Missionaries and doctor's appointments

March 9-15

- Daylight savings time started this week.  I was not excited.  I was quite happy with the sun starting to come up while I was getting ready and leaving for work.  After his day, it was dark again.  Oh well.  It's starting to come up again (even though this is the last week I'll be getting up that early for work).

- We met with a lady in our ward about our taxes.  Not going to lie...I didn't realize how much we got back for our college payments.  Neal only went to school part time at the beginning of the year before he finished his degree, so we didn't spend nearly as much for school.  That made our refund pretty much plummet this year.  Oh well.  At least we are getting SOMETHING back!

- I had a doctor's appointment (which you can read about here.)  After that we headed down to the temple in Denver for the last time before little dude is born.  It was a bit weird to think that the next time we'd be down there, we'd have a kiddo.

- The missionaries came over.  We've got some awesome missionaries serving in our ward right now.  They come over every once in a while to teach us.  We absolutely love having them come over.

- My friend, Ashley, and I went to the ward Relief Society Appreciation Dinner at our church.  We had a wonderful dinner served by the high priests group of prime rib, broccoli, and dessert (angel food cake with strawberries...YUM)!  We then had a fun quiz about how well we knew the history of Relief Society.  I also learned about Goodreads during this dinner.  Oh my gosh.  I love it!  If you're on Goodreads, add me as a friend.  I'm so excited about it!

March 16-22

- We went to our friend, Jessica's, farewell talk.  She leaves for her mission super soon, and it was so wonderful to hear her speak!

- The people at Neal's work had a baby shower for us.  I hadn't met most of them, so it was fun to go and meet his coworkers and have a lovely lunch!  We did a potluck, and one of Neal's coworkers made "Sloppy Joey's."  It was so cute!

- I made corned beef and cabbage with potatoes for the first time for St. Patrick's Day.  I was really nervous, but it ended up being really easy, and turned out really well!  I was excited!

- I had my weekly doctor's appointment.  I was still 50-60% effaced and 1 cm dilated, so not much changed.  Joey's heartbeat was good though, and everything measured good, so he just needs some more time :)

- We had the missionaries come over for dinner.  Hamburgers and bratwursts.  Yum!

- Neal ran 9 to 5 at the Candlelight a couple of the days.  The show closed this past weekend, so it was the last time he was going to run a show there.  It was a little bittersweet for him.  He also got to mix monitors for Tracy Lawrence and John Anderson.  He said it was a pretty incredible show.  I was jealous.

That's about it for these last two weeks.  I keep hoping every day that little Joey will make his entrance into this world, and I will be able to post tons of cute pictures on here.  Not yet thought :) I keep telling myself that really, at most, there are 2 1/2 weeks until he will be here.  They seem like the longest 2 1/2 weeks of my life ;)

Goodbye February!

Goodness time has gotten away from me.  I looked today and realized I hadn't posted about anything but little dude and what's going on with him since mid-February!

Week of February 9

- We did our last baby class this week.  Neal couldn't go because he was working on getting the Christopher Cross show loaded in at the Candlelight.  So my partner that night was the fake baby that they gave us (that we really didn't even end up using).  I took a picture of it, but I deleted the picture off my phone thinking I wouldn't need it anymore!  Gah!

- We had a baby appointment this week.  Hearing little dude's heart beat is so awesome :)

- Over the weekend we stayed at my parents' house with my siblings so my mom could go to Phoenix to visit my dad.  Every year for the last like 5 or 6 years, my dad has had to go out of town for work over Valentine's Day.  In high school I can remember going and getting flowers for my dad to give to my mom because he was out of town.  This year, my mom was able to fly down and visit him so they could be together :) We were happy to help!

Week of February 16

- We were still down at my parents' house the beginning of the week.  Since Neal had to work on Valentine's Day (welcome to the entertainment industry), we celebrated our Valentine's Day on the 17th.  We went to a cute little Italian restaurant called Pinocchio's by my parents' house.  They have SUPER yummy food, and we ended up getting a free dessert because they messed up Neal's order.  I gave Neal a really nice Fossil watch that he'd been looking at for a couple weeks, and he gave me a beautiful, Celtic style necklace.

- That Tuesday we went down to the temple.  Our friend Jess came down with us :) Afterwards, we went to Chili's for dinner.  Their molten chocolate cake gets me every time.  I love it!

- On Thursday I went to Noodle's and Co with some of the girls from our ward at church.  We ate a delicious dinner, and enjoyed catching up.

- On Friday my mom threw me a baby shower that you can read about here.  It was wonderful to see a bunch of my family and friends!  My sister and her husband even drove in from Utah :)

- On Saturday we had our Stake Relief Society Conference at church.  (To read about what Relief Society is and the role it plays in our church, go here.  It's a pretty awesome organization).  I went with my friends Ashley and Jocelyn.  We ate a yummy taco salad that was provided by Neal's aunt, Donna, and his uncle, Randy, and then listened to some wonderful musical numbers and speakers.  One of the speakers was Neal's mom, Judy.  It was kind of crazy to watch her give a talk to all of the Relief Society sisters in our area!

Week of February 23

- On Sunday, we had the missionaries come over.  They come over about once a month to teach us a lesson.  The lesson can be anything from how to be a better missionary to basic gospel principles.  We really enjoy having them over.  They work really hard and bring a real joy and peace to our home.

- On Monday I had a baby appointment.  Read about that here.  I also went to the chiropractor.

*Side note* I love my chiropractor.  I totally recommend that any woman who is pregnant goes and sees one.  He's helped me so much with back and hip pain throughout my entire pregnancy.  The minute I have any pain or sciatica or anything, I go in and see him and he fixes it.

- On Tuesday we went to a birthday party for Neal's nephew, George.  I can't believe he is 5.

- On Thursday Neal went snowboarding while I was at work, and then we had the missionaries over for dinner.  We made them Qdoba/Chipotle style burritos with moose steak.  They always tell us that they love coming over for dinner because we feed them meat they've never had before.  Haha.

- On Saturday Neal had the opportunity to participate in a really awesome experience.  He was asked to be a teacher for a mock Missionary Training Center that our stake did for the 16-18 year old young men in our stake.  He had a group of four that he spent the afternoon with, and taught them about being missionaries.  He really enjoyed it, and said it was a great experience.  After he was done, we went to Neal's cousin's daughter's first birthday party.  Neal's cousin Steph has had a luau for each of her kiddos when they're turned one.  We ate super yummy Cafe Rio style salads and just enjoyed being with family!

That's it for our February adventures!  Hello March!

Super fun week!!

So I don't normally post specifically about what we did during the week, but the week of May 5th was a super fun, awesome week for us!  It seems like we did a whole lot more than we usually do in a week! (Sorry there aren't a whole lot of pictures...I didn't do very well at that this week.  I figure with me posting our wedding pictures lately though, you've probably had enough pictures for a bit!  Haha)

Sunday night we went to my grandparent's house because my cousin Stephanie was in town visiting.  We had a delicious dinner, and then roasted marshmallows and made smores!  It was super fun to see her and spend time with her.

On Monday night we had our friends from church come over for family night (we call it Family Home Evening, or FHE for short).  Our friends Kevin and Ashley with their son Ryder, and Mike and Bekah with their daughter Carmen all came over.  They each brought a yummy treat to share, and I made some things, so we ate and played "Pirate's Cove."  After they all went home, our friends Frank and Sarah came over (they couldn't come earlier because the sister missionaries were at their house) and we played "Apples to Apples" with them.  It was a really enjoyable evening, and great to get to know our new friends better!

Tuesday the sister missionaries came over to our house, and explained that their mission president has requested they teach members the missionary lessons so that we can each be better prepared to share the gospel with those around us.  We accepted their offer, and they taught us the first lesson about the Restoration.  It was so wonderful to have them in our home, and we really look forward to continuing to have them there!

Tuesday night I tried a new adventure with cooking.  I made The Pioneer Woman's homemade pizza dough and homemade cal-zones.  They turned out delicious!!  You can see the delightful meat and cheese mixture in the pictures here...

The problem was, I had to double the pizza dough recipe because I accidentally doubled the yeast (I used a full packet when you're only supposed to use half).  We ended up with about 12 cal-zones.  Too much for Neal and I to eat by ourselves!  We took a few of them and delivered them to the dispatch center I work for so my coworkers could enjoy the fabulous-ness (and because they made us feel guilty on Facebook when I posted the pictures!)  Then Neal and I went to TCBY on a date and had delicious frozen yogurt.

Wednesday before work, Neal and I went shooting with Bekah and Mike.  I got to shoot my gorgeous new pistol (a Springfield) and automatically fell in love!  Neal also became very happy that I chose this gun when he shot it, and loved it as well.

On Thursday Neal's parents took us to lunch at Olive Garden to celebrate our birthdays (which are two weeks apart).  We also celebrated the fact that Neal took his last two finals for the last two classes he needed for this Associate of Arts degree!  We knew he was going to do really well in his English class, but he was worried about his math final.  He discovered later that night that he did really well on his cumulative final, and would be able to graduate!  (He didn't walk because we were in Las Vegas when FRCC had their commencement ceremony...more on that next blog post!)

The rest of the week we spent working and getting ready for our anniversary/birthday trip to Las Vegas!