Halloween

Now that Thanksgiving is less than two weeks away, I thought it would be a good time to finally upload the pictures from Halloween. (heh)

Peter went as a garden gnome this year. He's the perfect size, and it's an easy and cheap costume to put together. And (best of all) he's not old enough yet to have any say in what he's dressing up as.

Here he is, protecting our, uh, "garden"...


I dressed up as a speed bump. Just lovely, I know. I found a yellow shirt for two bucks at DI, and colored a tire track across the belly. Voila! A speed bump! I didn't get any pictures of me wearing it (guess who's always behind the camera), but I snapped a picture of the shirt later, just for the record.


I got a few laughs out of it. And a few confused chuckles. And a few people who completely misunderstood, and were shocked that I would have the audacity to wear such a morbid outfit. Huh. Well, I wasn't going for morbid, but I guess I can see how it could be misinterpreted that way. Oops...

Lest there be any doubt, I really am excited about this baby! Even if I come up with bizarre Halloween costumes.

Warm milk

Sometimes I have trouble sleeping, for no apparent reason. Last night, I lay in bed, awake for a couple of hours. Dead tired, and unable to fall asleep. All my tossing and turning must have awakened Darren. I told him I couldn't sleep, and he mumbled something that sounded like a sorry and turned over.

As I lay there, random thoughts drifted in and out of my mind. I remembered a book I had been reading earlier in the day, and how one of the characters had had a glass of warm milk to help her sleep. Warm milk? It might be worth a try.

For the next several minutes, I debated whether or not to get up and get myself a glass of warm milk. I was about to give up the plan, when Darren turned to me and asked, "Do you want me to get you some warm milk?" I was shocked. How did he know?

Now, drinking warm milk in the middle of the night is not something that I've ever done. He didn't ask that because it's a habit of mine, or because I've ever said a word about how warm milk can help you sleep. This was completely out of the blue.

When Darren came back from the kitchen a few minutes later, I told him how I had just been lying there thinking about warm milk, and what a coincidence it was that he had offered to make me some. He shrugged and said, "The Lord asked me to." That's my husband for you.

What a wonderful thing to have a husband who is sensitive to the whisperings of the Holy Ghost so he can know, that specifically, what his family needs--even something as simple as warm milk.

What a wonderful thing to have a Father in heaven who knows us perfectly, and cares enough about our happiness to grant us some of these "tender mercies."

With a stomach full of warm milk, I fell asleep thinking about the words of David A. Bednar: "Some may count this experience as simply a nice coincidence, but I testify that the tender mercies of the Lord are real and that they do not occur randomly or merely by coincidence. Often, the Lord’s timing of His tender mercies helps us to both discern and acknowledge them."

Counting Down

About three weeks ago, Darren got a phone call. Guess what? Big news! Our offer was accepted on that house in Orem that we love, after waiting FOREVER! It really makes the waiting worth it.

Well, at that moment, the clock was set for four and a half weeks until moving day, and started ticking away...

So, if you use some simple subtraction, you can easily deduce that I'm way behind in my blog updates. Sorry, guys.

You would also figure out that we have about a week and a half until we will be moving out of our apartment and into our first house. Needless to say, it's a time of much joy and anticipation and running errands and taping boxes and scrubbing down the apartment and getting quotes on homeowners insurance. I like to think that's why I've left my blog in the dark about the whole thing. When I'm not cleaning or organizing something, or chasing after Peter, I'm resting on the couch with my friend, Braxton-Hicks.

Since Darren and I knew that cleaning and packing wouldn't always play nicely with almost-3rd-trimester-ness, we decided to get an early start on everything we possibly could, so that we (read: I) wouldn't have to do the bulk of it in the last 3 days before we move. Hence, the 2-week plan:


Color-coded and everything! We did something similar last time we moved, and it worked like a charm. We had a very low-stress moving day.

Oh, and can I show you around our house? As always, a few hastily-snapped photographs don't really do anything justice, but you should get the basic idea.

And the verdict is...

Ultrasound time has come and gone.

So what do you think? Will we use Peter's clothes, or buy new ones?
Stock up on hair bows, or band-aids?
Make it pink, or make it blue?
Accomplice for Peter, or girl time for Mom?

The answer is, girl time for Mom will just have to wait, because we are having another boy!

I admit, I was pretty surprised when we found out, because for some reason I had been picturing a girl for these past few months. But we are completely thrilled to have another boy in the family! If this new little boy is as mellow, cheerful, and obedient as Peter, I would count myself a very lucky girl (if not, I'm still lucky--just a little crazier, that's all.)

The only problem now is coming up with a decent boy name. Lucky for us we don't have to actually choose one for a few more months...

In the Last Six Weeks...

I'll be honest, blogging has not been as high up on the priority list as some other things. I know, there is exciting stuff happening here. I know, this is the only journal-like record I'm keeping of my family at present. If you've been keeping up on my baking blog, you've seen that there's really nothing to keep up on. I've been neglecting that one as well.

I can't blame it on morning sickness anymore. Time to change. And there's nothing like a new blog design to make you want to freshen up the posts, too.

So. Where to start...

Did you know we've been house hunting? This is hardly new. Back in March, we started doing research into mortgage loans and familiarized ourselves with the housing market. In April, we started to go looking inside some homes. In May, we looked at one cheap, scary dump after another. In June, we decided we might need to be willing to pay a little more for a home, if we didn't want to live in a cheap, scary dump. Consequently, we found a great little inexpensive house in Orem and fell silly in love. It felt good. It felt like home. I dream about this house. Aaand, it's a short sale, which means all sorts of ugly lender/government hoops and processes to go through. And where are we now? Still jumping hoops and waiting. Waiting waiting waiting. Is this house worth it? *sigh* The answer is yes, which is why we're still here, waiting.

A couple of months ago I was at a routine prenatal checkup, and my doctor found a tumor on my thyroid. Let's just say it was a bit of a stressor. A biopsy was done, and the result came back non-cancerous, luckily. They're keeping tabs on it throughout my pregnancy, just to see if it continues to grow. Chances are pretty good they'll go in and remove it (along with half of my thyroid) after the baby comes. We'll see.

Speaking of pregnancy. Here we go again. This second one has been a little more intense than the first. Morning sickness more persistent and pronounced. Hormones and emotions more volatile. Appetite more fluctuant. But I'd have to say that, on the whole, I'm really enjoying the whole thing. Second trimester is actually really fun for me: At 20 weeks, I've had more energy and drive; I'm starting to look sort of pregnant (no, scratch that. I just look like I put on 15 pounds); I can feel tiny little fluttery movements inside of me; and next Friday we get to go in for our ultrasound. Exciting times.

Career Step. All right, this is the real reason my blogging has been put on hold. Every afternoon, during Peter's nap (the time I used to spend on blogging), I rush to the computer and work like a madwoman on my medical transcription course. It's really the only time of day that I can do it, and the deadline is looming up. If I want to finish the course before the new baby comes (which, yes, I do), I need to be working on it every single day, during every single minute of Peter's naptime. It's kind of fun for me, having my head filled with medical terminology and surgical jargon. It makes me feel kind of smart, except it's not really the kind of stuff you can whip out at a dinner party. Huh.

I've recently revolutionized the way I handle my housework. There are no words. This book was recommended to me by a friend, and it has changed my life. And I paid four bucks for it. Four bucks! Don Aslett, my friend, you don't know me, but I want to shake your hand--and I'm willing to bet Darren does, too.

Oh, and did I mention that my birthday was yesterday? I'm old--24. I know, that's young. Laugh all you want. But here I am still feeling like an awkward 15-year-old, and suddenly my early 20s are almost gone. I'm not sure how I feel about that, you know?

And last of all, Peter. Oh, my sweet, sweet baby Peter. I'm not sure who gave him permission to grow so quickly, but I can't really say he's a baby anymore. Toddler-ness is in full swing. At 20 months, he's running around everywhere, saying words that only Darren and I can understand. He brings hurt fingers and scraped knees to me so I can kiss them. He has learned how to tease and play games. He's incredibly eager to obey us. Every day I fall in love with him.

Here he is on the 4th of July, with Aunt Elicia:


And this is his coy face, which he pulls on us quite frequently:


Let's not wait another six weeks to get together again.

Sweet Sixteen

I'm sure this is old news for some of you, since I have already posted these pictures on facebook. But, for those of you not on facebook, here they are!

Voila! The tropical-themed birthday cake I did for Darren's sister's 16th birthday party! This sucker was a project, let me tell you.


A top view of the cake with palm tree and flip-flops in the sand. Don't look too closely at the palm tree. The first one I made broke right before the party, and I had to throw this one together in about a minute and a half, from the remnants of the old broken one. No joke.


And the side view:

Little News

• P is for Pimples. No, make that pickles.
• R is for Racing to the Restroom. Again.
  
• E is for Eating breakfast cereal. For lunch. Again.
• G is for Good morning, sunshine! Ha. Ha. Shove off.
  
• N is for Never enough ice cream in the freezer. Curses!
  
• A is for Actually, the smell of pickles makes me gag.
• N is for Naps. Needing Naps. Now.
• T is for This poopy diaper is gonna be the death of me. Remind me why I fed Peter lasagna last night?
  

Put it all together, and it spells...

"Sorry I didn't make dinner, honey. Just thinking about the kitchen makes me want to hurl all my insides out."

Yes, Darren and I will be introducing another little Hansen into the world this December! We're tickled pink! And maybe slightly green, too.

We've gotten pretty comfortable with one kid in these past 18 months. So, uh, how do you do two?