36 weeks

After church today... I was a bit tired! and a lot swollen. But only 4 more weeks!! If my grandma is right, possibly only a week and a half! Let's cross our fingers her dreams are right. :)

Tomorrow morning Mark will drop my dizzy, fasted-self off at the hospital for 3.5 hours. I'm following through with the glucose test. boooo... Better to know for certain, right? My next appt is on Tuesday!

ps - I turned to the left for this picture because of a nice pretty oven burn on my right arm. AND I just noticed I forgot my fake wedding ring all day. Good thing Mark was in town to sit next to me today! ha ha

paradise brought home

When Mark brought sand home from Diego Garcia two trips ago, I thought it was a bag of sugar-cookie mix. Having that sit on our counter made me want sugar all the time! (maybe that was why I failed the glucose test... and no I still haven't taken the 3 hour test! I'm thinking of letting it sliiiide...) Anyway, I didn't know what to do with the beautiful sand. When he showed me pictures of the broken coral that just sits on beaches there, I asked him to grab some of that next time. I had an idea after all. Now that he's home we set to work.

I've seen this done before, but putting it together proved trickier than I imagined. You pour sand, little bit by little bit, place the shell or coral where you'd like it, then pour sand around it. Then using a cue-tip to dig around and wipe the salty sand off the shells and coral pieces. We like it! I'm just glad it looks like SAND, rather than sugar now!

Mt. Fuji

A preview picture from Mark's 21 day trip: 

Other things under way: 

refinishing crib 

basement almost finished 

chose paint colors for basement rooms

36 weeks (picture coming soon.. if I can remember!)

Mark's birthday is around the corner! 

.. as is the baby's!

odd fascination

I have one with this commercial. 

Might be the music. 

Or the paintbrushes.

are we ready?

...we will be after reading this book! happy studying, Mark! 

purple mountain's majesty

Yesterday morning, ~ 5:00 am. Cool and beautiful morning! 

3 minute make-over

Before: 

After:
I love all the little fresh colors!! My bathroom is primarily green and white, so to throw in blues, oranges, yellows, and pinks adds a fun little punch of color. I almost did a lime green, but I thought this was more fun. I moved Mark's colognes to the downstairs bath (where he likes to get ready) and took his cubby over for my little pieces of jewelry. 

Ta-Da!! I'm loving it. Something so simple, but so enjoyable.

midnight snack

Today I went out on my 'investigation.' Instead of bear spray, I had my camera as a weapon; you know, to throw at it, if it were still nearby. 

Instead of trash, I found what looked like a grocery bag full of dairy products. Lucky bear! Sour cream, miracle whip, and lots of yogurt. 

Look at how the bear was able to get the lids off! So dextrous! I think when I can't get salsa jars open I should just go ask my neighborhood bear from now on.  

Hopefully the bear didn't have a 'rumbly in his tumbly' today... 

I sure would after a snack like this. yuck.

BEAR

...in the backyard!! I got it on video (on our actual video camera), Buckwheat thought he could kill it from the 3rd story deck, again...of course. But it was just eating trash; same snacking spot as last July's bear.

I heard munching and crunching, so I got up to look. There was a big black shadow "thing" on the hill, and I knew JUST what it was. 

So I said, "Buckwheat!! come here! come on sleepy head!!" ha! So we watched it for a good 5 minutes before I decided to be brave and call the neighbors. 

Even though it was after midnight I called Cat and they were all excited and happy that I called to tell them. 

It was a good sized bear, too! FINALLY I saw one this summer. Without doing my hikes I thought I might not see one this summer. Glad I did. Buckwheat's not getting a late-walk tonight.

Sincerely,

The Neighborhood Bear Watch

Post-sighting pictures just for fun: 

This is how light it is at 12:30 am, facing West:

Buckwheat now is on guard-dog/bear-watch patrol:

It will be a long night for him! "all in a night's work:"

pizza stone

Yesterday was a Visiting Teacher's opportunity to make a dinner for the family of a new daughter, Ryley. I was wondering how to make two large pizzas without falling over by the time I was done. A friend of mine had mentioned buying Pizza Man's dough for $2, so I went and checked it out! Also while I was out, I bought an $11 pizza stone from Target; genius! It proved FAILSAFE!! Anyone else use a pizza stone? It was an $11 well spent. 

I oiled the new stone, rolled out the wheat-dough, put on Prego spaghetti sauce (my secret, secret sauce - shhh!), mozzarella cheese then the pepperonis (while sneaking quite a few to the Buckwheat). I will be making these weekly, I believe! I just hope it tasted as good as it looked. 

I'd proudly guess it did; because tonight I used the small dough to make a spicy thai chicken pizza. It was scrumptious!! I forgot to take a picture, though, dang it! On it, there was: 

peanut sauce (Padang - it's a bit spicy!)

chicken

red onion

bean sprouts

carrot threads

mozzarella 

and a splash of olive oil

go on and try it!! 

films

I wish everyone could see this movie; 

but only if they have a tissue handy. 

the synopsis: Two lost souls, Nina (Tammy Blanchard), a pregnant, unmarried waitress, and Jose (Eduardo Verástegui), an introspective yet troubled cook with a mysterious past, find solace in each other as their lives become unpredictably linked throughout the course of one incredible day. An uplifting story of love, hope and forgiveness, this remarkable tale is co-written and directed by Alejandro Gomez Monteverde.

someone call peta

Buckwheat thought these were devices of torture this afternoon: 

So as soon as he could, he scrambled underneath the BBQ. 

While I waited I took some pictures of this pup's 

sad, sad, heartbreaking day. 

I didn't even get to finish, 

and he STILL got a bone and treat afterwards. 

Just because he's cute.

"L-7...wienie!" 

happy things

This is what I learned today... how to make Jodi's famous french bread! Since this is my favorite french bread in the world, I was pretty dang excited to see how it is made. (try it, then try disagreeing) The recipe she uses is SO not what she does. I've never braided with 4 pieces, but it was easier than I expected:

So I took notes: 

Here's the finished 'mini-loaf' that I did. I didn't get a picture of the above loaf when it was finished because we all ate the loaves too quickly. But I took this one home. The seasoning we used on this was Parmesan + Garlic Pampered Chef Seasoning: 

While I was writing in my journal this afternoon, Buckwheat alerted me to the UPS man:

A few days ago I ordered a PUJ baby sling (there's a splendid little video if you're interested), using a discount from Progressive Pioneer's site:

To top off my day, I made a salad wrap of avocado, tomato, mozzarella, salt, pepper, and a zing of lemon juice... tasty!

Off to see Angels and Demons. EEE! Scary!

fickle fabrics

An explanation: I'm "fickle."

Flannel: fabrics that I think are too "ordinary" but would look like a magazine clipping with a dark dark crib... and warmer in the winter! *added note: if I used these, they would be a pair:

Cotton: I like the whimsical feel of this fabric, like a Peter-Pan sky that our little boy could dream happy things about. But it's blue, thus being stereotypical for a boy! I'm having a tough time:
Julia, I loved looking at those fabric sites! If anyone knows of any fabric sites that you have used, let me know! I'd love to window-web shop!

feeling beaded

I failed the glucose test two days ago (I took it Monday, and found out I didn't pass yesterday at the appointment). The midwife said, "if you're going to fail it, you better REALLY fail it." I only failed it by a frustrating 2 points. Just enough to require me to take a fun 3 hour test. So besides feeling beat, here are 3 recent bracelets: 

This was for my sister's birthday back in April, but I just barely gave it to her last month! She asked for purple and teal when I asked to name two colors. I had to add the berry for a little bit of an Alaska-touch: 

This one I made for Grace, the just-graduated young woman who volunteered to play the piano in primary for me while I was gone last month. I asked her if she was trying to avoid Relief Society and she just smiled!

While in Colorado, my mother-in-law wore a beautiful bracelet with beads that were turned into charms. The charmed beads were attached to an elastic metal bracelet with hooks, so I improvised. I spent 3 hours twisting all the wires to turn these beads into charms, then strung and clustered them on one wire with some beads regularly placed to act like spacers. It's one heavy bracelet! I think our baby will love to play with it once he figures out how to grab at things: 

A closer look at the bead-charm clusters:

a care package

Did anyone else see this last week? Mark and I loved, loved this segment! These two should do more shows together: 

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Tom Hanks Care Package
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Stephen Colbert in Iraq

*you can make it bigger by clicking the bottom right corner of the clip's screen. 

happy things

Driving away from the hospital after my check-up this morning, I saw THIS hanging up. That makes me feel pretty good! 

*yes, I blotched out a person, he was staring! 

probably wondering why I was taking a picture of him

Then driving home, the stormy rain clouds were still threatening, but over the part of the valley I live in, the sun was shining down. It was beautiful:
It has been really drizzly the last few days here, and I'm loving it. Last night at 11:30, I took my book outside with Buckwheat, bear spray next to me, and no reading light besides the sky itself, and enjoyed a good little read outside before bed. It was so quiet and peaceful! I love Alaskan summers.

great and important things

I was looking through the two photo albums from growing up that I have in my possession, and I found some fun pictures of me and my dad. I thought it would be fun to list off what I've learned from my dad in picture-form.

. My dad taught me to not grow taller than him, or I'd have one sore forehead. That was good advice:

. My mom (and dad) taught me to date guys taller than me. My mom by stories, and my dad by example (nearly 6'4"): 
. He taught me to not sleep in on vacations because you'd miss the site-seeing. Not sleeping in made me fall asleep in my stroller instead:
. My dad taught me all types of history: American, European, literature, art, etc. Here we are at Anne Hathaway's cottage, the birthplace of Shakespeare:
. he taught me how to wink:
. Dad also taught me not everyone has to like wearing hats, but I should always help out my mom when she needs a model:
. Dad, you also taught me that the best friend I could ever have is my little sister:
Happy Father's Day, dad! And don't worry... I've learned many more important things from you too. I love you!

Kenai

Mark drove out last night to meet the scouts who had been fishing on the Russian all day. Instead of finding them right away, he was searching for two and a half hours, driving around in this pretty area: 

Not all of it was clear, sunny, and green, but it was definitely all beautiful: 

Pushing Daisies

A favorite show of mine on ABC just went 6 feet under. I just finished watching the series finale of this delightfully energetic show: 

In an entertainment world where more shows are being devoted to mind-numbing reality shows, it was refreshing to have a show so devoted to dialogue, costume, and set. 

Another reason I so loved the show was the physical distance that was necessary between the two stars. It kept this show wholesome: 
If the pie maker, Ned (above), touched something dead, it came to life (but only for 1 minute, or something else would die). This way he was able to solve murder cases with Emerson Cod, his chinese-food loving, detective of a partner. Right before the minute was up, Ned would zap (touch) the very-much-alive victim, making them un-alive again, forever. His girlfriend, and child-hood sweetheart (shown above), Charlotte Charles, was murdered on a cruise ship, and he zapped her back to life; but since has been unable to touch her again because he wants her alive and well, with him. 

Mark will be happy that this show has been wrapped up after a mere two seasons, because it would make him crazy with its fast dialogue and bright colors. It was a bit reminiscent of Gilmore Girls, in fact, just full of fantasy. I will miss this show!! 

fabric choices - and dilemmas

Picking the fabric out for the crib has come at last!! This week Joann's is having a sale, so I thought I'd go check it out today. 

I did. 

And I left with nothing. 

I need some FEEDBACK! If you read this in the next day, please comment and tell me what you think/if you agree with my criticality (wow, that's really a word!)/or disagree completely. Yes, yes, please tell all. 

This was one of the 3 fabrics I went to go take a gander at. It's more brown in person, not sooo orange, and the diamonds are about an inch long (bigger than I thought). I like it.. but if we don't refinish the crib, the colors will clash big time with the oak wood:

This one I loved, but thought it might be too girly with it having flowers on it. What do you think??
I am currently using this (the green vine) fabric for the tree in my house square that I just showcased. I think this would look beautiful with both a refinished crib (dark, dark brown color, nearly black) OR the oak (if we ended up leaving it as is): 

This I thought, "Too girly for a boy's crib sheets!" ...I was bummed: 

I think this green might clash with the green paint we have in the room (I know, I still haven't shown any pictures of the downstairs paint... I will shortly) ... but I love it:
I thought this was cute and kind of Moses-basket-esque:
Here it is again. I had to fade the color once so that it looked more like how it did in the store:
THIS I wanted to use for something summery... but Sir Kicksalot is going to be born when it's almost autumn... soooo I'll just keep thinking of something I can use it for:
Alright! Time to leave a comment. Even people who don't blog (Megan and Caila!), and just peek. I would love some feedback. Mark is a man, and thus I turn to you...