le petit prince.

Cubance had their ultrasound last Friday to find out the gender of the baby and...

Drumroll, please.

I made this little announcement for their blog, where you can get more details, ultrasound pics, the works.

(I'm just a little excited, can you tell?)

the precious young man strikes again.

Letter from Derek yesterday, a snippet:

"I love writing to you! You're my sister but you're also one of my best friends."

Not only is this adorable in itself since Derek isn't the most expressive person in the world (wonder where he gets that ::::cough:::::), but he used "you're" correctly.

Ain't never been prouder.

mine eyes are burning: and other tales.

Lately when I've woken up my eyes are impossibly red and hurty. It feels like tired but with a hint of corneal infection. No idea. One other possibility is the cold weather. Pretty much as soon as November hit it feels like we were thrust into the Arctic tundra and my body's still reeling from the shock of it. Skin and hair getting dry, sensitive eyes red-rimmed and watery, and the edges of a cold taunting but never fully revealing itself. A week or so ago I felt my annual sinus infection coming on and headed home early from work. Two Emergen-C's, a Theraflu, and 19 hours of sleep later, crisis averted. I was pretty proud of myself. Very much not ready for winter. I feel like I can skip the next few months. Bears sure have something in this hibernation thing I hear they do. Because I'm too cheap to turn on the heat, a typical winter morning for me goes something like this: Wake up. Stick arm out of toasty blanket pile to discern level of imminent pain once I venture out. Icicles form on arm. Retract arm into blanket safety. Take a deep breath. Throw off covers while simultaneously taking off clothes to dive into shower. Turn on delicious hot water. Next there's denial, bargaining, and finally acceptance. Must leave shower.

Le sigh. Let us now speak of something that is foremost on my mind, and that's the fact that never in all the days of the Galactic Standard Calendar did I think I'd be dating someone who has blond hair. I know you are all up in arms over this as much as I am. I guess the joke's on me. Let me explain, I guess. I used to make fun of Cara for liking Quinn from The Used. Or any other light-haired guy. I've always been a brown hair/brown eyes kind of girl. Cara can attest to the level of my disgust over anything else. But within the last year I've had a mighty change of heart. It started with Thor, continued with Eric Northman, and found its summation in Jax Teller. (Fully aware that I sound like a ridiculous teenager right now, thanks. "There's a difference between like and love. Because, I like my Skechers, but I love my Prada backpack." RITE??) For a long time I questioned myself and my place in the universe. And now, months later, here is this new Eric. Blond hair, blue eyes. And I'm telling you, the view is great from where I'm standing. Yeah, total mindblow. Just goes to show you never know who's right for you, and limiting yourself to only people who look a certain way is probably the most ridiculous thing ever. /end soapbox.

What else should we talk about? I feel like I've been absent from the blogging world for too long to really know what to say to you people. Hm. Do you like...cheese?

cancel all my plans--something's come up.

I just...cannot even.
I don't know what's more disturbing: The fact that the title of this blog is absolutely true, or that somehow Discovery has managed to tap into my dream database. And then plan their shows accordingly.

two rules of dieting.

1. Don't have extra Reese's peanut butter cups from your free day lounging around in your pantry.
2. Don't diet.

first vacation of the summer.

For the past week my family and I have been in central Oregon and northern California. We had the greatest time ever, like always, and I'm kind of in post-vacation shock right now. It feels weird to be in my house, driving my car, going to work (even if I did only go in for a half day.) Reality sucks. But my time away from it was a good one. From the trip overall, I learned I need to do the following three things:

1. Kayak more.
2. Move out of Utah.
3. Buy an old-school Schwinn and combine all three.

Here is a quick rundown of the things we saw, did, and ate.

Sunday, June 5.

Derek, Dad, Clara and I left early in the morning for Boise. Mom was already there since she had some properties to visit for work. The drive was relatively uneventful (I know this is shocking to you, since it's western Idaho) EXCEPT that we stopped at Shoshone Falls (the "Niagara of the West," apparently), saw the Twin Falls Temple, and stopped at a gas station that had some crazy alpacas. Yeah, Idk on that last one. Here are some photos from that drive:























































































We arrived in Boise that evening and just chilled in our hotel rooms. I guess you can't beat both a Sister Wives and a Hunt for Sasquatch marathon when you've been trapped in the car all day.

Monday, June 6.

The next morning we geared up for the drive to Oregon. Nothing much to say there...lots of sleeping and a random pit stop--the details of which will remain a family secret til the end of days.


We arrived in Bend, Oregon, in the early evening and stopped at the grocery store to get some food for the week. Derek and I were in charge of dinner the first night (grilled hamburgers, relish tray, watermelon, chips, oh yeah). We got our stuff together and headed to our cabin in Sunriver. I was really surprised to find that the cabin was actually part of a resort, which turned out to be awesome. For some reason I had imagined it as being isolated on some mountainside. Meh.

We arrived at the cabin and immediately everyone was involved in unpacking the truck and completing recon missions to scope out the best room and sleeping area to throw down their stuff.



That night we ate dinner, mom and dad and I went to the small country store to get some necessary caramel popcorn supplies (indeed I did make homemade caramel on a foreign, electric stove. Beat that!), and we watched a couple movies. We were pretty beat after the long drive so we all went to bed.











Tuesday, June 7.

After breakfast, Cara, Mom, Clarence and I went to the community's swimming pool. It was pretty warm in the afternoon, even though the breeze was chilly. It was kind of trippy to be swimming in a pool in the mountains, but trippy can also be synonymous with awesome, such as in this case.



We all got pretty burned, as we found out later that night. We played gin rummy as a family, at which I sucked so bad I might as well have been playing with Go Fish cards. Don't worry, I redeemed myself the next night with an overall score of 140. Yup.

Wednesday, June 8.

Wednesday we had a five-mile hike to Benham Falls. The weather was perfect and the best part was there weren't any crowds, so we were able to enjoy the scenery. That night Derek and I went on an epic bike journey in search of the path to the store. Apparently the family needed ice cream RIGHT NOW so Derek and I threw on our adventure packs and totally came through. 'Cause we do that.




Thursday, June 9.

Our last day in Sunriver we went kayaking on the Deschutes River. It was my first time and I loved it! Derek's already looking into kayaks for us to buy here so we can go on our own. It was fairly easy going, no Class 6 for us at this time, but I think it's only a matter of time...



That night we went to dinner at the lodge restaurant--super fancy and delicious. We walked back to our cabin and had the final round of the week-long rummy tournament. Mom won it all, of course, but that's only because she (a) keeps track through the entire game of who's going for what and everything they discard and (b) has a hidden contraption in her sleeve that allows her to get the card she needs at the last minute. It's easy I guess if you have no qualms victory dancing in your children's faces. Jk mom...you know I'm kidding!

Friday, June 10.

On Friday we packed up and headed out for Crescent City, California. We stopped in Union Creek at Beckie's for lunch and YES you have to stop there if you happen to pass by someday. It was so good. The drive got even more beautiful the farther along we went, getting closer to the coast and redwoods country. I love that area so much. It makes more sense to me than desert-y things do.



We got to Crescent City, checked into our hotel and set out in search of dinner. We landed at the Chart Room, right on the pier, and had a great view of the sun setting over the ocean. The coast is always beautiful.



Saturday, June 11.

Saturday we had a lot of driving and adventuring ahead of us so we got an early start. We drove through Redwoods National Park, which was awe-inspiring, even if it does conjure images of velociraptors jumping out of the trees at any moment to devour your family. Still beautiful. And just...enormous. One of the pictures below is of Clarence standing on the roots of a fallen tree. That's just THE ROOTS, people. We saw so much that day I have a hard time remembering it all, but at some point we ended up at Cafe Nooner in Eureka, California, which was freaking off the charts delicious, before heading over the Willow Creek, home of Bigfoot (over 10,000 sightings in this area alone). After checking out the museum at Willow Creek, we headed to Redding, over to Sacramento, through Tahoe, and sometime around midnight-ish ended up at the Grand Sierra in Nevada. Our hotel room was the nicest I've ever been in and it wasn't long before we were trying to figure out how we could get the beds back home.









Sunday, June 12.

It's a long way home from Reno to Salt Lake when you've already been driving for the better part of two days. Especially that desert, nothing drive where every time you come around a bend, you're pretty sure you've been on that stretch of road. Twice. For hours. Luckily I had my Sherlock Holmes to read. But eventually we made it home late last night. It was a great trip and I only wish I had time to upload all of the pictures we took between all of our cameras. On to the next!

Did I mention my family is the greatest?

top ten thursday: my brother.

Yeah yeah, you hear about him a lot. Deal with it.

Top Ten Thursday: Reasons Why I Love My Brother/He is Awesome.

1. He can always make me laugh and has the best sense of humor.
2. He is extremely smart and knows what he wants in life; we used to call him The Professor because he was always saying, "Did you know...?" And 9/10 times, we didn't.
3. He takes the time to listen to me and talks to me about books, ideas, funny things, the military, and how we would survive the zombie apocalypse.
4. He has awesome ambitions. (Marine officer, JAG lawyer, etc.)
5. He is himself and doesn't let other people influence him.
6. He is strong in the Church and does what is right because it's part of him.
7. He makes me a better person for knowing him and is a great example.
8. He is positive and doesn't let dumb things get in his way.
9. He is thoughtful, insightful, and loving.
10. He is my best friend.

(photo collage to come...I know you can't wait)