It was the artichoke dip that tipped me off...

Every time I have gotten pregnant, my first clue has been ravenous hunger(which is really foreign for me, right?).

With Emma it was Crown Burger. I was meeting Jonny there one day after work and couldn't even wait. By the time he arrived I had already ordered and devoured my burger and fries.

With Matthew it was a lovely roast beef dinner. When Jonny got home at 6pm he couldn't believe I had eaten without him. I told him I was just really really hungry and by the way I thought I was pregnant and now that he was home we could finally take a test!

This time it was the artichoke dip. I made some last Sunday night and could not shove it in my face fast enough. I informed Jonny that he was not being a very good husband - that his job in life is to eat more than I do so that I feel dainty and feminine and if he was going to eat more than me of that artichoke dip he'd better get to it.

I had an inkling that night, but didn't want to get my hopes up so I just pushed the idea to the back of my mind, along with the slightly nauseous feeling that I blamed on having eaten too much artichoke dip.

The next day when Jonny was at work I took a test. When I realized it was positive I looked at the clock and saw that Jonny was at lunch so I threw the test in a gift bag and told Emma we needed to take a surprise to Daddy. Is that gross, considering what I did to that test?



We are so excited! I am due around May 7th - only a month and a half after Jonny finishes his training in Arizona. I asked him yesterday, "Tell me honestly. Are you excited you get to miss most of this pregnancy and therefore large amounts of complaining from me?" He immediately replied, "No!" Good Man.

When we told Emma I had a baby in my tummy she was thrilled. Then Jonny gave me a hug and Emma told him, "Be careful Daddy! Don't squish my Mommy's baby in her tummy!"

The next day I was eating breakfast and she sat there watching me with an intense look of concentration on her face. Then she asked, "Mommy, is the food getting all over the baby?"

Her prayers the last couple of nights have gone like this: "Please bless the baby in my Mommy's tummy to get bigger and bigger and bigger so it can come out of her tummy"(holding her arms out in front of her to show the growth process. No, my eyes weren't closed), "and I can hold the baby and it not squirm away" (moving around to show the squirming because she always wants to hold Matthew and he, you guessed it, squirms away),"and it fall asleep" (here, she starts snoring). She has big plans for this kid and tells us just about every day, "She's NOT a boy."

Confessions of a 30 year old drama queen...

I wish I was one of those super easy going people who just kind of roll along with life and take it as it comes.

I'm not.

I'm more of a be dramatic (even if only on the inside)and sentimental about every little change kind of person. And whew! Change! That's another rough thing for me.

We leave here 6 weeks from today. Jonny is going to Arizona for 5 months for training and the kids and I are going to stay at my parent's house with them for that time. I am trying to be excited about the whole thing, but it's not working so well!



Every time I drive into Monterey I think "Oh! This is so beautiful and we are leaving it!"



And the ocean...this one is for my fellow beach fanatics - Mom, Lara, Aubrey, and Kaedi. Sigh.



I told Jonny I was sad to leave the ocean and he told me to go do things in the mountains when I am in Utah. What? He is not a beach person. He doesn't understand. He is adorable, even if he is not a beach person...

But let's think positive, shall we? While I am so going to miss Jonny, at least I know he is safe here and not in the Middle East somewhere, right? And while I will miss friends I've made here, I will make new friends there and then I just have more wonderful friends. And I will miss the ocean, but there is always Utah lake! Just kidding, but there are always the majestic mountains - any time I see even a picture of them my eyes tear up a little because it is home.

And if I do start feeling a little down, I always have this to cheer me up:


Little Beach Bum


Warm, lovey baby fresh from a nap with creases on his face from cuddling with his favorite blanky.

By Anna Quindlen on motherhood,

...the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs.

There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1.

And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.

Even today I'm not sure what worked and what didn't, what was me and what was simply life. When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I'd done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be.

Today is our Anniversary!

Today is our five year anniversary! On the one hand it feels like the five years have flown by and on the other hand, so much has happened in the last five years that it feels like forever! A good forever.
Happy Anniversary Jonny! I love you!

The greatest Dad in the world...

I have probably the greatest Dad in the world. It was his birthday last week on the 7th. I missed giving him a birthday shout out - it was just one of those days. Picture Emma having 4 potty training accidents and the baby Doberman Pinscher that I am babysitting (I know, what?) having a couple as well and the dog chewing on my hose and car seats and digging up my flowers...anyway.
Happy Birthday Dad! My Dad is one of the most genuinely nice people I know. He is an extremely hard worker. We have a common love of gardening and his yard always looks impeccable. He used to drive me crazy because, after every time I would tell him about a frustrating/bad experience he would ask me, "Now, what have we learned from this?" So it drove me crazy then, but now I find myself asking the same question all the time. He taught me that no experience is wasted as long as you learn something from it. I love you Dad!


Here he is with Matthew and Jonny the day they blessed Matthew.

Uh Oh Peanut Butter!

My cute friend, Brittany, watched my kids for me a couple of weeks ago and she taught Emma this song...



Emma loves it and sings it all the time. My favorite is how she says, "His heart was all aflutter." It ends up being more of a "His heart was all dufuttered!" She loves to sing it to Matthew when he is sad and it always makes him smile. It makes me smile too.