vegetable victory

summertime means lots of grilled foods because cooking dinner that way doesn't heat up the house. tonight while aaron was grilling chicken i threw on a foil packet of broccoli tossed in olive oil and salt/pepper. it turned out delicious! i love roasted veggies, but normally roast them in the oven, not on the bbq. i think broccoli is great in just about any form, but aaron has a more discerning palate and even he loved them. victory!!! i can't to make them again. aaron, too!

clean it

saturday afternoon was spent doing a major spring cleaning of our apartment. we threw away a bunch of stuff, gave away the rest, and laundered most everything we have. the dust under our bed was amazing and totally disgusting. it feels so great to have it done! there is nothing like coming home to a clean house.

burn

on saturday night i burned my hands on very, very hot soup (there is a whole backstory here which i won't bore you with unless you ask me to). at first reaction i thought it was a bummer and then it really started to cook my skin and i started screaming. we weren't at home so it took me a minute to run and find a faucet for cold water. since i was holding the container of soup at the time, both hands were burned in multiple places. short of the long, i ended up going to urget care because i was in a lot of pain and unsure how to treat it.

the doctor said i scored first and second degree burns on my hands (mostly my left hand, so writing is a total pleasure) and sent me home with antibiotic healing ointment, super strength ibuprofen, and gauze. i lathered on the ointment and slept with gauze wrapped hands that night. i must say, i am very impressed with how much they healed over night, but they are still quite tender!

my wonderful aaron has taken great care of me, including washing my hair for church on sunday (hot shower water does not feel good on the hands). he has been the gauze king, an extension of my hands, and a hairdresser. thank you for helping me!

hot soup on the hands is one mistake i will not be making again!

meep

I had some downtime while working in the bride's room at the temple on Saturday and was gazing into a mirror while lost in thought (there are mirrors everywhere in the bride's room so i wasn't finding a mirror to look at myself in). Like my father, I get a bit of a poker face while thinking and can look annoyed or angry without meaning to. I've always known this about myself but never seen it in action because if I think about it the "thinker face" disappears. Well, on Saturday I caught a glance of this face and was surprised at how frowny it is. A blank stare with a frown. Which made me think of the meep muppets on "The Muppet Show". That's pretty much what I look like, minus the bulging eyes.

I shared my discovery with Aaron on the way home and he couldn't believe I didn't know that was my "thinker face". Apparently everyone knew but me. We googled the meeps that night and found this gem of a clip on youtube. Needless to say I am making an effort to smile more.

Enjoy.

pump up the iron

i think i am iron deficient and am contemplating taking an iron supplement. i take a daily vitamin with iron in it, but i still have many of the symptoms of being low on iron. plus, i'm somewhat of a poster child of a person who would be anemic. i donate blood every 8 weeks (and many times my iron is boderline too low to donate), i exercise regularly, and i'm a woman. but, since too much iron can be very hard on your body i'm hesitant to grab a bottle and start popping pills. i've done much research, but would love to know if anyone has been down this road before. have you had experience taking iron supplements? non-pregnant experiences would be most helpful. i'd love to hear how it went!

hallelujah

we sold aaron's car last night! what a little test of patience! it had been for sale for only 11 months! when someone called and was very interested i tried not to become excited and i didn't tell anyone about it because so many had looked before and changed their mind. a really nice guy bought it and i'm glad it worked out for him and for us. we are so happy and thankful. what a relief!

pro 11:30 church

in january our ward switched from meeting at 9am to meeting at 1130am. i'm surprised at how many people prefer 9am. they give me sad looks when i tell them what time i go. i am all about 1130 church. here's why:


i have no children and nap times to deal with.

my calling does not require early morning meetings.

i'm up at 4:45am on saturdays so i'm very ready to sleep in a bit on sundays.

church is over early enough to still have an afternoon and evening.

allows for breakfast time and now that i've taught aaron how to make pancakes, he makes them each week.


december will arrive way too soon.

pigs are flying

the unthinkable has happened. aaron has bowed out of church basketball. i've posted on his love of basketball before so i will not reiterate that here, but it's high up there. team mama drama has happened lately (i'll avoid the story here so as to speak kindly of all) and the fun has disappeared. i'm sad it came to that, but secretly celebrating because that is one less thing we have to squeeze in on a saturday!

mia

we've been away for awhile. solely because we haven't done anything particularly noteworthy. each day is a wash, rinse, repeat mix of work, school, and the gym with a weekly dose of church and the temple thrown in. perhaps i can dredge up some thoughtful tidbits to share.

Saturday in LA

The San Diego temple was closed for two weeks so Aaron and I decided to go to the LA temple on our day off. We met two of my Santa Barbara friends for a session. The session was huge!! 190 people and it took almost 3 hours. Poor pregnant Lori was ready to be out of her seat. We had a great time and I can't wait to go back! Too bad it's located in LA.

I know the sun is not helping in this picutre, but a wedding party was hovering near by so we had to be quick.

We wanted to make the drive worthwhile and stay in LA all day, so we hit up the Getty. It stays open until 9pm on Saturdays and is free after 5 so we spent a few hours there in the evening. Aaron had never been to the Getty before so it was fun experiencing it with him. Hopefully we can do a full day in the future.

One of my favorite things about the Getty is all the impressionist art they have. I've always loved impressionism so that's my first stop. And the Getty lets you get close to the paintings! I got in trouble once at the Guggenheim because I was standing too close to a Van Gogh. Up close is the best part of a Van Gogh!

Monet's haystacks.

Van Gogh's Irises.

The bottom left corner of Irises. I zoomed in as close as I could get. I love the detail and the impasto technique!
Doesn't this look like a photograph? Unfortunately I forgot to note the artist. Anyone know?

Another great part of the Getty is all the furniture from the impressionist era. They had a beautiful panneled room set up from a sitting room in Europe. Can you imagine sleeping in this bed? All I could think about is how I got my sheets at Ross...

SDSU v. BYU

Our entry into the SDSU v. BYU game was gratis due to Sandys' sports connections at State. The arena was sold out that night, but we found some seats a few rows up and watched a great game.

Here is the student body supporting the missionary effort...

Even though I didn't go to either school, it's nice to see BYU win because State is always a wee bit uncalled for and humility is a good lesson!

hello Disney

We participated in Disney's Give a Day, Get a Day program by doing service for the San Diego Oceans Foundation. We stamped storm drains to help raise awareness that all storm drains in the county lead directly to the ocean. It was trial and error at first, but we got the hang of it and whipped out enough to go to Disneyland for free. We are excited every time we drive past 'our' storm drains. I enjoyed it and would do it again!

oh canada

Here are just a few pictures of our trip to Canada for Christmas.Two of Aaron's brothers greeted us at the airport with this sign they made. Since Aaron didn't have his camera ready when we were coming out of customs, his brothers kindly re-enacted the moment at home.

Christmas dinner in the barn at Gpa B's and Gma L's. Apologies for the blurriness. side note: ever think pictures don't look like you? i feel like this does not look like me. moving on...

Bundled up to go tobogganing (sleding in america). The trip was cut short due to an injury and the fact that we broke all our tubes. Obviously I wasn't taking any chances with the cold.

thanksgiving

A picture with some favorite folsom friends in St. George after an early morning temple session. The best part about driving to Utah is seeing the Staggs!
Gma is the best.

it's raining outside

and i forgot my umbrella.
and i wore a white shirt.
and i'm wearing my suede leopard print shoes.
dang it.