7.30.2007

kid



so cute

7.26.2007

five years and many more




i have spent one-fifth of my life married to justin.
he is my very best friend, the person who i look most forward to spending time with, the person who makes the everyday mundane life so much more fun and bearable.











we have known eachother for almost eight years now, having met the senior year of high school. i told my friends sarah and danielle, from the moment i met justin, i knew i would marry him. of course there were doubts along the way, but the Lord worked in too many crazy ways to bring us together. we attended college together. november of our sophomore year, justin sprung the question, and we were married less than a year later on july 27, 2002.

five years later, i couldn't love another person more.
i love you justin, happy anniversary.

7.24.2007

potter-tastic

when i woke up last friday morning, i felt the same excitement i feel when preparing for a trip. finn and i left the house at 7:30am to get in line at Borders for my "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" wristband, which would seal my place in the book receiving line at midnight. We waited, Finn in his stroller eating crackers and playing with a transformer, in line for about an hour until Border's opened (this brought back painful memories of waiting in line for the xbox 360!!) I was eighth in line! then came the whole day of waiting.

6pm rolled around and i left the house (justin was having some friends over for a game night.) Darby was going to go with me, but ended up going out of out town, so it was just me! I felt slightly shameful going it alone, but I had to go. i knew i would regret it forever if i missed this "party!"

i stopped at the mall to pick up a harry potter t-shirt. sounds lame, i know, but it WAS a celebration afterall! around 7 i made it to borders, although the potter festivities weren't starting until 9:30, i figured i'd better get there early. there weren't too many weirdos there yet. mostly the normal borders customers. i bought some postcards and a sudoku book to pass the time. i had a table all to myself, my ipod... what a great night!

1500 people!!

around 8ish, a woman in her 40's (with a walker) and her daughter, came over to me and asked if they could share my table (the place was getting full by this time) and i said sure. the daughter was 16, and was kind of shy. the mom was definitely not shy, which i think is what i needed. i know more about her and her family now, than i do about anyone in omaha!! (well, almost...)

9:30 rolled around, which meant the start of the festivities. the potter bee, the great snape debate and the costume contest. the only one i wanted to take part in was the bee, because i am pretty clever like that. so i made my way upstairs with my sidekick (the daughter, who proceeded to tell me about her own harry potter stories that she writes, quite clever, that one!). there were about 75 people ready to participate (mind you, a good third of these were shorter than me!) potter fans are very friendly so there was always someone to talk to... everyone practicing words they thought they might get tested on, or discussing different theories of what might happen in book 7... i can't remember all of the words i was asked to spell, but here are a few i can recall... "rosmerta" the bar lady at the three broomsticks, "serpensortia" a spell that does something with snakes, i forget, "avada kedavra" the killing and unforgivable curse, "scourgify" the cleaning spell, "tarantallegra" the dancing spell... when it was finally down to two of us (my opponent was dressed as the death eater, bellatrix lestrange, scary!) we went back and forth on a few words, and after i spelled "aparecium" correct, they called it a tie. i was expecting a cool prize, a gryffindor scarf, or an action figure or something... boy was i wrong! all of that work and i got a $1 mini water bottle, a junky pen, a hand notebook and some sticky notes. i was a little annoyed, but still glad i won.

voldemort and dumbledore, sorry they are so blurry!







i made my way back downstairs and chatted with the mom again for awhile, until around 11:30 they started getting people oganized to hand out the books (there were over 1500 people there, so you can imagine how difficult it was to organize this). people were divided by the color of their wristband. all the people who got their books first had orange ones, and this was me!! they called all the orange folks upstairs to get in line at the locked door, behind which was the books!! at 12:01am we all shouted "alohamora," the unlocking spell, the door was opened, there were cheers and screams, we received our books, and all of the other 1450 people were watching with green in their eyes. i sped home to tell justin all about my adventure and to start reading!

me and my goods

i actually finished the 750+ page book yesterday! i laughed, i cried! it was worth the wait, and was fun to participate in something that is so well loved. i know there are a lot of people against harry potter books, and most of those people have never even attempted to read one... but i will say that these books are more than just entertaining. the story is based on LOVE, and how it is stronger than any magic that can exist. anyway, i loved these books and they will stay on my shelves next to the LOTR and Narnia series for my children to enjoy.

7.23.2007

dairy goodness

go to this site, Five Minutes for Mom, to have a chance to win $300 in Horizon Organic products. DO IT!

7.19.2007

watching dad mow the lawn



7.12.2007

"33 pounds of cardboard goodness"


















oh dear. this all started with friendly games of puerto rico with chari and darin, over two years ago. since then a little beast inside of justin has been waiting to emerge, waiting for the right moment. the "game hoarder" has been set loose. this beast was lured out of its cage by justin's elder brother, jaybirdy, who in the last year or so has collected more boardgames than stars in the sky (extreme exaggeration, but you get what i mean). these are not boardgames like pictionary or candyland. these are intense, take-two-to-three hours, strategy soaked, boardgames. i admit, i enjoy playing these games. but never, NEVER, would i buy 8 in one sitting. actually, i would probably never buy one, just play other peoples. (these puppies aren't cheap). but justin sold his xbox 360 and decided to use a lot of his money from the proceeds for this monster purchase.
anyway, this is the tower of games that appeared on our doorstep yesterday.













and here is finn playing with all of the cardboard cutout pieces, what fun!

7.11.2007

on sleep


it's only natural that finn should be a sleep-a-holic... seeing as justin and i get more than enough sleep (er, around 8.5 hours, which is more than most adults with children get i am sure). but sometimes i wonder if he is sleeping TOO much! the little guy sleeps 12.5 hours at night... he had been taking 1, 2-3 hour nap during the day, but over the last week, that nap has increased to a typical 4 hour nap!! so that's like eight hours of wake time. amazing. i guess he needs it.
but either way it amazes me... and i am thankful for it. through these last weeks of such busyness, his long naps have helped me to cope!

in other news, i hit my first squirrel this weekend. actually it was the first animal i have ever hit. and i nearly cried. i felt so bad. just a big old "thunk."

AND my fantasy baseball team is STILL in first place!! i love it.

[ew, sick... check out that grody pink tile in our bathroom in the pic - that bathroom is the pimple of our house..]

7.05.2007

fantasy baseball scoreboard

1. the prophets 156-140-42 .524 - 12-10-4 2 12
2. Get up baby!! 155-142-41 .519 1.5 4-18-4 6 22
3. Arashikage Clan 155-145-38 .515 3 18-4-4 5 17
4. Red October 156-148-34 .512 4 18-7-1 3 43
5. Illinois 154-149-35 .507 5.5 7-18-1 8 19
6. Buckly Bruisers 146-147-45 .499 8.5 15-8-3 4 21
7. Slamalamadingdongs! 138-158-42 .470 18 10-12-4 7 26
8. Red Devils 137-168-33 .454 23.5 8-15-3 1 20

most of you have no idea what that mumbo jumbo above says... but the only thing that is important to take from it, is that my team, "the prophets" (named after the giant meeples used in ark of the covenant, a boardgame) is in FIRST. it's a big feat anyway, simply because i don't really follow baseball stats and players. but also because this is an all MALE league, with the exception of myself (durrr...). i may only enjoy one week at the top, but at least i can say i made it!
that's all for now, as finn is crying, rudy is barking, and i think i have a package at the door! woohoo!

7.02.2007

the many faces...



it's almost impossible to catch a smile on this kid with the camera... but we get a lot of other silly faces and scowls instead!

7.01.2007

our weekend


what a great, busy, and strange weekend!
friday as soon as justin walked in the door from work, we were out the door on our way to his boss's house (who is also our sister-in-law's parents). we were invited over for pizza and fireworks; they have a great view of them right out their front door. finn loved playing with the other kids there... and he stayed up until 11:00!!! he loved the fireworks, just sat on my lap and watched and pointed up in the sky everynow and then... the night was great, except for when finn threw up at dinner - i am not sure finn has really ever thrown up before, so this was a little weird, but he just had his immunizations on wednesday and i also am pretty sure he is getting teeth... so i just blamed those things for the occurence.

we all slept in on saturday until almost nine!! that NEVER happens. after we all got ready for the day, we left on a grocery shopping excursion... aldi's first and then walmart for the few items we needed there. we were invited to justin's co-workers house for saturday evening, for some grilled food, at-home fireworks and late night guitar hero! so we drove out west... tara has two children, taylor and max... quite loveable children. finn also loved playing with them! we were all set to eat dinner, i had almost sat in my chair, when finn threw up all over justin (he was sitting in his lap, munching). and it was a lot. tara and her family are no strangers to vomit, so everyone threw in a helping hand to clean up... finn had a quick bath, justin had a quick change of pants (from jeans to KISS pajama pants - hahaa!)... well, after finn went to bed, max started acting real quiet and sick. and sure enough, before long, he had lost his dinner too. he went to sleep not long after that, and the rest of us stepped outside for a small fireworks show put on by tara's husband. and by 10:30, we were back inside playing guitar hero, when taylor fell asleep on the couch. we didn't leave until around 12:30! two late nights in a row for us. but it was worth it, even worth the puke.

we stayed home from church today, mostly because we didn't want finn throwing up in nursery. and i am glad we kept him home, because on his last bite of lunch, he threw it all up. he didn't take a very long nap... and as we speak is falling to pieces. finn has never really been sick before, so we'll see what happens in the next couple of days.