can i re-do monday?

my sister andrea is out camping on the pismo dunes for 2 weeks. so i've been in charge of watching over her house, dog, fish, and mail. saturday jaren and i went together to check on everything. all was well. sunday jaren didn't want to go. but i dragged him anyways using the, "what if something happens to me" line. again all was well. then of course on monday, my first day going alone, i pull up to find that her house had been broken into!! AHH!!! her screen door (which i KNOW i locked) was open and so was one of her front windows and the planter box was knocked over. of course i start freaking out not knowing if someone was currently inside the house. so as i was calling her to let her know what had happened, i see a sheriff driving up the street. i flagged him down and he was actully responding to her house. her alarm company had notified them when her alarm was going off and no one was responding. so apparently the burglar had been in the house a mere 20 MINUTES EARLIER! as the sheriff was walking through the house with his taser gun drawn he was telling me that an hour before he got the call for andreas house, an elderly lady around the corner had come home to find a burglar in her house! so this guy was casing the area obviously and they had a great description of him. well it didnt seem like anything was missing from andreas. including her flat screen tv which was a shock. and thankfully she had taken all the christmas gifts with her to the beach. which she debated about doing for a few days. so she made the right decision. no word on if they found the guy or not. still weird he broke into the house through the window, didn't take anything, and left through the front door. odd! oh, and of course it was POURING rain during all of this to add to the craziness!!

last weekend before christmas! yay!

i can't believe i went to walmart yesterday! i ordered a gift for jaren but the shipping was more than the item was. weird huh?! so i had it shipped to the store for free. i didn't think it would take almost 4 weeks to get here. anyways our walmart looked like a bomb went off and was probably at full capacity! and the item was awkwardly packaged in an odd shape which made it hard for me to carry. and i forgot to grab a cart as i entered the store. so here i am, big ol' pregnant lady waddling through walmart with this huge oddly shaped box, having issues of course, and getting cut off left and right! the nerve of some people, GEESH!

and here are my finished ornaments

(minus the ribbon, made almost 50 of them)

our friend mike came over tonight to pick up his plate of goodies and thought they were cookies. plus my house has had an OVERWHELMING smell of cinnamon for a few days now. im pretty sure he would have snuck one in if we didn't warn him. ewww... can you imagine how bad these would taste? YUCK!

Christmas ideas

in a creative funk and not sure what to do? here's some christmas crafts i've done throughout the years and thought i'd share...

of course there's the popular rudolph brownies.

this is santas underwear that i stuffed with candy and a note saying, "i searched for a stocking, and couldn't find a spare, so i ended up stuffing santas red underwear." this isn't the exact one i made, very similar though. i sewed the entire thing up except the backflap and that's where the candy came from. i made these 10 yrs ago (oh my gosh, its been THAT long!) as a handout at church for my friends :)

one year in young womens i got a handout and have made it again throughout the years. it's the poem of the christmas nail.

It's Christmas time at our house and we're putting up the tree.

I wish I could find some simple way to remember Christ's gift to me.

Some little sign or symbol to show friends stopping by,

The little babe was born one day but He really came to die.

Some symbol of His nail-pierced hands, the blood He shed for you and me.

What if I hung a simple nail on my shining Christmas tree?

A crimson bow tied round the nail as His blood flowed down so free,

to save each person from their sin and redeem us for eternity.

I know it was His love for us that held Him to the tree,

But when I see this simple nail I know He died for me.
by John Patton

i simply went to home depot and bought a box of nails. then got gold string and used that as the hanger for the ornament. then tied a red ribbon around the nail. its probably one of the main ornaments we always look for every year as we unpack the christmas boxes.

one year while we were living in huntington beach, my mom asked me to make starfish ornaments for family members that live in new york. again, these aren't the EXACT ones i made, but very similar.

i made a santa one with golfclubs and a golfbag. and another santa wearing boardshorts with a football. i wonder why i don't have pictures of them? hmm..

and this year i'm making the cinnamon applesauce ornaments that are drying right now. once i have them decorated i'll post pictures. i wish i would have done it earlier this month so i could mail them to people. but i guess i'll have my gift for next year :) i'm also making my favorite peanut butter ball recipe and the rudolph brownies for jarens co-workers. hence the reindeer poop silly gift. cause they're all a bunch of sickos like that! lol.

better day!

jaren finally was able to hit the road at 1130am today. he was worried about checking out of the hotel at noon and having the grapevine NOT open today and then not be able to get another hotel room for the night. but all is well and he's finally back home and bugsy missed him TERRIBLY!!

as for me, i did manage to sleep last night even though bugsy woke up a few times and just wandered the house whining. its like he knew something had changed. dogs are weird. i also had an appt for my 1 hr. pre-natal massage and oh my goodness it was AWESOME!! nathan was kicking up a storm during it, so i couldn't relax completly but it still felt amazing! then i "treated" (ya right) myself to the nightmare of walmart 1 wk before christmas so i could finish up some final christmas touches. jaren made it home from work safely and wanted to go out for dinner. a few weeks ago at his company christmas party, they gave us a gift card to tahoe joe's steak house. WOW! it was delish! unfortunatly we will NEVER pay $27 for a steak and more than likely will never go back there again. LOL. but the memories will be great!

did anyone hear about the shark that "commited suicide?" kinda funny and kinda not. it happened at the atlantis resort in the bahamas. a shark jumped 18 inches out of its habitat and landed on the nearby waterslide which she then slid down into the pool. unfortunatly the pool was chlorinated and she didn't make it too long :( CRAZY THOUGH!

winter weather!

really chaps my behind sometimes! as im writing this, my poor husband is stuck in a hotel room in castaic thanks to the grapevine getting shutdown due to the snow. his boss told him around 2pm to not even chance the mountains and just pull off for the night to know that he's safe. his truck doesn't have a sleeper like his other trucks do. and of course he's totally unprepared to stay somewhere for the night. but i'm sure he'll be just fine. lets just hope i don't go into labor! LOL. of course that won't happen, but if it does, im in trouble! since im sure i won't be getting any sleep, i guess i'll wrap his gifts i have hidden around the house. also im going to attempt to make cinnamon applesauce ornaments. and all my supplies were around $5! hope they turn out how they're pictured online!

and here's aaron and andrew just for giggles :)

yay for more gifts! :)

i didn't blog about them yesterday because i didn't have pictures of them yet, but now i do :) so my aunt cheryl stopped by my house last week and brought more baby gifts and i love them!

first was an outfit from my cousin rachel and its just the cutest thing!

i think the little plaid cargo shorts with the little sandals are just ADORABLE!!!

kudos to her for her great taste ;)

then came the gift from my aunt and it was the diaper bag we registered for. jaren was REALLY excited someone got it for us! it was like the 1 thing HE registered for and wanted it to be "manly" enough for when he has to use it.

so thank you big time to my aunt cheryl and cousin rachel!!!

Happy December

As we were putting up our tree this year Bugsy noticed that the ornaments looked just like his rubber toy ball! So he patiently waited right next to them for the ok to get one and eat it up.

of course we gave in ;)

we also received a package this weekend from my mother in law that included this beautiful handmade blanket from jarens aunt marilyn. its adorable and im counting down the days until we get to use it!
also included in the package was our handcrafted crib bedding set from nathans wonderful grandma gilbert :) its AMAZING! included was a bed skirt, bumper pads, and an adorable quilt! we're also impatiently counting down the days until we can fill that bed with our baby ;)

also an update on my nephew aaron... he had his cleft lip surgery last monday, the 8th.
here is his last picture before surgery.

here he is 1 day post-op wearing his arm braces that restrict him from touching his lip and messing with the stitches.
and here he is 1 week later looking happy as usual and on his way to recovery.

a big thank you to everyone who has sent us christmas cards! they all look GREAT! our plans this christmas include us staying at home, sleeping, and probably setting up the nursery. so as we're looking right now, 1 week we'll celebrate christmas. the next will be new years. then our baby shower. then my due date! and hopefully he won't make an early arrival between now and then :)