Google Reader

For those of you who haven't yet tried out Google Reader . . .I'm here to give it another plug since it has saved me tons of time. It has cut down significantly on my blog hopping but it's worth the sacrifice! :) Go to google.com/reader and check it out. You sign into your gmail account (if you don't have one get one for free). And then you can add subscriptions - on the left hand side there is a little plus sign that you click on. I subscribed to all the blogs that I like to read (except for the private blogs) and then I click on the little button that says "updated" and it will then show you when blogs are updated. At first you will have all of your blogs that you read listed as new but soon enough you will just be able to log into Google Reader and immediately see who has updated their blog. Just one more reason that I love google!

Blog Update

I finally decided to change my blog background today (thanks to a tip from Christine) but even though I thought I had saved my page elements . . . I still managed to delete all the links on my sidebar. Now I'm trying to decide if I want to take the time to add them all up again. Besides the private blogs, I pretty much read EVERYTHING in google reader. It's just so much easier and faster than going through them all from the blog main page! And I'm all about saving time. Should I put my old links up just in case people want to blog hop? Or should I not worry about the links anymore?

Recent Happenings

Not much has blog worthy material has happened since my exciting radio win last week (which I found out that I still have to wait another couple of months to actually see that money!) but since this makes up for my lack of journal writing - I need to update it.

Ellie started her second session of swim lessons and I'm so glad that I decided to try it again! This week has been a complete change. We have a new instructor and I don't know if it was the combo of that and getting used to the water or what. But now Ellie loves getting in the water and playing. She will actually stick her face in the water but licks the water instead of blowing bubbles. I can't get her to float on her back and she still doesn't love going underneath . .. but we're making improvements. I have to watch her carefully now because she climbs out and then jumps in without making sure that I'm ready to catch her. And in even more exciting news - she will actually take a BATH! She has hated baths forever and so we've just done showers with her since I tried every way to get her to enjoy bath time to no avail. But now she likes them! The cost of swimming lessons is totally worth it if it got her to like baths. I still have to remind her to sit down in the tub (she likes to stand up a lot) but she enjoys playing with her toys in the tub and now I'm looking to add to our scarce bath toy collection. Any favorites? So far we just have little ducks and little soccer ball thing (with a net and everything).

We have our routine pretty set now with swimming in the morning and then I work with my transcription job while she takes her nap in the middle of the day. It's been so hot in the afternoon (and with the rising cost of gas prices) we have just been hanging out at home a lot and trying to be creative with our activities. Which has been fun as I realize all the little games that we can play. Our house is a little messier than ever these days (and I don't have the time to clean as much with my new job) but we're having fun and that's what matters.

Ellie seems to be breaking quite a few new teeth in as evidenced by the middle of the night waking up lately. From what I can tell it looks like she is working on 7,8 & 9 in the tooth count. Lots of fun in our neck of the woods! Ellie has figured out how to either climb/fall out of her crib and has decided over the past few days that she doesn't want to go to sleep unless she is laying down with Rob. Really weird for my child that I can normally put to sleep with no problem. I don't think we're quite ready for the toddler bed but I'm not sure what else to try. Anyone try crib tents out?


And I think due to the lack of sleep lately - we all managed to come down with colds this week. I hate when I get colds when it's 100 plus degrees outside.

I have to recognize my younger brother Trent who's going to BYU-I and decided to run in the Teton Dam Marathon a couple of weeks ago and try his first marathon. He took third place with a time of 3 hours and 13 minutes! Talk about fast! He is only a few minutes away for qualifying for the Boston Marathon after running his first one. Reminds me that I really need to get back in shape to keep up with my dad and brothers!

Saturday night I met up with one of my good friends and former co-worker Amy for some shopping and dessert at Cheesecake Factory. It was a much needed girl's night out and something I really need to be better at! I was on the hunt for board shorts and I think we went in just about every store looking for them to no avail but that's okay. Thanks for calling Amy!

Delete My Debt!!

So I'm one of those people who NEVER seem to get lucky winning things but I still enjoy entering contests in the hopes that I will win someday. Well this morning was my lucky day!! I entered the "Delete my Debt" contest that KMLE Country is doing with Dave Pratt in the morning. My phone rings at 7:20 this morning and I almost didn't answer it because who on earth would be calling me that early? Well good thing I did! They put me on hold and I was on the phone with Dave Pratt!! I won $700!! I'm so over the top excited. Rob's tuition for ASU is due and this couldn't have come at a better time. I think I almost started crying when I was on the radio and I probably sounded really retarded but I don't even care because I just won $700!!

First D-backs Game

Since Rob isn't really a huge baseball fan and I'm not a big Diamondbacks fan, it took my family coming into town to take Ellie to her first D-backs game (she has been to 2 Mariners games and spring training games already). Last Friday night my dad got us some good seats on the lower level to the game.

Before the game we hurried over to a Mexican restaurant near the park and met Rob there for dinner. Rob was still recovering from being sick that week and I think the hot sauce about did him in since he left in the middle of dinner - too sick to make it to the game. I thought about sending Ellie with Rob but figured that with him being sick - I should probably keep her.

Fast forward to the end of dinner and my brother Kory goes to get Ellie out of her chair and says that she feels wet. Well poor Kory had to experience a severe case of diaper blow out that completely disgusted him (and me!). Apparently Ellie still hadn't recovered from her sickness from that week either! It was terrible. I haven't seen a blow out like that since she was probably 6 months old. My dad's girlfriend Debbie was really sweet and ran with me to the bathroom so we could get Ellie cleaned up as much as we could. I start hunting through my diaper bag and realize that I haven't restocked my diaper bag!! Of course I'm usually the girl who makes us late for things because I'm obsessive about making sure I have EVERYTHING I could possibly need in my diaper bag. I'm down to one spare diaper! So get her dirty clothes off and into a bag and put the clean diaper on her (praying that she doesn't need a second one) and put the spare skirt I have in my bag on her. Well, it was at that point that I remembered that my spare top had been taken out that week and used and I hadn't replaced it!! Seriously - I haven't used a spare outfit for this child in months but I usually have one! So now Ellie is down to wearing a blue flowered skirt and no shirt. We were going to be late for the game so I just figured that we would have to take her white trash style to the game with no shirt and buy one there. So that's what we did! I should have taken pictures of my shirtless child. She could probably pass for a boy except for the flowered skirt I had her wearing! But $15 later in the Team Shop we had her a cute pink Dbacks shirt to wear.

Thankfully she was a ANGEL for the whole game. I was so impressed. No more accident, no crying, and she just made herself happy by eating snacks and people watching. She even saw her first fireworks show after the game. Too bad the Diamondbacks were on a 6 game losing streak at this time! It was still fun though after the rough start.

Kory, myself (ignore my hair that I didn't do after swimming that day) and Ellie, Debbie, and my dad

Pool Fun?

Ellie still hasn't decided whether she loves or hates the swimming pool. Last weekend my dad was in town with his girlfriend Debbie and my brother Kory. They were staying at a nearby Marriott hotel so we had to take advantage of the use of a swimming pool on the hot days! We took Ellie over and at first she screamed and screamed and wanted nothing to do with the water unless she was sitting on the steps. She gradually warmed up and was having lots of fun as long as she knew that she was near the edge and could climb out and get back in as she wanted.






Yesterday though we started swim lessons with the City of Mesa and she HATES them. I thought she might be okay after our weekend in the water but nope. There are 6 kids in the class between the ages of 6 months and 18 months and mine is the only one throwing a fit. I guess I'm not too surprised since she still hates showers and baths. But the instructor (granted a high school student) acts like she has never had a crying child in her class before. Monday's class Ellie screamed for the majority of it. Today's class was a little better since we started in the shallow water and we worked on climbing out of the pool to get a toy (she was the star at that part) but she isn't wanting to stay in the water. I'm hoping by the end of the two week session she will enjoy it and not be screaming every day!

Promotion!

Just have to give a shout out (do people still use that phrase?!) to my wonderful husband Rob who was just promoted to MANAGER at Grand Canyon University! It's been his goal since he started working at GCU last October to be a manager and he has worked hard every month to make sure that would happen one day. We really didn't think it would happen so soon but that just makes it all the more exciting and praiseworthy! I'm lucky to have a husband that works so hard to provide for our family and to make sure that I can stay home and raise Ellie. And we feel really blessed that the Lord has led us in this direction. Last September when we were dealing with selling our business and everything that went along with that, we couldn't really understand what was happening or why. And while we still don't have all the answers, it's always nice to realize that this is a path that we needed to be on but probably never would have chosen ourselves! (Amazing how that works, huh?) We love you Rob and know you'll do great with this new adventure!