Last week marked 2 years since our first kiss...what's not to celebrate? AND Jon recently had his 3 year jobversary at his current job--congrats to Jon! "ersaries" are fun because they remind me of tons of things that happened before and everything that's happened since the last "ersary". I hope everyone celebrates kissiversaries, graduatverseries, jobversaries, and other such "ersaries" of good things in life, because in addition to all other good reasons for celebrating, they're another excuse to bring out the ice cream, and who doesn't want that?
8/15/08
Happy Kissiversary
Last week marked 2 years since our first kiss...what's not to celebrate? AND Jon recently had his 3 year jobversary at his current job--congrats to Jon! "ersaries" are fun because they remind me of tons of things that happened before and everything that's happened since the last "ersary". I hope everyone celebrates kissiversaries, graduatverseries, jobversaries, and other such "ersaries" of good things in life, because in addition to all other good reasons for celebrating, they're another excuse to bring out the ice cream, and who doesn't want that?
6 months (a.k.a. 28 weeks, 2 trimesters down)
These photos were actually taken at 27 weeks, but they were 3 months before the due date of little baby Smith. We're getting so excited for him to come! Every week I get bigger, and every week he reminds me more that he's hanging out inside of me...he is a mover!! This kid is moving, kicking, shifting, pushing, and doing double back flips from the second I wake up in the morning until after I go to sleep at night. I absolutely LOVE feeling him, and it's so fascinating for me when I get to look down and SEE him moving! How fun is that?!? I can't believe this little person in me has enough room in there! I love every time he moves, and the only concern I have is that the doctor said I should start to notice his regular schedule of resting and being active. Umm...I don't think he ever sleeps. Is this a sign of long nights to come? Or just evidence that we really will have a mini Jon on our hands? Good thing we're both night people; looks like it might be coming in handy for something besides studying for finals or doing other ridiculous things that should never be done while half asleep. :)
Jon loves him moving just as much as I do, and he makes me laugh. A couple nights ago when I got excited and put my hands on my stomach because the baby was moving, Jon pushed my hands away and said "Get out of here! You get him all day long! It's my turn!" I love how excited he is, he'll be such a fun dad.
As for the belly shot showing the view of my feet...I had to lean forward to see those toes. A week or so ago I tried to put on shoes for the first time in months (it's summer, flip flops are such a blessing), and I just couldn't physically bend my body in half. It was the funniest thing. I'm hoping Jon will start volunteering to paint my toenails when that becomes impossible, but I'm waiting for the affirmative response on that. Three months left!!
Miracle update--the Nats won a game!
I have a huge project (this is Melissa) at my work that I'm solely in charge of laying out, editing, and final printing for every quarter that called for a huge redesign this quarter, and it was pretty much a nightmare. Well, everything went mostly well despite the regular back and forth changes that always happen with content people vs. layout/design people, until I took them all to print (450 copies, 30-page full-color books, this is loads of paper and production) without realizing that one of the settings was off that made the back pages not line up with the front pages...hard to explain in type, but suffice it to say every single page had been misprinted without my knowing until it was too late. Thousands of pages gone wrong was enough to make me sick and give me the first reason ever for an emotional breakdown at this job. Luckily everyone in my office was super supportive and understanding of needing to reprint EVERYTHING, I stayed 5 hours late printing, and the books still met their deadline without corporate ever knowing something had gone wrong. So when my corporate marketing director offered me 4 tickets to a Nats vs. Reds game the next weekend--without ever knowing of the hard week I had with my big mistake doubling with the frustration of apartment searching at the same time--it made my day.Our good friends the Allens came with us and it was so fun having them. We totally weren't expecting the seats to be as great as they were, but we were seriously 10 rows from the field, right in line with third base, it was so rad. Clearly somewhere we'd never sit if it weren't free. It was also Jon's and my first time the new stadium, and it was almost futuristic, we were so impressed. It was awesome! I couldn't believe the difference a good stadium made. The night was perfect--we got pics with bobble head racer Teddy Roosevelt, we had Five Guys burgers and dippin' dots ice cream, even though it sprinkled off and on it never downpoured on us, and the Nats WON! I certainly wasn't expecting the worst team in the league to pull a win, so it was fun for us to have something to cheer for. Thanks for coming Rach and Shiloh, we had a blast!!
We see famous people...
Thanks to our friend Nicole who scored us some sweet tickets, last week we got into a local DC one-time event that was loaded with famous celebs, people that normally we wouldn't just head out for a night on the town with. Or maybe we just went to the Madame Tussaud's wax museum in DC. But we gotta hand it to Madame Tussaud, she's got some kickin're-creation skills that she handed down to modern sculptors. These guys looked so real! The lighting in the photos make them look less real, but the exhibit is awesome. Did you know Madame Tussaud was a wax sculptor during the French Revolution and people made her dig through guillotine victims to recreate wax replicas of them? Very interesting. You wouldn't believe the hours that go into making just one of these wax statues. We were totally impressed and had a lot of fun. Thanks again Nicole!
8/7/08
It's official...we're moving!
After 6 weeks or more of painful apartment searching (as noted in previous American Dream post), we have indeed been blessed and found something that fits our needs, our budget, and our liking. I knew (or I at least hoped somethin' fierce) that this day would come, and we're so grateful it did. The deal we're getting is unheard of here and nothing short of a real-life miracle for us.This week we signed a 6-month lease starting Sep. 1st for a 2-bedroom basement apartment in a neighborhood that's perfect for us. Unfortunately it means a change of ward (and stake), but we are excited for the move and feel really good about it. It's actually just over 5 miles from where we live now, so we'll still get to keep in close contact with our friends, which we're happy about. The apartment will need some definite touches to give it that home-y feeling, but Jon and I are up to it and excited to make a new place our own.
'Making it our own' will imply, among other things, locating a bunch of furniture since we currently own nothing. So if you happen to be dying to get rid of an extra bed, couch, kitchen table, chairs, or anything of the sort, we'd be more that willing to take them off your hands! :) Otherwise, I'm off to craigslist again to do what I do best--bargain shop. As soon as we have the place up and running, we'll be sure to invite everyone over to visit, and now we'll even have room for you!!
8/1/08
The Pageant on Mormon Hill (trip)—Post #3
Monday: Day 3
This road trip ended up taking a lot more posting space than I had originally intended, thus the 3 posts. To go in order, you'll have to scroll down to #1, then up to #2, then here.
Monday of our trip was such a good day. We started it off by showering (FINALLY) at our campground (nice work KOA, way to keep your bathrooms clean), and then rushing off to a 9:00 session in the Palmyra temple. The temple was beautiful on the inside. It was my first time inside a mini temple, and I loved it. The youth were doing baptisms right across from the endowment rooms, it was fun to be able to see all aspects of the temple working so close together. We LOVED the stained glass in this temple, all of which was fashioned to look like the Sacred Grove. It was so simple, but so pretty. There is also one clear window through which you can look straight through and across a field to the Sacred Grove, about which President Hinckley said the Palmyra temple is the one place you can stand in one temple and look out and see another (or something like that) in reference to the Grove. It was so beautiful and peaceful.
One of President Hinckley's sons was actually in our session, and my favorite thing about that is that if Jon hadn't heard someone say that in the men's dressing room, we probably never would have known. He was dressed just like the rest of us, sat where the rest of us sat, and did everything the rest of us did. I love how the temple makes us all equals and it seems to erase our differences that are more obvious out in the world. We didn't speak to him, but it's fun to see his family continuing onward full of faith. I'm sure he's a wonderful man like his father.
From the temple we drove down to Fayette, NY to go to the Peter Whitmer home, another site we had missed on our trip last year. It was perfect timing since all the pageant people had left, and we had a tour with just one other couple in addition to ourselves. The senior sister missionary giving us the tour was great, and she knew so many extra stories about everything that had happened here—she'd really studied up on her church history, and she made it a lot of fun. We loved it. We took our time, and the truthfulness of the events that happened there seemed so peacefully obvious as we were reminded of their great significance. The reorganization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was on April 6, 1830 in Lafayette, NY, in the Peter Whitmer home. So many sacrifices were made for that event to happen, and so many blessings have flowed worldwide since. It was a perfect way to follow our temple session.
The replica room of where the church was organized and the first sacrament of our day was blessed and passed. They fit 50-60 people in here!
The Peter Whitmer home was also where much of the Book of Mormon was translated by Joseph with Oliver Cowdery, after the persecution in Harmony, PA had become too extreme to finish it there. History and journal research says the room they finished the translation in probably looked somewhat like the room below. Fayette is also where the prophet was when the priesthood was restored on Earth through Peter, James and John, depicted in the sculpture below. We would totally recommend going there to anyone who hasn't been. We stayed until the skies opened and dumped an entire ocean on us again, and then we were off for the rest of our drive home.
Addendum: the drive home
On the way back to VA, we stopped in Williamsport, PA, because who wouldn't want to stop in the big city with a small town feeling where the Little League International Championship field is? Okay, maybe not everyone would stop, but my dad did once with us on a family vacation, and luckily Jon wanted to do the same. I LOVE baseball fields, and this one is especially cool. It's down off the side of a huge hill that makes for a pretty cool stadium feeling where people can watch the game from the sides of the hill. We loved it, and we probably spent 45 minutes there or so, just walking around, reading signs and plaques they'd put up, and living up the little league life. The truck says it all...
This road trip ended up taking a lot more posting space than I had originally intended, thus the 3 posts. To go in order, you'll have to scroll down to #1, then up to #2, then here.
Monday of our trip was such a good day. We started it off by showering (FINALLY) at our campground (nice work KOA, way to keep your bathrooms clean), and then rushing off to a 9:00 session in the Palmyra temple. The temple was beautiful on the inside. It was my first time inside a mini temple, and I loved it. The youth were doing baptisms right across from the endowment rooms, it was fun to be able to see all aspects of the temple working so close together. We LOVED the stained glass in this temple, all of which was fashioned to look like the Sacred Grove. It was so simple, but so pretty. There is also one clear window through which you can look straight through and across a field to the Sacred Grove, about which President Hinckley said the Palmyra temple is the one place you can stand in one temple and look out and see another (or something like that) in reference to the Grove. It was so beautiful and peaceful.
One of President Hinckley's sons was actually in our session, and my favorite thing about that is that if Jon hadn't heard someone say that in the men's dressing room, we probably never would have known. He was dressed just like the rest of us, sat where the rest of us sat, and did everything the rest of us did. I love how the temple makes us all equals and it seems to erase our differences that are more obvious out in the world. We didn't speak to him, but it's fun to see his family continuing onward full of faith. I'm sure he's a wonderful man like his father.
From the temple we drove down to Fayette, NY to go to the Peter Whitmer home, another site we had missed on our trip last year. It was perfect timing since all the pageant people had left, and we had a tour with just one other couple in addition to ourselves. The senior sister missionary giving us the tour was great, and she knew so many extra stories about everything that had happened here—she'd really studied up on her church history, and she made it a lot of fun. We loved it. We took our time, and the truthfulness of the events that happened there seemed so peacefully obvious as we were reminded of their great significance. The reorganization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was on April 6, 1830 in Lafayette, NY, in the Peter Whitmer home. So many sacrifices were made for that event to happen, and so many blessings have flowed worldwide since. It was a perfect way to follow our temple session.
The replica room of where the church was organized and the first sacrament of our day was blessed and passed. They fit 50-60 people in here!
The Peter Whitmer home was also where much of the Book of Mormon was translated by Joseph with Oliver Cowdery, after the persecution in Harmony, PA had become too extreme to finish it there. History and journal research says the room they finished the translation in probably looked somewhat like the room below. Fayette is also where the prophet was when the priesthood was restored on Earth through Peter, James and John, depicted in the sculpture below. We would totally recommend going there to anyone who hasn't been. We stayed until the skies opened and dumped an entire ocean on us again, and then we were off for the rest of our drive home.
Addendum: the drive home
On the way back to VA, we stopped in Williamsport, PA, because who wouldn't want to stop in the big city with a small town feeling where the Little League International Championship field is? Okay, maybe not everyone would stop, but my dad did once with us on a family vacation, and luckily Jon wanted to do the same. I LOVE baseball fields, and this one is especially cool. It's down off the side of a huge hill that makes for a pretty cool stadium feeling where people can watch the game from the sides of the hill. We loved it, and we probably spent 45 minutes there or so, just walking around, reading signs and plaques they'd put up, and living up the little league life. The truck says it all...
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