Staycation, Rain, & Trouble

After Rob's hospital visit last month, I feel like I've just been in a state of playing catch up ever since! On my list was this blog... so I'm finally going to do a quick recap for my own journaling.

The last week in August we had initially planned on heading to San Diego and the beach. But we had to scrap those plans due to Rob's health. So instead we did a little "staycation". I was able to use Priceline and we got an awesome deal at the Doubletree Resort in Paradise Valley/Scottsdale. We were able to enjoy the beautiful and large pools, had pizza in the hotel room, and I let Ellie eat donuts on the bed for breakfast. While only about 20 minutes away from our house... it was amazing how just being at a hotel can you make you feel like you are far away! It wasn't the beach but at least it was something and I want to repeat it next year - especially since resorts in Arizona always have great summer specials going on.




I'm quickly realizing just how close I am getting to my due date. People keep asking me how I'm feeling and the answer is pretty good! I could do without the neverending heat here (oh and the heartburn and insomnia) but overall, I'm still feeling allright. I do have to be careful to take breaks and rest and I'm noticing it is getting hard to bend over. But I am not too uncomfortable yet and trying to enjoy feeling halfway decent for a few more weeks since I know this stage is going to come to an end soon! I am not nearly as stressed about this new baby coming as I was with Ellie. I do have a list of projects that I still want to get done in the next few weeks but I also have the mentality that life will go on if I don't get them done in time.

And on that note - Ellie has become the best little helper when I'm cleaning. I pull out cleaning supplies and she immediately runs to get a rag out of the drawer to help me. I'm definitely putting her to use helping me out! We're still working on getting her to pick up her toys and books (she won't do it unless I'm sitting with her and helping) but we're making progress.

Ellie started a community class a few weeks ago with her best friend Brooklyn. I am going to have to try and capture pictures one of these days but the girls love it. They get to play with playdough, dance, a little tumbling, songs, play with a parachute, hula hoops, etc. Ellie would love to go to this class every day but it's only once a week. We've been filling the rest of our free time with other playdates which has been really helpful to keep Ellie happy and entertained!

We enjoyed a nice rain storm during the day a few weeks ago and Ellie immediately wanted to run out and play with it but quickly grabbed the umbrella. Ever since she has been asking me to buy her a pink umbrella. I couldn't get her to jump in puddles this time but hopefully we can get another daytime storm and enjoy puddle jumping! It's probably always going to be funny to me how Ellie doesn't know what to do with rain and I grew up with it almost every day in Washington.



I definitely have a two year old on my hand who can get into trouble super fast! This last week alone she decided to get into the eggs in our fridge and cracked one on herself. And within the same hour dumped out a whole container of dog food. She keeps me on toes for sure. And she's really into dressing up in Rob's work boots and clomping around the house in them. And being rewarded with stickers that end up all over herself and all over the house!


Our stake was reorganized with new ward boundaries this last week and after almost 3 years, I was released from being Primary President. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself since I've been in Primary for almost 5 years straight. But we have a brand new ward now (part of our old ward moved with us) and so it'll be fun to have some new experiences. And I'm going to enjoy not stressing about the Primary Program that was supposed to be done in 2 weeks!