An aquarium afternoon with Grandpa!

We were long overdue for some Grandpa Braden time so when a perfect Saturday afternoon presented itself a couple of weeks ago, we immediately made plans to head to the aquarium in Boise. I admit, after following the legal troubles in the news, I was a bit wary of the aquarium but it's now under new, law-abiding ownership and it was really nice and well presented.

 Clyde was SO into all of it - and of course it helps that my dad is a total fish/sea creature/water buff (he's always had really awesome fish tanks and has explored and snorkeled in a lot of the ocean on different cruises he's taken) and could thus explain what everything was and help Clyde know how to touch and hold a lot of the little creatures and such.

Will loved to look at everything and touch them at least once, but definitely wasn't as gung-ho as Clyde.

 Jack takes after me and liked looking at everything while staying pretty much hands-off. I think Clyde and Will's favorite part was the rays and feeding them little pieces of krill; I think they talked Grandpa into buying at least two cups of it to distribute into the tank.

 

 After a solid couple hours at the aquarium, we picked up some food and headed to a nearby park to carry on the fun. The boys played and snuggled with Grandpa and told him stories and used his fancy new phone to sing along (and in Will's case, dance along) to their favorite songs and be comforted with cookies when they tumbled off the picnic table bench (Jack).

The boys had a great time and Dad and I got to talk and talk and it was a splendid afternoon! 

Of course, while we were there Jack randomly became obsessed with the porta-potty and couldn't understand why I kept heading him off every time he'd run that direction. It'll probably come back to haunt me in a few months when I want to ditch the diapers - "Sorry, Mom, that day at the park was your chance. I was ready; now I've rethought the matter...."

And the timing worked out perfectly; the boys were just winding down when Chuck got off work, which was right next to the park so he got to load/buckle/drive home the tired boys while I opted for a tranquil drive home alone in the Saturn :).

Thanks again Daddi-o, we had a great day! Love you lots!

Baby shower / torrential downpour

Earlier this month I had the sweetest, loveliest baby shower ever, hosted by the sweetest, loveliest e-bff ever, Jayna, and co-hosted/planned/coordinated by the equally sweet and lovely Bethany and Christy (who was out of town for the shower itself but helped immensely beforehand).

Bethany, Me/theBaby, Jayna

As I get ready to raise a daughter and embrace my inner girly self, Jayna is one of my shining examples: she's feminine and beautiful and domestic and generous and sweet - but also bold and strong and witty and unapologetic and her three daughters mirror those same characteristics. I love being reassured that such a balance is attainable.

The perfect setting for a dainty tea party; Jayna's decor and house is ideal for such a soiree (I almost said shindig there, but it didn't seem classy enough...). 

It was so fun to walk in and see all the gorgeous little touches all around:

Some of the details that need to be highlighted:

Aren't all of the teacups and saucers darling? Jayna and Bethany have collected them (okay, mostly Bethany at Jayna's behest) at thrift stores over the last couple of years and they've been the stuff of magic at several other tea parties - mostly sweet little girl birthday parties :). The plates were amazingly discovered one-by-one by Bethany over the past weeks at local thrift stores; I wish I had gotten more individual pictures of them! (And have I mentioned yet that despite that fact that I've been to her house and read her blog fairly regularly, Bethany and I had only met ONCE previous to this day? And yet she still put this crazy amount of work into my shower? And gave me a gift? And is a stellar example of mothering three boys and one girl?)

So many wonderful women came to support me and baby girl Izatt: (clockwise starting top left) my cousin's wife Stephanie and their oldest daughter Kara (who is now taller than me! Yikes), Kara and Emily (who both took time out of a crazybusy Saturday to be there), Heidi and Courtney (all the way from Utah! more on their trip to come...), Kautri (who has the cutest little baby bump and just found out she's having a girl this fall), Maren (whose constant friendship and support mean soooo much to me), and the amazing Judy and my amazing mom.

Guests who slipped out without being subjected to my camera were: Aunt Iris, Nicole and Paulina, Janna, and Tasha. Sweet ladies who couldn't come but still sent gifts were DeArley, Karlina, Shelly, Christy, Emily  K, Tawny, and Gloria.

Everyone was so thoughtful and generous and this baby girl now has a wardrobe to be envied:

Seriously, so many cute clothes and accessories that I hardly know what to do with them all! In fact, as we discovered at the shower, I honestly don't know what to do with some of them - the gift bag from Nicole and Paulina and Kara included some little pink flowery items that I [naturally] assumed to be headband/bows only to discover they're [allegedly] sandals of some sort. I'm withholding judgment until after the baby comes and Kara shows me how to put them on her, haha.

Adding to the fun of the shower was an awesome 'Hair Bow Bar' where guests could avail themselves of flowers and clips and ribbons and Bethany's expertise to make little adornments for the baby's hair (which if genetics and my ridiculous heartburn are any indication will be plentiful - so I obviously am very appreciative of any and all help in that department I can get!).

After all of the fun, I took my station wagon full o' girliness home and promptly held Chuck hostage until I had unpacked every outfit and onesie and dress and shoe and bow and ruffle for his admiration.

And then in a time honored pattern of mothers and daughters, I channeled my own dear mum and did the exact thing that I had mocked her for like three hours previously: sat and smoothed out and folded tissue paper, hahaha.

Obviously much thanks to Chuck for taking this picture (the three shots previous to this one I was unaware of and are thus more hilarious and even less flattering, haha). 

Thanks again to everyone who has been so supportive and generous as we get ready for this baby! Two and a half weeks to go, yikes! And yay! Equally!

Girls' Retreat 2014

As part of my plan to get as much girl time in as possible before being entrusted with a tiny such creature of my own, I jetted off to McCall at the the end of March for two days with four of the best girlfriends around:

{Jana, Paulina, Emily, Kara, Nicole... don't worry, there's a better picture of us all at the end of the post...}

I know it appears that I'm kind of an outsider in the picture, but that's just because my stomach area prohibited me from snuggling in as close as, say, Paulina and Emily, hahaha.

First order of business was packing up the car - a process in which Kara proved invaluable as the 'inside woman':

We traveled in serious style; Emily's car is amazing! Alas, it could not make the drive any less curvy and although Paulina was the heavy favorite to get the most carsick, I ended up being the one who forced us off the road at one point so I could very attractively throw up in the snow a bit (it's cool; I'm pregnant). Nausea (and 'the burps' hahaha) aside, it was an excellent drive!

That led to an excellent destination, a timeshare condo in McCall:

Sweet, right? Alas, most of these pictures were taken on our way out two days later, so don't mind our mess :). Our first order of business was to draw names for sleeping arrangements, ending with Kara and Emily bunking together in the master bedroom, Paulina and I sharing the second bedroom with twin beds, and Nicole and baby Myla taking the living room with the pull-down bed that simultaneously awed and alarmed me. 

The rest of the night was spent at the hot tub (Kara, Emily, Nicole), talking and playing with baby Myla back at the condo (Paulina, me), watching a movie (everyone), doing hair/getting hair done (Nicole, Kara) and falling asleep in a chair and being sent to bed two hours before everyone else (me. It's cool; I'm pregnant).

The next morning we all lazily woke up (well, as lazily as five moms can; I think everyone was awake by 8...) and admired the new snow and the wildlife right in our backyard:

before heading to the Pancake House for breakfast. HOLY MOLY, it was amazing. Sooo much yummy food. Most of us went in with someone else to maximize the number of dishes we could sample (except Kara, who kept declaring it all too complicated, haha) and I can personally vouch for the deliciousness of the GIANT cinnamon roll, the omelets, pancakes with coconut syrup, berry filled crepes, and hot chocolate. And happily Paulina provided awesome conversation prompts so we had plenty of time to sit and plenty of things to talk about while we cleaned all of our plates!

The conversations continued as we headed home; we all delved deep into our respective 'how we met/dated/married' stories - most of which we'd all shared before but it's always fun to refresh :). It was at this point I realized how ridiculously coordinated we all were and insisted on some official girls' trip pictures, although Kara decided to kick things off with some candid shots first:

As usual, the picture-taking process was hilarious and ridiculous; I had to run to the bathroom in the middle of it because I was laughing so hard (it's cool; I'm pregnant). Highlights were the upper right picture where it looks like Kara is reaching to caress my baby bump but was actually reaching for my hand (more or less awkward? Debatable...) and the bottom left where I'm clearly sitting ON Nicole and Emily because they didn't leave my wide hips enough room to plop in between them after setting the camera timer.

But we managed one good one!! Kara, baby Myla, Nicole, Jana, Emily, Paulina:

After our photography session, we settled in at the table for a late lunch and Taboo, which also provided laughs and laughs, most notably Emily's unusual but very effective tactic of story-telling to elicit a correct response from her teammate(s). Then it was time to venture back downtown to check out the local shops. 

At one point in our wanderings I pulled out the camera to capture our traipse through the somewhat sketchy 'ice cream alley' and instead managed to capture poor Kara trying to ice skate instead of walk. Luckily she regained her balance quickly (she's a dancer) because it quickly became clear that Paulina was going to make nooo effort to help her, haha. Out of concern for the baby only, Paulina waited and watched to make sure I made it through the frozen section safely :).

After our meanderings, we had just enough time to pick up milkshakes and make it home in time to watch a broadcast of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints General Women's Meeting on Emily's ipad. It was perfect; we were all comfy and the speakers and music were wonderful and yay for technology!

The night was still young, so we hit up the hot tub for a bit before coming home for a delicious late dinner and another movie. It was around this point that we said good night to Emily - and then things got crazy. Apparently Em's the level-headed one in the group? 

It technically started the night before with Kara getting lowlights(?) and BANGS and then Paulina went gorgeously blonder and then there was a lot of facial waxing going on and then Nicole trusted me to wash her hair, which was hilarious because a) my ability to even reach the sink was questionable (it's cool; I'm pregnant) and b) I was SO terrified of messing it up. You know the whole 'shoemaker's kids go barefoot' thing? I felt so bad that our amazing hairstylist was stuck with ME contributing to the well-being of her (normally very beautiful) hair. Luckily we made it through pretty well; I just went heavy on the scalp massage part to smooth over the fact that my lathering was sub-par :).

And then Nicole decided to continue our BANG-ing weekend by cuttin' herself some (adorable) bangs... which sparked Paulina's imagination my direction, haha. And even after I pulled up a picture of my semi-disastrous bangs from elementary school, the vote was still unanimous that I get bang'ed as well:

and Kara channeled her inner Jana and documented the whole thing :). And I love them! Mostly when someone else amazing is on hand to style them for me, of course - like the next morning when Kara awesomely did my hair! And she did Paulina's too, in the sweetest/Swedish braid/side bun configuration ever.

More shots of the snow that McCall showered us with, including Sunday morning when it came time to pack up and head out:

We stopped in Cascade on the way home to attend sacrament meeting, and we really enjoyed the branch there. The two speakers talked about prayer and there was such a sweet spirit there; I was really grateful to have been able to take part. 

And we all survived the drive home with a decent amount of nausea (those roads are seriously. the. worst.) but no unplanned stops along the way :). It actually went by fairly quickly, thanks to some pretty incredible conversation. One of my favorite aspects of this group is discussing pretty serious subject matters; there's so much respect and understanding and intelligence and varying perspectives and thoughtful questions and answers and I love it.

And before we all headed home to reality and families and such, we paused to commemorate the trip one last time:

{Kara, Paulina, Emily, Nicole, Jana. See, I told you this one was better :) }

LOVE you girls! This was just what I needed; can't wait for our next 'retreat'!

Existing children update

My poor boys haven't gotten much face time on the blog lately, so before I recap some more Jana-centered adventures (a girls' weekend in McCall, a girls' weekend here with my bfsc's from Utah, my baby shower); I figured I'd showcase their cute little selves a bit:

Some school shots - the bottom left is 'crazy socks day' and the bottom right is 'mix-match day', both during Dr. Seuss week. And one morning I let Jack wear his little backpack to take the boys to school and bless his heart, he thought it meant he was also going to school and the tears that came when we drove away were in.tense.

These pictures were taken on a day when I was apparently extra neglectful and Will and Jack got all sorts of wonderful screen time, which they enjoyed from a box and also with Daddy's xbox headphones on. Goofs!!

As a way of dipping our toes into this whole 'girly' thing, the boys made some cute jewelry as we watched General Conference earlier this month. The boys took to it quite nicely and now [spoiler alert, Mom!] Grandma Pam has several pieces awaiting her for Mother's Day!

For a dreadful while there, Jack was very insistent that he had recently turned like ten and no longer needed a safety device of any sort in the car. He'd scramble into the van and head for the back row and settle in and then smile sweetly while I threatened everything under the sun to get him to come back... which he never did, which meant I got to hie my svelte self in to retrieve him. It was a blessed time for all involved. Anyways, prayer works because he's back to happily climbing into his car seat (as long as he gets to clip the top part) and we're all thrilled. This picture is from the olden days though, and I love it because he buckled his baby into his seat and I guess thought that would make the difference and we'd let him stay in the back, haha:

Jack is also hilariously dramatic right now when he's scolded or redirected or refused anything, and the best part is that Clyde is always there to offer solace. Will and Jack are good buds as well (as evidenced by the picture in the bottom right), but Clyde has a special soft spot for Jack and loves being his shoulder to cry on when Mom and Dad have the audacity to say no. Is it horrible that it actually makes saying no easier?? It just makes me laugh so hard to watch Jack run to Clyde's arms, haha!

And on the days that Jack has melted down about twenty times (meaning that I've melted down at least ten!), I just remind myself how flipping cute he is asleep:

Of course sometimes he gives me a heart attack whilst sleeping, like this day when I realized I hadn't seen him for a bit and then went looking and calling for him to no response. A bit alarming, especially considering his love of the front yard and recent ability to open the front door. Blessedly, he had just taken advantage of another new skill - climbing the bunkbed ladder to Clyde's bed - and fallen asleep up there. Oh, children!

And finally, a couple pictures of Clyde and Will mid-adventure. They are the sweetest little duo and play together so, so well (98% of the time....). Hopefully lightning strikes twice and my youngest two children will likewise be excellent playmates - we already know Jack doesn't mind dressing up in pink; I'm sure he'll be a natural at tea parties!!

Final countdown...

HOLY moly people, we are officially having a baby next month. Yesterday marked the four-weeks-to-go point, which means that as of today I am having a baby in THREE weeks (and six days...). The realization of how flipping soon that is has definitely hit. I have yogurt in the fridge that is good beyond the date that I will be having a baby. Insane.

 And just for fun, here are some recent pictures of the fantastic growth of my baby/cookie bump, from my doctor's appointment a few days ago. Doesn't everyone take pictures using the mirror on the back of the door while they wait for their doc to come in? Nope? Just me? 

My appt was good; I whined about some random third trimester nausea in the evenings and also found out I'm already dilated a bit (almost 2cm). Here's what this means:

a) my body is ridiculous. Why put me through painful contractions when I have to have a c-section anyways? Not friendly.

b) I will basically for sure make it to May 16th. I was this dilated this early with Jack and thus held out hope that he would come early and he sure didn't. 

c) Dr. Klomp said I should probably take it a bit easy which I am choosing to milk as much as possible when Chuck is around: "Oh, honey, Jack needs a new diaper. I'd change him, but I should probably be taking it easy. You know what the doctor said and all..." Chuck obviously sees exactly what I'm doing and heartily rolls his eyes, but steps up every time nonetheless. He's a doll.

 With the due date looming, I am declaring myself in nesting-mode, with a to-do list including: making a cute canvas/paint sign for the baby's wall of an Anne of Green Gables quote, darkening the doors of D.I. and Savers relentlessly until I find the last couple baby clothes items exactly as I have them pictured in my head, and BLOGGING! I have loads of adventures to post about and that seems more vital to get done before the baby comes than, say, scrubbing my kitchen floor :).

And finally, one day last week I spent some time sorting through baby clothes in Jack's room (soon to be Jack-and-the-baby's-room) and my youngest son kept absconding with various pink clothing items. A few hours later, he insisted on being put to bed IN THE CRIB, you know, where he hasn't slept since early January.

Sooo I think it's pretty obvious that there won't be annny sibling rivalry issues here. I predict a smooth transition with no adjustment period needed, lucky!!

Honey/baby/anniversarymoon

So, out of all the things I need to blog about, this morning I picked Chuck's and my recent getaway for two reasons, 

one:

he's currently on a plane coming home from a business trip and I thought it would be a fun way to welcome him back and distract him from the unfolded laundry 

and two: 

a family I know (but not well) in my mom's ward was subject to the horrific sudden loss this week of its young husband and father, and all week - when I haven't felt nauseous and heartbroken and anxious and just so sad - I've felt an overwhelming gratitude for eternal marriage. I have a strong testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ and I know that families will be reunited after this life is over - but in the meantime, having to face that mortal separation decades before it's expected seems too unfair. As with any such loss that I've witnessed, it's made me more determined to live worthily of being with Chuck forever and ever and not take our time together here with our family for granted and take the best care of our marriage that I can. 

And now that we're all crying, here's a light-hearted recap of our trip last month...

2014 is a prettttty milestone year for Chuck and me: June 12th will mark our TENTH wedding anniversary! Ohhh snap, look at those young and innocent faces:

 So obviously I've spent a lot of time daydreaming about an amazing trip this summer to mark the occasion - Hawaii, Europe, a cruise, New York City, etc. BUT then I remembered a few crucial facts: 

a) Chuck and I are homebodies. There is nary a 'traveling bone' in either of our lame, lazy bodies. We are embarrassingly content with looking at all of y'all's exotic vacation pictures while we sit on our couch in Idaho.

b) Regardless of the fact that ten years of marriage seems to warrant a big vacation, it turns out the universe doesn't actually owe you such a thing - you actually have to fund the thing yourselves. NGTH (not going to happen....)

and c) as these recent pictures remind us:

 it turns out we'll have a four-week old baby to celebrate with on our tenth anniversary! Do you know what comes with a four-week old baby? A survival-mode, hormonal Jana who leaks and cries and is still recovering from a c-section and still looks six months pregnant and feels about as romantic/sexy as ... I don't know, a walrus? 

(Anyone else super jealous of Chuck right now??)

SO I decided to plan some sort of early anniversary trip / babymoon!

But then Will read this book:

 about Mama and Papa Bear going on a 'second honeymoon' and then learned that Chuck and I indeed never taken a first honeymoon and decided that should be remedied (and also that we should go canoeing on our trip...)

Hence the official title for our trip: 

our honey/baby/anniversarymoon! 

Really rolls off the tongue, right?

 So we picked a couple days in March that coincided with Grandma Pam's spring break (aka babysitting availability, that woman is a saint) and we hit the open road! Our destination? Boise, Idaho! (heyy, we live in Nampa, so technically that's out of town...)

Because I'm amazing and Costco gift card deals are amazing and the 'suite of the month' deal is amazing, we were able to stay at the Anniversary Inn in Boise for two nights:

 I know, right? Cue whatever innuendo sound effect is your favorite; mine is bow chicka bow wow!

 And we had such a fabulous 42 hours together with noooo kids and noooooo schedule and noooooo stress and [sadly] noooo sudden photogenic-ness, haha:

 Here's the round-up of our self-portraits from all the fun. We actually broke down and asked someone to take our picture at one point on our walk and they held the camera and counted down and all that and then after we walked away we realized they hadn't actually taken a picture. Love it.

 Our adventures included dinner at the same little Chinese restaurant where we had our first date eons ago, a Savers run where I found this amazingly perfect dress for the baby:

 It was five dollars, but so worth it. Cutest thing ever right? Even cuter in person. She'll probably wear it every day next summer (it's 18mos), complete with all stains and marks it will accrue by then. So excited.

We went to an afternoon movie:

 We really liked it. I cried, so that's a mark of a good date, right?

Favorite thing was our long walk along the greenbelt and into Julia Davis Park:

 the top two pictures are of a giraffe and a zebra. I decided that the next time my kids ask to go to the zoo, I'll save myself a gazillion dollars and instead just walk them along the outside path and tell them it's an "I Spy" zoo adventure! Brilliant, right?

 We ended up at the Anne Frank Memorial which is beautiful and peaceful and has lots of places for pregnant ladies to sit and rest and ponder incredible wisdom and perspective and inspiring words:

 And in an effort not to get tooo deep or mature, we mixed it up that night by eating at a restaurant/arcade combo that was loud and slightly overwhelming and not really someplace we would normally go - which made it the perfect one-time experience for our getaway!

 Ohhhh, did I beat Chuck at Mario Kart? That's what the picture sure seems to suggest, despite Chuck/Yoshi the Pirate's best efforts :). GOOO Peach, go! (Also, how great do I look as a blonde? It's okay, you don't have to answer that right away. Just ponder....)

 And for the most hilarious set of pictures you've seen today, here is Jana playing skee-ball like it's bowling....

 and getting in the FIFTY spot! Which apparently I mark by pulling a weird sort of "Mary Catherine Gallagher" type move... that's not awkward.

 Our getaway concluded with a late-morning temple date:

  which was a perfect way to celebrate our almost-ten-year-old marriage and our expanding family and our gratitude to our Heavenly Father for the blessings he continues to pour down upon us. 

Happy honey/baby/anniversarymoon sweetheart! 

Don't worry, I have biiiiig plans for our 20th anniversary - has anyone been to Mountain Home in June? Is it nice? Or maybe Burley? Twin Falls?? 

I guess we've got time to think about it...