happy birthday!!!

Today is Chris's 29th birthday. Last night we celebrated at my parents, tonight he has requested his favorite dinner (white chicken enchiladas), and Saturday night we'll celebrate at Cheesecake Factory with our good friends Peyt and Liesl (Liesl also has the same birthday). Basically it is a birthday week. :)

Sometimes Chris and I like to play the game of, "If you could do anything today, what would it be?". If I could plan the perfect birthday for Chris, it would probably include:

*Breakfast at some pancake house
*18 hole round of golf
*Lunch at Claim Jumpers
*Movie (probably Appaloosa--which I would have to bow out of)
*Dinner at Outback

So happy birthday Chris. I know today won't be as exciting as it would have been pre-kids, but I hope you still have fun. You truly deserve it for being the most amazing, selfless husband/dad I could ever ask for!!

relaxin

golf

Over the past several months, Chris's interest in golf has really taken off. He has known how to play his whole life as his grandparents would often take he and his brother out when they were kids. But it wasn't until recently that he started to really enjoy it and want to play it often. Fortunately his schedule allows him the opportunity to play at non-peek times, making it so it isn't as expensive. A few times, people that he has played with have asked him if his wife plays, to which he always responds "no". In thinking about golf, here are some thoughts:

Pro:
*It would be something fun for Chris and I to do together
*I would know more of what Chris is talking about when he shares with me about his game
*It does seem like it would be quite relaxing to be out on those beautiful courses

Con:
*It is expensive! Seems unwise to try and force an interest on my part when an interest would equal more money to shell out
*It is time consuming...meaning we would need babysitting for Cam...again more money (unless my mom did it every time)
*For some reason, I just don't have a desire to learn. Seems difficult, to the point of pointless to me to try and hit such a little ball such a long distance and into such a tiny hole

Who knows...maybe down the road when the kids are grown I might consider giving it a try. But for now, I'm content to let it be Chris's hobby.

Here is Cameron helping his dad clean the golf balls. He loves to see the balls plop into the bucket of water. :)

thanks grandpa!!

This past weekend we went to visit my in-laws up north. Chris's dad had been working on a train table for Cameron. It came out beautifully and we were so thrilled to bring it back with us. Cam's train set fits perfectly on it. Thanks grandpa!!

We came up with a new game this morning of toppling down the trees. Take a look...

baby mama update

I had my first doc's appointment today. Chris went with me because we knew we would be able to see the heartbeat, which we did. Seemed just as special as when we saw it with Cameron. Other than that, there was nothing to exciting about the appointment, unless you call the fact that I've gained 7 pounds in 8 weeks exciting. In my defense, the majority of it is legitimate as I'm sooo much more hungry this time than with Cam and need to eat so much just to make myself feel better. However I don't think I can claim that defense last night as I was quite full with dinner, but proceeded to polish off two pieces of chocolate cake.

Before the appointment, we dropped Cam off at my parents' house. After the appointment, we went to lunch at Red Robin and then to see Eagle Eye. It was a fun action movie, but a little too far fetched for my liking. I love sci-fi movies, but if the movie is trying to play itself off as plausible, when it totally couldn't be, I'm a bit annoyed.

All in all, it was a great Tuesday!

girl trips

A couple weeks back my dad drove down to Mexico with some friends to take part in a 50 mile bike ride. Not bad for a 65 year old, huh?



This has got me thinking about all the girl trips I have taken in my life. During college, I took countless road trips with my friends. We would take off for the weekend to Hume Lake, San Diego, Santa Barbara, etc. Except for a few times, we always had a free place to stay with a family member or friend. These are some of the best memories of my life. I can't tell you how fun those times were. Makes me nostalgic just thinking about them. Here are a few of my favorite trips...

San Francisco



Santa Barbara



Palm Springs- we would always go in the heat of the summer so the rates were super cheap. We would cram several girls in the rooms so it would be even cheaper.



Europe-ok so this was a little more pricey of a trip, but it was kind of a celebration of our college graduation...so it was worth it!

"Love grows best in little houses..."

The title of this blog is from a line in one of my favorite country songs by Doug Stone. I grew up in a very little house (I think around 900 square feet). Yesterday as my mom and I were coming back from the mall, I wanted to stop by and see it. It is sooo interesting to experience what I see now as an adult as compared to back then. The streets seem sooo much more narrow, the houses sooo much more close together, and our actual house seems tiny! But I think back to when I was a kid, and I never felt like we lived in a small house. I thought we had a HUGE block for me to ride my bike and skate on and that our neighbor's yards were enormous.

It really goes to show that kids (for the most part) could care less about the size of their homes. My backyard was plenty big for me to play in. I will say that I think it helped that the friends my family had were all in similar income brackets, so I wasn't exposed very much to huge homes. But the fact remains, it truly doesn't matter the size of your home growing up. All that matters are the memories created there...and I have hundreds of awesome memories here.

Here is a picture of our house. When we lived in it, it was green (then later painted grey). Gonna be honest and say that I might have been a little embarrassed as a kid to bring a friend home to this color. :)