Babymoon

We finally got our vacation!!!

One of my greatest friends in the whole world just moved to California. TRAGICALLY, her husband had to leave for Washington only a few days after their move, leaving poor Jeanette all by herself in a new place. Being the great friend that I am, I decided that Kent and I could go babysit her for the week.

Oh did we have fun :) My favorite part was that Huntington Beach was only 67 degrees while back in Chandler it was 110. My least favorite part was getting some kind of stomach bug on beach day :( We also helped her unpack and get settled in her cute house while laughing till we cried like the good ol' days. She and I have had SO MANY crazy adventures together and I am sure going to miss her. I'm glad that we got to spend our last "vacation" with her.

Jeanette and I at Huntington Beach:


Kent and I also headed up to Sherman Oaks and spent the night at my cousin Todd and his wife Leila's house. We had a lot of fun visiting with them. Leila is also expecting her 1st baby and we are just so excited to be pregnant at the same time. Neither of us are finding any joy in actually BEING pregnant, so we got to whine to each other a lot too!

We then headed back home on Friday and I cringed as I watched the temperature rise. We'd like to head to Utah in a few weeks, but other than that we'll be staying close to home for the remainder of the Summer. I am so grateful that we got to get out when we did though.

So, goodbye to our Babymoon:



And HELLO to our little girl in less than 3 months!:



Boogyboarding is my FAVORITE thing to do at the beach, but because of a little "baby bump" I had to live vicariously through Kent. He had never been, but I think he caught up pretty well and it looks like he had a lot of fun! Next year, my turn!

Here she is!

What an exciting week we had!

It started out as any other week with the same old Property Management duties (have I mentioned that I'm REALLY looking forward to not doing this anymore???), and I couldn't wait to get through the work and get back to another weekend.

Just as I thought I couldn't take it anymore a lovely surprise came my way. I was on the phone with someone who had lived in a Townhome we just started managing. He had left behind a few items and the Tenants we had just moved in didn't find a need for one piece in particular. The 48" Projection TV. This gentleman did not feel any attachment to it and said "whoever wants it can have it."

?!WHAT?!

So, me being the "customer service-oriented" person that I am jumped at the chance to help him out.

Look what we got!



Friday afternoon was definitely filled with rearranging and a lot of heaving and ho-ing (I don't know how, but our other TV was only 1/2 the size but twice the weight!).

Kent and I were joking with the fact that we are such simple people. We don't really go after lavish things, or get overly excited about TVs, or anything like that. But do you know what kind of LOSERS we would be if we passed this up?

For the record...we are still incredibly broke and this TV was 100% FREE. We would have NEVER saved up our money to even buy something this ridiculous either.

So, I still have some rearranging to do with our Entertainment unit...seeing power cords is a Pet Peeve of mine and everything looks cluttered around it as well. My dad built the unit, so I don't want to get rid of it. We turned the middle piece on its side and set the TV on top of that which works temporarily, but I'm afraid that it could topple over or crack or something.

On top of the TV we are also getting a love seat for FREE. Maybe Property Management isn't such a bad thing anymore?

P.S. I interviewed 4 people yesterday for my position and we found someone who will be starting in July :) Woo Hoo!

P.S.S. Thanks to Amy and her Jimmy and Mike and his Muscles for helping us get our new toy home.

Congratulations Lanae on Your New Baby Boy! :)

Today Lanae had her 3rd baby boy - I hope I'm not stealing her thunder by writing about it first - I'm just so excited to hear the news: Cayden James Larson.  We're so happy for her and the rest of the Larson family - 3 boys!  Crazy.  

Carly cooked a great chicken dinner with rolls, mashed potatoes and grilled zucchini.  Amy really missed out on some yummy yum stuff.  Maybe sometime this week we'll be able to see her.

I went to an entrepreneur roundtable meeting for most of the day Saturday, meeting 9 new folks, and deciding to start a new company with 2 brothers that live over an hour away - not sure how that's going to work out, but we'll see.  Concept: redstartup.com - a company designed to offer young companies resources (like legal help, accounting, marketing/design/branding, etc. ) that most startups desperately need, but can't afford.  We'd be able to do it by taking a piece of equity up front, and having the costs be tied to revenues once the company begins generating sales.  Mostly geared for service-type businesses where the entrepreneur has some experience in the field they're pursuing.  

Met with 2 financial planners, reluctantly I might add,  later in the day on Saturday.  We need to get life insurance and a 529 plan setup for our baby girl for a college fund - they're going to get quotes over for both of those.  Great thing about owning your own company - you can expense these type of investments out tax free going in, and tax free coming out - if you do it right.

Today I was set apart as 1st Counselor in the Elders Quorum - this is now my 7th time to serve in an Elders Quorum presidency.  Still teaching gospel doctrine to the 14-15 year olds, which I really enjoy.  Carly is still doing the ward bulletin, and I have a funny feeling she may be called to the nursery here soon.  She's been helping out the last 2 weeks with some pretty violent little boys (one hit her in the eye with a book and almost gave her a black eye).

Carly went down to Tuscon this weekend to help out with Job's Daughters.  I really admire her dedication to the things she believes in.  I've been to one ceremony before, and I gotta admit: it was boring.  But she loves it - go figure.  I hope our kids are active in either DeMolay/Jobs Daughters, or Boy scouts/girls scouts - I think we're pretty much going to require them to be in one of those 2 organizations - both teach faith in God, good works, and help the youth prepare for the future. 

We attended the temple on Friday morning - we've found Friday mornings to be the best time for us lately.  Our goal is to go twice a month and we hope to go this Thurs evening with our ward, which, we've never done.  What can I say - I'm just not into "social worship".  I prefer things quiet when I'm there.  But, I think we should give this one a try this Thurs.  The Mesa temple is one of the busiest temples in the world, apparently.  I believe it - even on a Friday morning, the session is pretty packed.  Evenings are very difficult to get in.  Can't wait for the new temples being built in Phoenix and Gilbert - Gilbert is just a few minutes away.

This past Wednesday I was elected President of our local Toastmasters group - I hadn't planned on running, let alone winning, but one of the members put me on the ballot (without my "consent", I might add).  Now that I've been elected, I've got a bunch of ideas on what we might do to become a better club.  Some ideas: having a prayer to start off each meeting; having members pledge to the toastmaster oath prior to joining; having ribbon or trophy awards rather than just pieces of paper that go in the trash; video recording of the speeches; postings on youtube and facebook to create a better PR outreach; more club socials/game nights at members' homes, and a few other ideas...The other 6 leadership positions are all filled by women, so I'm sure I'll have my hands full.  (FYI: Carly served as the VP of Education the last 6 month term, and she did an amazing job at it - the club will definitely miss her hard work and contribution; I wish she was still serving; I've never been in a leadership role in Toastmasters before, so this will be new for me.)

We got a TON of toys from Shawn and Chad (Ken's daughter and her husband) and their little girl, Chloe, whose 15 months old (and just so adorable I might add).  With all these new/used toys, our little girl may just be spoiled after all.  :)  Not such a bad thing I suppose.  I'm going to be the biggest sucker for anything she wants.  Bye-bye discipline-daddy.  I wonder how Ben handles 4 girls - I'll have to ask him sometime.  I can only imagine.  Sounds like from Tonia's most recent post that he's doing a great job at being a super-daddy.  I hope I can do the same for our kids.

Oh before I forget, Carly and I want to make some predictions on our little girl's size, date and other stuff: 

Kent thinks she'll be:

17 inches

6 lbs 3 oz

brown hair

blue eyes

10:58 am

Sept 3

Labor will last 3.5 hours

Natural birth (no medicine/c-section)

Carly thinks she'll be:

21 inches

7 lbs 8 oz

Blond hair

blue eyes

9:30 pm

Sept 15

2 hours

Natural birth (no medicine/c-section)

Those are our 'bets'.  We'll see...

Hope Lanae and her family are doing well - we hope to visit sometime soon whenever she's feeling up for some company - perhaps in a few weeks or next month sometime.