So Warm...So Beautiful...

My work sent me down to St. George for a day to teach a finance class at an expo. So we decided to make the most of it by turning it into a little vacation! Alex and Mya and I drove down a couple days early, and got to stay at Alex's Grandma's vacant condo down there. Plus, our friends that live in Flagstaff were able to come and stay with us too. They have 2 little boys, and Mya had a blast with her best friends, Jeffrey and Jackson. It was a wonderful trip!! We had some sunny, beautiful days at nearby parks, and one particularly fun day at Zion's National Park.

The trip was great (and I'm officially more in love with our new minivan than I ever have been before)! We came back to Salt Lake to some 'spring' snow--blek! What can I say, I think I'll always be an Arizonian at heart...

DADDY'S GOURMET--Off To A Great Start!

After months of research and preparation, my amazing husband launched his ice cream sales last week! For right now, he is only selling it at the Wing Coop (3971 Wasatch Blvd). There are some other potential locations in the works, so you'll have to stay tuned for updates! Speaking of updates--join the Daddy's Gourmet group on Facebook, and follow him on Twitter!

Alex hosted a launch party at the Wing Coop last week, and we had tons of support from family and friends--and some great Daddy's Gourmet shirts!

Four of Alex's biggest fans!

Alex's brother, Josh, with his two younger boys, Trey and Devin

Alex will be switching his flavors every two weeks. To start out with, he has been selling his Berries 'n Cream, and Chocolate Raspberry Truffle..... yum...

Happiness in a little plastic cup (no, seriously)

Sales are doing great so far. I'm so proud of my sweetheart, and so excited that now other people can enjoy his delicious talents!!! And I'm looking forward to his next flavors--he hasn't decided for sure, but maybe Cookies 'n Cream, Mint Chocolate, or Banana Split... AWESOME

He's A HE (And Is Already So Handsome)!

I am now in my 23rd week of pregnancy, and last week we finally had our '20' week ultrasound. It was wonderful! First, it's a BOY! Sure, it's a little less economical (already being fully stocked with girl's clothes, that is), but we are totally thrilled. Mya is VERY excited too--and since we told her that she's getting a baby brother, she has stopped calling the baby 'Peaches'--so that's a good thing!

Our little guy was very wiggly, and kept hiding his head under my belly button (thus the shadows on his head).

The 3D ultrasounds is so amazing--I can't get over the cool technology that let us see our baby like this!

His cute little profile

And there it is ladies and gentlemen--his little boy part! (I actually wasn't too sure about this shot... but you'll just have to trust me that we saw a couple of much clearer shots of the area--and he's definitely a boy! He was just moving around too much to get a better picture proving it.)

More importantly than knowing the sex (although it is really fun to know, and to call the baby "he" rather than "it"), we learned that he is a very healthy baby so far, and is developing just as he should. All of his organs, limbs, features, etc. measured right on, and we couldn't be happier about it! The due date is still set for July 1st for now. Now we just need a good name... and a bed and some blue stuff....

4 Months? Really??

Lots has happened since Halloween! Lets see, how about a brief re-cap of the past four months...In November of course, there was Thanksgiving. What a wonderful holiday--a day set aside to be with family, and show our gratitude for our many incredible blessings. We had 20+ people come over, including lots of Alex's family, and my mom. We took some family pictures, and had a great time enjoying the most delicious Thanksgiving dinner ever (everyone's cooking was yummy, but I particularly enjoyed my dear husband's INCREDIBLE turkey, plus his homemade pumpkin cheesecake.... mmmm....)

Something that we found out about in early November that we are particularly grateful for is

that we are expecting baby #2! Right now, I'm in my 19th week. So far, the pregnancy has been very 'textbook', which I am so thankful for. I've had the regular, expected symptoms and discomforts, but no problems. I'm starting to feel the little one move around quite a bit, and I'm loving it! We'll find out if Mya will have a baby brother or baby sister in a couple more weeks--so stay posted!

In December, we had a couple of big things happen. First, I quit my job as a Housing Counselor at CDC. I had been there for almost 2 years. It was a great job... but I almost lost my mind and had to get out while I still could! Okay, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. Actually, I found another job that just suited what Alex and Mya and I need! A part-time job as an Educator with USU Extension. I started in January, and I'm really enjoying it. I teach classes in the community about housing and finances. It's great! I really miss some of my dear co-workers (pictured below) from CDC. Other than that, I am loving working less hours, and living with much less stress!

The second big thing in December was... you guessed it... Christmas!!!

My favorite holiday ever!

I love the festivity of the lights and music, and the camaraderie that can be felt just about anywhere. It was so much fun shopping for gifts for Mya this year--at age 2 1/2 she is SO excitable, and she loved everything she was given.

Most of all, the Christmas season is a time to reflect on the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I can't think of many things better than that! To celebrate this special holiday, Alex and Mya and I packed up our little Subaru to the brim, and we drove down to Arizona! We stayed with my sister, Kara, and had a WONDERFUL time! It was warm outside, we had lots of great family time, yummy food (by that time, the pregnant lady was starting to have a pretty good appetite), and an overall amazing time!

January was cold. The end.

February has started out with a bang. WE BOUGHT A MINI VAN!!! Yes, I am 25 years old, a soon to be mother of 2, and I proudly drive a mini van. We have been talking about it for a little while, especially as our good ol' Nissan has, well, gotten older. And with the approaching addition to our family, it seemed like it was a good time. (Plus, I think that the drive to AZ in our Subaru pushed us over the edge a little--we could neither one bear the thought of another road trip in that dear, small vehicle!) Just a couple days ago, we came across a deal that was just too good to pass up. We found a 2006 Honda Odyssey in great condition, with low miles, that was amazingly within our price range. After lots of research, etc, etc, we bought it. We have been so thrilled with it!!!

Alex's job managing the Wing Coop has been great. He's really able to utilize many of his skills with HR/management, and he enjoys it. Plus, what's even more exciting is that he is on his way to selling his homemade gourmet ice-cream at the Wing Coop! It's been an interesting learning experience to find out what goes into legitimizing ice-cream sales--it's a lot! Alex has been working with the Utah FDA guy to get his approval, plus he's getting all of his licenses lined up that he'll need to vend. He has some AMAZING recipes--so if you like ice-cream, visit the Wing Coop in the coming weeks, and enjoy some of the best ice-cream you've ever had! Oh yeah, they have great wings too. I'm so proud of my talented husband!

Happy Halloween, Mateys!

For Halloween this year, Mya dressed as an adorable little pirate. She's almost 2 1/2, and this is the first year she kind of understood the idea of 'Halloween' and 'trick-or-treat'. We had lots of fun Halloween festivities.... We went to our Ward's Trunk-or-Treat, went to TWO different pumpkin patches, and had fun trick-or-treating in our neighborhood, and visiting relatives.

This is a really cool pumpkin that we didn't carve. Our talented sister-in-law carved this, and we thought it was the perfect centerpiece for our family picture--thanks for sharing your talent with us Heather!

This was the first pumpkin patch that we visited. It was fun running around and looking at the pumpkins, but it was super cold, and none of us lasted outside for very long!

This was the pumpkin patch we went to on Halloween day. The weather was gorgeous, and the only problem was the bright sunshine washing out some of our photos--a minimal price to pay for nice warm weather to play in!

There was an awesome pirate ship at this pumpkin patch, and obviously, it was PERFECT for our little pirate. She had so much fun climbing up and down the ladder, saying "aaaarrrrggg" to anyone that would humor her, and steering the big ship!

I thought all this pirate booty was cool, but apparently Mya just wanted to play on the ship (and we accidentally kept her there about 3 hours past her normal nap time so she was a little grumpy...)

And here's Mya, all ready to go trick-or-treating on Halloween night! She had fun saying trick-or-treat at all the houses and getting to pick out candies. I was very proud of how politely she would say "trick-or-treat please", and follow the receipt of candy with a very sweet "thank you". At a couple of houses, she would get some candy, then say "excuse me" to the homeowner and try to sneak her way past him/her to go inside their house! I think she was a little cold. It wasn't as weird when it was a friend's house, but when she did it to a stranger, we were a little embarrassed (especially when I actually had to go into their house to pull her out!). Good thing they were really nice!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Now I Can Rent a Car (as an Adult)!

Last week I turned 25--or as my parents both like to point out, I am now a quarter of a century old! I had the greatest birthday! Alex and I got to go on a wonderful date while my Mom babysat Mya for us. My Dad treated us to a delicious dinner at Cafe Trio, then we got to see one of our favorite comedians, Jim Gaffigan.

This was our dessert at Trio. Can you guess what it is? Ice cream? Nope. Gelato? Nope. CHEESECAKE! It was the chef's special: peanut butter cheesecake with Venezuelan chocolate, and candied bananas on top. It was even more delicious than it looks!

And here we are with Mr. Gaffigan. You may have noticed that my hair is longer in this picture than in the first one (and Alex and I look a bit younger...). That's because this picture was taken 3 or 4 years ago when we first saw Jim Gaffigan perform. He doesn't do his 'meet and greets' anymore, so I thought I would at least put the picture up from when we did meet him! The show was even more hilarious than I had anticipated, and we had an awesome time!

This painting was given to me by my incredibly talented, super cool father-in-law. He painted it--and in case you couldn't tell, it's me! Pretty awesome, huh? If you want to see more of his artwork, visit http://laughing-guy-art.blogspot.com.

Alex's Grandma Nola is so thoughtful. She knew that I would have some birthday presents to open on my birthday, and Mya would want to open something too. So, she bought Mya a darling set of dress-up jewelry, with accompanying purse, high heels, and hair accessories. If you can't tell by the picture of Mya checking herself out in the mirror, she loved everything in the set!

My little prima donna. She did NOT like it when I made her take everything off for bedtime. She's only two years old... I somehow thought I would have more time before seeing my little girl in earings and high heels!

For my birthday dinner, my talented chef husband made my favorite Greek dinner. And for dessert, he made an incredible ice-cream cake. It was a chocolate cake, with homemade chocolate cake batter ice-cream (that's right, he put chocolate cake batter into the ice-cream. And yes, it was even more amazing than it sounds!), and a homemade chocolate ganache on top. YUM. At work, my co-workers bought me a wonderful cake from Schmidt's Bakery. And to top off the birthday festivities, my Dad, Step-Mom, and sisters sent me flowers! I don't think I've ever had flowers delivered to me at work before. It rocked. I am officially one year older and... uhh...a few pounds heavier (but all the yummy desserts were totally worth it)! Thank you to all my amazing family and friends for making my 25th birthday so memorable, and so wonderful!!!

On an unrelated note, I'm feeling like a big looser every time I log in on my blog and all my posts get "0 comments". If you read my blog, don't hold back on the comments! Then, maybe I'll blog more, if it looks like someone might be reading this thing. Or maybe not.... It'll just help me to not feel like a blog looser! I'm a blooser. So sad...

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

What more can I say.... nothing, really, because the video says it all!