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...

32 weeks

Work it! Work it!

Taken on Sunday by my "snappy husband." 
32 weeks! 

knock-knock

I was just watching this belly of mine, and I saw a 'double-punch.' It seemed like the little guy was knocking. Knocking for what? maybe some salad? some french fries? some freedom? 

I'm not sure, but I get excited thinking about what this little boy will have in store for Mark and myself. While sitting in church on Sunday, Mark told me how he's excited to teach him that "Buckwheat loves funny, short stories." I think Mark is just thinking of ways to set this boy up so Mark is laughing all day. 

That is fine with me. Laughing in the homes means a happy home! If this little boy is half as funny as Mark and his brothers were as little boys, then we will have the strongest abs on the block. That's fine with me, too. 

Another thing I'm looking forward to is getting back into shape; toned and healthy. And small again. I liked feeling small in stature next to Mark. Now I'm not so sure I am! At least my shoulders haven't swelled, and he can still put his arm around me in church! ha

Feeling this boy jump and cart-wheel around makes me hurt and sore, but as I told my Grandmother yesterday, it's pretty funny when I push back on his little feet or knees. Mark pushed back on his little foot yesterday and the baby pushed back even harder! It was so sweet seeing Mark's eyes get all small and squinty from his smile. 

...I love these boys.

six mile chalet

Friday night was the squadron's "Captain Promotion Party." There were quite a few 1st Lt.'s pinning on Captain around the same time. Mark and I drove two cars so I could drive home and get to bed early while he stayed to help with clean up. He told me to follow him closely, not get lost, and what I should do if I did get lost. I thought he was teasing!

But this place took a lot of windy driving to get to. It was nestled so far from anything I've been to on base. It took about half an hour to get to, so I thought we'd hit ocean soon! There were all sorts of sea planes and lakes around the 'chalet.' I'm already thinking of when I can go back to get pictures. It was beautiful!

I'm glad I followed Mark; this map is not very detailed (for the wives, at least):

jewels ... almost?

Here's a piece of jewelry I made for my friend Aubrey. It doesn't seem like nearly enough compared to what she did for Mark and myself and what she gave me when we met up. But I loved it so much that I made a 'replica' for myself. 

a new look

I just changed the banner, and colors on my "mjsheavenlyhome" blog. I love the fresh, light look! The banner is one of the pictures Mark took of the broken coral on the beaches of Diego Garcia... you know, the other name for a heavenly paradise! So here's smiling at a new look for the "M & J's Heavenly Home" blog. 

house quilt

Here is my square-design for the latest quilt project. We are all supposed to design a square and make 16 of them. Then we all swap and have a house of everyone's. As you can see, I chose to do a cabin to remember Alaska by. It's not done, but here it is so far. 

I think I'll add some swirly smoke coming from the chimney and a window. Some of the other quilt squares I've heard of/seen have been: 

- a bird house

- a gold fish bowl

- an igloo with little penguins

- a beach hut with palm tree

- a mushroom (this square may have changed...)

So while I'm hand-quilting my middle-eastern-themed quilt, I will be working on this quilt as well before the little guy joins us in the next couple of months.

good medicine

This morning I woke up at 7:52 after a dream about having a migraine, canceling my brain surgery because of the migraine, then being chased by the crazy surgeon, then being unconscious for 8 hours, then waking up walking down a road being met by a worried woman in a car. She was nice and helped me get home. That was my dream. 

The morning proceeded with a strong headache during breakfast, then at 10:00 when Mark left for work (he had a check ride today so he got to go in later) I fell asleep for 2.5 hours. 

I had lunch with potato chips and cherries for dessert. 

Then my vision started to get a bright fuzzy spot to just the right of where I was trying to focus. 

Here it comes! 

When the blurry spot faded to a ring around my vision, my head began to ache!! And ache it did. 

I willed myself to sleep until 4:00, then woke up and stood up slowly. 

Mark called at 7:00 on his way home and told me he passed!! Hurray for good check rides! I told him about my hurtful day, and he brought me home a drumstick. 

Thank you, honey, for the good medicine. I feel good! 

should I blog this?

Remember on "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" where she creeps him out by showing him pictures of their future kids?? 

Well....... 

We took this picture of me: 

And this picture of Mark:
And this is the result. HOW CREEEEPY, right? It's a pretty good mix, we think. But so weird!!
Kinda looks like a cousin of mine mixed with a Lipnicki. "Ain't life like a bowl full of cherries?"

Mark says I have to add this to this post:

"I loook heeedieous"

home again

Last night we flew in at 8:30, found Buckwheat in baggage claim, didn't find one of our bags in baggage claim (guess it wanted to see Ketchikan instead of Anchorage), got picked up by some fabulous friends, squinted into the sunlight and drove on home. 

When Mark checked the mail as I crashed on the couch, he brought me back a surprise from this place: 

My diploma!! I wasn't expecting to feel any different, but I do!! I'm sorta proud of myself:

This morning, Mark gave me a reason to be proud of him. He drove off to work as a captain. I snapped this as he was getting ready. Nice hat, eh?

After waiting until noon for some basement workers (never came), I decided to start my day off with some serious grocery shopping. Buckwheat is sad, I think he got attached to my parents a bit, so I brought him along to cheer him up. We don't know why, but he loves car rides (even in his boo-box!):

Driving home I saw some of Alaska's outdoorsy types:

Noticed how green it is:

Saw the Alaskan pine-trees that remind me so much of Dr. Seuss trees. What do you think?

Then I went outside to our backyard. Besides the Amazon-grass, I noticed the green-belt has turned green!! And there are some beautiful wild flowers back there too:

Buckwheat must have felt like a panther in our jungle:

Sadly, for Buckwheat, Mark cut the grass tonight so our house looks lived-in:

Before:

After:

Can't you just smell the fresh cut grass??

So summery!