Memorial Day

I love 3 day weekends. OK lets be honest, all of my weekends are 4 day weekends, but I like getting to spend an extra day with Lance. We celebrated (commemorated?) the holiday in style, with delicious shish-kabobs and homemade ice cream! It was soo good. I think I ate more today than I have in the past week. (Its hard when the baby is always squishing your stomach).

My man in action!

I ate 6 or 7 seven of these puppies in one sitting. Impressed? Lance was. I blame the baby...

Patiently waiting for the food to be done...

Ugh the weather was crazy today. This is what we woke up to:

We also stopped by the cemetery to leaves some flowers on my grandparents graves. Other people in the area already beat us there. It was cool to see the cemetery so full of flowers. Beautiful really.

In other news, looks like I will not be wearing my wedding ring for the next few weeks, until baby comes. Although I have had hardly any swelling up to this point, the warm weather pushed things over the edge. My ring got completely stuck on my finger at church on Sunday, and it took over 10 minutes of ice cold water and soap to get it off. It hurt so bad :( I hate not wearing my ring; I feel naked. Hopefully it will be back on in less than a month!

More classes??

After graduating, I figured I was pretty much done with classes (except one 3 credit class I had to take this spring). Right? Wrong. I did not anticipate how much time my 3 credit cooking class would take. 10 hours a week in cooking lab. Not too bad though. Besides that class, I have had multiple other classes to keep me out of trouble. This month: 1 concealed carry permit class, 2 cooking classes at Macey's grocery, and 4 prenatal classes at the hospital. With each class lasting an average of 3 hours, thats plenty to keep me busy until the baby comes. (Official due date t minus 40 days!). I guess you never stop learning. And when I say never stop learning, I mean I'm ready for the formal classroom learning to end. Although I can't lie, I really enjoyed the concealed carry class. I got fingerprinted and everything! And the first cooking class. OK really, I liked all of them, even the they made me watch a birth video in the hospital. And it was gross. I can't believe I have to do that. Life is hard.

Side note: Since I am kind of a mother, we celebrated a subdued Mothers Day. I got pretty flowers and a card. Lance says they were from the baby, but I'm not sure I believe him. She must have had a accomplice.... And Lance made me a delicious steak dinner all by himself while I took a nap. He set the table and everything! I was so impressed! I didn't even think that he knew where we kept the china or the tablecloths, but I guess he is more observant than I thought. Unfortunately for him, he got to deal with fussy hormonal teary pregnant me all morning. I wasn't exactly looking my best, so no pictures... Darn.

Also, I hate doctors offices. We waited 1.5 hours this morning for a 10 minute appointment. Ugh.

1 Year!

With all the business of graduation, we barely had time to plan anything for our first anniversary, which was on Sunday. Which is ok, because we kind of already celebrated back in March. But still, we went to dinner at the Chef's Table in Orem, which was sooo delicious. We had never been there before, but we will definitely hopefully go back! Seriously the food was amazing, and it was so nice and romantic. We also celebrated by eating the top of our wedding cake that was in our freezer for the past year! My family packaged it so well; it was still moist and tasted great! They also put a bunch of notes in with the cake, and those were fun to read. Kudos to Genevieve for correctly predicting that I would be pregnant :). Sharon came in a close second by guessing that I would have two children by now. Maybe next time.
Lance and I have realized over the past year that marriage has its ups and downs, and is usually not easy, but it is definitely worth it. There is no one else that I can even imagine being with. He is just the best husband and I can't believe I found someone that loves me so much. We are the luckiest, and when Daughter gets here in June we will truly be complete! I hope for much more happiness in the future, and the good news is- we're halfway there!

PS I am really glad to be able to talk to my other best friend again. Can't wait to see her.

Graduation Celebration!

The past couple of weeks have been so crazy and busy and fun!! We had a blast celebrating with our families and friends. Where do I start? I loved getting to spend a few extra days with my niece Eve (and Sharon and Andrew and Dad) before things really got busy. She is such a cutie!

I don't know what that look is for. She loves me.

The rest of my family, and Lances family, got in to Provo on Thursday. My family made it just in time for graduation! (Literally. I did not even see them before the ceremony. Thank you snowy mountains.) Graduation was AWESOME. It was the best feeling ever. I can't believe I made it through this semester. What makes it even better? Finding out I got A-'s in the two hardest classes I have ever taken at BYU. OH SNAP. I was pretty proud of myself. Anyway, walking across the stage and getting my diploma (holder) was just such a relief. And, I didn't even trip!

Oh she would dress Eve like a little Ute fan! Don't worry, I will indoctrinate her in the ways of the Cougars.

Haha I am not at all surprised that Lance has his eyes closed in the only picture I got with my family.

Proud parents? I hope so!

Thursday and Friday were just full of celebrations and family time and graduation, and then Saturday morning was my baby shower! My sisters-in-law, Meagan and Britta, as well as Lance's mom and grandma threw me the best shower ever! It was soo much fun, and I'm so glad almost my whole family could be there. (Jamie: I miss you). It was good to see so many of my friends too, especially Laura, Mindy, and Maren, who came out all the way from Colorado. Sadly, I didn't get any pictures from the shower on my camera. But I did get a lot of awesome presents and ate way too much delicious food!
I was sad because, with everything else going on, I wasn't able to focus too much attention on Easter, my favorite holiday. Lance and I are considering celebrating it next week. After pretty much everyone had left by last Monday, it took me nearly a full week to recover. And by recover, I mean finish the laundry and clean the condo and eat all the leftovers. Genevieve, my super talented sister-in-law, took maternity pics with me and Lance on Thursday. I can't wait to see how they turned out!! The one I saw looked pretty good, so I am excited.

Basically, the week of graduation was pretty much the best thing ever. I am so grateful for our families and friends and how generous they are! Mostly I am grateful for Lance, because I am almost positive I never would have made it to graduation without his support. He is the best husband ever! Now we just get to hunker down and wait for Daughter to get here! I am absolutely so excited to be a mother (and to not be pregnant anymore!) Less than two months now!
I can't believe he can carry me and the baby! And he makes it seem so effortless! My hero <3

Baby Shower!

My sisters' diaper cake was impressive! I totally stole these pictures form Genevieve. Just kidding, she gave them to me willingly. I'm glad someone was on the ball at the shower with the camera because I certainly wasn't. I was too busy....

Eating delicious food:
Hanging out with friends and family:

And opening presents:
And of course, what's a baby shower without a few babies!

:(

I made it four years here without getting a single parking ticket.

So it only makes sense that I would get one....

less than a week before graduation.

Ouch.

Spring??

After the awesome birthday weekend we had in Salt Lake, my actual birthday on Wednesday was pretty low-key. We did go out to dinner, and I got some beautiful flowers from my husband! (They look even prettier now that they are all open.) We also team-made angel food cake for my birthday cake, and it was deee-licious! 22 doesn't feel very different than 21.(I'm about 6 1/2 months pregnant here in this picture)

I'm approximately 30 weeks along now- the end is getting closer! Speaking of ends, graduation is so close I can almost taste it. The next two weeks are going to be rough, but I think I can make it. Today I presented my capstone research paper on Botswana. It was very stressful, and I almost fell over in my heels, but I made it out alive. I think I might have even done well! (I would hope so, after the hours I have spent studying and writing about that country....)

Unrelatedly, Lance and I LOVED General Conference this weekend. I'll be honest, it was probably the first time that I have watched and payed attention to all the sessions. It was so good, and we tried to look for specific ways that we can improve our little family. It was great just to spend the weekend relaxing with my husband. Although, I am not pleased with the weather. We planted a bunch of flowers in our little yard on Saturday, and of course we woke up to snow and freezing temperatures on Sunday and Monday. We'll see if they make it. I mean, I knew it would snow again this spring, but I was really hoping we were past the hard frosts. No more ice!! Although it's looking like more of the same for the next little while....