happy/sad day.

today was my very last day of working full time.

i will miss:

seeing my cute sister every day.
talking to fun/funny/interesting/crazy people on the phone every day.
my paycheck.
my pretty desk.
my itunes library {still trying to figure out how to transfer it all}.
my co-workers.
paid holidays.

have i ever mentioned how my job was the coolest? i got paid to go on this trip, this trip, this trip, this trip, and this trip. i even got paid one day to hike timpanogos with these fun people from all over the world:
i will be going back to work part-time, but it definitely won't be the same. i'm so grateful for the many opportunities this job has given me. i will miss it.

but i will not miss my chair or the backaches that it gave me :)

i can't help it.

i am sucker for pretty diaries and notebooks. i see them and i must have them. i like to write lists, notes, quotes, ideas, etc in them. there is always a pretty little notebook in my purse. this beauty came from all tucked in. i could spend hours in this tiny boutique, looking at all of the fun books and toys and clothes and treasures for kids. i recommend it very much.

pat on the back.

let's all give sean a big pat on the back for eating spaghetti for dinner tonight. he didn't clean his plate like i did, but it's a start. also, pasta dishes are the best. i don't know how i ever ate pasta off of a regular plate.

the final countdown.

37 + weeks.

i can't sleep {my hips ache all night}.
i get up 4+ times in the night to pee.
i'm dying of heat all the time.
i can't reach my feet, bend over, lean forward, etc.
my feet are swollen.
my hands are semi-swollen {no more wedding ring}.
i walk funny... and very slowly.
i've reached the elevator stage. no more stairs for me.

and i'm soooooooo ready!

please make a wish that this baby will come early!

middle names.

we have finally narrowed it down to 3 middle names for our little girl. we love all 3, but would like your input! if you hate all 3, that's ok {we hate your names, too... jk!}, vote for the one you hate the least :)

1. serena bea
2. serena bree
3. serena breanne

let the voting begin!

{please vote on the poll over here --------->}

heather + russ.

russ popped the question on friday, and now the last of my sisters is getting married! we're so excited for her. we couldn't be happier to have russ join the family. congrats, lovebirds!

april showers.

{and one in march}
♥
our little family has been showered with love {and lots of wonderful gifts} by our family & friends. i didn't bring my camera to any of the showers, so if you took pictures, please email them to me! to those of you who contributed in any way...
♥
thank you thank you thank you!
♥
we love and appreciate you so much! each shower was so beautiful and fun... and we feel truly spoiled. thanks for helping us get ready for baby!
♥
{no... this post is not meant to replace thank you notes! i'm a huuuuuuge believer in handwritten notes, so you'll receive one shortly if you haven't already :)}

definitely embarrassing.

i recently realized that i've been spelling these two words incorrectly for as long as i can remember.

definitely. {i thought it was definately with an a}

embarrassing. {i thought it was embarassing with ONE r. and apparently i realized this once before, and yet i continued to spell it wrong!}

i blame all of my grammatical and spelling errors on spell check. it's made terrible spellers of us all.

the thing that i really hate about it is... i'll just say it... i'm kind of a snob about spelling and grammar. {you might be wondering why i don't give a flying whatever about capitalization. well... i just don't!} i'm one of those people who secretly takes great pleasure in finding spelling errors in books, on fliers, on signs, in the newspaper, etc. i found a spelling error in my copy of the memory keeper's daughter and it made my whole week. i'm also the type who wants to die of embarrassment when i look back on my posts and find a typo. it kills me, and i have to fix it immediately. it's a horrible and judgmental habit, and i'm sorry.

i'm also sorry for all future spelling/grammar errors. i'm sure there will be many. it's a blog, after all, not a professional publication.

photoshoot.

i had a little photoshoot with my friend dana yesterday. as un-cute as i feel, i figure i had better document this time of my life! see a few more here.

thanks, dana! i think they turned out great. can't wait to see the rest!

obligatory wicked post.

last night was the night and i was not disappointed! we were sort of worried because we got a little paper in our programs saying that elpheba's standby was performing. but she was amazing. galinda was hilarious. the costumes were fabulous. the ONLY thing i could say wasn't as good as the first time i saw it was fiyero. but i still loved it. totally worth sitting in that insanely hot theater for 3 hours!

the belly.

{36.5 weeks}

sorry i've been slacking off with the belly photos. my other camera died... but mostly i just really don't like taking them! getting HUGE, huh!? {compare to this little thing 6 weeks ago. weird.}

happy administrative professionals day to me.

what? did this major holiday slip your mind? it did coincide with earth day. however, on my calendar, administrative professionals day is listed, and earth day is not. anyhow... my thoughtful office manager never forgets APD. i love these flowers. sooooo summery!

ah!

so i may have gotten a cold sweat last night when i realized how close i am to having this baby. i know our lives are going to change so much. it will be an amazing change, but it just doesn't seem real yet. some mornings i wake up and i really forget that i'm pregnant {until i try to move and i'm like a beached whale}. :)

i had all of these milestones to pass during this pregnancy that would mean i was getting REALLY close... and i'm passing them left and right!

trip to cali: that was forever ago.
sean's bday: come and gone.
nursery: done.
showers: only one more to go.
wicked: tonight!
last day of work: next thursday!

we're meeting this little girl in less than 30 days!

that being said...

i'd love some advice from you mommies out there. what should i/we do in our last days in the honeymoon stage of life? everyone says sleep. and trust me, i've been doing plenty of that. but what did you do {or wish you had done} in your last days without a baby?

spring.

spring =

sunlight after 5pm {see above}.

wearing sunglasses again.

sleeping with the windows open and the fan on.

blossoms everywhere i look {except for on our pathetic excuse for a tree}.

still few enough mosquitos to take a walk outside.

rainstorms.

our birthdays {april 14, may 28, may ?}.

cooking on the grill.

driving with the windows down.

birds chirping.

spring cleaning.

strawberries.

flip flops.

happy ariel.

alphabet.

how cute are these animal alphabet cards i found at michael's? i haven't figured out how to use them yet, but i couldn't pass them up. i may have to save them until i have a boy and use them in his nursery. {it makes me a little crazy to think about being pregnant all over again when i haven't even reached the finish line yet...}.

who's watching.

this is the money we could be ARE saving by switching to geico. isn't he handsome?

weekends {+pregnancy} make me lazy.

heard baby's heartbeat on friday afternoon. {didn't hear the news i was hoping for: "we miscalculated! you're having this baby tomorrow!"}

stayed home with sean on friday evening:
made peach cobbler.
watched a movie.
went to bed at 9:45 :)

slept in a little today. {because i hardly slept all night. i hit a new record number of trips to the bathroom in one night. i think it was 6.}
went to breakfast.
did a few chores.
went to a movie.
played cards.
cooked on the grill. hooray for spring!
and now i'm seriously considering bedtime at 9:45 again.

i'm lazy and my back hurts and i'm ready for this baby to come!

{one month from today! hoooooray!}

happy thoughts.

♥ isn't my easter lily lovely? sean brought this home for me the other day and it's been making our house smell so pretty. this was our lone easter decoration/gift. no baskets. no candy. no presents. no colored eggs. just this pretty little easter lily.

♥ baby S is getting soooo huge. she's killing me with all the kicks and punches and movements. but i'm glad i can feel her in there. she's snug as a bug and i can't believe i still have 4+ weeks left. there's no more room in there for her to grow!!

♥ i went to see/hear the utah smyphony tonight with my mom. it was amazing. they performed a rachmaninoff concerto that was sooo beautiful. i am so so amazed by concert pianists. this guy was fabulous. i'm so glad the browning center has semi-comfortable seats so i could enjoy the music. baby loved it too. she was moving around like crazy the whole time.

happy happy birthday, sean!

today my handsome hubby is one year older. i love you, sean, and hope you have the best bday ever :)

happy easter.

nursery revealed: part two.

the big reveal. sorry the lighting is kind of bad, but i refuse to use the flash. i can never take good pictures with the flash. i'm very happy with how the room turned out. i like how everything isn't perfectly matchy. and i'm pretty sure that rug is the best part of the whole room :) love it!

{sean's favorite parts are the night light, light switch cover, and mobile that he picked out}

thanks to my mom for hemming the curtains last night! i'm so glad it's all done. now i can concentrate on deep cleaning every square inch of my house before baby comes :)

for my daughter.

i finally finished this little blanket that i've been working on since august. yesterday i learned how to crochet flowers for a little finishing touch. the things you can learn on youtube! i made a whole bunch of these flowers because they are so easy & cute... but i have no use for them. any ideas?

p.s. the green is much cuter than it appears in these pictures. it's "sweet pea" green and it looks sage in the pics.

books.

yesterday i finished this book. loved it. as i put it back on my shelf, i was trying to decide what to read next. i started looking through my books... and i realized that the majority of books on my shelf were purchased and read after i got married. so i started counting them and couldn't help but be impressed with myself! i've read 49 books in 39 months of marriage. sean is offended by this because he thinks it means i'm bored with him and have to resort to reading to entertain myself. but truthfully i just looove reading. i hope i can keep up the pace of 1.2 books per month once baby comes. until then, it's my goal to read a book a week. i'm trying to make a dent in all of the unread books on my shelf.

for anyone who cares, here are all 49 of the books i've read over the past 3 years. my must-reads are linked in red.

♥

the five people you meet in heaven, mitch albom
the wonderful wizard of oz, frank l. baum
the nazi officer’s wife, edith hahn beer
the glass lake, maeve binchy
a great and terrible beauty, libba bray
rebel angels, libba bray
the sweet far thing, libba bray
deception point, dan brown
cold sassy tree, olive ann burns
the wizard heir, cinda williams chima
the wanderer, sharon creech

walk two moons, sharon creech
a christmas carol, charles dickens
a northern light, jennifer donnelly
the peacegiver, james l. ferrell
eat, pray, love, elizabeth gilbert
the goose girl, shannon hale
princess academy, shannon hale
austenland, shannon hale
book of a thousand days, shannon hale
enna burning, shannon hale
the princess and the hound, mette ivie harrison
a company of swans, eva ibbotson
a countess below stairs, eva ibbotson
leadership & self-deception, the arbinger institute
the girlfriends’ guide to pregnancy, vicki iovine
ophelia, lisa klein
a wrinkle in time, madeleine l’engle
fairest, gail carson levine
ella enchanted, gail carson levine
and there was light, jaques lusseyran

beauty, robin mckinley

twilight, stephenie meyer
new moon, stephenie meyer
eclipse, stephenie meyer
breaking dawn, stephenie meyer
the host, stephenie meyer
east, edith pattou
the last lecture, randy pausch
harry potter & the order of the phoenix, jk rowling
harry potter & the half-blood prince, jk rowling
harry potter & the deathly hallows, jk rowling
sybil, flora rheta schreiber
the lovely bones, alice sebold
the thirteenth tale, diane setterfield
i capture the castle, dodie smith
the strange case of dr Jekyll and mr hyde
these is my words, nancy e. turner
the accidental tourist, anne tyler

♥

currently reading: the memory keeper's daughter, kim edwards

♥

{image}

good morning sunshine.

it was so nice to wake up to sunshine this morning. i've been loving the snow, but sunshine is a very welcome change.

nursery revealed: part one.

this past month we decided to tear apart my pretty nursery to make way for some "simple" improvements. as you can see from the picture below, there was a random corner that was wasted space and a window seat full of empty space. we thought it would be a simple enough project to put up some shelves and add a storage chest in the window seat.
it turned out that it really wasn't that simple of a project. luckily we had a lot of help from some great neighbors and friends.

this was demolition day one. the project begins.

making way for the storage chest. still no shelves.

we realized that we needed to rip off the entire top of the window seat to make the lid for the storage chest flush with the rest of the seat. {this is where we are thinking... wow. this is a big project.}

the lid is on and hinged. added some beadboard {perfect idea, ryan!} to hide the storage box and pretty it up a little.

shelves up. molding up. last minute addition of the molding below the window. everything is caulked and ready to be primed and painted. {by far the worst part of the entire project. i hope to never pick up a paint brush again!!!!}

and voila! the finished product. we are so pleased with how it turned out. it was totally worth the dust all over our house and all of the tedious painting.

the things we do for this baby. she is so spoiled. this is by far the nicest room in our house now :)

you like?

{stay tuned for part two of the nursery reveal. there's still work to do. pictures to hang. curtains to hem, etc. hopefully we finish it before she arrives!}

101 things i've done.

i loved this post on juliann's blog and wanted to give it a shot. it took forEVER, but here is my list!

i have:

1. spent many sunday afternoons on my grandma's porch swings.
2. had my friends break up with a boy for me {it was 7th grade...}.
3. won first place for a drawing of a princess & a fire-breathing dragon.
4. hidden in my sister's closet for close to an hour just to scare her when she turned out the lights to go to sleep {she was MAD}.
5. watched a movie in the middle of a golf course at night.
6. started a book and not finished it {many many many times}.
7. littered.
8. eaten dog jerky {my "friend" told me it was human food}.
9. quit a job after only a week.
10. not flushed a toloit in a public restroom because the handle looked disease-ridden.
11. had a full blown panic attack.
12. participated in several temple dedications {bountiful, nauvoo, winter quarters, draper and one more but i can't remember which...}.
13. paid my tithing even when it was really hard to.
14. gotten on the matterhorn at disney world 5 times in a row {this was more recent than you might think...}
15. purchased a crib/rocking chair/changing table before we even started trying to get pregnant.
16. read the book of mormon.
17. toured alcatraz.
18. cried when my cat died.
19. sluffed a lot of school.
20. been spelunking in the nutty putty cave.
21. bought a wedding dress 4 months before i actually got engaged.
22. had my drivers license suspended.
23. accidentally driven to tooele when i was trying to get to jordan landing.
24. fallen off my bike many times {i have the scarred knees to prove it}.
25. auditioned and not made it.
26. auditioned and made it.
27. recorded a cd.
28. fallen down the stairs in the DC temple.
29. fallen down the stairs in the commons area in high school.
30. cried at the end of madame butterfly.
31. taken a cooking class.
32. been to several shows in branson, missouri.
33. eaten fried alligator.
34. wished i could sew.
35. flunked chemistry.
36. received a free cookie at the carl's jr drive through {haha! so much more to THAT story!}.
37. hated an ex-boyfriend really really badly.
38. faked sick.
39. given nick-names to every employee at our favorite gas station {turtle, semi-hot, no-nick-name, eater, left gray tooth, shane... ok that was his real name}.
40. spent too much money on tanning and diet coke.
41. driven to denver and back twice in one week.
42. written a love letter.
43. been married in the temple to my best friend.
44. spent many summer nights hanging out on alicia's back porch.
45. prepared a cake mix just to eat the batter.
46. fallen in love with the boy who brought me a book instead of flowers on one of our first dates. 47. been a part-time nanny to triplets.
48. ran out of gas on the freeway.
49. spent christmas and thanksgiving in hawaii.
50. spent one christmas in airports trying {and failing} to get to orlando.
51. roadtripped to las vegas with my girlfriends.
52. rejoiced when i got rear-ended {they paid me at least as much as the car was worth}.
53. performed from memory a 30+ page choral piece.
54. spilled syrup all over myself at denny's after a dashboard confessional concert.
55. exploded a bottle of ketchup all over myself at coriann's texas roadhouse in ephraim.
56. sang in a christmas concert at the cathedral of the madeline.
57. participated in a study for rheumatic fever.
58. mistaken st george for cedar city.
59. had a waitress follow me out of a restaurant because i was still holding her betty boop pen.
60. saw david archuleta sing the national anthem at a jazz game :)
61. volunteered at the steve young/jerry rice bay area classic golf tournament for charity.
62. had my picture taken with shawn bradley at said golf tournament and felt like a MIDGET {see here}.
63. had a see-how-many-pieces-of-bubble-gum-you-can-fit-in-your-mouth contest.
64. taken a drawing class.
65. left my umbrella on the metro on a very cold, very rainy night in DC {and really really regretted it}.
66. carved my name into a park bench.
67. floated down a river on an inner-tube in the middle of the night {really smart}.
68. played in HUGE piles of leaves in my grandpa's backyard.
69. chewed abc gum.
70. saw the musical Wicked in Denver.
71. gotten lost in a parking garage and had to have Sean come help me get out {he was at home and had to come to downtown salt lake}.
72. purchased a box of chocolates for myself.
73. graduated from seminary {miracle}.
74. taught the sunbeams.
75. camped out on the living room floor with sean. just for fun.
76. poisoned a plant on purpose.
77. collected stamps.
78. crocheted a few things.
79. taken voice lessons.
80. taken piano lessons.
81. listened to my sharona on repeat on many occasions.
82. washed the same load of laundry 5 times because i keep forgetting to throw it in the dryer.
83. gotten engaged on the 4th of july to the love of my life.
84. married him on a rainy day in december.
85. cried until i couldn't cry anymore.
86. laughed until it hurt.
87. started a puzzle and not finished it.
88. gotten really excited over a new vacuum :)
89. done sean's homework for him.
90. talked/screamed in my sleep.
91. stepped in human poo in a hot tub.
92. conquered my fear of the alpine slide.
93. collected pogs.
94. owned a pogo stick.
95. left my charm bracelet {a christmas gift from sean when we were dating} in the dressing room at target... never to see it again :(
96. received answers to my prayers.
97. worn white eyeliner and thought it was cool.
98. had an impromptu dance party at IP with my girlfriends :)
99. taken a lot of pictures of my feet.
100. been in awe of the fireflies in missouri.
101. written a list of 101 things i've done.

whew! that's a lot. i'm not offended if you didn't make it through the whole list.

sinking in.

my belly button is sinking in.

i thought it was supposed to pop out?

it's kind of freaking me out.

love at first sight.

we have gone through 2 vacuums in 3 years of marriage. the first started smoking and then had to go. the second was a piece of junk that made the worst high pitched sound EVER when in use. so after buying 2 cheap, poor quality vacuums, we decided to fork out the money and buy a dyson. this is partly because we've been doing some work in the nursery {pictures later} and our house has been blanketed in a layer of dust. i knew our old vacuum couldn't handle the job. and it's time for spring cleaning. and maybe i'm nesting a little. but anyway, we LOVE it. that thing can SUCK. sean went over our carpet with the old vacuum and the next day we used the dyson... let's just say i'm horrified by how much our old vauum wasn't picking up. {and isn't she pretty??! and she's sooo light!}