"Family his-tor-y, I am doing it, my family his-tor-y"

I've mentioned before that Aaron is taking a Family History class at school this semester. We've both been really into it. I've been working on the Lemmon family line, mostly because most of the Lemmons I know are dead, and I don't know any of the living ones who are doing any family history, so I don't know if any has been done. Anyways, for an assignment Aaron had to spend 3 hours at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. I decided that I wanted to go with him. That's why we came to Hooper this weekend, because my mom and Kerry were kind enough to baby-sit Lincoln so that Aaron and I could go to Salt Lake together without the munchkin. Thanks Mom and Kerry!

We learned lots of cool stuff at the FHL. I know this sounds nerdy, but family history is so awesome. I would recommend it to anyone. It's especially awesome when you can find out stories about your ancestors, and they start to become real to you. That's what we did today. We found out some cool things about my great-great-great grandfather Washington Lemmon. That's his picture, by the way.

Cool thing #1, you probably noticed that his first name is Washington. Not a usual name. Well, he's named Washington because his father, James Lemmon, was a messenger boy for George Washington during the Revolutionary War, so he named his first son Washington, after George. Cool!

Washington Lemmon was the first one on the Lemmon side to join the church. Here is a story written by someone else that tells about his life. (Please ignore all the grammatical errors in the following story, I did my very best to leave it as it was originally, and it tried my patients.)

THE HISTORY OF WASHINGTON LEMMON
by Florence Lemmon Burningham

Among the pioneers who came to Utah and settled in Salt Lake Valley, there were few who lived so long and participated so actively in the work of building up the state as Washington Lemmon.
For almost a century he watched the United States grow from a small sparsely settled country, bounded on the East by the Atlantic Ocean and on the West by the Mississippi River, to become a large powerful nation that extended form the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean on the West and from Canada to Mexico.

He was born at Shelbyville, Shelby County, Kentucky, October 6, 1806 and lived there until 1812 when his father took his family and moved to Indiana. His mother died in Indiana. His father, having a family of small children to take care of, soon found himself another wife. He married Amy Rawlins, 2 April 1818 at Poali, Orange County, Indiana and later moved to Harrison County, Indiana.

Washington Lemmon married Tamer Stephens August 31, 1826, Harrison County, Indiana. They were both 19 years old. They were very poor. They had only half of a bake skillet to cook with. Their first two children were born at Croydon, Harrison County, Indiana.

In 1828 Washington’s father moved to Adams County, Illinois and perhaps he to his son or sent him word that this new country was a land of opportunity because in 1830 Washington took his family and moved to Adams County, Illinois. He acquired a farm near Quincy and worked hard to develop it into one of the best farms in that neighborhood. He lived there for twenty years and ten of his children were born there.

Washington Lemmon first heard the message of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from David Evans, the late bishop of Lehi, Utah County, Utah. His wife, Tamer, was baptized by Jacob Meyers, October 1840 and Washington was baptized by David Evans, March 1841. He became a personal friend of the prophet Joseph Smith and other leaders of the Church.
He was in the Church in the early days of its existence at Nauvoo, Illinois and in Missouri. He took part in those troublesome times, building up and developing the Church, strengthening its membership and aiding in the erection of buildings for its work. He was a carpenter and he helped build the Nauvoo temple.

In 1844, when the prophet Joseph Smith was killed, Washington was in Indiana preaching the gospel and campaigning for Joseph Smith to be the next president of the United States.
In 1850 he moved his family to Council Bluff, Iowa, where the headquarters of the Church was at that time, it being known as Winter Quarters. He spent two years there getting ready to make the trip across the plains.

Washington Lemmon and his family came to Utah in the Captain Jolly Company, which was one of the 21 companies of Mormon emigrants that crossed the plains in 1852. Each company having about 50 wagons. The Jolly Company had about 340 souls. They left the Missouri River June 11, 1852 and arrived in Salt Lake Valley September 10, 1852. They crossed the plains in covered wagons. The boys, Leander and Alfred, drove the cattle and when they arrived in Utah they said, “Their feet were so tough a prickly pear could not stick in them.” When they desired butter they would put the cream in the churn and the jarring of the wagon would churn the cream to butter.

Washington’s oldest son, James William Lemmon, came to Utah with the Mormon Batallion. His second son, John, came with the gold rush and went to California. After the family had been in Utah several years a man came to their place and wanted a place to sleep and something to eat. The family lived on the county road and they had that kind of request quite often. This night while they were eating the man said, “I am your son.” Tamer, his mother, went over to him and turned up his sleeve and there was a scar on his arm and his mother said, “Yes, you are my son John.” This was a pleasant surprise for the family.

The family settled on Dry Creek southeast of Sandy. In the Winter of 1853, Henry Bowden went out by Sandy looking for some of his cattle. A terrible snow storm came up and he lost his way. Washington Lemmon found him nearly froze and wandering around in the snow. He took him to his place and Henry always said, “If it had not been for Washington Lemmon he would have froze to death.” They became very good friends and both of them lived in Millcreek Ward.
The career which Washington made for himself marked him as one of the most qualified pioneers who came to Utah. He saw Utah grow from a wilderness to one of the most flourishing and prosperous places in the West. He aided in bringing agricultural resources up to the present standards.

The family moved to Millcreek (it is now 4338 Highland Drive) in the spring of 1853. Washington built his own hoe including all the doors and the windows and many pieces of furniture. It was a large farm which was used mostly for raising grain, alfalfa and a large fruit orchard. Many of the trees he budded and developed until he had most all kinds of fruit suitable to the Utah climate. He also had good gardens and all kinds of small fruit. He raised bees and sold honey. At different times he had herds of sheep, cattle and horses. He had flocks of chickens, geese, and turkeys, which all farmers had for their own use.

Washington was about six feet tall and weighed about two hundred pounds. He had brown hair, a high forehead, and blue eyes. He was tall and straight, a very good looking man. He never drank intoxicating drinks or used tobacco. He rode horse back after he was ninety years old.
He was a prominent worker in the Church of his choice and enjoyed the confidence and esteem of all the members who knew him. He was known as a man of integrity and up-righteousness. He was counselor to Bishop Miller of Millcreek Ward 1859-1882 when Bishop Rueben Miller died. He was ordained a High Priest the 26 March 1856 by David Pettegrew, Cottonwood organization of High Priests, Bishop Reuben Miller President. He was ordained a Patriarch 30 March 1884. He received his Patriarchal Blessing from Hyrum Smith (brother of the prophet) and was told he was of the tribe of Levi.

He died October 2, 1902 at the age of 96 years. The funeral service was held in the Mill Creek Ward house, Sunday October 5, 1902. The speakers were Apostle Hyrum M. Smith, Bishop J. C. Hamilton of Millcreek and U. G. Miller of Murray. The remains were interred in the Millcreek Cemetery. He was survived by nine children, forty-two grand children, sixty-six great grand children, and a number of great-great grand children, making five generations.

Sources of Information:
1. Biographical Record of Salt Lake Valley and Vicinity
2. Special Correspondence to Newspaper
3. Lemmon Family by Francis Marion Lemmon
4. Life of Washington by Mabel Lemmon

I thought that was pretty cool. Anyways, we had a great time at the Family History Library. I was amazed how fast 3 hours went by. I could literally spend years in there and still find new information. Impressive. I can't wait to go back!

Rodeo

We had big plans to spend the weekend in Hooper. Lincoln and I packed up everything we would need, and when Aaron got home from school we loaded it all in the car and headed out. This picture is of Lincoln "helping", I guess you could say he was supervising. Haha! On the way to Hooper we got a flat tire. :( Aaron pulled off the freeway into a gas station. I feel bad for him, he's probably never had as much car trouble in his whole pre-married life combined as he has since he's been married to me. What can I say, I'm a car trouble magnet. But he got the spare on pretty quickly and we were off again in no time.

My mom's friend had free tickets to the rodeo at Weber County Fair Grounds, and she invited my mom, Kerry, Tanner, Tanner's friend Raysh, and Aaron and Lincoln and I to go with her and her family. Niether Lincoln nor Aaron had ever been to a rodeo before. We had seats on the front row, it was awesome. It was also indoors, so it wasn't cold out, which we were really grateful for.

Lincoln loved all the animals and all the action. Every time a horse would ride by us he would say "horse! horse! hehehe! (that's his horse noise)" It was so funny. It was also really nice to have Kerry sitting next to us to explain all about the different events. I think we would have been a little lost with out him.

This video gives you a better idea of how close we were. My favorite events were the bare back and the saddle bronc riding, barrel riding, the muttin' bustin', and the chicken chase. I didn't really care too much for the cattle roping in all of it's various differentiations, I thought it was kind of boring.

For bare back and saddle bronc riding, the cowboy has to stay on a bucking horse for 8 seconds without falling off. For barrel racing, the cowgirl rides a horse as fast as she can around three barrels. Fastest time wins. In muttin' bustin', little kids (like not all that much older than Lincoln kids, up to probably like 10 yr old kids) sit on the back of a sheep and see how long they can stay on. The sheep don't buck or anything, but it's pretty funny to watch. I told Aaron we should sign Lincoln up in a few years, he didn't seem too keen on idea. :) And as for the chicken chase, well...you can see for yourself:

I don't know whose idea it was to stick a hundred kids under the age of 12 in an arena and have them chase 6 chickens around, but what a hoot! We laughed hysterically the entire time. No, we didn't send Lincoln out there, although I thought Aaron should have taken him down, but maybe when he's a little older.

Here's Tanner's friend Raysh, with his chicken. Yup, the prize for catching the chicken, was in fact that chicken itself. I thought that was really funny. Lincoln liked the chicken. Raysh gave him on of the feathers and Lincoln held on to it all night. Needless to say, my mom was very happy that is was Raysh and not Tanner who caught the chicken.

Anyways, a good time was had by all. Thanks Carrols for the fun evening!

Tryin' Out The Trike

Today the weather was beautiful! It was even warm enough to wear just T-shirts. Lincoln and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to take the trike he got from G & G Swan for Christmas for a real test drive. He's been riding it in the living room since we got back from Christmas Break, but he gets frustrated because he can only ride it from our couch until he runs into the cabinet under the kitchen sink, and then he can't figure out how to turn it around. I thought it would be great to take it outside today and see what he could really do on it where there was a little more space. We have a church about a half block south of us across the street and I thought the parking lot would be the perfect place. So, I got Linc on his trike (I let him ride it on the sidewalk while I walked next to him, I figured it saved me from having to carry him, or the trike, or both) and away we went.

Wow. It took us FOR-E-VER to get there. I had no idea how slow a toddler on a trike could go. Especially since he doesn't quite grasp the concept of sitting on the seat yet, he just walks with the bar in between his legs. It's kind of funny actually. Anyways, it wasn't a big deal that it took so long. We really weren't in any kind of a hurry, and it was so nice out, and Lincoln was having a blast just riding straight on the sidewalk and stopping to look at the cars driving by, and the cracks in the sidewalk, and a stray pebble, and...you name it, and he stopped to look at it. But it was actually pretty nice not hurrying him along, but just letting him do his thing.

He was enjoying himself so much that he cried, and threw a little tantrum when I made him get off and hold my hand to cross the busy street. But he got over it as soon as we got to the other side, so all was well.

Like I said, I thought the church parking lot would be a good place for him to ride. This particular church parking lot, however, has entrances on three different streets, and as we were coming up on it, I noticed that the locals were using the parking lot as a short cut so as to miss the school zone and the crossing guard, that was on one of the streets. People were seriously cruising through the parking lot at 30 MPH. Which, ok, doesn't sound that fast, but they'd come whipping around the side of the church with no way of knowing if there was a little kid riding his tricycle just out of site. I decided that it wasn't going to be my little kid on his trike that they couldn't see. We kept to the sidewalks.

Lincoln had a great time anyways, and probably didn't even know that we'd changed plans. I taught him how to put his feet up on the front part of the trike so I could push him fast. He thought that was great, but we had to cut that one short, because he couldn't get the hang of steering while I was pushing him, and we went into the grass a few times. He also saw a bee, for the first time in real life (he has a book that has a picture of one, so that's how he knows what it is) and he got really excited about that. I had to try really hard to convince him that he didn't want to touch it. Everything was saw after that was a "bee!" whether is was a fly, or a pebble, or just an off-colored spot in the sidewalk.

After about an hour we headed for home. A few of the neighbors and their kids were sitting outside in the lawn enjoying the sunshine. Since I don't know anyone in our complex very well, I decided that we would sit out there too, and Lincoln could play some more and I would try and get to know people a little bit better. Lincoln opted to mostly watch the other kids play, instead of playing with them, which I thought was kind of odd, but I figure he'll grow out of that eventually. It was fun, and we had a nice time.

Happy B-day to Me, I Turned 23

Today was my 23rd birthday. It doesn't feel much different to be 23, but we sure had a fun day today anyway. Aaron got up with Lincoln and let me sleep in this morning. He also let me take a shower first without complaining that I took most all the hot water. (We only get enough hot water at a time to have 1 and 1/2 showers, so whoever showers second gets iced. We usually only have to deal with this on Sunday though because we are hurrying to get ready for church so we can't wait for the water heater to heat another tank.) He also got Lincoln ready for church. What a guy! Lincoln was good at church for the most part, and he stayed happily in nursery, can't ask for a better birthday present from him than that. After church Aaron put Lincoln down for a nap, and let me take a nap, while he made me this awesome birthday sign you see above. It says Happy Birthday and all of the letters have a fun memory of our family and a picture to go with the appropriate letter. If you click on the picture it will get bigger and you'll be able to see the sign better. So cute.

Since being in the car for a long time makes me feel yucky and hurts my back these days, and since we celebrated with my family yesterday, we opted not to go to Hooper. Instead, Aaron's Aunt Debby and Uncle Richard invited us over to their house for dinner. Aaron's brothers Kelly and Ryan came too. It was a regular party. Aunt Debby made delicious everything, that included roast beef, salmon (for Ryan who is a vegetarian), salad, biscuits, and potatoes. All of it was very good. For dessert we had my favorite, German Chocolate Microwavable Bunt Cake. You make the cake in the microwave, it only takes 15 minutes, it comes out warm and gooey and delicious. I wouldn't want anything else on my birthday. The picture above is of me blowing out my candle. It's the only picture I have of the party, which just goes to show why you should never leave your husband in charge of taking the pictures. ;) After cake and ice cream we opened presents! Uncle Richard and Aunt Debby got me a really cute picture frame. They know how crazy I am about pictures. Aaron's mom and dad got me a hair straightener which I really really wanted because only half of my old one gets hot. Kelly got me a Paul Cardall CD, which is acoustic guitar and piano. It's awesome, and very soothing. I can't wait to listen to the whole thing. Aaron got me some winter boots, which I've been wearing since Christmas time. Nothing like an early birthday present. :) Thank you everyone for the great presents, cards, and birthday wishes. You made me feel special.

After going home and getting Lincoln in bed, Aaron and I had big plans. It never ceases to amaze me what you can do with a couple bottles of paint, a creative genius husband, and a little bit of imagination.

When Lincoln was a tummy in Arizona we painted my tummy to look like a basketball. It looked really good, almost realistic. In fact some people couldn't tell the difference at first when we showed them the pictures. (If you want to see a picture of the basketball belly, watch the slide show on the sidebar titled "Family History" it's in there somewhere.) We decided then, that we'd have to paint my belly every pregnancy just to be fair.

Since day one we've been calling this baby Shark Bait, so it only seemed natural that we should try to paint Finding Nemo on my tummy. The first step was finding a good model to look of off. We watched lots of different scenes in the movie until we found one where Nemo was in a position that we liked. Then we had to figure out all the colors we were going to need. Don't worry, we used non-toxic finger paint, so it won't hurt either me or the baby.

First Aaron painted my tummy all blue. We joked that I could join Blue Man Group. Then he added some white in with the blue to make the water seem more realistic. The paint was really cold at first, and I jumped every time he touched my tummy with it. We had to wait a little while for the blue to dry. It took too long, so we got out the blow dryer and that sped up the process and warmed me up all at the same time.

Next it was time to do Nemo. Aaron started with the orange. After going to the dinosaur museum yesterday, I thought the orange outline looked like a little fish fossil. Then came the white. We took a picture after every step because I couldn't see what it looked like. It's kind of funny not to be able to see your own tummy. Once Aaron put in the black lines, I thought it look a lot better, like an actual fish.

It was really hard to get this picture of Aaron painting my tummy. I probably took 10 different shots, but I was having a rough time getting Aaron's face, and my tummy both in the shot. I ended up with lots of pictures of Aaron's elbow, or with Aaron's head cut off.

In the beginning we were going to try to have Aaron paint it like Nemo was in a fish bowl, but we decided that would be pretty difficult to make look right, because you can see through a fish bowl. So we opted just to do an ocean scene. I think it was a good idea that we did. Aaron used the lid of an ice cream bucket as his pallet, and to paint he used a combination of paint brushes and his fingers. It just helps to show his child within, it doesn't take much to convince him to finger paint! :)

After the Nemo fish was painted, it was time for the plants and surrounding background. Aaron did seaweed in green, but only on the sides at first. He also painted some red plants that are supposed to be those spongy looking ones. I think they turned out great and add some good color.

We thought about calling it finished after that, but Nemo looked to centered and posed. We knew it needed something else. We thought about adding more fish, but we didn't want to detract from the Nemo fish, and since this is supposed to be an artistic representation of Ivan, and there is only one Ivan inside my tummy, we thought it best to only have the one fish. Aaron added some more seaweed instead, and it was just the touch this painting needed. I think it turned out really well. We were excited. I have no idea what we'll do to outdo ourselves when the next pregnancy rolls around, but we still have a long time before we have to worry about that.

Here are a few more pictures of the finished product.

Don't you think you can almost image a little piece of ocean right in the middle of my body? Sometimes it definitely feels like a fish is swimming around in there.

This is my fish face. I realize that it's not an attractive picture, but I wasn't really going for attractive anyways. Haha! I love it.

And one more. We had a lot of fun doing this. I know we're weird, but it's ok. Maybe we'll inspire others to get creative as well. I mean, if you have to have the belly, you might as well have fun with it right?

A Letter at Last

A few months ago, Aaron decided he wanted to go to grad school at BYU to get his master's degree in Electrical Engineering. The application process was brutal, mostly because it took a lot of time, which is something Aaron doesn't have a lot of. But he was able to get his GRE studied for and taken, and all his letters of recommendation in, and his letter of intent, and all the other fun stuff that goes along with applying for grad school. And then we waited...

On Friday night a good friend of Aaron's, who is also in the Engineering program, called and said he'd gotten a letter in the mail and that he'd been accepted to grad school, and had Aaron gotten a letter. No, he hadn't, but maybe tomorrow. Now we were kind of nervous. This morning Aaron called another good friend who had also applied to see if he'd gotten a letter. Later this afternoon he called back to say he had. We were still waiting for our mail to come, we were even more nervous.

Finally at 4:30pm our mail came. At first Aaron didn't see a letter, but when he got inside he found it stuck between two advertisements. When he opened it this is what he saw:

He got in! We were so excited. Good job Aaron. I know you'll work hard and make the most out of this opportunity.

The program is a 30 credit hour one, so it should only take Aaron three semesters. Probably a Fall/Winter/Fall since we aren't sure if they offer graduate classes (or at least the ones he needs) during Spring/Summer. What that means is that we'll be in Provo for at least another two years. My mom was very happy to learn about that. :) Aaron also has to write a thesis, and is looking in to getting a research position to help pay for it all.

Birthday Eve

Today is my Birthday Eve. For those of you that don't celebrate the holiday, that means it's the day before my birthday :) We started the celebrations so early this morning that we had to wake up Lincoln (usually he is the alarm clock). We went into his room and he was so cute all cuddled up and asleep. Don't worry that he's totally backwards in his crib.

We met my mom and Kerry and Tanner at IHOP in Lehi at 9:00am for breakfast. It was delicious. Aaron had french toast, I had Nutella Crepes which I highly recommend, and Lincoln had a smiley face pancake. It was Lincoln's first time ever ordering food at a restaurant, usually he just eats off of our plates, but we were both too hungry to share with him today. Other highlights of the meal include Lincoln taking a bite of his blue crayon and pulling the funniest disgusted face I've ever seen.

After breakfast we did presents in the parking lot. Mom and Kerry gave me a cutting mat and circular cutter, so that I don't have to measure out my fabric with the twisty thing on the kitchen blinds anymore (hey you do what you've gotta do), and some new dish rags that my mom crocheted for me (hooray!), two movies Ever After and The Sandlot. Very excited about all of it. Thanks guys!

The big activity for the day was the Museum of Ancient Life at Thanksgiving Point, so that's where we all headed next. Supposedly it's the largest dinosaur museum in the world. Pretty cool. In one of the rooms a sign told us that most of the smaller skeletons and fossils on display were the real deal, but that most of the larger ones were a cast because the bones are too delicate to be fused and screwed together, and that's why they just do a cast.

I was surprised how much "hands-on" stuff they had. Here is Lincoln and Uncle Tanner crawling though a small tunnel they had on display. They also had tons of exhibits that kids (or anyone I suppose) could touch, feel, sit on, climb through, etc. It was pretty cool, and Lincoln loved it.

Here's Aaron, Lincoln, and Gramma Tam. I can't remember what they are pointing at, but it must have been awesome since all three of them are pointing.

Aaron picked a fight with a raptor. Ok not really, but if this had been real life, Aaron would have been toast. Look at the claws on that thing.

This is probably my favorite shot of Lincoln of the day. He's climbing up the leg (foot and ankle is more like it) of a Brontosaurus. It's one huge dinosaur and took up an entire room. Lincoln barely reaches up to his ankle.

Mom, Kerry, Tanner, and Lincoln in front of the Stegosaurus.

Mom, me, Aaron, Lincoln, and Tanner in front of the Stegosaurus.

This was my favorite exhibit, it's called the erosion table. What it is is a sort of model or a river bed. It's got tons of sand on the bottom and little toy trees and toy dinosaurs in it. Every so often is a water fountain type thing that lets out water. The point is to build little islands, or dams or other structures out of the sand, and then you watch to see how over a period of time water erodes the land mass. It's really cool, especially because it's so hands on. All of us from Lincoln right on up to Kerry enjoyed playing in it.

In this picture, on the far left, you can see the dam Tanner and Kerry built. Aaron and Tanner are currently in the process of personifying a tsunami to speed up the erosion process. Lincoln is torturing plastic dinosaurs by hurling them to a watery grave. :) We probably would have spent a lot longer at the erosion table, but Lincoln started throwing sand, so we had to go.

Here's Tanner in the under water room. All the skeletons they had in there were pretty scary looking. I'm glad I don't have to worry about running into any of those guys while I'm out swimming.

I thought this picture turned our really well. It almost seems like the shark really is swimming up right behind them and they don't expect a thing. They actually don't know for sure that sharks this big ever existed. The only fossil evidence they've found are shark teeth that are 7 inches long. Yikes!

Here is a dinosaur egg and me, looking like I swallowed one! :) I can't imagine having to poop one of those things out and then still having to wait who knows how long for it to hatch so I could see my baby. I'm glad I'm not a dinosaur.

This was another cool hands-on exhibit. It was a giant sand box that had dinosaur bones burried all over the place. The kids got paint brushes and were turned loose on 'em like real paleontologists. Again, we had to leave this one sooner than planned because Lincoln kept throwing sand. Oh well.

After the museum we had a small lunch at a place called JCW's. I made cupcakes last night for Birthday Eve, so we had those too. Here's me blowing out the candle. :)

Typical

Here is a typical video. I delete thousands of these, probably. It's an example of where Lincoln has been doing something really awesome, or new, or funny for the last 20 minutes, so I decide to get out the camera and BAM! he will no longer perform, but instead becomes fascinated with the camera because it is an electronic device. It's definitely typical, but this video also happened to be hilarious so I decided to post it. :)

35 Weeks...and counting

This picture was actually taken on Valentines Day, but I saved it for today because today I am 35 weeks pregnant! And just like the title says I'm counting down. I know I shouldn't be counting down already, it's just going to make the last few weeks take FOREVER, but I can't help it. As you can see, I'm huge. It makes doing everyday things pretty difficult, breathing, sleeping, eating, tying my shoes, changing Lincoln's diaper, sitting in the car for long periods of time, you name it. So that's why I'm counting down. I keep asking Aaron questions like "Hey Aaron, after Lincoln was born I had energy again right?" and "Aaron, after I had Lincoln, I started feeling like cooking dinner again, right?" I guess it's been so long since I was normal (whatever that is haha!) that I'm afraid I won't ever be again. But really I shouldn't complain because the pregnancy is going well, and I am healthy (except for the stuffy nose I've had non-stop for eight months!) and the baby is healthy, so that's good. I don't want him to come prematurely, but after he's full term, bring it on!

Moving on to more exciting topics than the woes of pregnancy... the baby's name! I was going to wait a week to let everyone guess the letters, but the suspense was killing me. Haha! Plus, my mom already guessed it (which she did with a lot of help from Suzy's guesses, so good job Suzy!) so I might as well say so. We have decided to name Shark Bait Ivan Erastus Swan. So far no one but us is really thrilled about that name, but that's ok because Aaron and I are in love with it, and that's all that matters. But let me explain why we picked it.

Ivan is Russian and means God is gracious. Ivan is a name I have always liked. It was on my list of names to name my kids before I ever met Aaron. I like it because it's not a common name, but when you see it on a piece of paper you can pronounce it just fine, and most people can spell it first try. Aaron really likes names with strong sounds like "n" "v" "c" "x" etc. And for our boys we wanted to pick strong sounding names. Ivan is perfect. It sounds good yelled at a baseball game, "C'mon Ivan, hit the ball!" And it also sounds good as a general authority, "Ivan E. Swan of the seventy will be our concluding speaker." :) It sounds like the name of someone who could look you in the eye and give you a firm handshake. I like that. Plus, it was one of the few first names Aaron and I agreed on.

Erastus is Greek and means Loved. Since Aaron is taking a Family History class this semester, we have been working a lot on our family history, and are both getting really into it. We thought it would be really cool if we could find a middle name from our family history. As it turns out, Aaron's dad's grandfather's name is Charles Erastus Swan. After we had picked out Ivan, we tried out a lot of other family names as the middle name, but nothing felt like it flowed really well. Aaron was the one to suggest Erastus, and I immediately liked the sound of it, not to mention the fact that it's not your typical middle name. So we looked it up and discovered it meant Loved. We also happen to really like names that have a cool meaning (as opposed to the ones that are like "from the grassy hill" or whatever). We tried it out, checked the initials to make sure they didn't spell anything awkward, and pretty much fell in love with it. And that is how Ivan Erastus Swan came to be the name we chose.

Maybe once the little guy is born and is absolutely adorable the name will grow on everyone as much as it's grown on us. We hope so. And mostly we hope that he likes it and feels like it's a name he can be proud of.

What Are YOU Gonna Call Him?

Well, I know we said we weren't going to announce Shark Bait's name (or even decide on it) until after he was born, but we (probably mostly me) weren't feeling very settled about welcoming a nameless baby into the world. So we sat down for a few long hours (not all in a row, but mostly over this weekend) and picked out a name for Shark Bait. We feel really good about it, it's the only name we've both felt really settled and comfortable with, and trust me we tried it out in lots of phrases... "______ go sit in your chair." "Lincoln stop throwing toys at ______ ." And this is the name we like. Also, we really liked the way Stacey (Aaron's sister) announced what Jeremiah's name was going to be on her blog, so we decided to do something similar to make the game fun.

Here's how it works. We have taken all the letters in Shark Bait's real name (first, middle, and last) and we've mixed them all up, and you guys get to guess what his name is going to be. After a week if no one gets it, we'll put up some hints. Here are the letters....have fun!

N A S U T R A W A V E S N I S

Lincoln's Room Decor

As previously mentioned, we are working on decorating Lincoln's room in a pirate theme. We decided that this needed to include something on the wall that has his name on it. Since he was born we've had a picture frame on the wall that has his name in it, but the colors match the crib bedding that's going in the baby's room, and so we are going to put the picture frame in there as well. So that was leaving Lincoln's room pretty bare.


We decided to cut the letters of Lincoln's name out of wood, along with some anchors and hang them up in a net on the wall. The letters and anchors weren't too hard to do. We used my mom's scroll saw while we were staying up there, and we also painted them. I did the letters of his name, they are red and navy blue. Aaron is quite a bit more artistic than I am, so he did the anchors.

The next step was to get the net. We couldn't find anywhere that sold fishing net that looked like it could be on a pirate ship. So we moved to plan B, make our own. We bought some hemp twine, and with Aaron as the master mind, figured out how to tie it into a fishing net. He used a piece of cardboard to hold the ropes tight and then measured out the distance between the knots, and then he tied all the knots. There were a lot of knots. When we were all done with the net, we put Lincoln in it, just for fun, and swung him like it was a hammock. Linc thought that was great fun, and whenever we would have the net lying on the ground he would go and lie on it, in hopes that we would swing him again.


After that we had to tie the letters into the net. Aaron did that by drilling holes into them and threading some twine through and tying that on to the net. It looks great. The letters kind of remind me of little fish caught in our net. :) The last step was to wrap the rope around the anchors. Aaron also figured out how to do this and make it look authentic. I'm telling ya, my husband is amazing. He has all the hidden talents, like making rope, that he just whips out when we need them. I love it!

Then of course we got to hang it on Lincoln's wall. It looks awesome. I'm really excited to get the rest of his bedding sewn so that it all comes together and matches.

Heart Day

Happy Valentines Day! Our day wasn't super exciting actually, Aaron spent the morning on campus working on homework. Then we cleaned our house. For dinner we invited Aaron's brother Kelly over. We had a red and white themed dinner. Spaghetti with meatballs, heart shaped french bread, salad, cranberry juice mixed with gingerale with heart ice cubes, all on heart shaped plates. Oh, and of course the heart shaped chocolate chip cookies for dessert. Kelly thought I was weird, but I'm sure I get it from my mother. :)

This is the valentine I made for Aaron this year. Niether of us really made a big deal out of the holiday. Inside his heart are some reeses peanutbutter cups, his favorite candy. Yes, if you can't tell, I made the heart my self...I was going for authentic heart shape...or something like that. Haha! The "with love" part is supposed to be attached, but as soon as I hung up the valentine, Uncle Kelly lifted Lincoln up to see, and Lincoln promptly pulled it off. Oh well. Lincoln got a heart shaped magna doodle. It's mini so it will fit in the diaper bag for church.

Happy Valetines Day 2009!