New Year, New Blogs, New Jeans

New Year

Happy New Year! Well, in about 10 hours from now. Yikes, it makes me tired just thinking about being awake for another 10 hours. Truth be told, I've been staying up past midnight for the last several nights just watching movies or TV episodes with Paul (we just started on the latest season of 24), but now that Andrew sleeps through the night and sleeps in at least until 8 am (I know, he spoils me!) I have a lot more wiggle room in my bedtime.

Anyway, isn't it always exciting to start a brand new year? It seems the possibilities are endless. Just a couple of days ago I found the little scrap of paper that's been floating around since this time two years ago with Paul's new years resolutions on it. The top on the list was "find work". Unless our plans change and Paul goes for a PhD, I am pretty confident that 2010 will be the year he accomplishes that goal. We have all our fingers crossed that it will be EARLY 2010 that that happens. I haven't settled in on any specific goals for myself for 2010. I'll marinate on that and maybe publish some if I have the guts. They say that making a goal public makes you more likely to follow through on it.

New Blogs

I've come across a few cool blogs within the last week that seem appropriate for the new year. You can find them in my list of blogs to the right. For those interested in getting into better shape/being healthier, there's Trainer Momma. For those wanting to be more stylish (who doesn't want to be more stylish?), there's Ain't No Mom Jeans. And for those who want to be more fun, creative moms, there's Rookie Moms. They all look like they have some good info and interesting content.

New Jeans

Ok, this doesn't really have anything to do with the rest of this post (well, maybe the part about wanting to be more stylish), but I'm so excited to report that I found the perfect jeans!!! This is a big deal for a girl. The last time I went on the hunt for new jeans I spent three days of shopping to find a decent pair, and now that I've been wearing them for a few months I find that the fit isn't even as good as I thought. They taper too much at the knee. So I was overjoyed to walk into Old Navy the other night and find a perfect pair or darker-wash, mid-rise (the Old Navy "Flirt" is the best rise for me), straight-leg boot-cut (not flared), jeans that fit great!!! By the way, Old Navy is having their big after-holiday jeans sale so every pair is only $19! I was so excited that I went to try on all the different washes they had in the same style, only to find that every other pair of that style in my size was cut differently and just didn't fit quite right. Ugh, I hate it when they do that. Oh, well, I'm just grateful that the pair that happened to fit perfectly is in a wash I really like. Besides, I have learned my lesson about buying clothes that don't quite fit right or aren't quite flattering, and it is this:

"She who shops then walks away, has money to shop another day"

Snow

Yay, we got our first snow of the winter yesterday! It was only a couple of inches max and never actually got below freezing, but it was beautiful nonetheless and managed to stick around until this afternoon. It's always extra exciting when it starts snowing when you don't even expect it to snow. I took Andrew out on the back porch to experience the falling snow. He put his hand out to feel it a couple of times, and walked around in it a little, then hung out under the overhang of the house. I tried to convince him to step out into the snowfall again, but he had clearly figured out that standing under a bunch of cold, wet stuff falling from the sky isn't too comfortable. Paul took him outside today and fed him some snow, which he says he liked.

Silhouette

Here's a little Photoshop project I did earlier this month. I had seen a morning news show where they suggested you make silhouettes of all the family members to put up on the mantle as Christmas decorations. I thought that was a pretty cute idea, but instead of using a photocopier like they suggested, I could use my new Photoshop skills. My Photoshop skills are still developing, and I've forgotten a lot of what I've learned already, so it took me a little while to do it, and I employed Paul's help for a step or to, but I'm excited to reveal the outcome. Now I just need to decide what to do with it. The possibilities are endless. Here is Andrew:

A Very Merry Christmas

I am so very thankful that we were able to spend Christmas with our families this year. On Christmas Eve we had a great party at Terry and Emma's house--a potluck with a white elephant gift exchange, Christmas carols, and reading of the story of Christ's birth found in Luke. It was actually the first Christmas Eve party I've ever planned, and it was a big success. All the food groups were represented in the delicious potluck meal, the little kids ran around and had fun, and the adults talked and had fun. On Christmas morning Paul, Andrew, and I headed over to my parent's house as early as we could to open stalkings, eat our traditional crepe breakfast (not 'till 11 am, mind you), and then open presents.
Paul, Andrew, and I then headed out to the Battle Ground skate park for a little bit to try out his new skateboard that I got him. (The muscle to the right of my tailbone is still a little sore from when I fell flat on my back, but I don't think I have permanent damage).
It seems like typically Christmas afternoons and evenings tend to be kind of boring, but this year we had a special guest coming for the evening so we had something to look forward to. Diya, a friend of Paul's from his master's program at Carnegie Mellon, had been working in Seattle on a contract job, so she took the train down to spend Christmas evening with us. We fed her the oh-so-traditional (not) Christmas dinner of baked potatoes with barbecued pork and then played a few games of Clue, our new favorite game and almost the only board game that Paul will play. All in all, it was a great holiday.

Thanksgiving

Here we are at my parent's house on Thanksgiving. Since both sides of our families are local, we always have to juggle them during holidays. This year we went to my parent's house for the afternoon and then headed to Paul's sister Heidi's house for the Thanksgiving dinner in the early evening. Last year in Pittsburgh we didn't have any family for Thanksgiving, so although it keeps us busy when we have to go to two places on one holiday, I'm thankful that we are here in town with family.

I was just thinking how appropriate it is that the "holiday season" begins with Thanksgiving. What better way to enter the Christmas season and the new year than by reviewing and acknowledging all the things we have been blessed with over the past year? The past year has been challenging in a number of ways (being poor students living on financial aid, having a baby that hates to sleep, Paul being super busy in grad school, living away from family, Paul graduating without a job during the worst job market in decades, living with family while Paul still continues to look for a job, etc). But at the same time I have had the opportunity to learn to be thankful in ways that I wasn't before. These are some of the things I have found myself thankful for over the past year: we have good, nutritious food to eat every day; we have a warm place to live; Andrew's birth, my c-section, and Andrew's one week in the NICU were paid for 100% by our nation's medical assistance program; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is the same everywhere I go and every ward we move into has friendly, faithful, kind people in it; our family is together under the same roof; Andrew is an extremely happy baby, and healthy too; Paul is a great father; and I get to be a stay-at-home mom. There are so many more things I am thankful for. Perhaps I will post more as the season of thanks-giving continues into Christmas.

Stairs

Just being around older cousins at Thanksgiving seems to have pushed Andrew forward in his development. He started climbing stairs and standing up on his own. He quickly became proficient at stair-climbing and practices whenever he can. For the few days before I got around to finding a baby gate for the foot of the stairs he would climb up 5 or 6 steps and then kind of call out/whine for me to come get him. Thank goodness he was smart enough to know that he doesn't know how to climb down stairs yet (safely, that is).

Today I got a little bit of a shock when I was in the kitchen and I heard a baby gate topple over and then Andrew crying. I figured he had somehow pulled the baby gate at the foot of the stairs down onto himself. I went to the stairs, and there was the baby gate propped up against the banister and no Andrew in sight. I rushed upstairs to find that Andrew had climbed all the way up the stairs and then had discovered the baby gate that was sitting around propped up against the wall in the upstairs hallway and pulled that one down on top of himself. I won't mention who left the baby gate down at the foot of the stairs. I'm just glad Andrew is so good at climbing stairs without falling.


The stair-climber, on his way to a bath