Marriage is all about compromise.

I have wanted S to get firefighter license plates for our cars since he was hired on over a year ago. He has been very hesitant and with his good reasoning, I said that it was okay if he didn't want to get them. Then a few weeks ago, he got a hold of some car decals for professional firefighters. I chose one out that matched my car well (everything is matchy-match when it comes to our cars...right down to the car seat we bought for baby girl) and S put it on. I must say it is quite nice! Not too flashy and not something someone would recognize until they got up close.

By the way, S got a cool black and orange one for his truck and he also picked out a pink and white one for baby girl's stroller...or her pink Power Wheels.

~

I think I have finally broken free of my crafting hiatus. It has been such a good week to do so, also! It's the first full week I've had off for some time where I had absolutely no plans, so I decided to go to work.

First, I had picked up some newborn onesies and iron-on decals a few weeks ago. I had some anxiety when it came time to affixing them because I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist and I didn't want to make any mistakes. So I finally picked up a onesie and a cute rubber ducky applique and thought here goes nothing! And it worked....miserably! Apparently I hadn't read the directions thoroughly when it came to the part where it says "dry iron." The ducky melted away and I was left with a onesie with a giant burn mark. It got me a little over my perfectionist attitude though (as I was going to have to go back to the store and buy one to replace the one I'd ruined) and I decided to just see what happened with the others. S tried his hand at the first (he's much more patient than I am) and gave me some pointers. The rest actually turned out okay, I think!


Next was tackling a scrapbook album that I started last year. Each page was a border that I had hung underneath my dry erase calendar and on the opposite page I typed up the month's most memorable events. It was a good idea and I kept up on it, until last December when the final pages were done. Then they all just sat around unbound, lacking any desire to be put together into an album. While S was on the computer the other night I came in to do something that should have taken me 30 seconds and suddenly ended up finishing the album! The whole thing took me about 10 minutes to finish (if you don't count the 5 months prior to that!)


Finally, when S was at his station last fall, I would send him to work with treats and such. It's a great way to satisfy my love of baking without consuming everything I make. I found this recipe for creme-filled cupcakes that intrigued me, so yesterday I whipped up a batch. They were fairly easy, the most time consuming part being the baking and cooling. Not to toot my own horn too loudly, but I think they rival their Hostess counterparts.

After I dropped them off at the station that evening, S said he was in his room studying and he heard his engineer exclaim, How did she get the cream inside?! It's a secret...

Good News Minute:

A few things we've had to smile about lately!

• S just learned that they posted a date for the test to get into medic school. He was also personally reminded from the Chief of that date, so I think that's a good sign that, hoping he does well on the test, he will get in. I told him that I'd help him study as much as I could (hey, I ended up learning a lot from that anatomy class he took!)
• We had our first "stay-cation" outing this week: a trip to the Bees game. Yeah, they lost miserably but the food and company was great. I love baseball.
• S took charge and replaced the front yard sprinkler system installed by our homebuilders. It was honestly a piece of crap. Luckily S knows a thing or two about sprinkling systems so I am confident that the plants we put in this year will actually have a shot at making it. He also is working on putting in some sort of sprinkler in the back so that I won't have to go out and hand water every day (yahoo!) Which leads me to a story that is honestly so funny that I will risk public humiliation to share it. I came home from work the other night and S told me to go out back and see what he had been working on. He turns the valve and a sprinkler head pops up to which I reply, "Oh, Cool!" Not even two seconds later I said, "Hey, it's raining!" At this point S says I had confused look on my face as I looked up at the clear sky and tried to put two and two together [in my defense it was dark and I was standing on the other side of our yard]. This confusion quickly turned into embarrassment as I "got it." S just started to laugh like crazy as I went back inside to finish my yogurt. Still laughing, he came back in and said something like, "You are so cute." I told him as soon as I finished my snack I would be going upstairs to look at my diploma. S started chanting, I am smart, I am smart...over and over again. At this point I started getting the giggles which turned into a laugh-so-hard-I-cried-fest. Geez, I really wish I was making this stories up.
• We watched Seven Pounds which is honestly the stupidest movie I have ever seen. The good part of this is that I got so bored that I started poking little girl fetus and she started kicking back so that S could really feel her this time. Minus the rib jabs (and the fact that I swear she actually likes to sleep in my rib cage), I'm having a lot of fun with her moving! Oh, and apparently she likes Jolly Ranchers and Madagascar 2.
• I got released from my calling as a sunbeams teacher. I would say this didn't qualify as good news, but I was getting so burned out. The nice thing is that I wasn't called to be anything immediately after I was released (which is a first, I think...usually it's from one calling to the next.) Between being pregnant, trying to deal with a bunch of bored 4 year olds and trying to make up the time I missed coming in late to work (which has meant 11+ hour work days), I didn't realize how much of a burden it had become. If I wasn't before, I definately now am a firm believer that Heavenly Father really does know what we can/can't handle!
• At the exact moment we needed to get new tires for my car, we found rebates from not only the tire manufacturer but the dealership as well. And they aren't cheap-o tires either. We will essentially be getting one tire for free!

There's no place like home...

At least, that's how I feel after driving nearly 3000 miles in 2 weeks!

We decided that we would try to get a couple of vacations in before baby comes and the end of April seemed like the perfect time to do it, so off we went! We headed up the California/Oregon Coast for the first trip. Scott had never been there and it had been I awhile since I had, so we were both really excited to go. We traversed the arid desert, Sierra Nevadas and central California for 1000 or so miles until we finally made it to the coast.

I love the climate of the Pacific Northwest! Everything is so green and the rainy/misty weather doesn't bother me at all! We spent the next two days going through the Redwoods. (I have to be honest. I was pretty sick of trees by the time we got up into Oregon.)

The rainy weather we had on day two disappeared and it was actually really sunny for the duration of the trip. We camped in some great spots, my favorite probably being underneath the redwood trees. To give you an idea of how tall those trees are and how much light they shut out to the ground below, S and I slept in until 10:30 thinking it was only about 7:00.

On our fourth night we found a great place to stay that was right on a secluded beach. As soon as we had camp set up, we took our camp chairs and barbecue grill down to the beach, had lunch and played in the sand for awhile. The water was too cold to enjoy, but that didn't detract S from throwing on his swimsuit anyway. I accidentally found out that the shorts I had brought for the trip no longer fit me but, luckily, I could fit into the hubby's.

Day 5 we woke up and realized that we still had a lot of distance to cover in 3 days so we thought it would probably be best if we cut into central Oregon and headed up to Portland. I've never been to Portland nor the Columbia River Gorge so I was very excited. The river is HUGE, exactly as I had expected it would be. We didn't spend a lot of time in Portland, but I would really like to go back someday. I think one of my favorite parts of the trip was going to the Bonneville Dam and seeing the fish ladders there. Just off of one of the dams there were a group of Sea Lions who were taking advantage of the fish and having themselves an entertaining (and slightly gory) feast.

They also have this fish hatchery with the world's largest Sturgeon--10 feet! For a fish! He was more the size of a dolphin.

Night 5 was accidentally our last night because, as we headed out the next day, we were making good enough time that S decided we might as well drive straight through. I was sad that we actually had more time to spend on the coast than I thought we would and didn't take advantage of it. But I have to admit, my bed felt awfully comfortable that night!

I went back to work for two days and then it was off for vacation two: our (becoming) annual trip down to Powell. I was pretty concerned that I might not be in the best shape for it, but I ended up being okay for the most part. I drank tons of water, stayed in the shade, and tried to take naps whenever possible. All in all I think it was the more relaxing vacation of the two. It's so beautiful down there and, since we didn't have a boat growing up, most of it is still relatively new to me.

I think our lil' girl liked the boat, too. She was very active for most of the trip. It's hard to believe that she'll be with us on our next trip down there! A little tiny part of me missed having the opportunity to get on the wake board, but I had fun playing photographer. S had a lot of time behind the boat this trip.

It's been a crazy couple of weeks. They were great trips and we had fun. However, we are both glad to have an excuse to stay home the rest of the summer and take it easy.

In bloom!

We came home to this and I was ECSTATIC!

These are the most promising strawberries I've ever planted. Haha, I planted two bundles of six bare root plants thinking half of them would die. All of them survived! We are going to have a LOT of strawberries!

And my pea plants. I've planted them for the last several years, both here and at my parents, and I've never had that great of success. So when I had TWO plants come up this year, I was thrilled!

It's been 3 years since we finished our backyard and all of our perennials have really taken root. I think this is the lushest it's looked back there in the spring time.
My mom asked me today what else I was going to put in the garden this year and I told her not much! Especially anything due to be harvested around the same time I am!