Late-night blog

It's almost 1 a.m., but I'm still unwinding from work, so I thought I'd post a quick blog with some family updates. I'm 18 weeks along now and have been able to feel the baby kicking for a couple of weeks. We will find out the gender of the baby on May 19th. I'm very excited. :)

Ruth has been really grouchy during the last few days. On Tuesday she came down with a fever. I think she just has a cold/allergies, but I'm really not sure. I think my work is taking its toll on her, and I feel bad about that. I very rarely get to put her to bed anymore, and I miss spending the evenings with her and Tony. I think the Census will probably have enough work for me to stay at this job until the end of June or well into July, but I might leave in the beginning of June. That will mark the end of the 4-6 weeks I originally committed to. It's nice to have some extra income coming in, and my job really hasn't been stressing me out as much as I thought it would, but I miss putting Ruth to bed, and I want to be able to spend summer evenings with her and Tony. Tony and I are going to be a "Ma and Pa" during the stake's youth conference pioneer trek this year, and that's the second weekend in June, so I think I might just be done working then. My parents have been very helpful with watching Ruth in the evenings until Tony gets off work, and I would just hate to ask them to keep doing that well into the summer.

Ruth has started swim lessons and she really enjoys them. She thinks it's funny when I blow bubbles, but she hasn't figured out how to do it herself just yet. Instead she just ends up drinking a bunch of pool water.

Also, Ruth's Grandma Christensen bought her a cute little playhouse for her birthday (June 20) and Ruth LOVES it. It was so cute to watch her and Jack play in the house together on Wednesday. My camera battery is still dead, but I will have to charge it so I can get some pictures. Ruth and Jack like to give each other kisses now when they say goodbye, by the way. It's SO cute! But Tony said, "Let's not start that yet!" when he saw them do it. Too cute. :)

Well, I should actually head to bed because we have swim lessons in the morning. I hope to post more soon!

Happy International Respect for Chickens Day

I'm all about respecting chickens, but really, who comes up with these observances?

Anyway...

The excitement about our new car vanished quickly on Friday when Tony went outside to check the oil and found the car wouldn't start. We had it towed to a mechanic who later called and told me that the car's problems were the type that no mechanic liked to deal with (too complicated). However, he said he was hopeful he could get it in working order by mid-week. Well, thankfully, this mechanic is awesome and is getting our car in working order. It should be done today or tomorrow. For those of you living in the Omaha area, I HIGHLY recommend Excellence in Auto on 84th and Blondo. The owner, Tom, is a great guy and will do good work at a fair price. A good auto mechanic is hard to find.

Also, my job is going well. I work every evening but Sunday and Wednesday from 6 to midnight. I'm doing payroll and administrative stuff, and the people I work with at the Census Bureau are great. Sometimes it gets a little tiring, but I'm glad to have a job so we can pay for our car troubles! It's hard to find the motivation to be productive some days (like today... I had to work until 1 a.m. this morning and didn't get to bed until 2 a.m....), but overall things are going well with the job situation.

We have a busy week coming up with Mother's Day, our anniversary and my birthday. We also have a goal to plant our garden and work on our yard all day tomorrow, since both Tony and I have the day off. I'll try to remember to take some pictures!

Mourning the Melting Pot

I know I must be a little out of the loop, but my favorite restaurant, The Melting Pot, has closed. :( I guess it's been closed for a couple of months now. Big bummer. BIG bummer. My parents took me there for my birthday one year, and then Tony and I have celebrated our past two anniversaries by eating there. The last time we went was especially nice -- we got a private booth/room and spent about 2 hours there enjoying the fondue goodness. Our anniversary is coming up again in a couple of weeks, so I was going online to check out The Melting Pot menu and the place is GONE!!!! Ugh. So now time to find a new nice restaurant to enjoy. If anyone has any recommendations, please let me know. We aren't afraid to spend a bit of money -- it's our anniversary, after all.

Bye Melting Pot!!! I will miss you!!!

Workin' woman

In case you didn't know, a few weeks ago I got a part-time, temporary job with the Census Bureau. I was a QAC, or a worker at a questionnaire assistance center, and I basically got paid $10.50/hour to sit in community centers and libraries to answer people's questions about the Census. (Nobody came and asked me any questions, so I got paid to read the newspaper and my Harry Potter book.) It was a super easy job and only 10-13 hours/week for a couple of weeks. That job ended on April 19, and they offered me a different job doing data entry at their main office here. I'm going to be working four days per week, 6-8 hours/day. Most of my shifts will be 6-midnight, but I'll be working 3:30-midnight whenever I can (basically whenever we have someone to watch Ruth that long). The job will last 4-6 weeks, so generally speaking I'm not worried about being away from Ruth. What will be hard, I think, will be not seeing Tony as much and having less time to do stuff around the house and the yard. But it's only temporary, so I'm sure we will survive. I train on Tuesday and start on Thursday.

To make this whole job situation work, we went out and bought something we've been wanting for a very long time now: another car! We paid $1100 for a lovely Buick Regal. Tony sees it as a "project car" (it needs some minor fixes - for example, it's missing a radio) and is enjoying it so far. I like not having to coordinate picking Tony up from work and school with my appointments. So yay for owning another car!
Also, we had Stake Conference today. I enjoyed Stake Conference very much, but I will say it's a BIG challenge to attend with a grouchy toddler. We had to go find an empty room for a time-out at one point. She eventually got distracted by a sticker book I brought along. I figure it's important that we go, and as she gets older she will get used to being there.

Anyway, busy week ahead! I'll let you know how the job goes!

Snakes

You know that show, Fear Factor, where they have people do really freaky, gross things for money? Well I've decided I would never survive on that show. The primary reason:

Snakes.

I hate snakes. I think I would faint if a snake slithered over my foot or something, let alone lots of snakes slithering over my face or whole body, like in this Fear Factor photo:


Unfortuntely, we have a ton of snakes in our yard. I grew up with snakes being an infrequent sight, and now I am seeing them on an almost daily basis. The problem: The dozens and dozens of old railroad ties we have in our yard. They're used for terracing and landscaping, and a lot of them are rotted out and need to be replaced. Snakes love them -- they're like snake magnets. *shudder* I've had nightmares about snakes since the weather warmed up. Not even kidding. Maybe I need to see a therapist or something.

The most disgusting sighting happened last week, when I saw a knot of snakes sunning on top of the chain-link fence in our back yard. They were all curled up together doing who knows what. At first I thought they might be dead, but as I moved closer I saw they were definitely alive. I later watched them slither down the fence and into the nearby rocks. *shudder again* Totally gross. I thought I got a picture on my phone, but it didn't save.

Unfortunately, replacing all the railroad ties with new lumber will be an expensive undertaking that we will probably have done by a professional landscaper. So I am resigned to deal with the snakes for at least a summer or two. I know, I know, garter snakes aren't harmful at all -- they're actually good for your lawn and garden and whatnot. I just hate them because they have a tendency to startle me, and, well, they just look gross. And since there are so many of them, I'm freaked out by the possibility of one finding its way into my basement. I proceed into my basement with caution now because I'm paranoid. I know, I need to get over it.

Pray for me! :P

Cute ideas for Ruth's room

So I have been slowly gathering cute decorating ideas for Ruth's room, which is pretty far down the list when it comes to things we want to redo in our house. But I'm probably most excited to take care of her room because little girl rooms can be so cute! Right now we're still planning on painting it yellow. But who knows -- that may change between now and whenever we actually do it. Anyway, here are some things I want to put in her room:

1. Group of different sized photo frames with neat pictures/drawings/paper inside

From YoungHouseLove

These people used scrapbook paper and clippings out of magazines for some of their art. I think this grouping looks so fresh and cute.

2. Floating bookshelves, either made or purchased from someplace like Target (on sale this week for $5-$8 apiece). These could also go other places in the house.

From YoungHouseLove

3. Armoire, probably made by Tony. This plan is from one of my favorite blogs, KnockOffWood, which features plans for beautiful homemade furniture. Some pieces are knock-offs designed to look like furniture you would by at high-end stores, hence the blog name. :)

4. Cutest homemade kitchen play set, ever!

I saw this and immediately fell in love. It was featured on KnockOffWood, but the plans are by CraftingChicks. This would be more for a playroom than Ruth's room, since there probably wouldn't be enough space to fit it all in Ruth's room. But I love it!!! The person who made this spent $127 for everything, including fabric and accessories, but she made this out of high-quality wood. It will be a hand-me-down toy. Maybe a future Christmas or birthday gift?

Anyway, I'll keep you posted on future decorating ideas! Our goal right now is to get some landscaping and yard work done during the next month, and then hopefully we can start working on the inside of the house.

Disney World

After a long hiatus, I am back to blogging! I thought I better start out with a quick overview of our trip to Disney World. We had a great time, and our week was jam-packed with fun stuff! Ruth did pretty well on the plane trip there, and then right after we arrived at our resort, we went to the Hoop-Di-Do Musical Review dinner show, which was lots of fun. Then we rested up for our first day out in the theme parks on Tuesday. We hit the Magic Kingdom first, starting with the princess breakfast in the Cinderella Castle. The breakfast was amazing, and the girls looked so cute in the princess dresses Grandma made for them. Here is Ruth with Princess Jasmine:
We enjoyed balloons, ice cream treats and fun rides on Magic Kingdom day. I think it was my favorite theme park.

Here is Tony trying to pull the sword out of the stone:
He was not successful.

On Wednesday, we went to Animal Kingdom with the kids, and then the adults went to Hollywood Studios in the evening. We watched the amazing Fantasmic show and rode on the Toy Story ride, which was lots of fun.

On Thursday, we went to Epcot, where we saw Nemo and lots of cool fish. We enjoyed many other rides there and had another "princess" meal, this time dinner. I love Epcot, where you can see the "world."

Then, Friday, it was time to head back home. Here are some pics of Tony with his siblings, and Grandma with her grandbabies.
It was so wonderful to see our family, and we can't wait to do something like this again in a few years! We love you and miss you, Jenny, Mike, Mike, Janalee, Marcie and Leila! And we are grateful to Tony's mom for providing us with such a fun, wonderful trip. Thank you!