Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Privacy Needed??

The lack of posts lately is due more to the fact that our camera was having issues than that Everett hasn't been up to fun stuff. I feel like the past few posts have really neglected our favorite little guy, so here's an update: Mr. E is now 16 months old (only 5 more Sundays until he goes into Nursery!!) and becoming quite the little man. He can say apple, diaper, Dad and every now and then I swear he says Mama. He LOVES to wear shoes and is currently obsessed with a blue and red velcro pair from Target. He has been known to go down for naps with the shoes on, as well as in hand. It's gotten to the point where I sometimes hide the shoes so I don't have to fiddle with him wanting them on, then off, then on again. His shoe obsession extends to Will and me too. Every morning he runs to get Will's shoes for him and if I'm going around barefoot, he'll find my flip-flops, bring them to me and won't leave me alone until I've put them on.

Everett has been a one-nap man for about four months now, but it has just been in the last couple of weeks that he's started taking that one nap in the afternoon. He hung on to the morning for as long as he could, but now he's going down between noon and one, which has been absolutely lovely for me.

The weather here has been gorgeous for the entire month of March, so we've been spending many an afternoon at the park. E loves the kiddie swing and climbing up the slide on his feet (with Mom's help, naturally) and then sliding back down, feet first, on his tummy. I can't begin to tell you how much joy this way of sliding has brought him. Everett also enjoys any type of ball. Soccer ball, baseball, golf ball, oversized basketballs. He thinks they are the bees knees and his face lights up whenever he's within a 50 ft radius of a ball.

Our little guy has also been reading up a storm. I must admit, I've been really anxious for him to show some kind of interest in books, and now that he has, I'm day-dreaming of the time when we'll have juvenile fiction books in our home (Juvenile fiction is only some of the greatest reading ever!!). Some of my favorite childhood memories are of reading some great juvenile fiction. Anyway, E's favorites these days are "Thomas and the School Trip", "Clifford the Big, Red Dog", "Zoom, Zoom, Zoom, I'm Off to the Moon!" and "Dr. Seuss's ABC Book". I almost have all of the Thomas book and the Clifford book memorized, thank you very much! Who says your memory goes down the toliet when you get pregnant and have kids??

And perhaps what is definitely signifying that Everett is growing up is the following: He must have some sort of privacy when going to the bathroom. You know, the serious, must concentrate type of bathroom. The other day he and I were playing around in his room having a grand old time. He was all smiles and giggles and then, for some reason (yes, folks, I'm a tad slow sometimes), he would NOT look at me for anything. I thought maybe he was trying to play a game, but when he peeked out over the folder, I could tell him was getting down to "business". Everett, no worries, Mom has learned her lesson and will be giving you all the privacy you need to get the job done!








Monday, March 12, 2007

Whirlwind in Washington D.C.

Last week was Will's Spring Break (I know, it's still amazing to me that colleges actually GET spring breaks. I wonder when BYU will get hip and start giving it's students a well-deserved break in the middle of Winter Semester?) and we spent it in our nation's capital. We left early Tuesday morning and returned to the ATL late Friday evening. It was such a wonderful trip!!
Especially since my mom graciously agreed to watch Everett for the week. A whole four days without the little man??? We love the little guy to pieces, but it was so wonderful to be able to set our own schedule, take only one suitcase, eat when we wanted to, and not have to take into account E's nap/sleep schedule. Plus, it was pretty cold there, so we were glad we left Everett in 70 degree warmth.
Will and I fell in love with D.C. What a neat city! I had been there once before in 5th grade, but Will had never been. We crammed as much as we could into our visit and we still missed out on a ton of stuff. We've decided we'll have to do one of two things: 1) Move there or 2) Visit frequently. We're up for either option.
We took as many photos as we could and quite a bit of video as well. We were the quinessential tourists, complete with backpack, cameras, maps and of course, our Fodor guidebook. Here are some of the better pictures and I'll see if I can't figure out how to post video from our camcorder as well.

Oh! And many thanks to our friends, Craig and Jennifer, for letting us crash at their place. Plus, Shanna, Michelle, Eric, Ryan, Lacey and little Aubrey for making time in their busy schedules to visit with us and share a good meal!

At the Atlanta Airport waiting to board our flight. That BYU hat was such a conversation starter! We met someone at the airport, the Washington Monument and elsewhere who spoke to us simply because they recognized the "Y".


One of the first things we saw, besides the International Spy Museum, was the National Archives. It was awesome to see the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Magna Carta (the Declaration of Independence wasn't on display due to some work they were doing on it). And for the record, the room didn't look anything like it did in National Treasure!


Next up was going up, up, up 550 ft. to the top of the Washington Monument. We could see all over downtown D.C.!









On Wednesday, we drove over to Annapolis to check out the U.S. Naval Academy. We saw the D.C. Temple from the interstate, we ate at the famous Chick and Ruth's Delly, saw the Maryland State House, walked down Main Street in the snow and visited the United States Naval Academy.














On Thursday we saw Ford's Theater, the White House, the Air and Space Museum, the Museum of Natural History, the Capitol, the Holocost Museum, the Supreme Court Building and the Library of Congress.


















Ok, I am now far too frustrated to continue this post. Pictures are taking forever to load and are being funny about placement. Sometimes I really, really miss the old Blogger. Sigh. Suffice it to say, we had a WONDERFUL trip, saw too many more things to list, and simply can't wait to return. Yea for Spring Break and Washington D.C.!!

Wednesday, February 28, 2007

A Welcomed Addition

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. I've been waiting until today because I wanted to have a picture to go along with this post. We are so thrilled to announce that we are expecting a new addition to our family!! I am 10 weeks pregnant and the EDD is September 25th. We couldn't be happier and even though Will wants a boy, I know he'll be happy with a girl as well. Here's the first photo of our little muchkin. We saw the heartbeat and if you look closely, you can see it's hands and feet. At one point during the ultrasound, I swear he/she waved to us! It was a neat moment, especially since Will and Everett were there as well.


Pregnancy this time has been so different for me. Everett's pregnancy was an absolute breeze. No sickness, no nausea, no nothing. I haven't been as lucky this time around. I've had tons of nausea and there's even been vomitting as well (Which I'm really bummed about since I was going on quite the record for not vomitting - since 8th grade!). I'm looking forward to a smoother 2nd trimester, so keep your fingers crossed for me.

So now you're in on our good news! Any tips on handling two children vs. one would be greatly appreciated! Also, any name suggestions for girls, since between the two of us we've only come up with one that we even remotely like, and we're disagreeing on the spelling. Boys names we're set with, but girls?!? Yikes!

PS - And I would be remiss if I didn't give a birthday shoutout to one of my favorite gals, Jessica. Happy 27th!!! I'm always glad when Jessica's birthday rolls around since, for some reason, it doesn't make me feel so old anymore. I hope Scott and the kiddos treat you well today!!

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Happy Valentine's Day!

As this is my second Valentine's Day as a mom, this commerical makes me giddy and smiley all over. It's for Publix grocery stores, which I believe are only in the Southeast. So to all my friends in the West, Mid-West, Northeast and anywhere else, enjoy!

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Congrats to Will!

Will is in his last calendar year of school at Georgia State. And although we are both excited for him to finish, Will CAN'T wait to graduate already!!
And as some of you know, Will has had a long and illustrious school career, due to things like working to pay for his mission, his mission, his "tour de schools" out West, his accident, and of course, transferring to a Georgia school where he started with a whopping 12 credits to his name.
Also, as some of you may know, Will has chosen to major in Finance and go into the financial services industry. He wants to help people manage their money, plan for retirement, buy life insurance and invest. He has been looking at one company in particular and has had a couple of interviews as well. We are thrilled to report that Will has earned a paid internship with Mass Mutual! The internship has all sorts of perks, one of the main ones being that most likely, it will transition into a full-time job upon graduation. YAHOOOOOOO!!! Congratulations Will! We are so proud of you!

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Three Years Already?!

If you're like Will and me, you can hardly believe we've been blissfully wedded for three whole years. Time really flies! Today was a much prettier day than three years ago when we were sealed in the Atlanta Temple. There are so many reasons I'm grateful that I'm married to such a wonderful man. We truly are each other's perfect complements. Not a day has gone by that I haven't been amazed by Will and thankful that we are eternal companions. But as this is our third anniversary, I'll list three things I especially love about Will:

1) He makes me laugh every single day
2) He loves to stay busy and rarely complains
3) He has such a strong, firm testimony of the gospel

For various reasons, we agreed to take our anniversary easy this year, with promises to do more in the years to come. So imagine my surprise when I found these waiting for me this morning:


Thank you Will for three fabulous years and here's to many, many, MANY more!

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Mr. Copycat

When we were in Utah, Jessica's kids taught Everett the following trick:


Photo Sharing - Upload Video - Video Sharing - Share Photos

Crafty is As Crafty Does

As some of you may know, one of my goals for 2007 is to become a bit more crafty. The first thing I decided to tackle was vinyl-lettering, which I learned is all the rage in Utah. Anyway, these are my first two projects and I'm pretty excited about them, so I decided what better way to showcase them than to blog about them??

The first tile is a wedding present for my friend, Melissa, who's getting hitched in THREE days!!! I really hope she likes the gift. I think it's cute, personal and looks (key word) like I spent a lot of time/effort/cash on it. What do you think?



And while I was at it, I couldn't resist crafting one for myself. I chose a green color since I'm trying to pull my living room together somehow!


I still have two more vinyl-letting projects to do, but this time I'm going to use a wooden board. Expect to see pictures of those masterpieces coming soon!

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Our Little Helper

It's nice to know if Will needs help with a household chore, Everett is willing to lend a hand:


We're willing to hire him out. If any of you need some help around the house, just remember that Everett is only a phone call away!


Such service!
Such helpfulness!
Such a cutie!

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Natalie's 100 Things

Since I've had so much fun reading everyone else's 100 Things, I thought I'd share 100 Things of my own. Enjoy! (And yes, I thought coming up with 100 things about me was difficult!)

1) I'm 50% Mexican and no, I'm not fluent in Spanish
2) Growing up I played softball and basketball


3) I took piano for 4 painful years and have never regretted quitting
4) My favorite food is rice
5) I’m the 2nd child in my family, but the oldest girl
6) I’ve never broken a bone
7) I’m extremely clumsy
8) During my junior year of high school, I was 2nd runner-up in my school's beauty pageant


9) I played basketball in high school
10) I was on the TV announcements in high school for two years
11) I had my wisdom teeth out at age 12
12) Strawberries are my favorite fruit

13) I LOVE to sleep!
14) I was a published author by age 9
15) I’ve always wanted to be blonde
16) Growing up, I always wanted braces and used to pretend my gum was a retainer.
17) I still would like glasses
18) I love surfing the Internet and getting emails
19) I went to Spain for two weeks with my sister when she was 18 and I was 20 – not with a group or anything – just the two of us
20) I’ve been to a taping of “The Daily Show w/Jon Stewart” in NYC
21) My first job out of college was a tour guide at CNN
22) My second job was working for three General Authorities, one of whom was Elder Gene R. Cook
23) I met my husband at a Young Single Adult dance in Atlanta
24) I took the AP Spanish test my senior year of high school and to this day it’s the hardest test I’ve ever taken
25) I think hummus is yummy
26) Cheesecake is my favorite dessert



27) I went on a cruise for my honeymoon. It stopped in Belize, Honduras, Grand Cayman and Cozumel.
28) I’ve always wanted to skydive
29) I was the same major all during college until my very last semester when I changed it.
30) I wrote for the Daily Universe (BYU’s newspaper)
31) I also was an editor for the Daily Universe for six semesters.

32) I’ve had my picture taken with Harry Connick Jr.
33) I love the movie “Newsies”
34) I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE absolutely any version of “Pride and Prejudice”
35) I’m not such a great singer
36) I love speaking in public/church
37) I have a loud laugh
38) I’ve gone to movies by myself – including opening night of “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets”

39) I got to live in a $1.2 million dollar home for four months – for free!
40) I’ve never gotten a speeding ticket
41) I love to play games
42) I haven’t thrown up since the 8th grade
43) I love to Google people I used to know
44) The first time I met my husband, he was in a wheelchair
45) My husband and I were married six months after our first date
46) I’ve always wanted to live, just for a little while, in NYC
47) I totally want to live overseas
48) I’d love to go on an African safari
49) I’ve been to Nicaragua

50) I’ve never had the flu
51) I had to have an emergency C-section, after 12 hours of non-medicated labor, in order to deliver Everett


52) I still want to have a natural childbirth
53) I’d like to have more boys than girls, but that dang ring test says it isn’t to be!
54) My goal weight is to get back to my college weight
55) I love to play Ultimate Frisbee
56) I hate running just to run. I’d rather be playing a sport

57) I like the beach, but don’t like to swim in the ocean

58) I used to have six piercings in my ears (three in each)
59) The smell of smoke makes me want to hurl
60) I love to read
61) I don’t know a lot of the really common Primary songs, even though I grew up in the church and went to Primary every Sunday.
62) I was Hall President of my Freshman dorm
63) I was nominated “Most Talkative” for a Senior Superlative, but didn’t win
64) My favorite color is red


65) My first kiss was my Freshman year of high school at age 15
66) I share my birthday with Joseph Smith Jr. (Dec. 23rd)

67) I hate my birthdate. Oh how I’ve always wanted a summer birthday!

68) I love to clean
69) I vacuum at least twice a week
70) I love the smell of bleach, chlorine and laundry detergent
71) I graduated with a degree in Print Journalism
72) I was Assistant Editor at Atlanta Home Improvement magazine
73) I love “Anne of Green Gables” and used to say over and over in my mind, “Gilbert
Blythe says being smart is better than being good-looking”
74) I’ve always thought that given the chance, Prince William and I could be good friends
75) I love British accents and movies
76) I’ve had dinner with Alton Brown, from the Food Network’s “Good Eats”
77) Nine times out of ten I take reading material to the bathroom
78) I like to sleep in matching pjs


79) I always wash my face and brush my teeth before bedtime
80) I love to cook

81) I’ve driven from Provo to Atlanta in three days BY MYSELF!
82) I like to watch college football and basketball
83) I’m a HUGE Harry Potter fan
84) I’d love to write a book
85) Seafood is super duper yummy
86) I went through the temple without an upcoming marriage or mission. It would actually
be 2 and ½ years before Will and I were sealed.
87) I’m pretty easy going
88) I love to watch any kind of trivia show. Jeopardy is a favorite
89) My wedding day and reception went exactly the way I’d always wanted it to

90) I’ve always wanted children with blue eyes
91) I love office supplies
92) I like to color with crayons
93) I was vice-president of my freshman class in high school
94) I don’t wear white shoes before Easter or after Labor Day
95) I have a pretty good memory and always remember the most random facts about people
96) I can’t wait to go to Italy, Ireland, England, France, Australia, New Zealand, most of South America, and pretty much everywhere else one day!
97) I can’t roll my tongue
98) I talk and make lots of strange noises in my sleep
99) Thursday is my favorite day of the week, hands down
100) I’ve never been to Disney World or Disney Land

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Christmas 2006 Trip to Utah

We decided it was be really fun for our little family of three to take a Christmas vacation to Utah. Since both Will and I used to live there and missed certain things, and also since we've been promising Jessica and Scott we'd come see them for the last, oh I don't know, 5 or 6 Conferences now, we figured a vacation was in order. We had a LOVELY time and hope to make a Christmas vacation a regular thing.

We took a ton of pictures, but they're mostly of Everett, so here's our trip through Everett's prespective:

We flew out on Christmas Day and stayed a couple of days in Bounitful with our good friends, the Phillips. Everett not only saw and felt snow for the first time, but he also got to see the Bountiful Temple.



Uh, yeah, I don't think he was a big fan.

We also went to Temple Square as well and the Joseph Smith Memorial Building where we met a 14 year-old boy who was also named Everett and thought it was the coolest thing in the world to meet another Everett.

All of the Christmas decorations were up and in the following two pictures Everett goes from not very happy to full-on grin - all due to the fact that I pulled out the camera.


Next, we headed to Provo so I could reminisce about my college days. We went to Cafe Rio (YUM!), the Malt Shoppe (banana cream pie shake, please) and of course, BYU campus. We had a blast hitting up the Bookstore for some BYU gear and Will now feels like a 100% Mormon with his BYU shirts, hat and jacket. Everett did NOT have fun being bundled up, but did have fun wandering around the Wilk.

Everett's also pretty happy whenever he can get his sticky hands on either of our cell phones. Oh and he knows the difference between a real one and a toy one!

And he's figured out that it goes next to his ear, but hasn't quite mastered the technique yet.

Of course, our trip was filled with plenty of naps for our little man - you can see one trip to the Bookstore has totally wiped him out.

A lot of our trip was spent feeding Everett and this night was no exception. Before this trip he'd only eaten at McDonald's once. And now?? Don't ask! But judging by the following pictures of his tummy, you'll get an idea...





During this trip we also learned that Everett has discovered how to invert the nipple on his sippy cup, as evidenced below:



And one of the highlights (at least for me) was spending time with good friends, Scott and Jessica and their kiddos Ethan and Grace. Everett really liked Ethan and Grace, although I'm not sure the reverse is true.

So yes, it was one heckuva trip! It was cold, we saw snow, ate some good food, did fun things, made some cool purchases, spent time with friends and generally had a fantastic time. Yahoo!!!!

PS - Can you believe we met on my 2nd day in Provo in August of 1998?!?! How can we both be married with children when I still feel like I'm 18?

About Me

My photo
Two crazy lovebirds + three cute kids = The Fab Five