I've Been Tagged

On August 24...

20 years ago I was... not quite 8 and getting really ready for school to start. I always hated summers because by the end I was pretty bored. I guess I'm crazy, but I've always liked school. =) I was living with my family in Rose Valley, WA.

10 years ago I was... not quite 18 and getting ready for my senior year of high school in Kent, WA. I was doing daily double volleyball practices and pretty pumped up about being the varsity starting setter. I was also practicing the piano like crazy in hopes of auditioning for music programs at colleges in which I was interested.

5 years ago I was... getting prepared for fall piano lessons to start (teaching part time), working at North Valley Friends Church as their secretary and hoping beyond hope that my boyfriend of several years (Seth) would soon propose (unfortunately for me, he waited until the middle of December!). We had both recently graduated from George Fox University and Seth was just starting his graduate program in clinical psychology. I was living in Sherwood, OR with my friend, Tara.

3 years ago I was... again preparing for fall piano lessons to start, but this time on a full-time basis. Seth and I were gearing up for our 2nd year of marriage and he was still in graduate school at GFU. We were living in Dundee, OR.

1 year ago I was... finding out I was pregnant! Seth and I had recently moved to SLC, UT and we had both just started new jobs. I was working in the Art Department at the University of Utah.

So far this year... I've dealt all day with a cranky baby, deep cleaned my apartment in preparation for moving to WY and watched the Olympic closing ceremonies.

Yesterday I... packed some boxes, played with my Ellie and blogged.

Tomorrow I will... pack more boxes, do much more cleaning, continue to play with my sweetie baby and try to keep my stressed-out mind from remembering that we move in 2 days.

Next year I will... who knows! I will be living in Sheridan, WY and probably be teaching piano lessons again. I will be taking care of a 15 month old, and therefore probably running around like crazy. =) This one is hard because there are so many possibilities!

I tag: Natalie, Lindsey, Amanda and Lynn

Here's What Eleanor Thinks of Mommy Blogging All Day

Past and Present

So much has happened this summer! I suppose I've updated you all with the most important, big events, but taking time to sit down and write (while our internet is working) is tough these days, so the less intense moments have not gotten shared. :) I love that this blog really encapsulates our year here in Utah and I'd like to be able to look back at it in the future with fondness and a sense that it is fairly complete... thus a slew of back posts. Feel free to read them if you so choose, but also feel free to skip them as they are mostly for remembrance sake.

Daddy Makes Me Giggle
Packing
Reaching
Rolling, Rolling, Rolling
Grandma Came to Visit!
Eleanor Goes Camping
Aliesje's in SLC!
House Hunting
Grandpa's First Visit (with Grandma, too)
Daddy's a Doctor
2 Month Check-Up
4th of July in Sheridan
Bridge Moving
Ellie's First Hike

Packing

Seth, Ellie and I are working hard at packing up our Utah Adventure. Boxes abound and our "home" feels quite disassembled, but it is good to feel progress toward our new life. Ellie is such a help during this tumultuous time as she smiles and giggles, coos and kicks. I'm thankful for her and amazed at how well she helps us keep perspective in the midst of stress.

Evenings here are slow and comfortable. By the time 7:30 or so hits, Ellie is ready for chill time with Mom and Dad. We generally hang out in the living room these evenings, watching the Olympics and playing with our gal. She's getting more and more entertaining and it's fun as she interacts with us more and more. Her most recent "game" is pushing herself up to standing on our laps (something she's done for a long time) and then suddenly releasing her knees and sitting down hard into our laps (the new part). She will do this Stand/Sit game over and over and over again, sometimes acting very serious about it and sometimes giggling madly.

Reaching

Eleanor has recently discovered her hands. She will stretch them out in front of her and examine them carefully as she slowly moves her fingers. Sometimes she will now reach for toys that dangle in front of her. She loves her play mat, especially the green and blue duck that hangs above her head. I think, for me, the most interesting piece of this development is watching her turn over to her tummy on her play mat and see her pick at the brightly colored pictures on the mat. It is fascinating to see her begin to put together the differences between 2 dimensional and 3 dimensional objects. She surprises us often with new reaching skills. Just a few days ago, I turned around to the carnival-like music that comes from her bouncy seat - she had her left hand solidly around the pull lever and was delightedly pulling it and listening to the music.

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

Ellie decided to roll over in both directions today. I can't tell you how much this helped me!

I was, stressfully, running errands while Seth stayed at home with Eleanor. In the middle of trying to send a fax that was not wanting to be sent, I got a phone call from Seth. With a slight inward groan, as I assumed it would be bad news (not a good attitude, I know), I answered and asked for confirmation of the fax number I was trying to reach. While Seth looked for the number, he also told me: "Eleanor decided to really roll over today. I left her on her back on her play mat and when I came back a few seconds later, she was on her belly. I left her that way while I went to get coffee and when I returned she was back on her back!" All I can say is, it is wonderful to get fun news about your baby while trying to take care of tiresome moving details. We love you Ellie!

Since that day, Ellie has continued rolling and rolling. It's nice that she can now choose to be on her tummy - it makes tummy time much easier!

These pictures were taken a bit before she decided she likes rolling over a bit more... first is the fuss, then you can see things turn out just fine as she decides to take a nap.

Grandma Came to Visit!

Since we finally have a time-line for our move, Ruthie was able to come out and visit us here in SLC one last time. It was great to see her and for Ellie to have Grandma around again! We had a good time. It was all very low-key and that was perfect. We spent lots of time hanging around at home, playing with El, watching the Olympics, chatting, etc. We also went out for a few fun meals (hooray for the Spaghetti Factory! and how great is Ruth's Diner!?) and spent one whole day shopping. This wasn't normal shopping, however, it was "clean out Bethany's purse" shopping. It meant we got to go shopping, but used only gift cards (really important as we will no longer live near many of our favorite stores). I'm super excited for this fall now, because Ellie has some really great, super cute, clothes to wear!

Thanks for coming, Ruthie! We had a great time and we can't wait to see you and Jon again in October!

Eleanor Goes Camping

Here we go!

Lower Provo River - our campsite!


Ellie for the first time in the tent.

Snuggled up for a cold night... now it's time to take those layers off!

We saw a lot of wild life... and a herd of cows with their calves... I guess we were in open range country.

Isn't she beautiful?

So interested in everything outside.

We took Ellie on her first camping trip this week. We were really hoping to make a trip down to southern Utah, but unfortunately they are currently have flash floods. We decided not to wander into that danger zone... Instead, we headed for the beautiful Wasatch Mountains and camped alongside the Lower Provo River (literally alongside). One of my favorite memories of the trip is Seth getting out of the car to check out a campsite and skipping back toward us asking, "Can we camp here, please!?!" I didn't realize it at the time, but the river ran beside our campsite on two sides. Seth had a great time using his brand new fly fishing rod while we were out. He even caught one tasty treat for us! :)

Eleanor did great during our trip. She was mild mannered in the car, chill while outside, loved staring at the trees and fire, and slept well as normal. I was fairly concerned about her warmth at night, since it got fairly cold, but she seemed to handle it just fine. Luckily, I hadn't yet packed all her fleecy jammies, etc, so we had a pretty cute, bundled-up bug on our hands.

It was nice to get our fill of marshmellows and hotdogs, the outdoors and campfires in the midst of this crazy time. Hopefully we'll be able to get in a few more camping trips this fall, once we've settled ourselves a bit in Sheridan. I hear the Big Horn Mountains are beautiful in the autumn and have some great hiking, fishing and camping.

Aliesje's in SLC

My best friend from college, Aliesje King, has just moved to SLC. She's gotten herself a job as a middle school and high school science teacher. Exciting stuff. We are super glad she's finally here, safe and sound, and hope her transition into life here in the valley goes well. We are sad we'll be moving here soon, but are thankful for the short time of overlap.

Liesje and her family came in on the 31st and we all went out to a fun dinner. It was good to see them again and to catch up. Of course, Ellie stole the show and kept up all our spirits after long days of driving and unloading boxes.

Since then, we've enjoyed spending time with Liesj shopping, eating and getting in a few chill moments. It is fun to see her interact with Eleanor and her presence has been immeasurably helpful to me during my times of ridiculous stress and imbalance. As always, Aliesje, you help me remember to be, love and breathe a little more. Thanks.

More of our beautiful girl!

Ellie is growing so fast! We love all the changes she's making and are having more fun with her every day. She can now lay on her tummy and hold her head high while pushing up her chest with her arms. She's rolled over 2 or 3 times from front to back. She loves to roll around on her back and often gets herself stuck on one side or the other. She also has discovered her voice... a wonderful and horrible thing. :) We love all her new noises and faces, but she learned how to yell just a few days ago... fun for her and cute to us right now... we'll see how we feel about it in a couple of days. She is still a very happy and healthy baby. She smiles and giggles often. We are delighted to have such a strong, vivacious babe.

A New Home

Last week, Seth, Eleanor and I headed up to Sheridan, Wyoming to look for housing for the next year or so. We were unsure whether we would decide to rent or buy... but once we realized there were a total of 3 rental properties available in Sheridan and the surrounding area, we dove deep into the 82 real estate listings available in our price range! After 3 days of walking through almost 20 houses we felt pretty good about our prospects. We put in an offer on what we considered the most promising and 3 days later found ourselves signing papers on our first house. I feel so grown up... so, barring any unforeseen complications, Seth and I will close on 323 2nd West Parkway on August 30th. We're excited to get to live in one place for 5 years or so... I can't wait to be done moving!

Here are some pictures of our to-be home (obviously it will look TOTALLY different with all our stuff in it instead of a stranger's... but you'll get the idea):

From the front...

Front door

Inside the front door... living room

From the living room into the dining room

Kitchen

Back deck
Ellie's room
Master bedroom
Random piano they don't want to move... so have offered to me if I want it... hooray for collecting pianos... now I'll have 2 in the living room and one in the basement. And, random side note, I guess the long-time music teacher at Sheridan High School was the original owner of this house and taught piano lessons out of the living room for years and years. I'm getting pretty excited to start teaching lessons again...
Basement rec room... isn't the 1958 linoleum gorgeous!? haha
Basement bedroom
Stairs down to the basement