Stop Travel USDOT VanWyk Wisconsin Xpress (as in U.S. Xpress) Yanke Zooming
Stop time 9:44am

Start time 9:46am (finding the letters on license plates we passed)
668WWA SB3P2M  989CMQ  126TDX  490MLE TF4209  G598107  237SJH 894NIP  790JJA  KTYAHWK  206ALZ  CWM 995TLN 188WDO PS4404  951RQZ  6FBR122  795ESC  896TJY  U1462O  OVF776  435EWX  835RMX 726SYK  013NQZ
Stop time 12:10pm

Start time 12:56pm (finding the words randomly)
Airport Beatrice Class Downtown East Federal Grand Harley Icy Jery’s Knight Lincoln Mack Nation Oak Park Quest Ramada Sale Then University Vehicles Warning Xtra York Zoo
Stop time 4:05pm

We stayed the night in Laramie, Wyoming.  I did not make any lists the next day (the 16th) because I was too busy whining about the lack of data service on the phones as we drove through the rest of Wyoming.  I was also taking lots of pictures of the scenery.  It is beautiful even if there is not a single person who lives there to enjoy it!!!  We decided to stop briefly in Salt Lake City so we could take Jacob’s parents to see the new Conference Center.  It was a fun tour.  And wouldn’t you know it, the first person we see as we are rounding the corner to park the car was Brother Maynard.  He and his wife were serving a mission here in Macomb, and just left in August.  Driving through the mountains was very pretty.

We headed back early the morning of December 20th:

We watched A Christmas Story and Back to the Future I, II, and III

Alphabet searches:

Start time 8:55am (in  order)
And Blackfoot Comfort Diabetes Exit Fort Gas Highway (9:00am) Indian Just (9:19am) Kehoka (10:28am) Lots Miles North Ogden Price Quizno’s Restaurant Subway TechnaGlass Unleaded Villiage Watson Xtreme Yard Zone (no passing zone)
Stop time 12:54pm

Start time 2:42pm (finding the words randomly)
Area Benson Cross Draw Express FedEx Georgia Halliburton Interstate John Keystone Lays Marten Number Only Parking Quick Richfield Sswift Trading Ursus VanPack Winning Xpress (Ad Xpress) Yesco Zone (Auto Zone)
Stop time 5:10pm

We stayed that night in Ogallala, Nebraska.

December 21:

We watched Rigoletto and we stopped about 1:30pm in Omaha for lunch at Jimmy John’s in hopes of meeting up with a couple of friends.  Unfortunately, neither of them were able to make it.  Maybe another time.

Alphabet searches:

Start time 9:22am (finding words randomly)
Ants Bridges Coleman Drive Eagle Food Golden Hershey Inn Join Kearney Lodging Minimum Nebraska Oversized Penske Quit Road Simon’s Transport Utility Veterans Wallace Xterra Yourself Zumstien
Stop time 12:15pm

Start time 12:16pm (finding the letters on license plates we passed)
325OYA 421PAB PCO648  PGD520  8-E2706  18-F585  RGW007  917HLC  200PII  RDJ634  73682K PLW453  XGM676  17-N188  POM896  PVF7849  OYQ634  RCO658  584TTS T865260  HU51693  PV6347  OXW366  PXB761  14-Y427  66055HZ
Stop time 2:40pm

Start time 3:13pm (finding words randomly)
America Buckle City DesMoines Elk Ford Go Horn Immigrant Johnston Kum Limit Malibu Nissan Oldsmobile Pontiac Quality Ram Sunrise Town Up Value Wings Xtra Yukon Zeitner
Stop time 4:33

That is enough of my obsession for now.  Give me a day or two for pictures and holiday reporting.

Sitting outside to hand out candy (what was up with only 30 minutes of trick or treating?):

And my tail closer-up (it may very well be my favorite part of the costume):

With out my snout (like when I had to get a drink or eat):

My eyes, simply because I like this picture:

The scary (lunging) monster that made a little girl cry:

It also got a “What the fff…?” by a boy about 12-13 years old, that caught himself, and then I told him he should not know that word.  And I think Loana Deveraux had to go change her drawrs after her encounter with the monster….  Here she is, or was?

Here are cookies I made using the cookie press (for the first time ever) that Jessie gave me because she never used it:

While such a thing had never happened with this particular computer before, we’ve all seen random system crashes, and I didn’t think anything of it. I had saved all my files before going out the door, after all.  I pushed the power button on the computer case to shut off the machine and reboot it…

…And nothing happened. The case LEDs were still on, keyboard LEDs still glowing. The machine had all the appearances of being alive, but was dead. I tried again. Held the power button down for 15 (it should turn off after 10), 20, 30 seconds. No response. It wouldn’t turn off.

Hmm. This is strange.

I flipped the rocker switch on the power supply and the machine shut off instantly. After a short wait, I flipped it back on and pressed the power button.

Nothing happened.

Again, I pressed and held the power button. No case LEDs, no keyboard lights, no fans spinning up, nothing. Great.

I love the small town where we live, but one of its downsides is that there’s no decent place to buy computer parts in a pinch. Thankfully, there’s a big internet electronics warehouse store that’s located such that when we order things with the cheapest UPS ground shipping, we almost always get them the next day. But, it being late Friday afternoon, I knew anything I ordered wouldn’t actually ship until Monday, so I wouldn’t get it until Tuesday. Oh well, at least I still have the laptop to keep me on top of things.

I decided that the power supply was fried, so I ordered a new one, which arrived tuesday afternoon, just as expected. Tuesday evening, I sat down with the ailing computer and swapped out power supplies. I got it all plugged in and put together, and hit the power button.

Nothing, again.

Dangit! For those of you lucky enough to have never had a computer die, here’s a hint: When you have a computer that’s just dead, the culprit is almost always either the motherboard or the power supply. In this case, I had good reason to believe the power supply was the problem. Apparently it wasn’t (or at least it wasn’t the ONLY problem). Now I need to order a new motherboard.

Again, it’s after shipping time, so anything I order will ship Wednesday and arrive Thursday. Fine. I ordered a new motherboard, and went back to work on the laptop (which, by the way, is a Mac, and doesn’t have all the Windows software I need to work on my main business projects). The new motherboard arrived Thursday afternoon, and went easily into the computer case

Cross fingers. Say a prayer. Do a rain dance. Push the power button.

It booted right up. No other hardware damage, no data loss.

The rest of Thursday was spend installing new drivers for the new chipset and audio all that stuff that comes with a new motherboard, and Friday I was finally back in action. A full week without my main computer was quite a bit of lost work, and put me behind schedule, but I’m catching up quickly.

The moral of the story: While I didn’t lose any data, it made me take a good look at my backup strategies. While the source code that keeps my business running was always backed up in two different places, other things (like iPhone app sales records) were not. If there had been a hard drive problem, some important things could have been lost.

So please take this opportunity to review your backup strategy and make sure that everything important is backed up and will survive a hardware failure or worse (Question: what would happen if your house burned down while you weren’t home? Would you still have your precious data intact?). We work way too hard on creating our digital lives to have them vanish at the whim of a few faulty bits of silicon. Be careful!

Until this morning when I opened the front door and saw two squirrels pulling on the bird feeder post.  They had it bent clear to the ground and were eating the seeds.

I got mad!  I told them I hated them, and never to come back; then I shook my fist at them.  Mostly because one of them was digging in a flower pot that was barely beginning to sprout.  They had better not have destroyed our flowers.

I went to Farm King and found squirrel repellent. When I pulled back into the drive, there was another squirrel digging at the base of the post.  I will have to re-dig and re-place the post.

The repellent is a wolf or fox urine based product, 100% organic, and stinks!  It won’t (shouldn’t) scare the birds away, and ought to not harm my produce.  I hope it works!!!

Picture heavy!

View of front of house.  I like to sit in those chairs and enjoy the warmth, and try to catch glimpses of the birds.

Here is from the west.  The edges here are rain gutters that were taken off the house(they have been sitting on the ground for quite a while so I figured I can use them).  I cut them and buried them as borders.

Same section, different view.

East section.

Sunflower-this is the first I had seen of it above dirt, it grows fast.  These are the Mammoth Gray variety and will get heads about 20 inches wide and we will be able to eat the seeds, if the birds don’t get them first.

It is really cool-I think-to see the ground split from the pressure of the plants growing and breaking through.

Here are the beets once they broke through. I had to put the beets in a bigger pot, not pictured.

Here are blooms on the tomato plant (there are two opened, more not yet, one may be harder to see).

There was a furry creature that dug up in this flower pot.  I think it must have a death wish!

Then I saw that it was digging up the pot where I had planted carrot seeds!

And if that wasn’t enough, it decided to dig into the unopened bags of soil that I hadn’t gotten to yet.

This picture was taken through the window.  The birds like the food I put out, but must not be comfortable around me yet, because if I am on the porch they tend to stay away.  Or if they do approach, they fly when they notice the camera.

However I was able to finally capture a few birds. Here is a sparrow.

And here is a Cardinal, we think he is still young and growing his red feathers yet.

We have beets, carrots, green bell peppers, big hamburger tomatoes, roma tomatoes, sun flowers, potatoes (white and red), and some strictly decorative flowers.

I started this post Sunday, so it gets that date, however I did finish it on Monday.

Another reason for a post, is that I feel a little queasy looking at that mouse every time I get on here.  I know, I put it on here.  But yuck!

A new quiz will return next week.  I know there are so many of you sitting on the edge of your seats waiting for a new one.  Since I think there are only about up to 10 people who read this.  I could be wrong, If you read this feel free to leave me a word in the comments.  Though I do ask that it not be a word I can/should not repeat to my friends’ kids.  I am not picky about who reads it, I am just curious.

Apparently, the door is not sealed at the bottom, and we had a visitor enter on Friday.  He does not sing and/or walk on two legs, so he does not warrant a name.

Jacob looked on Google, and it said to use humane traps.  Sorry, humane went out the window the second that thing entered my kitchen.  I called Ronda, she suggested a trap that I found easily and was inexpensive.

We set two.

When we arrived home tonight this is what we found:

He was snapped in this one after eating all the bait in the other one.

The package said to un-clip him into the trash and then the trap can be reused, It wasn’t completely dead yet, we threw it away with the mouse.  They are not that expensive, and I really don’t want to touch it any more than necessary.

Jacob wants to put up a warning sign to all mice and spiders that dare to enter our house.  Telling them we can co-exist peacefully outside, but in the house they are not welcome, under penalty of death.

I like to catch the spiders and put them in a jar and see which of them is the strongest!