Reflections

This past week has been full of ups and downs emotionally.
Let me go back to last Sunday. It was the day of our Christmas program in Sacrament meeting, which was scheduled to begin at 9:00. Jeff and I are both members of the Ward choir, who was providing the majority of the program, and we were supposed to be at the church at 8:00. We set our alarms to wake us up early, but then had a hard time getting out of bed. We were still pretty tired after my brother's wedding from the day before.
Suffice it to say, we didn't get to church until 8:40. We joined the choir in running through one or two songs, and then the prelude started. I had to go set up chairs in the Primary room. Jeff came and helped me, but then the 1st counselor in the bishopric had to pull me aside and talk to me about a few Primary matters. It was now 1 or 2 minutes before 9:00.
Unfortunately, I really needed to use the restroom, and I knew I wouldn't have an opportunity during Sacrament meeting. So I ended up missing the very beginning of the meeting and most of the opening song. I was pretty upset that I had to walk up to the stand while the congregation was still singing, because I felt really rude and irreverent. I felt really overwhelmed and almost broke into tears after taking my seat. I was also really exhausted from the activities of the past few days.
I really didn't want to cry, especially in front of the whole ward, so I took some deep breaths and tried to calm myself down. I reminded myself that I was participating in the Christmas program and wanted to help the congregation feel the Spirit. Then the thought crossed my mind that if the Savior was attending our Sacrament meeting, I would be able to calm myself down. After that thought I was finally able to pull myself together.
I was still a little moody during the program, though, and didn't feel the Spirit as I could have. As we approached the end of the meeting, it looked as though we would end about 10 minutes early. I started to worry about what this would mean in Primary and was only half paying attention as a man got up out of his seat among the bishopric and walked to the podium. I turned to look at him and thought, "Hey! That looks like Dallin H. Oaks." Then he started to speak, and I thought, "It even sounds like Elder Oaks."
Yep, I was a little slow... because it was Elder Oaks. I had been sitting a few seats away from an apostle of the Lord this entire time and hadn't even known it! I then remembered the thought I had earlier and realized that it had pretty much come to pass. An apostle is pretty close to having the Savior visit your Sacrament meeting. Apparently they had announced his presence at the beginning of the meeting, when I was in the restroom. I didn't notice him before I sat down because I was embarrassed and kept my eyes on the ground as I found my way to my seat.
It turned out that he didn't have any assignments that Sunday, and when that happens he always attends another ward. I think he knows my bishop - they have season tickets to the Symphony near each other or something like that - so he decided to come to our meeting.
It really put things in perspective for me. I really need to focus on what's most important and not get so caught up in my emotions. I've ridden several of these emotional rollercoasters this past week, and I find myself wanting to blame them on my pregnancy. It's nice to have an excuse, right? But I can still control my actions, and I can seek to be less reactive when I'm feeling emotional.
I'm grateful for Jeff's love, support, and understanding through all of this. But I really do want to do better. I can do better. I will do better.

Sick

On Wednesday night my stomach was feeling a little off. Then when I woke up on Thursday I was feeling nauseous. At first I wondered if it had to do with my pregnancy. I haven't been sick like that for months (and I only threw up 3 times when I did feel nauseous at the end of the first and beginning of the second trimester), but I've heard that it can crop up later. So when I threw up around 9:00, the first thing I did was try and eat something, since that's what settled my stomach before.
Well, that was the wrong choice. I felt generally icky and was a little feverish, and I threw up again around lunch time. At this point I decided to call my doctor. I was worried that Cosette wasn't getting nourishment, and I wasn't sure what the best course of action was. I hoped that it was just some kind of 24 hour stomach flu and would pass quickly, but I didn't know if I needed to do anything special. They told me to stick to an all-liquid diet on Thursday, then a BRATS diet on Friday.
Cosette was NOT a happy girl. She is the most wiggly when it's time for me to eat, and let me tell you - she was pretty wiggly on Thursday and Friday. But I was grateful for her movements, because it let me know that she was still ok while I was getting this bug out of my system.
So I took the rest of the day easy on Thursday, sleeping and sipping water and apple juice. Right before bed I tried some jello that Jeff kindly made for me. Thursday night was no fun at all. I had a really hard time sleeping and my stomach was growling something fierce, but I was still nervous about eating. I did get up at one point and have some more jello, along with some applesauce and a plain roll, but I didn't dare eat more than that.
I was finally able to sleep for a few straight hours between 2 and 5, and it was wonderful! I felt a lot better when I woke up on Friday - no longer feverish and at least semi-hungry for food. I stuck to my BRATS diet during the day and didn't really have any symptoms besides being a bit tired and weak.
I was really glad to be feeling back to normal on Saturday, since that's the day my brother Kenneth got married. That's right - my week wasn't all bad! But that will have to wait for another post.

"A date which will live in infamy"

December 7th is a historical day in US history, "a date which will live in infamy" as said by Franklin Roosevelt concerning December 7th, 1941 - the day Pearl Harbor was bombed. Well, we have discovered that not only is it a day to remember in US history, but is also a day to remember in the Anderson Family history.

I now consider that day as our day of infamy. Allow me to explain. Tuesday was quite normal, in fact, mostly uneventful till evening. As part of my elder's quorum duties, my counselor and I decided to go out and visit members of the ward. We typically do this every Tuesday night. We met some others at the church building and then headed to an apartment complex to visit.

On the way there, I was driving along minding my own business, when almost out of nowhere a Lexus SUV missed a stop sign and slammed into the back of our car. I remember seeing the SUV coming and saying to my counselor, "What's that guy doing?!". Then BAM! We got spun around and landed up on a curb. Ambulances came after a person in a nearby house called 911.

I had a bad headache afterwards and it got worse while we were taking care of insurance/police business and so I had a friend take me to the ER (after we picked up Christine). They checked me out and didn't really find any serious damage. So we went home and went to bed. I had a headache the next morning, and now my back is occasionally sore, but otherwise I am happy that I wasn't hurt worse and that Christine was not in the car with me.

Now, here's the reason why I might now consider this our family date of infamy. A few days later, Christine and I were talking about the accident we had while we were dating and remembered it was also in early December. So we checked her journal and sure enough - December 7th. Probably just a strange coincidence, but Christine and I may have to look out for trouble on that day in the future.

Oh, here are some pictures of our wrecked car. We don't know if it will be a total loss, or if they will be able to repair it. You might see in the picture how bent the tire is, may be axle damage or frame damage. Hope to find out soon what the estimate is. Who knows... maybe we'll be getting a new car for Christmas.

Changes on the horizon

I received a tutoring referral from the science teacher at my school. I met with Cassidy, a Pre-Calculus student, for the first time this past Thursday. And I can tell that I'm really going to enjoy tutoring her.
First off, she asked her mom for a tutor. It's always great teaching a student who wants to be taught, not someone who is being forced to sit through something their parents want for them.
Second, she asked a lot of questions. It's much more interactive and fun for me, and it's also easier to get to the root of the misunderstanding/confusion.
Third, I'm happy to expand to two students (I've been tutoring a Korean student now for the past two years). As I get closer to being at home full-time (I'm going to stop working at La Europa in mid-January, when the semester ends, and be a stay-at-home mom), it's nice to have a larger side income.
That's always been my plan: teach for a few years, stop when we start having kids, and tutor on the side for fun/earning an extra income. Plus, if I tutor in the evenings, I could leave Cosette with Jeff and be baby free for an hour or two each week. I've heard from several stay-at-home moms that this is a good idea.
So, that's my plan. It's actually been a blessing that I was cut to part-time at the beginning of the school year. It's allowed me to step down more gradually from full-time, to part-time, to staying at home all the time. I've realized that it's hard to stay motivated and get things done when you're home all day. It's harder than I thought it would be. So this has been a nice transition period to help me learn how to set goals and get things done at home, and also get used to not teaching. It's going to be hard leaving my students halfway through the year. I'm sure I'll blog more about that come January.

Protein Diet

Part of the Bradley method is to eat a diet high in protein. It's called the Brewer pregnancy diet and is supposed to help me avoid complications like toxemia. I need to eat 80-100 grams of protein every day. But it's also a balanced diet, made up of the following:

Daily servings
Milk - 4
Eggs - 2
Protein/Meat - 2
Green leafy vegetables - 2
Grains - 4+
Vitamin C - 1+
Other Fruits and Vegetables - 1+
Fats/Oils - 3 Tbsp
Salt to taste
Water - 8

Weekly servings
Yellow/Orange Fruit or Vegetable - 5
Whole Baked Potato - 3
Liver - optional

I must confess that I haven't really committed to it. I do keep a daily diet journal where I record everything I eat and the amount of protein that's in it. It's definitely made me more conscious of what I'm eating. But I seem to fluctuate in and out of the target range of protein. Plus, it seems like WAY too much food to be eating on a daily basis. Really - 2 eggs every day? Three baked potatoes every week? Who eats like that? Not me. At least not normally.

I have felt a little guilty that I'm not more committed to eating a balanced diet. I do know that it's very important. And I have made improvements in cutting down on sweets and eating more fruits and vegetables. But I'm still nowhere near meeting these numbers.

Well, at my Bradley class this week, my teacher told us that if we could get the 4 servings of milk and above 80 grams of protein every day this next week (we submit our journals to her and she looks over them), she would give us a prize. She hinted that it might be zucchini bread. I LOVE zucchini bread! I am totally motivated to meet my protein numbers and get enough milk for one week.

I feel bad that I've been motivated by zucchini bread rather than my love and concern for my baby. But it's true. Although, in my defense, I have been trying to improve from week to week. And at one point I was going to challenge myself to meet the daily protein goals for an entire week, just to see if I could do it. But now I'm determined to do it.

It certainly helps that we had Thanksgiving this week, and there are almost 80 grams of protein just in the turkey I ate. Plus, we had the leftovers for dinner tonight, so that's two days down, only 5 I really need to worry about. I had over 80 grams of protein on both Friday and Saturday, so now I only have 3 more days... Wish me luck!

Primary Moments

Since I was called as Primary President several months ago, I have written down funny or touching moments that have happened in Primary. Here are a few. Enjoy!

During Junior Sharing time, the teacher held up a heart and asked what it means. After the kids shouted out "Love!", one of the 5 year olds reached over and hugged the girl that was sitting next to her.

During a sharing time activity, kids were being selected to come up to the front and participate. When Malakai, a Sunbeam, was asked to come up, he was very slow to get out of his chair. One of his fellow Sunbeams impatiently shouted out, "Get up, Malakai!" Everyone laughed.

One day the kids were feeling kind of restless, so we announced that we were going to sing a "wiggle song." One of the 7 year old boys slumped down in his chair, folded his arms across his chest, and declared, "I hate wiggle songs. They're for babies!" (Well, I guess that makes me a baby, because I got out of my chair and did the Snowman song with the rest of the kids.)


The Sunbeams were picking pieces of paper that had pictures on them of blessings we can ask for when we pray. One of them was a picture of a smiley face, and the teacher asked them what it was. They looked confused, and one boy finally ventured a guess... "An apple?"

While trying to explain the Plan of Salvation, the teacher was putting visuals on the board and asking the kids questions about them. She started with a circle that had "Premortal Life" written on it and asked them if they knew what the premortal life is. An eager Sunbeam raised her hand, and when called on proudly declared "It's a circle." At the end of the same lesson, the teacher had three circles representing the three kingdoms in heaven. On the circles were a sun, moon, and stars. Pointing to the sun, she asked "What is the celestial kingdom like?" (looking for the answer "the sun"). One kid called out, "the best!" Well, I guess that's right...

Family Pictures

As part of our Bradley class, we had to take a family photo. Well, we never got around to doing it, so our teacher took a picture on her iPhone and sent it to us. I happened to be wearing my shirt from Halloween (which I kept meaning to take a picture of and post on the blog), so now we killed two birds with one stone! Isn't the shirt great? I couldn't pass it up when I saw it online. It even glows in the dark!
Here are some of the pictures from our 20 week ultrasound (which was about a month ago - we're having a girl!). We didn't get any cute profile shots. The only head shot we got looked like this (I think it's kind of scary looking; sorry it's upside down - not that it really makes a difference):
I really liked the pictures with her hand in them. I think both of these show her right arm. The second picture is my favorite - she was resting her neck on her arm. It really annoyed our technician, because she needed to get a shot of the whole arm (to check the bones), and she just wouldn't cooperate.
Well, there are our family pictures!

Natural Childbirth

Overall, I like things to be natural. I rarely wear make-up or spend time fixing my hair. And as the years pass and I get more and more gray hairs, I'm determined not to dye it (I have NEVER dyed my hair). We'll see if I follow through on that... but I think my silver hairs are really pretty. They're the shiny kind, not the dull grey.
Anyway, I also try to avoid taking medicine whenever possible. Fortunately, I don't have any serious illnesses or conditions that require me to take medicine regularly (for which I'm grateful). But when I get a headache, I try things like laying down for a nap, drinking water, eating, etc. before I take an Aleve.
Now, these are just my personal opinions and preferences. I don't look down on those who wear make-up, dye their hair, take medication, etc. I just don't like to do these things myself.
That being said, I've always leaned towards natural childbirth. I was pretty sure I didn't want an epidural, but I didn't know much past that. After becoming pregnant, I've done more research into the methods that are out there. Jeff and I have decided on the Bradley method, also known as husband-coached childbirth.
The overall idea is that childbirth is natural and our bodies are made to handle it. However, we need to learn how to give birth. This is aided by good nutrition, exercising and strengthening specific muscles as well as learning what to expect during labor and what you can/should do during each phase. And it's referred to as husband-coached because your husband learns along with you and coaches you through the labor.
Jeff and I started reading the book about the Bradley method together. I don't agree with everything they say, but I do like the overall philosophy. But some of the exercise descriptions in the book were confusing and difficult to follow. And since this is our first child, we decided that we wanted more instruction than the book alone could provide. So we signed up to take a class.
This past week we started our 12-week course of Bradley classes. They are held in the home of our instructor Alyssa (pronounced Alysha) on Thursday nights. There were originally going to be four couples, but everyone else either backed out or forgot, so right now we get private instruction!
In addition to the 12 classes, we have daily and weekly homework assignments. I have to fill out a daily pregnancy nutrition journal documenting everything I eat. This is actually good for me, knowing that someone else will be looking over it each week. I know I should eat better than I do... I also have daily exercises, some of which Jeff helps me with. And we have weekly reading assignments to complete as well. It will take a little while for me to work them into my daily routine and remember to do everything, but I'm committed to making it work.
It's been interesting to hear the different reactions I get when I tell people that I want an unmedicated, natural childbirth. I'm surprised by all of the fear and negativity that seems to surround giving birth. Some experienced mothers tell me that I think that now, but I'll probably change my mind during delivery. Others think I'm crazy, or vow "I could never do that." A few are supportive or have done it themselves.
The way I see it, I'm not going into this blindly. I'm preparing myself physically and mentally for a natural childbirth. I know that a complication could arise and I may need medication or an emergency C-section - this is why I'm giving birth in a hospital - but I hope it doesn't come to that.
I hope I haven't offended anyone. I firmly believe that each woman should research and find out what is best for her. As for me, I'm going to give natural childbirth a try.

New Calling

Hello family and friends,
So I thought I would write a short post. Christine usually writes the posts. But since I got the new calling, I thought I would post. So, if you didn't know, before today I was the Ward Executive Secretary. The calling kept me busy answering and making phone calls. Well, as the Stake Presidency put it, "out of the frying pan and into the fire." My new calling is... Elder's Quorum President. Yep, I actually have never been in an Elder's Quorum Presidency before. I have a lot to learn I think. I actually have known for about two weeks, but it doesn't really make me any less nervous. I am not the most outgoing, talkative person in the world as most people know. So I called at least one counselor who is more outgoing than average. Now Christine and I are both "President Anderson". I had a few people call me that today. That will take some getting used to.
Any sage advice?

Book Sale in SLC

Thanks, Suzanne, for passing on the info that the SLC downtown library was having a big book sale this weekend. I went on Saturday morning for an hour or two, but I could have easily spent the whole day there.
I was especially on the lookout for children's books. All hardcovers were $1, paperbacks were $0.50.
My favorite find were four books written by Max Lucado. If you're not familiar with this author, he writes great children's books with Christian themes. I first heard one of his books in a Relief Society lesson, actually.
I also got the Doctrine and Covenants illustrated scriptures (it probably won't be read as much as the other books of scriptures, but hey - it was in good condition, it only cost $0.50, and I want to get the whole set eventually), the parable of the girl and the bicycle, a collection of Bible stories, and a collection of nursery rhymes.
I also bought an Algebra 2 textbook for a buck! It will make a good supplementary text for my class.
You may have noticed that most of the books I bought were religious in nature. I have a goal to collect religious toys, books, and pictures to put in a special "Sunday box" for my kids. I got the idea from reading the Work and the Glory series - one of the characters mentions that families did this in early America, and I really like it. I want the objects in the Sunday box to be special, only brought out on Sundays. Some things (like the illustrated scriptures) will be out all week. But I'd like to find a toy set of Noah's ark, gather religious-themed games (we have a Book of Mormon Guess Who to start our collection), scripture DVDs, and maybe some of those scripture action-figures (like Captain Moroni) that I've seen for sale, etc.
That's the idea. What do you think?

We're going to have a baby!

This post is WAY overdue. Sorry about that.

We found out I was pregnant the Sunday after Father's Day. We are SUPER excited!

Overall, I've felt pretty good. I haven't been too nauseous, though I have had my moments.

Here is a copy of what I like to call my "baby blob" picture. It was taken at my first appointment, when I was 10 weeks along. I never understood why people enjoy these so much, since you really can't see anything but a blob. But it means a lot more when it's my baby. First of all, it made it seem more real that there was actually a baby inside of me. I had no idea that you could see the heartbeat (not just hear it) that early. It was very cool.

My official due date is February 27th. And no, it is not a leap year next year (although I think it would be cool to have a leap year baby). (This is one of the most common questions I get when I tell people my due date, so I thought I would just clear it up now.)

Jeff has been really kind and helpful to me. He is a good sport when I'm tired/cranky, or if I don't want to cook dinner because nothing sounds good to me.

We should find out if the baby is going to be a boy or a girl mid-October, so we'll keep you posted!

Insight from Work Training?

So this past week, my company provided some training for my job. So I thought it might just be a few boring days of sitting in a room watching a power point presentation on medical manufacturing standards. Well, I was pleasantly surprised.
It would be hard to capture all the cool insights into human behavior and life that I learned, but I'll try and share a few of the quotes that I remember.
1. "You'll only be as good as what motivates you."
2. "Character is the measure of how far you will go with a decision long after the emotions of that decision have left." So when we have made a decision and we are moving towards it and then we have to sacrifice something, then our emotions fade. Think of how people get all hyped up about weight loss goals, then when they have to sacrifice some things, some of them will fold. Character is something that we have to continually build up by sacrificing the short-term rewards for long-term rewards.
3. There are three basic "phases" of human behavior. They are all driven by the need to "survive". In order to do that, we want to "stand out in a crowd". How do we do that? The three basic phases of human behavior. The first kind of human behavior we learned in grade school. We try to stand out in a crowd by putting other people down. What ever is different we put them down for it. People will even put down things that most people consider good. I thought about how once I got made fun of for going to college. People who behave this way often blame others for their problems.
The second phase of human behavior is the talent/intelligence phase. Again, motivated to stand out in a crowd we separate ourselves by being better at something than everyone else. How often do you have a conversation with people where they try to one-up an experience. Although this behavior is a little better than phase 1 behavior, people still feel bad.
The third phase of human behavior is what I call charity [the teacher called it lifting]. This is the best kind of behavior. It is the kind where we lift others up. It is the kind that makes us feel good about ourselves. This behavior will become the second phase of human behavior if we yell it from the roof tops. When we pride ourselves on how much we do for others, then we are only looking to lift ourselves above the crowd, not lifting others up.
He said stress is what pulls us from Phase 3 to Phase 2 to Phase 1 behavior and we often get so frustrated with others exhibiting phase 1 behavior that we react back with phase 1 behavior.
There was a whole lot of other great insights, but it would be a super long post, but you'll have to ask me sometime and I'll share more of what I learned.

New Church Calling

I received a new church calling about a month ago, but I realized the other day that I never blogged about it. I am now the Primary President in our ward.
I'm really enjoying being in Primary again (when Jeff and I first moved into our ward, we were called to teach the Sunbeam class).
Some of the kids really make me laugh. There's one energetic little four-year-old boy who enthusiastically shouts out "Jesus!" almost any time you ask a question. One week, when someone was reading a quote that said something like "succor the little children to come unto me," he shouted out "Sucker? I want a sucker! Can I have a sucker?" Ahh, precious moments.

Wii Gave In

Yep, we finally gave in and got a Wii. Growing up, I was never very big on video games. I enjoyed watching them more than playing them. So I never thought that I would ever want to own a game system. But I've really enjoyed playing games on the Wii. I think they're more fun and interactive.
We've started out with the basic sports package and Wii Sports Resort (thanks for introducing it to us, Rachel and Jeff!). We have one white remote (mine) and one black remote (for Jeff). The game system also came with one nunchuck. I guess we'll eventually get a second one, but for now we just take turns playing the games that use it.
Our favorite game is 100-pin bowling. We've gotten to the point where we get strikes or spares on almost every frame. I also really enjoy wakeboarding, and Jeff is really good at table tennis.
Another reason for getting a Wii is that, sadly, Jeff and I have kind of become couch potatoes, and when we play Wii games we're at least moving around. Sometimes I work up a sweat or get out of breath (especially on the swordfighting game - I get pretty into it). We may eventually buy Wii Fit, but I want to borrow it from someone and try it out first.
I'm glad that it's finally starting to get warmer (although I won't be surprised if it snows tomorrow) and look forward to being able to play frisbee, bocce ball, and sand volleyball outside soon. But in the meantime or on rainy days, I feel good being able to move around and get my heart rate up a little playing Wii games.

Happy Pi Day!

Yep, it's that time again - Pi Day! And no, I did not misspell that. March 14th - 3/14 - 3.14...
I went around at church today wishing everyone a happy Pi Day. Of course, I had to then explain it to them, and I think several people were still confused after I explained it.
We invited a few friends over to celebrate Pi Day with us this year. I made a banana cream pie because it's easy, and it's also one of Jeff's favorites. Before I served the pie, I shared pi trivia and answered questions about pi and the golden ratio (which was a lot of fun for me). We then sat around, ate our pie, and talked and laughed. It was a fun evening.

Jeff's Music

For a while now, we have had a goal to work on Jeff's music. First, we would like to re-record and copyright his existing songs. We found a website geared towards independent musicians where Jeff can then sell his music through digital downloads as well as CDs. In addition, we would also like to write out his music.
The surgery on Jeff's wrist kind of set us back on the first half of our goals. So this past week we started on the second half: writing out the sheet music.
We started with my favorite song, Mountain Breeze. Fortunately, we have a digital piano that allows Jeff to record his music. Unfortunately, we can't print it out straight from the piano because Jeff doesn't stay strictly on the beat (which is inevitable, of course). So, while we have the notes that he plays, we still need to figure out how to put it all together. Also, it doesn't separate his left hand from his right because he moves around on the keyboard so often, so it can be difficult to sort out all of the notes.
Jeff has a software program on his laptop for writing sheet music. Because I'm still getting used to how it works, I've decided to first write it out by hand (plus, it's good to have a hard copy back-up). So far I have one page completed by hand and on the computer. It is very satisfying to see it written out. It's slow going, but I'm hoping that I'll get faster the more I do it. I can't wait to have an entire song completed. I'm especially looking forward to the day when I can hear other people play Jeff's songs using the sheet music I helped to write out.
I'm grateful that my background in musical notation and music theory has prepared me to help Jeff. Thanks, Mom, for making me work on notation along with learning songs.

Funny Chats

I thought it would be fun to share a few g-mail chats that I've had with Jeff while I was at work. To find these clips, I started back when Jeff and I were dating. It was fun reading through them. Sorry it's kind of long.


10/25/07
Jeff: Work was okay today. I feel like I am on shaky ground. I am moving from something I do very well and enjoy doing to something I am poor at doing and don't really enjoy. I feel like everyone is speaking a new language to me that I don't understand.
me: Sounds frustrating.
Jeff: I am trying to make lemonade out of lemons, but I am low on sugar.
me: But at least you're going into it with that attitude. That's gotta help with the overall sugar level.
...
me: It's like you're stuck on an episode of the Office, but you're getting the raw end of the deal and there's very little humor. Office politics can sure be screwed up sometimes.


11/6/07 (Jeff was feeling sick and had stayed home from work. And by the way, this is the day that we started "officially" dating.)
me: So what have you done today? Watched any good movies?
Jeff: I watched tv and veged. Not any movies. I did some laundry and mopped the floor.
me: You mopped the floor?!? Wow, you're a much more active sick person than I am.
Jeff: with a swiffer quick and easy.
me: Oh, good.


1/28/08 (we had gotten in a car accident due to snow back in December)
Jeff: I was getting a lot of comments today about me dating. - Because we ran into my coworker at Boondocks.
me: oh yeah?
Jeff: One lady asked how my hot date was? I hesitated because I was thinking of you as my hot girlfriend instead of a hot date. She thought I was embarrased, but I wasn't.
me: :)
Jeff: She also said she knew because she heard that we had run into someone from work and everyone thought that meant we had been in an accident. Silly. Then my other co-workers reminded them that we had actually been in an accident a few weeks ago.
me: very silly. but hey - only off by a few weeks!
Jeff: Then they were asking me if I had made any big purchases lately. Them teasers. My coworkers knew i purchased a tv.
me: yep. coworkers can be funny like that


2/12/08 (Jeff was sick again. This was also the chat where Jeff came up with the phrase "much of bunches")
me: have you eaten much today? still sticking to brat and getting plenty of fluids, right?
Jeff: still on the brat. Bananas, apple sauce and toast. I will try rice tonight.
So I guess I am on the bat diet.
me: hee hee. :P


2/27/08 (Jeff was still feeling sick)
me: I hope you're having a good day. I'm having an ... interesting day. I've been very scatterbrained, and I kept getting frustrated and sighing outloud. I feel very disorganized. I'm thinking of going home early today.
Jeff: I feel a little scatterbrained after taking the pain pill.
me: hmm - what's my excuse?
Jeff: sympathy scatterbrainedness.


3/10/08 (we got engaged on the 8th, the Saturday before this chat; we're discussing signing Jeff up for Facebook)
me: no, you can't visit my site if you don't have an account. would you like my login info?
Jeff: I'll just set up an account later? Would I be able to view the stuff posted on your site then?
me: yes, after i approve that we're friends (you or i would need to request, and then the other would approve)
Jeff: I would hope you would approve that we're friends he-he-he;)
me: hmm, i might need to think about it ;)
Jeff: I'm glad you didn't say that Saturday ;).


10/7/08 (this was a week after I had surgery on my finger, so I had a splint or cast on my right hand)
me: it's cold at my work - i wish i had gloves
the heat doesn't work :(
Jeff: :( you could only really use one.
me: ha ha hadn't thought of that
thanks! u reminded me that i have a mismatched glove in my drawer
(i lost its mate last winter, but never threw it away) and it's the left one! :):):):):):)
Jeff: That's cool.
or warm.
me: :)

Goals for 2010

I am going to post my goals for the year on my blog, so that I can look back on them next January and see how I did. Also, this will hopefully motivate me to look back on them regularly and maybe let you know how I'm doing.
1 - I want to use my Saturdays more productively. This past year I wasted too many of my weekends and would go to bed on Saturday night disappointed with myself. This year I want to have a specific list of things that I want to accomplish each weekend, and then actually do them. I started yesterday, and it felt great! I don't let myself watch any TV until I get my list done. This is what my parents tried to teach me when I was growing up and had to do Saturday chores. I know it's a bit late, but I feel like I'm finally starting to understand and value using my Saturdays productively.
2 - Kind of hand in hand with number 1, I also want to keep my house cleaner on a regular basis. This past year, I seem to let things slide for a few weeks, then I get in a cleaning mood and have to do some heavy duty cleaning. Usually, I'm motivated by having someone come over to my home, because I like to present a clean (or at least semi-clean) house. So this year I would like to make more of an effort to stay on top of daily and weekly cleaning and straightening so that it doesn't get so overwhelming. It feels nice to have a clean house, too!
3 - I hope to exercise on a more regular basis again. For a while, I was exercising in the morning with my co-workers. But we got out of the habit and never started up again. I know that I need to set some definite goals or it won't happen. I am open to suggestions, if anyone has any.
4 - I want to be better about planning date nights in advance. Jeff and I spend a lot of time together in the evenings and on the weekends, but we rarely plan ahead. Often, we sit at home and play kenken, watch TV, or play games. While I enjoy all of these activities, I would like to plan a specific date night at least twice a month. Once a week would be better, though.
5 - I have gotten too relaxed in going to the temple regularly. I have let illness and busy schedules get in the way of what is important. I want to get back in the habit of going at least once a month, but preferably twice a month. I know we can do it - we just need to make it a priority.