Sunday, April 26, 2015

Weekly wrap up

I usually type these posts up on Saturday or Sunday night. I really should do a little daily post and post them all at the end of the week. Anyway, I didn't blog last week because we were too busy having an AWESOME weekend with friends!
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Things that happened last week...

Matthew had his 1 year check up! He is growing really well and Dr. Barkimer didn't have any concerns. Matthew had to have 3 shots and a blood draw and those were NOT fun. But we were both brave and made it through okay!

Stats
Height: 31" (83%)
Weight: 25 lbs 3 oz (94%)
Head circumference: 47.8 cm (91%)

Matthew's battle wounds

We also got passes to the awesome Betty Brinn Children's Museum downtown! We're excited to use them a lot!

Matthew got the Melissa and Doug Band in a Box for his birthday and he loves using all the instruments, especially the maracas...


On Saturday we went to Madison with the Pughs and Christiansens. We've been to Madison a handful of times but were able to see a lot more than we have before. The weather was fantastic and we had so much fun with our friends!

I took this picture of the Capitol building, I think it's cool

1) An empanada from the Stella's booth at the Farmers' Market (they ran out of spicy cheese bread twice while we were in line, so we settled for these)
2) My BOSS parallel parking job. Daniel coached me through it, it was amazing
3, 6, and 10) Checking out the animals at the Henry Vilas Zoo
4) A super cute couple with a super cute goldendoodle. The kids went nuts!
5 and 7) Hanging out at the Capitol
8 and 9) Scenes from The Pine Cone, a truck stop halfway between Madison and Milwaukee. The food wasn't great, but the desserts made up for it!

On Sunday we skipped church and went to brunch at Cafe Hollander. And it was delicious. We had to wait for awhile because there were a lot of us, but it was so worth it!

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Things that happened this past week...

On Monday we went to the Children's Museum...

Sam and Matthew could be brothers!

...and a Brewers game!


Matthew lasted about 1.5 innings before just wanting to run around. Luckily there were a lot of friends at the game too, so we were able to meet up with them and let the little ones play together. The Brewers lost, but we still had a good time!

I started my new job at the WAC! It's weird to call it a job, I only work 5-6 hours a week, but I'm getting paid! We'll lose a lot of government benefits in a few months when Daniel starts residency, so it's nice that I can bring in a little extra money. 

This is not a great picture, but it shows Matthew's love of books and Daniel's love of reading. I especially enjoy Daniel's little embellishments, like this one: "When he opens the door and feels how chilly it is, he'll ask to borrow a sweater, even though he's a full-grown moose and was outside without a sweater two minutes ago."

I booked my flight home for Jillian's graduation in June! Daniel is going to stay home with Matthew, so I will be baby-free for 4 days! I know I'll miss them a lot, but I'm excited about being able to do whatever, whenever with my family.

I took a shower this morning and came out of the bathroom to find this...

A small tornado tore through our living room and ended up asleep on the couch!

Something I love right now: Sling TV


Sling TV was basically made for me. It's like a mini cable package without a cable subscription! We get 20-ish channels (ESPN, HGTV, Food Network, History, and A&E being our favorites) and it's $20/month. It's internet based, so we stream it on our Xbox One (Daniel's graduation present to himself) and we can watch live TV and it's no problem. Thanks to Sling TV, we've gotten sucked in to this season of Married at First Sight (we love Sean and Davina!) and Daniel starts his mornings with SportsCenter. It's fun to discover new shows and watch some favorites too!

-Jenn

Sunday, April 12, 2015

Weekly wrap up: Birthday edition

We celebrated Matthew's birthday this week! And we were all sick this week! It's been a long week!

On Tuesday I woke up with gunky eyes and a headache. I figured it was a sinus infection. I went to Chick-fil-A for breakfast/play time with Emily C and Emily P and their kids, it was a nice pick me up!

We were basically the only ones there and it was awesome!

Daniel was off on Tuesday, so I went to the walk-in clinic while he stayed home with Matthew. Because I was coughing, they made me wear a mask, which I realized about 15 minutes in that I had on upside down. I was grateful when they called my name so I could take it off!

Not only did I have a sinus infection, but bronchitis and pink eye too! I texted the Emilys and told them I may have accidentally gotten them sick, then wondered around Walgreens waiting for my prescription to be filled. I'm getting better, but I still have a stupid cough. I'm running a 5k in about a month and NEED to start training. Hopefully I can kick this yuckiness soon and get back to normal.
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Matthew woke up with gunky eyes on Wednesday. I was sure it was pink eye and set up an appointment with Dr. Barkimer that afternoon. Daniel was off in the morning, so I was able to do my shift at the gym without Matthew spreading germs! Dr. Barkimer saw it was pink eye right away and prescribed an ointment. He said to call if Daniel got it and he'd write up something for him.
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I was nervous about Matthew's eyes because Thursday was Matthew's smash cake shoot. I made this cake with a few tweaks and made it a cake, not cupcakes. You guys know I'm not some crazy health nut, I picked this cake because it was the only one I found that didn't use bananas (Matthew can't stand any type of banana). To balance out the healthiness of the cake, I used a jar of Betty Crocker frosting! Here's the final product...

No joke, this might be the most domestic thing I've ever done

Emily C came over to take the smash cake pictures and I LOVE how they turned out! I took this one on my phone...


And here are a few of my favorites from Emily...





The backgrounds were giant TV boxes from Best Buy wrapped in wrapping paper from Target, I think they looked so cute!
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Friday was Matthew's actual birthday! Daniel woke up and felt awful (he didn't get pink eye but got a nasty sinus infection/sore throat), so he stayed home for the day. After breakfast I took Matthew's 12 month picture...


Then made a compilation of the past 12 months...

He's changed so much but looks exactly the same!

Unfortunately, it rained Friday afternoon and flooded the front lawn, so we had to push his picnic party back a day. I wanted to go do something to celebrate, but Daniel still wasn't feeling good and I didn't want to go without him, so I bought myself some cookie dough and that made me feel a little better.
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On Saturday my friend/former roomie, DaNae, came up from Chicago to visit! She was a good sport during Matthew's party, the weather was AMAZING for a picnic (Daniel and I got a bit sunburned)!

Sandwiches, chips, fruit, cupcakes (not pictured), water

Matthew loves fruit!

He also loves cupcakes!

The picnic party was a success! Everyone got plenty to eat and we had fun hanging out on the lawn!

DaNae and I went on a Sprecher tour (that's my go-to thing when people visit), except it was more like a let's-walk-through-a-couple-rooms-while-I-awkwardly-try-to-think-of-things-to-say than a real tour, this guy didn't know much about Sprecher at all, which was really disappointing! The soda did not disappoint though, DaNae loved the Cream Soda while I couldn't get enough of my favorite Puma Kola.


We stopped by Kopp's for a snack, then tried to drive around downtown, but we ended up by the port because of construction. DaNae and I were able to catch up, which was great, so we didn't mind driving aimlessly for a bit. When we got back, Matthew was up from his nap, so we decided to go back downtown to the river walk and see the Bronze Fonz.

Thumbs up!

We walked around some more, found a few cute shops, and finished the day at Pizza Shuttle... 


It was so great to see DaNae, we will definitely hang out more now that she's so close!
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Since last week was General Conference, we didn't wear our Easter outfits. Daniel didn't go to church today, but I made him get dressed for an Easter picture anyway. Matthew looks so grown up here!


-Jenn

Sunday, April 5, 2015

Weekly wrap up: Utah edition

We spent the week in Utah! Jillian got accepted to BYU for fall semester, so we spent a few days exploring Provo and Salt Lake. Matthew slept for about 30 minutes in the car on the way to O'Hare on Monday so I was expecting a nice flight with a snuggly, sleeping baby. Um, WRONG! This kid had no desire to sleep, despite my many attempts to get him to settle down. We blessedly had an empty seat next to us, so Matthew spent most of the 3 hours looking out the window and eating snacks. I also brought a magazine with lots of pictures of babies, as well as a photo album with a bunch of pictures of himself (Matthew loves looking at pictures/videos of babies and himself).


My mom and Jillian arrived in Salt Lake before I did, they met us at the airport and we took off to visit Aunt Iris, my Pop's sister. She's in the middle of a service mission and is in charge of the titles for all the mission cars in North America, which sounds really overwhelming. She has a cute apartment right up the street from Temple Square and walks to work most days.

Aunt Iris and my mom

We went to dinner at IHOP in Sandy and had just ordered our food when Matthew started having a meltdown. He was tired and hungry, so I made a bottle and he drank half of it in 30 seconds. He still wasn't happy, so I gave him some Veggie Straws and he ate those, then threw up everywhere. I went to the bathroom to clean him up while Mom wiped down the table and Jillian asked for our food to go. We quickly drove to Daniel's aunt (Cara) and uncle's (Scott) house in Highland, cleaned Matthew some more, and put him to bed. We ate our dinner and went to bed even though it was fairly early, funny how sitting on a plane all day can wear you out!
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On Tuesday we spent the day in Provo. We took a tour of campus in a golf cart, went to this devotional, and had lunch at the Creamery with Michelle and Gerilyn!

Michelle is probably selling her soul and transferring to the U in the fall :-(

I love everyone in this picture!

After lunch, we walked around campus some more and checked out the Wilk, the new Life Science Building, the Smith Fieldhouse, the RB (including a brief stop in the room where Daniel and I met), the MOA (where Daniel proposed), and the Harold B Lee Library, where I visited my old workplace on the second floor...

There's no place like LIIL!

After BYU, we went to University Mall to look for prom dresses for Jillian and were unsuccessful. We had dinner at The Old Spaghetti Factory (it wasn't that good, but the memories!) and listened to the girls at the table next to ours talk about the pros and cons of waiting for missionaries, among other things (I do not miss BYU problems). We drove back to Scott and Cara's and I put Matthew to bed while Mom and Jillian turned back around to have a late dessert with friends who used to live in Wilmington. I got to hang out with Cara and Scott and it was fun to visit, I hadn't talked with them in a looong time!
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On Wednesday we spent the morning hanging out until lunchtime, when we picked up Daniel's brother, Mark, from campus and went to Zupas (by far the restaurant I miss most). We met up with my friend and her son, Jen and Henry. Jen and Derek were in our ward and were also married on July 10, 2009, so we were instant friends! Jen is due with Baby Boy #2 in June, but you can't even tell!


After lunch, Mark and I were able to visit Meliah's sister, Julie, and her husband and new baby, Curtis and Colin. It was so fun to catch up and hold sweet Colin! Julie pushed for several hours and then had a c-section (sound familiar?), she's definitely recovering way better than I did!

I see so much of Julie in him!

We dropped Mark off at campus (I can't believe we didn't get a picture with him!), we went to Riverwoods and Provo Towne Centre for more prom dress shopping. There were a few cute ones, but nothing that was a true winner, so we left empty handed. We went to JDawgs for dinner (they have a shop at Thanksgiving Point), Matthew was not really a fan, he had more Veggie Straws and yogurt melts than hot dog.


We went to bed early that night!
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Matthew woke up at least once every hour starting at 1am on Thursday. By 6:30am, I was at my breaking point. Mom decided to find an urgent care, so we left at 7am and drove around American Fork until their InstaCare opened up.


Poor kid had another ear infection! We picked up his medicine, stopped by Kneaders for a sugary breakfast pick-me-up, then went back to Scott and Cara's. Matthew fell asleep in the car and stayed asleep just long enough for me to take a shower. Mom and Jillian left to spend the day in Salt Lake and Matthew and I spent the afternoon on the couch watching HGTV.

Matthew looks like a GIANT. I look pretty good for only 3 uninterrupted hours of sleep, right?

I didn't get a chance to go to Temple Square or the Conference Center and that bummed me out, but it was a good idea to chill with Matthew for the day. Matthew went to bed early and we packed up and went to bed early too!
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Matthew slept all Thursday night! Mom had to come in and wake me up on Friday! I was hoping for an easy ride back, but the flight was pretty much the opposite of Monday's. I was in a middle seat between two men, Matthew slept for about 20 minutes and then cried and wiggled around and was generally a handful for the rest of the time. The guy with the aisle seat got up and walked around for a bit, he was not a fan of sitting by us! The man with the window seat asked if I wanted to switch with him, and that helped calm Matthew down a bit and also gave me a little more room to play with him. I've decided that I'm not flying with Matthew by myself anymore unless something crazy happens and I absolutely have to. Or until he turns 2 and I have to buy a ticket for him. I was so happy to see Daniel when we got home!
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Yesterday we had the Chambers Court Easter party! There was an egg hunt and Matthew "found" 2 eggs and was so happy to shake them! There are some rouge jelly beans as a result of the shaking, but he had fun!

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Something I love right now: General Conference
Every 6 months, Mormons gather together for General Conference - twelve hours of sermons and lessons from Church leaders and officials spread across a weekend. They occur in April and October and each typically has an overall theme. This weekend was all about strengthening marriage and family, which I loved! I feel like there was less focus on the nuclear family and more "strengthen the family you have," which I also loved, since there are lots of different types! Because it was Easter, there was also a lot of emphasis on Christ and his crucifixion. I really enjoyed the video the Church put out this year...

Because He lives, so can you!

-Jenn