Swift kick to the face

Keeping it real my friends. I'm totally complaining on this post. Feel free to skip it.

We were out of town all last week and I must say it was a dream. Mike, Charlotte and I went to Las Vegas and San Diego. It was heaven to be in warmer weather, have Mike all to ourselves and not worry about a thing. Aren't vacations the best? So therapeutic and rejuvenating. But vacations can't last forever and our vacation was over all too quickly. As we were making the drive home from St. George to Salt Lake we hit snow and I knew coming home would be hard. It's always hard to come home from vacation but this time was especially hard. Reality sucks.

First swift kick to the face:

We had enjoyed 60-70 degree weather for a week, then like I said the ride home we hit snow and for the next couple of days we had continuous snow. Not a ton of snow but it's no fun to have to wear big coats and scarves again. Uh where was all of this snow in January? Enough already. I'm ready for spring.

Second swift kick to the face:

We got home from our lovely vaca and less than 24 hours Mike was headed on a plane to Cincinnati. What can I say, I'm a sucker for Mikey and like having him around. Charlotte and I loved spending every minute with him last week. You know how I feel about vacation Mike. We got so used to seeing him and playing with him and then he's up and gone for a few days. Back to reality, back to Mike's busy schedule, and back to having to share Mike with the hospital. Bummer.

Third swift kick to the face:

Second night home from vacation, Mike is gone. I had only been asleep a couple of hours when I hear Charlotte whimper at 1:15 a.m. Weird. She's doesn't usually wake up in the middle of the night and if she does she goes right back to sleep. She cries off and on for a bit and I figure I better go see what's going on. The minute I open the door to go into her room, I got hit by the deathly smell of throw up. Yup. Vomit. First time Charlotte's really been sick, she's had a couple minor colds, but nothing serious. She's never thrown up before and this was miserable. Poor girl. I go into the room and vomit is everywhere, EVERYWHERE! I'll spare you the details but the next couple of hours are spent cleaning up her room, calming Charlotte down, giving her a bath, getting her to bed, falling asleep myself, only to wake up 45 minutes to an hour later to repeat the routine all over again ALONE. Yes I can handle a late night with a sick baby, I just wish I could have had Mike there for advice and support with this being the first time Charlotte's been that sick. Yay for motherhood! Yay for husbands being out of town! Not....

The good news, I got to watch the Bachelor, the sun was out all day yesterday, Charlotte hasn't thrown up again since Monday morning and Mike will be home soon.

However just for a moment I'm going to dream about last week, watching Charlotte for the first time in the ocean, hearing her squeal at the birds and walking with Mike along the beach.

Take me back please. I'm ready for another week of vacation.

VIP for a night

Aside from Mike's busy medical residency, Mike has a "second job" where he works a few times a month to earn a little extra cash and gain more experience working as an Internal Medicine physician. I'll be honest, first hearing about this opportunity I wasn't too stoked about Mike picking up extra work with his already busy schedule. There are some months I feel like I never see the guy and he was going to work more? However, it really hasn't been too bad and there have been some good perks. Mike has loved being able to have this second job and it's been a great learning experience for him. Luckily it doesn't take him away too much and for the most part he gets to choose the days/times he works. But I must say the best part about this second job came Christmas time when Mike received his bonus, TWO third row VIP tickets to a Jazz game, let me clarify that the VIP part included dinner and treats for us all evening. Not sure if we were more excited for the free fancy food, or the third row seats. Now for us small people who have tried to live on a somewhat tight budget for the past 5.5 years, who would never dream of spending that kind of money on tickets for anything, this came as VERY EXCITING news to us. We have been counting down the days until the big game. Do we live sad lives or what? I reserved a baby sitter a month in advance, we were not going to miss out! Let me tell you it was quite nice to live as a VIP for a night. We had great parking, fantastic food and awesome seats.

Yes that was the view from our seats. Not bad eh?

We were lucky to go the first Jazz game with Coach Tyrone Corbin as the coach. For those of you out of state readers this was a VERY BIG DEAL. The previous coach, Jerry Sloan coached the Jazz for 20+ years. But I couldn't tell you whether Coach Corbin did a good job or not, let's be honest I grew up in a house full of girls, I don't know what makes a good coach, especially a good basketball coach. I am good however at cheering really loud and getting into the game. Lucky Mike. :)

The Jazz ended up losing the game and I couldn't have cared less. Mike and I had the best night. I don't think it will be anytime soon that we have a VIP night again, but for one night it sure was nice to live like one!

OBSESSED.

Mike and I have always said we don't want to get cell phones for our kids until they are

AT LEAST

16 years old.

Well purchasing cell phones for our kids may come sooner than we want.

Currently Charlotte is obsessed with cell phones.

She loves pushing the buttons and holding it up to her ear pretending to talk.

She's such a girl.

We are in trouble.

Sticky Rice

A few thoughts for a Tuesday night:

Whoever thought it was a good idea to give Charlotte sticky rice for dinner was

DEAD WRONG.

(And the mom of the year award goes to...yeah that wouldn't be me.)

Poor quality due to using the camera on my phone

It got everywhere, and when I say everywhere I mean

up under her chin stuck in the folds,

behind her ears,

and we even found some when we took her diaper off for a tub.

She did however LOVE IT and couldn't get enough of it.

For the first time in a long time I quit in the beginning of my run. I honestly don't mind the cold, if you dress properly it's not too bad and running in the cold can be quite refreshing. But when I layered up today and headed outside for a run, the wind was whipping me around all over the place with below freezing temps. I was over it. I lasted a mile and headed home. BOO. I did make up for it by riding our spin bike but I still felt a little disappointed in myself for just throwing in the towel. Cold is fine, wind SUCKS.

It's finally February! Hip, hip hooray. January is always a killer and although this January really wasn't bad this year it did seem to last forever. The closer we get to spring and warmer weather, THE BETTER!

On the up side I noticed tonight just after 6 p.m. the sun had still not completely set! The days are slowly but surly getting longer. YES!

Let's hear it:

Big Valentine's Plans?

Do you hate the wind as much as I do?

Counting down the days until spring?

Have you ever tried to get sticky rice out of hair?

Please share!

I love you St. George

We headed to St. George over the weekend and it was blissful.

The weather was lovely.

Both Mike and I said, "It feels like SPRING" over and over again.

Although the weather in the SLC hasn't been terrible, it was still nice to go someplace a little bit warmer, relax and not wear a coat and scarf everywhere we went.

We started the weekend off with a half marathon. I had never done this one before. It was a well organized, fairly flat, race. I had in my mind that I wasn't going to worry about my time for this race, I was just going to run it for fun. I too often become obsessed with my time and it was nice to just run for the enjoyment of running. I didn't pay attention to how slow I was going, I just took it easy and it felt great.

The rest of the day was spent playing with Charlotte outside. We've not played outside for a long time. Charlotte loved being able to roam free without a jacket on. We loved walking with her, throwing her in the air, and holding her hand.

And now it's Monday and it's time to get back into reality.

The weekend was over too quickly

We'll be going back again soon for sure.

Do you ever just run races for fun and not worry about your time?

When the last time you went outside without a jacket/coat?

Have you been a mini vacation lately?

Looking forward to spring as much as we are?

Please share!

My WORD

January has arrived. Time for resolutions, dreams and aspirations for the upcoming year. As you know I chose a word to focus on each year in hopes that it will help shape and mold me into the person I want to become.

2008: ADAPT

2009: NEW

2010: APPRECIATE

I'm so proud of myself; it's mid January and I've already chosen my word, I chose it in December, and I've starting working on it! This is a miracle for me my friends.

SO without further ado my word for 2011 is.....

D I S C I P L I N E

This couldn't be a more perfect word for me this year. Now that my life is slightly less structured than it ever has been I need to be much more DISCIPLINED to get things done and accomplished in my life. You know how when you are super busy although it can be stressful you seem to get everything done? When I'm really busy I'm good at prioritizing, organizing and using my time efficiently. But most days I'm not super busy and even though my day isn't as full I still struggle to get things done. So it's time to be more DISCIPLINED!

So for 2011 I hope to be more disciplined by:

*Limiting my time on the INTERNET. Such a time sucker for me.

*Not eating EVERYTHING I see. I'm not cutting out sweets or anything crazy like that but I definitely need to eat healthier and be more disciplined with eating my fruits and veggies.

*I need to be more disciplined with my work-out schedule so I can meet the goals I hope to accomplish in 2011.

*Stick to my budget and be more disciplined in my money management. I'm taking a grocery guru class come February to help me with this!

You get the idea.

Some other things I need to be more disciplined on but they are more private and personal.

I'm totally stoked about my word. Every time I think about what I should get done, feel lazy or want to eat another sweet treat, the word DISCIPLINE pops into my head. It's kicking my butt, but that's a good thing.

I am setting a few goals for 2011. Nothing big or too unrealistic. I like keeping it real, stretching myself but keeping it attainable. I'm really excited about 2011. I just know it's going to be a great year. Mike's career path will be more finalized, where we will be living in the future will be more finalized, we've got two amazing family trips this summer, and Charlotte is more and more fun everyday. Cheers to 2011!

What's your word?

Do you make resolutions?

Happy to have 2010 over with?

Feeling good about 2011?

What are you looking forward to?

Please share!