Friend Tribute

Preggie Pops, what will they think of next? But seriously, such a good idea, whoever came up with them is a brilliant brilliant person. They are made with all natural ingredients (like ginger) that are supposed to alleviate morning sickness.

Even more brilliant, in my book anyways, was my friend who recommended them to me. She said they really helped her when she was so morning sick with her last one. Aaron and I went on a hunt to find these little treasures, but weren't able to locate them. My friend, being the sweetheart that she is, sent her husband to a store where she knew they would be, and she got me a bag! THANK YOU, THANK YOU! That was such a thoughtful thing for you to do. It made my whole night last night. :) It's so nice to have good friends.

And so this blog entry is a tribute to my friend and the way she always is so willing to do things for others. I'm sure I am not the only one who has benefited from her kindness. In fact, I know that my husband's Scouts benefit quite a lot from her generosity in the dessert department. Thanks for being so thoughtful and for looking out for us!

Tagged Again! by Shay this time

How long did you date? We met at the end of August 2005 got engaged February 10th 2006 and married May 6th 2006

How old is he? He will be 25 in November

Who said "I love you" first? Aaron did I'm sure

Who is taller? Aaron

Who is smarter? I would say Aaron, but I'm better at remembering people's names. :)

Who's temper is worse? Mine. Not sure I've ever seen Aaron be really mad before.

Who does the laundry? I do usually, but Aaron is great at helping me fold it and put it away

Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? We don't really have sides of the bed, we like to mix it up. When I'm pregnant I usually sleep closer to the bathroom though.

Who pays the bills? Mostly Aaron

Who cooks dinner? We both do. One of us takes care of Lincoln while the other cooks dinner usually

Who drives when you are together? Call me old fashion, but I think Aaron should drive when we're together. He's better at knowing where he's going anyways.

Who is more stubborn? Aaron and I are both very stubborn people when we want to be. I'd say we are pretty equally yoked in that department. Our kids don't have a chance!

Who kissed who first? Aaron kissed me first. He kept telling me while we were dating that he wouldn't kiss me until he could tell me that he loved me. He also said it would take him probably six months worth of dating to kiss me. It didn't. Only about 2 1/2 and then he said it meant something but not everything (as in he still wasn't ready to tell me he loved me). Boys! :)

Who is the first to admit when they are wrong? Refer to above question about stubborn. But usually if Aaron is the one whose wrong (and sometimes even if he isn't) he's the first to admit it, because he is also more of a sweetheart than I am.

Whose parents do you see the most? We do the best we can to keep it fair, by rotating every other Thanksgiving and Christmas between Utah and Washington. But when we live in Utah while we're at school it's inevitable that we see my family more.

Who proposed? Aaron did, on the hiking trail leading Y mount in Provo, Utah

Who is more sensitive? We were pretty evenly matched, and then I had a baby, and now I am a way bigger baby than Aaron.

Who has more friends? Probably me. I come from a small town growing up where I knew almost everyone. Aaron moved several times and was home schooled up until high school. And I am a social butterfly you might say. Aaron has a few very good close friends, and I have friends all over the place some close and some not as close, but I'm a lot better at keeping in touch with people so maybe that's the reason.

Who has more siblings? Depends. If you are going full-blooded siblings, Aaron does. He has two older sisters, an older brother, a twin brother, and a younger sister. I have three younger brothers, but I also have two older step-sisters and an older step-brother.

Who wears the pants in the family? We both do, usually about different things

I tag: Anyone who wants to do it. It's kinda fun on a hot afternoon.

This is How We Pass the Time...

After many wrestling matches, plenty of crying, and lots of blurry, slobbery photos, I've finally captured Lincoln's teeth bumps on film! (As you can see in the picture, I pretty much had to strap him down to do it.) No, the little buggers haven't come through the gums yet, but any day now they are bound to. Meanwhile, we'll be liberally applying the baby Ora-gel, feeding the little guy chunks of ice, and letting him gnaw on basically everything he can get his hands on. Sheesh, you'd think we had a puppy! :)

So I thought since it was so hot today that I would take Lincoln swimming. More about that later, but as I was preparing Lincoln to go swimming (not an easy task, mind you) I came to an alarming realization. Up until this point I thought all swim diapers were generic. For example the last ones we bought had a picture of Nemo on them, and I didn't really think anything of it. When I was at the store last time, I found Lincoln's size and dropped the package in the cart, giving them no more thought...that is until this afternoon. Apparently, swim diapers come in boy kind and girl kind. I had bought the girl kind. So for the rest of the summer Lincoln will be sporting Ariel on his cute little bottom. Oh well, at least his swim suit covers it up, right? You can see Lincoln's horrified expression in the pic above. Scarred for life.

As I mentioned above, I thought we'd go swimming today since it was so incredibly hot. I got the two of us all decked out in our swimming suits, applied the sun screen, gathered the towels, the water, ya know all the junk you have to take with you to the pool, and we headed out. After the 5 minute walk in the blistering sun, I was really looking forward to a refreshing dip, only to discover that the pool was closed! Cripes. Well, I wasn't letting all my hard work (not to mention one Ariel swim diaper) go to waste, so I filled up the tub!

I think Lincoln had a pretty good time. Although I'm sure he thought it was strange to be having a semi-cold bath with his clothes on. But he splished and splashed to his little heart's content, for all of about 15 minutes, at which time he decided to pull the plug and end his make-shift swim session. When Aaron got home from work he brought with him an armful of moving boxes. In order to entertain Lincoln he set up the boxes fort style in the living room. He then commenced to give Lincoln, not a horse ride mind, but an elephant ride. It was hilarious.

Lincoln Learns a New Skill

I can't believe how fast Lincoln learns new things. It's a pretty amazing thing to watch, I'm sure every parent would agree. The other day Lincoln and I were playing with the Jenga blocks (and by playing with I mean banging together, throwing, sucking on, and Lincoln knocking down anything I attempted to build) and I decided I'd explain to him how to put them away while I was picking them up. Then I handed him one and helped him make the motion to put it in the box. Then he just started picking them up and putting them away. It was so cool! Not every block made it into the hole, but a lot of them did. So I was pretty excited about Lincoln's new skill. Now all we have to do is work on leaving them in the box after they are all put away. (He likes to dump them back out again.)

Sorry for the Suspense...

Lincoln was playing with the power cord to our modem, and it shorted out, leaving us without Internet for the last few days. Good job Linc! It always amazes me how much I rely on the Internet for things.

Anyways...back to the riddle. You guys pretty much guessed it!

We are expecting another little Swan. We found out on July 16th. I'm not very far along, only about 5 weeks. We debated about whether or not it was too early to tell everyone, but it came down to the basic fact that I am terrible about holding things in. So there you go. My due date is March 24th 2009. My one requirement for having another child was that Lincoln be old enough to be in nursery by the time the next one was born. They will be about 19 1/2 months apart, so we're good. I'm happy that Lincoln will have a sibling close to him in age. That's how we've always wanted it to be. Thanks for your congrats, and stay tuned for the next nine months for updates!

Our Homemade Riddle

Ok, Aaron and I came up with this riddle. See if you can figure out what it is. Each picture is a different phrase, but each phrase is the same thing. Enjoy! We'll post the answer as soon as everyone makes their guesses.

"Utah We Love Thee"

Well, today I realized that I hadn't posted anything on the blog about us moving back to Provo at the end of August. So...Guess what everyone? We're moving back to Provo at the end of August! We've been here in Texas on an internship for Aaron. At first we were supposed to come back at the end of August, then Aaron's work liked him so much they offered to extend his internship until the end of December. We decided to stay to save some money for school. What we didn't anticipate was the cost of living here being a lot higher. We haven't been saving as much as we would've hoped. So we started praying about it to decide what to do. Then on the 4th of July Aaron got an email telling him that he'd received a scholarship, a grant, and a smart student grant worth enough to cover the cost of tuition, books, and insurance for the rest of his schooling career. Wow! I love it when the answers to prayers are so obvious! We'll be leaving the last week of August.

It's kind of bitter sweet because we are excited to go back to Utah where we have family, and to get on with school, and to get away from the cock roaches and humidity. But we are going to be really sad to leave our ward here. If we could we'd pack you all up and move you to Utah with us (wouldn't you guys just love that?) :)

As I was looking up pictures on the internet to give this post a little color, I came across some of the BYU Honor Code Posters. These are one of the many things I love about BYU. They have these signs posted all over campus, and I think they are hilarious. The Goldifox one is my favorite. If you can't read it try clicking on it to get a bigger image. But I think it's a humorous way to get the point across. I should see if I can find a picture of the posters that are the reasons why you should take Spring/Summer classes, those are great too. Good ol' BYU I have missed that place and all it's wonderful little quarks.

Retired Intro

Well, I decided that I needed to update Lincoln's introduction on the side bar of our page. Aaron had the genius idea that whenever I "retire" and introduction I should post it as an entry that way it'll be in the book we plan on making at the end of the year out of all our blog entrees. So that's what I'm going to do. This is the first intro I ever wrote of Lincoln, and I probably wrote it mid-April or so. Also, feel free to check out Lincoln's new intro on the side bar.

Lincoln has a strange sense of humor and a goofy personality, but I guess that's what happens when you mix two people like Aaron and Krystal together. Lincoln thinks the funniest thing in the world is when Aaron blows his nose. He's terrified of the vacuum, but not the hair clippers. His favorite song is "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" and it calms him down, even during an extended diaper change (extended meaning changing the whole outfit because he's pooped or peed all over it).He sleeps through the night 3 out of every 5 nights. He sleeps on his side or stomach with his hands above his head. His favorite foods are carrots, squash, applesauce, and bananas. He dislikes eating peas, and his oatmeal (unless we mix it with fruit), and we are pretty sure he's allergic to rice since he's puked it up every time he's ever had it.

Lincoln can sit up by himself, and do the worm (aka crawl) across the living room floor. Aaron is teaching him to play Patty-Cake, and he's pretty good. Lincoln will also, sometimes, play dead, if Aaron chases him. Lincoln likes outside and people, so... as long as his diaper is clean, he's eaten, and had a nap, he's generally pretty easy to take along!

Just Need to Rant and Rave for a Second

Ok, so I'm really annoyed by the stupid pest control guy that just came to our apartment! Grr...I just put Lincoln down for a nap, which he desperately needed because he got up several times in the middle of the night with his teeth hurting. So then I hear this absurdly loud banging on my door, I go to open it and it's Pest Control Guy saying he needs to spray in my apartment, because the complex is having everyone's apartment sprayed. Ok, now I'm not really opposed to this, what I'm opposed to is the fact that he must think I'm deaf and is practically yelling this information at me. But whatever. So I let him in, explaining I wish I'd known they were coming as my house is a mess, and still in his booming voice he says, "There was a notice on your door last week." Sure, ok. Then still yelling, "Do you have any pets (long pause) or children under 1?" First of all since when do pets come first in importance before children under 1? And second, obviously I have a child under one because my living room looks like it's exploded with baby toys, some clothes, and a diaper I haven't gotten around to throwing away yet. And to top it off Lincoln, whose just been woken from his precious nap, starts screaming at the top of his lungs. I say, yes, I have a baby. Then Pest Control Guy bellows "Well I can't spray here!" and stomps out the front door, slaming it behind him. Good! I didn't want you to spray here anyways, and thanks for waking up my baby you stupid jerk! Grrrrrr......

Okay, I feel a little better now. Thanks for listening :)

Got Tagged By Kris

So, I got tagged a long time ago, and am just now getting around to doing this (sorry Kris) but anyways here goes nothin'

Four things you may not know about me:
1. I do not own, nor do I wish to own a television. (#1 because I think it's a waste of time, and #2 because there is such trash on TV, even if you are watching a good show, you never know what's going to be in the commercials)
2. I am terrified of rollercoasters, ski-lifts, and ferris wheels. Basically anything thats high and moves fast (or in the case of ski-lifts, just high). Which basically means I'm no fun at amusement parks.
3. I have never seen Star Wars, nor read Harry Potter. (I haven't read Twighlight yet either, but I am planning on it, so it doesn't really count here.)
4. Just in case the above makes you think I'm no fun, you may not know that when I was a freshman at BYU I jumped into Utah Lake at 2 a.m. on a snowy February morning, and I actually did it twice so that I could be the winner. :)

Four places I go over and over again:
1. Crowley Park
2. The mail box
3. The apartment swimming pool
4. the apartment playground (Aaron takes our car to work so we're pretty stuck with what we can walk to)

Four people who email me:
1. My Mom
2. Aaron's Mom
3. Heidi
4. Uncle Scott

My four favorite foods:
1. ice cream, preferably some kind of chocolate
2. Taco Soup
3. Shish-ka-bobs
4. Ham puffs are topping the list at the moment

Four places I'd rather be:
1. Vancouver, WA
2. Provo, UT
3. Hooper, UT
4. A tropical island sitting on the beach building a sand castle

Four movies I could watch over and over again:
1. A Christmas Story (and we do, every Christmas)
2. Enchanted (this is one of my new favorites)
3. Emperor's New Groove
4. Finding Nemo

Four people I am tagging:
1. Natalie
2. Shay
3. Sydni
4. Lisa, Jordan, Carter

Glenville Spray Park

Tonight our ward had an evening play group so that the dads could get in on the action. What a great idea! We all met up at the Glenville Spray Park. It was a blast. I was a little unsure how Lincoln would do with the water falling on his head, but there was no need. He LOVED it, and thought he was just as big as all the other kids.Aaron and I weren't planning on getting wet, but some of the Knight kids had other ideas! This picture is of me and Lincoln in a water fight with KC and Zoe. I'd like to say I won because I squirted KC the most times, but seeing as he started soaked and I started dry, and we both ended soaked, I think he was the winner. It's ok though, it actually felt a lot cooler to be wet in this crazy Texas heat.

After our battle, KC and I tried with all our might to get Aaron wet, but we were unsuccessful. Oh well maybe next time. All in all everyone had a good time. I'm putting in my vote to have more evening play groups!

Muddy Buddy

Today I was out watering our "garden" and Lincoln followed me outside. He decided to play in the spot that used to be where the onions were, but they all died.
He looks pretty mischievous in this picture. And he should, because he's about to eat dirt! Gross.
My happy mud-covered baby. He's such a little boy, don't you think?

Independence Day 2008

Happy Fourth of July! I am a big fan of this holiday. I love the parades and the gatherings at the park with all the little boothes and things to do, and the kids running around everywhere, and the joy of being together as a community, the fireworks, and of course the patriotic music.

At first I was a little sad this year because it would be the third year in a row that we didn't get to celebrate the 4th in Hooper. I love the 4th of July in Hooper, specifically for all the reasons mentioned above. It's just nostalgic I guess. And also this year we weren't going to have any family around to spend it with. I mean, at least last year in Phoenix all of Aaron's sisters and their families were there to celebrate with, and that made it fun. But this year Aaron and I were on our own. We got up early (which just goes to show how much I do like this holiday, because I don't do early. Not for anything.) and went to the ward breakfast. We have such a wonderful ward here in Texas that is was almost like being with family. At the breakfast Sister Mayberry invited us to come and have dinner with them. We took her up on it, and offered to bring the watermelon. Then Aaron and Lincoln and I drove to Plano to catch the parade.

It was a good parade, but a little too quiet for my taste. What does that mean? Well, it means there were way too many cars with logos on them, and not enough bands or other things going on to get people excited. I have to say I am partial to bands. I was in the marching band in high school (I played the symbols, if you can imagine that!) and on the 4th we got to march in at least 3 parades playing our patriotic songs. I LOVED IT! But I think Lincoln really enjoyed the parade, so that's what really counts. And hey, we got a free car wash coupon out of the deal, so pretty much it was worth the drive.

After Lincoln's nap we went swimming in our apartment complex's swimming pool. Then for dinner we went to the Mayberry's. They are such a cool family. I'm glad we had the opportunity to get to know them better. Thanks Mayberry's for letting us share in your family celebration so we didn't have to be by ourselves on the 4th!!

We decided it wasn't worth keeping Lincoln up past his bedtime to go see fireworks. So we went home, put him to bed and watched a movie. I guess we could have watched fireworks on TV, but we don't have one! :) So our holiday was very enjoyable. My only regret was that for the 3rd year in a row, I forgot to pull out my patriotic cd and listen to it. Man, I'm such a loser. Guess I'll have to save it for the 24th...PIONEER DAY BABY!

Little Duck Face