A renewed determination

This morning, as I sat in bed trying to ease myself awake, I stumbled upon my old blog. The blog linked to my maiden name email address. I spent quite a while reading posts from back before I was married, reading about what seemed so important at the time, but now I don't even remember. Evidently, in December of 2008 I was very stressed about my Latin final. It was almost surreal reading through some of those posts, most of which I don't remember at all. It feels like it was a lifetime ago.

Reading through those posts made me realize how much I value having written them. It is so easy to forget the day-to-day worries and excitements as time passes. It renewed in me a determination to blog periodically, to document those daily moments that are so fleetingly brief.

So here I am, blogging. :)

On Saturday, Justin and I dropped Jeremy off at our friends' house and made our way to downtown Sac for the Chocolate Salon.

It wasn't super big, but it was a lot of fun! Every table had free samples. We made our way around, hitting the less crowded tables first, then going back to the more popular ones. 

One table (pictured below) had a bunch of different samples of chocolate made using cocoa from different places around the world. It was cool to taste the difference, just from a different cocoa. 

We got a LOT more chocolate than is picture below; that's just what we didn't eat while we were there. Some of the chocolates were VERY fancy. There was definitely a lot of chocolate there that I wouldn't pay the price to get, so being able to sample it was fun. 

We even ran into Mary! Back when we were looking for housing here, we went to Le Grand Confectionary, where we met Mary. We chatted for almost an hour, and haven't been back since. But she remembered us! It was fun chatting with her. She's the one in the middle. 

All in all, it was a great date. We finished off the day by having dinner with the Lowry's, then playing a game called Funglish. It was a great Saturday. 

Friday was an equally great day. I spent the afternoon baking cookies with my friend Katie. Then, when Justin got home, he surprised me with a fun evening all planned out. He brought me flowers, blueberry bagels and strawberry cream cheese (one of my favorite breakfasts), then we loaded into the car and spent the evening at Scandia. It's a fun Scandinavian-themed amusement-type park. They have a few little rides (none of which we could do with Jeremy), an arcade area, and miniature golf. We did a round of golf, and by then Jeremy was ready to sleep. It was a fun surprise though, even if we didn't get quite as much time there as we would have liked. 

There's not really a story behind this picture, other than the fact that Jeremy decided there are better ways to use a fork than the conventional method. :) He's such a silly boy. 

On Saturday morning, (yes, I know I'm going all out of order) I gave both of my boys hair cuts. Jeremy did NOT like it. But we made it through, and he no longer has a mullet. I miss his long hair on top, though. I wanted to keep it longer on top, but I'm still figuring out how to do any style of haircut different than Justin's. 

In the last week or so, Jeremy has learned a new word: Amen! He knows when to say it, too. He usually jumps the gun a little, saying it when the one praying says "in the name of Jesus Christ," but I'm so excited that he is learning language so well already! Occasionally he says it in the middle of the prayer too, if it's a longer prayer. I guess he's trying to tell us to wrap it up. :) 

This means he can say 5 words: Mama, Dada, Amen, Nana (for food - started from Banana), and No. He can also do the sign for "all done", and occasionally "eat". He might say more, but that's all I can think of right now. 

He's also started walking more and more. Up until last Wednesday (Jan. 22), the most he had done was 4 steps at a time, and it was very sporadic. He'd only walk on his own every week or so. Since Wednesday though, he's been doing a LOT more walking. It's exciting and scary at the same time. It's great that he's walking and growing and all, but it means he's going to be more mobile and probably more adventurous as a result. Not sure I'm ready for that. 

Lately we've been spending a lot of time at the park. Supposedly California is in a drought... Coming from AZ it's hard to tell. But we've been capitalizing on the lack of rain by spending lots of time outside. This little boy LOVES being outside. 

The park we like to go to has a playground with this fun little tunnel, which Jeremy loves. It's always one of the things he spends the most time on. The tunnel, and the swings. 

In other news, Justin is going to be an uncle! Sort of. Our stake is doing a pioneer trek, and he has been asked to go as an "uncle". It's basically a support roll, to be extra hands and an extra priesthood holder. He's really looking forward to it. I'm excited he gets the opportunity, too, since he never went as a youth. I wish we could go as a Ma and Pa, but with no family around to watch the bear, we weren't really a good choice for it. Maybe when we move back to AZ we'll have the chance.

Since everyone else is doing it...

What can I say, I'm a follower. :) At least when it comes to blogging.

So, what's new with me? Well, last week we got rid of Jeremy's pacifier. That was not very fun. But he's just about used to it now, and surprisingly, it actually made this last Sunday easier. Since getting rid of it, he has slept less during the day, but that means he could make it through 3 hours of church without having a complete meltdown from exhaustion. On the other hand, it also means he's only taking one nap a day... Oh well, it was bound to happen eventually. 

Isn't he the cutest?!

I'm also in the process of opening up an Etsy shop with my friend, Essi. She can draw really cute little animals, and I make baby shower invitations. I'll post a link here when it's up and running. It's been a lot of fun designing them, and working with my best friend on them has been a blast! 

We watched our friends' two kids on Saturday while they went on a date. They are returning the favor this Saturday when Justin and I are going to an event called the Chocolate Salon in downtown Sacramento. I'll try to remember to post here all about it. 

Another project I'm working on is upgrading my office into a craft room. Justin has a desk in there right now, and it mostly just serves to collect junk. So I asked him if he'd mind if I kicked him out of that room, and he said sure. So, I'm getting a craft/sewing room! Right now there's still a bunch of paper and such that needs filed, but once that's done, I'll get to start rearranging and organizing.