Baby Boy is Getting Old!

Our little boy Benji was born in August. He is too cute! I am very busy and lazy and blogging is, frankly, not very convenient.

After a four-hour, epidural-less, whirlwind labor, Benji joined us. Yes I was upset that we only had our phones for his first pictures.

He was 7 lbs 2 oz and 19.5 inches long.

He was a sweetheart from the very beginning.

We got a huge surprise when our families drove up together from Utah to meet Benji. They are crazy and only spent 1.5 days not travelling. But they got to meet our little guy.

And since then, we have fallen even more in love with him and have taken him on many adventures including many walks, a trip to the zoo, and his first dip in the lake. I think he looks a lot like my dad.

Now that he is getting older (I mean, he is super old, 2 1/2 months!), it is really fun to see his little personality develop. Benji is so smiley and is constantly cooing and gurgling (not constantly, he is quietish when he sleeps and sometimes he screams). He is so chill and loves to be snuggled.

We love our Benji Boy!

Counting Down...

Obviously, I am really pregnant. Like due in one week. And it is super hot right now. Today, our car thermometer said it was 93*. This is very hot because I get grumpy and uncomfortable when it hits 80* here in Washington (I do not like humidity). We ate out so we could dine in some air conditioning. Poor Rachel has to deal with a tired, sore, and often grumpy mom all day long. I read her many books so she doesn't destroy everything all day. But she still does and makes a huge mess and runs around naked laughing. This girl is going to get a rude awakening when I birth out her brother and become mobile again---no more running just out of mom's reach (except she will probably get faster).

We are excited for the Baby Boy to arrive. I am excited to not be pregnant and to meet this little fellow. Andrew is excited to see The Boy wiggling because he always misses my tummy going crazy. Rachel has no idea but we get her to say, "Come play with me, Baby Brother." I think she is more excited about Grandma coming on an AIRPLANE to the AIRPORT in two weeks (bolded words make her super excited). So we all have things to look forward to coinciding with the birth of the Baby Boy. Any day would be great! Preferably sooner than later. Can heat put you into labor?

Outdoorsy Summer Adventures

You know us, we love to be in the mountains. Even though we are busy with a house, fun with friends, Rachel, and trips, we have gotten into the great outdoors a few times this summer.

Bridal Veil Falls

In May, we hiked to Bridal Veil Falls. It was a bit steep but not too bad. It is a beautiful, roaring waterfall. Rachel loved it. We hiked with Andrew's brother Wesley and his wife Maren. Andrew took many beautiful photos.

Unfortunately, Andrew used his $250 memory card that he was swindled into buying. It died in June on our family vacation. And we do not have the money to pay for someone to recover the photos at this time. Needless to say, we are unhappy about this. The moral of the story is to not spend that much money on a memory card.

Fishing in Daddy's "Boat"

We don't have a real boat (someday!), but Andrew does have a float tube. He went out one morning to our neighborhood lake to try his luck at fishing. No luck. Rachel and I went to see him in the morning. Rachel got to wear her life jacket and did really great on Daddy's "boat". Since then, she loves pointing out boats and saying they are Dad's.

A beautiful sunrise; lilypads; "Mom, the sun is in my eyes!"; Rachel and Andrew seeing the sights of the lake; Rachel and Sarah after the cruise.


The Big Four Ice Caves

In the middle of July, we went hiking to the Big Four Ice Caves. It is a pretty easy hike. I was 35 weeks pregnant, no climbing to the top of a mountain this pregnancy. But we had a great time. Rachel kept singing, "Hiking! Hiking!" I think she likes hiking. You were born into the right family, little girl.

The cutest hiker EVER; the Ice Caves are pretty much melting snow that make caves, they weren't very impressive right now; Sarah and Rachel; trees in front of The Big Four (the mountain); Sarah waiting for Rachel and Andrew (can you see the belly?); a waterfall going down to the snow; Rachel and Sarah at the picnic at Coal Lake; wildflowers along the road.


Camping at Cascade Park

We went camping with our friends at a Church property called Cascade Park. Rachel had so much fun getting dirty and playing with the big kids. All the kids loved the awesome barrel swing next to our campsite. We ate yummy food and had lots of fun. Rachel even slept really well in the tent!---until 5:20 when some very noisy crows started cackling in the trees next to our tent. I went out and shooed them away, but Rachel would not go back to sleep. She was fairly pleasant but super tired. Andrew and I were really tired, too, as we had stayed up late looking at stars and chatting with our friends.

Claire, Rachel, and Dallon having fun around the fire; all three kids on the swing, pushed by Kendra; Dallon kept kissing Rachel in the swing, which was really funny because she always tries to kiss him when she plays with him, but he never lets her; Rachel in the swing; a very sleepy Rachel snuggled up in a sleeping bag; Rachel and the awesome swing---so very tired but she did not want to get out.


We have had a pretty great summer and have gotten out into the wild at least once a month. That has been nice. I hope you have had a great summer, too!

No Posts in June?

Yes, no posts in June. We had a fun and busy month. We were gone for half the month and we were busy/I was tired the other half of the time.

Here is a summary. Maybe there will be more posts later, and maybe there won't.

Rachel painting on our vacation with Grandma.

Blowing bubbles with Grandma and Nigel.

She climbed this all by herself. She is getting to be a climber.

Helping mom work in the yard.

Getting wedding cakes ready for Elise's wedding.

Rachel at the wedding.

And there are some pictures from my phone.

In other news, I have just 6 weeks left until The Boy arrives!

Our Trip to Utah

My grandma passed away on May 1, so we all took a quick trip down to Utah for the funeral. Although it was for a sad event (and a joyous celebration of a lovely, long life), we made the best of our time with family.

Who knew SeaTac airport had a little play land? Rachel loved climbing and sliding on the toys, especially the slide and the airplane.

We went to feed watermelon rinds to the local horse and colt. The kids were very intrigued.

We also made a point to visit with Andrew's elderly grosseltern, Oma and Opa.

The bottom two pictures are after the funeral, where we got a picture of all of Grandma's grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Quite a legacy!

I will miss my Grandma, but I know I will see her again. And, as one friend said to my mom, "Look at the great lengths she went to so that you could have all your kids with you on Mother's Day!" And look at how wonderful it was for all Grandpa's grandchildren to be with him for this day.

Our Little Fish, Continued

Here are some more pictures of Rachel at swimming lessons. This time, with me.

Rachel waving hello; "jumping" out of the water; going down the slide after the last lesson (she has pretty much refused to go down any slide since); wrapped up in her towel; post-dunk.

Rachel did great at swimming lessons and I had a fun time with her!

Our Little Fish

I signed Rachel up for swimming lessons, you know the kind where the parent is in the water and you sing songs and splash and pretty much just try to help them be comfortable in the water. She loved it. So did I.

She liked "swimming" after the rubber ducks, singing the songs, "jumping" off the wall into the water, and watching the other kids. She did not like "floating" on her back very much. Some days she liked blowing bubbles and splashing, other days she did not.

Since swimming lessons have been over, she has found her swim suits and said "swinnin" almost every day. I think we will be spending a lot of time in the pool, lake, or wading pool this summer.

Who Wore It Better?: 25 Weeks Edition

Who wore 25 weeks pregnant better? Pregnancy #1 Sarah or Pregnancy #2 Sarah?

The details:

Pregnancy #1 Sarah

• is happy to finally look pregnant instead of slightly fat.
• has a round belly.
• has an old school phone.
• is having a girl.
• has no acne and crazy leg/armpit hair.
• feels great.
• is freakishly pale in July.
• is making a soft, "madonna and child"-like smile.
• is looking forward to her new baby.

Pregnancy #2 Sarah

• has been looking pregnant for a while, but is happy overall about how she's carrying the baby.
• has a lumpy belly.
• has a phone she wants to upgrade.
• is having a boy.
• has horrible acne and is almost a naked mole rat in shaved areas.
• feels sick and tired.
• has a tan in May? in Washington?
• is sticking her tongue out because she is sick and sassy.
• is looking forward to her new baby but does not know how she is going to manage two kids.

So----who wore it better?

Honestly, I do not know. I think I'm currently looking pretty great for being 25 weeks and feeling horrible and in my second pregnancy. And what you can't see in my bathroom selfies is my legs. I think my legs are in better shape this time around than last time. But the first time, I was not all lumpy yet. I am currently lumpy thanks to pregnancy #1.

You can tell me what you think of how I look if you want to. My feelings truly will not be hurt! I have a pretty positive self image and body image. But you don't have to say if you don't want to. ;)

Easter Fun

This is my 350th post on the blog! Wow. That is a lot of posts. I am also trying something new with pictures. It takes more work, but it will take up less space.

As you know, it was just Easter weekend. We had a fun time celebrating in many ways, mostly in egg hunts.

Ward Easter Egg-stravaganza

Rachel chilling at breakfast; throwing a fit because she wants to go outside NOW; finding an egg; a full basket of eggs; finding a sneaky egg.

She also learned how to say "egg" so she had plenty of opportunity to practice.

Finding her basket at home

It's Easter morning!; searching for the basket; found it!; and there are treats; eating a Reese's peanut butter egg for breakfast; showing dad what she got; too cute.

Rachel seemed pretty excited about the things in her basket. We did not go crazy with gifts from the Easter bunny. Thanks to my parents, we did not have to buy any candy.

HOA egg hunt

I'm on our HOA board and headed up an egg hunt for children.

Finding eggs strewn about on the grass; a plethora of eggs; the kids who came; on the hunt with mom; an egg in a tree!; family Easter picture.

The other people helping me with the egg hunt thought we needed about 400 eggs. And then only 7 two-year-olds showed up. By the end, the parents were saying, "If you get five more eggs, we can go home."

And Rachel's dress is a size 18 month dress. It looked more like a ball gown because she is barely into 12 month clothes.

We also tried to remember the reason for Easter---our Savior, Jesus Christ. We had a wonderful stake conference on Sunday. I was in the choir. It was nice to sing songs about Him and feel the Spirit testify of His resurrection.

And The New Baby Is...

VERY CUTE! And also, A BOY! And he sure wasn't shy. He was sleeping, so he doesn't sleep in a very shy way.

Baby Boy

We were excited. Andrew was smug because he guessed it. He just knew it. He was especially smug because he "knew" it two for two. We'll see how smart he is in the future.

Rachel is disappointed there isn't any chocolate in the bucket.

I was pretty sure it was a boy, but I wasn't positive like Andrew was.

Of course, every pregnancy is different, but this one seemed very different.

I broke out. My belly seemed lower. I wanted to eat hamburgers instead of curry. And those are the not gross differences between this pregnancy and the last.

I did hope for a boy. One of each would be nice---and I had wanted a son first, so second will be great. Hopefully this pregnancy continues to go well!

Blogging Woes

So, I am having some blogging issues and it is not necessarily because I am lazy or don't want to get on the computer. It has to do with images.

I ran out of space to upload pictures to blogger a while ago. I opened a flickr account. This works OK, but people started added some of my pictures to their favorites or whatever. I don't know these people. So then I started making my images private and that worked for a while, but then suddenly you couldn't see them. Then I made the images in my last post public and a bunch of people marked them as favorites. I still don't know those people who are favoriting my sweet little girl. And the main point of this blog is so you who I know can see pictures of my sweet little girl and future sweet little baby (coming in August, I haven't mentioned that). As of late I have been using Facebook to share pictures (I know, the safest and most private place on the internet---not).

Pretty much I will have to explore my options but I'm thinking I might need to delete some earlier posts and maybe make my blog private. Sorry to those who have private blogs, but I really hate private blogs. I hate checking them, I hate that I have to be logged in. I am pretty much 90% less likely to read your blog if it is private. I will keep thinking about this and exploring options but input from my readers would be appreciated.

That's all for now!

February Photo Dump

Andrew got a new camera, so if it looks like he doesn't do anything with us, that is not true. He is playing with his fancy pantsy camera.

In February, we didn't do anything big. We lived our normal lives.

We went on lots of walks in the cold.




We bathed.




We napped and awoke from said naps.






We went to the zoo and hung out in a meerkat hole.


We learned how to climb things.




We celebrated Valentine's Day. Thanks Andrew!



(You can see that I'm not good at the new camera)

We read books.


We practiced the piano.


And brushed our teeth.


Pretty uneventful but also really great!

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow (in February)

We had a pretty good snowstorm a few weeks ago. Andrew and I were on a hot date at the Stake Valentine's Social/Seminar/Dance. That was pretty fun. Especially because Rachel was at home, sleeping in her bed. We looked at the window and the snow was coming down! Beautiful. We both really miss the snow. It doesn't feel like winter (especially Christmas) without snow or general freezing conditions. We drove home after doing a few donuts in the Church parking lot (CURSE YOU, SUBARU! Not conducive for donuts). And while driving home, we were amazed and laughing and horrified as we watched Washington drivers who did everything you aren't supposed to do in the snow. (I realize that it does not snow here very often and that they don't have these things pounded into their heads, but it was still amazing.) One of my friends described it as "a clumsy ballet." Yes.

We saw:

• Slamming of the breaks
• Overcorrecting
• Sharp turns
• Hitting the gas

Wow. Who knew driving in the snow was such a skill?

The next morning, we went out and played in 2 inches of the white stuff.


Rachel seemed pretty interested.


Her boots collected the snow so she was walking on platform boots. It was hilarious.


Going down the hill with Mom.


Rachel raising her arms in the sled with Dad.


A beautiful baby who loves the snow.

I think Rachel really liked it. Every time we are in the garage and she sees her snowboots, she grabs them and drags them everywhere.

I hope that it snows again soon!

Super Bowl Sunday in Seattle's Seahawk Suburbs

People here were really excited about the Seahawks being the champions and being in the Super Bowl. We wondered if anyone would be at church. Church starts at 1 and ends at 4 and the game started at 3:30. During sacrament meeting, the chapel was full of blue and green. The die hards were so pleased. Us bandwagoners were pleased that we wore the right colors to church. Rachel's dress was perfect. You will see a picture soon.

While sacrament meeting had been as full as it usually is, the third hour in Relief Society had about 10 sisters, as opposed to the usual 20ish. And instead of Primary kids banging down the door at the end of church, it was the High Priests who rushed in and threw the chairs up and set up the Seminary seating.

Driving home was weird because there were not very many cars. We all changed our clothes and got our blue and green jello, cookie dough, and ice cream, and headed out. And there were even less cars on the road going to our friends house!


Rachel playing with her friend Ethan.

We ate food and treats and were not very healthy. We cheered and had a good old time.

I couldn't help but taunt my cousin Scott a little bit via text. Turns out I texted him at pretty much the worse point of the game for the Broncos---no points, Seahawks at like 36 or something (I don't really care that much about football).

Sarah: Enjoying the game?
Scott: No offense Sarah, but go to hell
Sarah: None taken.
Sarah: I imagine the Broncos are feeling like they're in hell right now.
Scott: They should, cause I do
After the game.
Sarah: Don't cry.
Scott: You're not the boss of me.

Thanks for the great laughs Scott!

Rachel had not napped since the morning and being awake through all of church and having fun with your buddies all evening can really tire you out. She got really really snuggly, which never ever happens.


Snuggling with Dad.

And then the Seahawks won and all the Broncos looked sad and they dumped Gatorade on the coach before the game was done and it really wasn't that intense. People were screaming and setting off fireworks and we went home before the buzzed drivers got out onto the road.

And that is our tale of being Seahawks fans because we live in Washington.

Sorry and Nothing Much but Randoms and Seahawks

Sorry the pictures aren't working. We shall see when I get around to fixing it. I just have other things that need to get done, you know?

It has been super foggy lately but yesterday and (it seems like) today the sun burned the fog off and was a lovely day. We went to the park and got some lovely Vitamin D yesterday, and we will do that this afternoon too.

I feel like we are obligated to watch the Super Bowl and to support the Seahawks. Usually, I don't watch or care about the Super Bowl, and if we didn't live in the Seattle area, I would root for the Broncos, so it is kind of weird to feel obligated in this way.

Speaking of that, we learned that Rachel is afraid of fireworks when people around us set off fireworks after the win on Sunday. I can only imagine the noise people will make if the Seahawks win, when the Seahawks win. It will be bigger the the Fourth of July, and that was big.

We are trying to deep clean our house to rid it of demons in preparation of Chinese New Year. It is always something I begin with gusto and then have to drag myself to do finish it.

We have friends living in Belgium and friends who will be living in the UK at the same time and we thought we should go visit them. Unfortunately, Andrew does not have enough vacation time. Well, he does right now but we have to save it for the summer when we go to Lake Cascade with my family and then when we go to Utah for a wedding. Sorry friends living in Europe.

And that is all for now!

It's January!

Well I have been slacking but that doesn't matter. The main reason is that I am too lazy (and confused about whatever program Andrew wants me to use) to put pictures on the computer, and then to flickr, and then to the blog. So I thought I'd post Christmas stuff, but that isn't on here.

So here is a Thanksgiving picture.



And here is a very random picture from a walk I went on with Andrew, Rachel, and Wesley (Maren was running).

Yes, that is a chicken with some ducks.

We are doing fine around here. Not too much to report.