Big but small

On Sunday, I was trying to get dressed, and I noticed that my stomach has rounded out significantly in the last few days. Jeff and I decided that it has doubled in size since Christmas! Holy Cow! Monday I immediately went to Em's house and raided her maternity clothes. Oddly enough, they are mostly still too big! Dilemma: tight regular clothes, baggy maternity clothes, or sweats and a t-shirt? Every day but Sundays, sweats and a t-shirt win out. I must confess, I was quite used to my marathon-body, so looking down at this little bump is WIERD!

Jeff duly documented the growth-- this picture was taken Tuesday, Dec. 30th. The doctor still is not sure how far along I really am, so I could be anywhere from 17 to 19 weeks along in this picture--almost half way already! I know my stomach isn't very big at all, and it'll only get bigger... but it still feels so... round!

Merry Christmas!

December 25th, 2008, 5:00am-- I woke up to go to the bathroom and eat a snack, and then I was wide awake. So... I tapped my sleeping husband and asked him if he wanted to get up and open presents. He was awake in no time. On came the Christmas music and out came the stockings. Merry Christmas! We increased our game collection quite a bit with Mad Gab, Deja-Moo, Go Nuts!, and Clue on the Go. We love games!!! Now we just need a family to play them with...

Us on Christmas morning, around 6:45am

Jeff's parents sent us a Rosettes Kit, and Jeff promptly whipped up some perfectly star-shaped Rosettes. Mr. Gourmet Chef Jeff.

For Christmas Dinner, we went to Em and Jesse's house 30 minutes away, and ate yummy ham and cheesey potatoes and played games with a ton of fun people. Merry Christmas!

Laurs is BACK!!!!

My BEST (non-husband) friend in the whole wide world (and my roommate for 2 1/2 years), Lauren DeNys, got home from the Baltic States Mission on Friday, Dec 12th, 2008!!! So, I drove the 7 hrs to Nebraska for a little visit on Dec 17th-19th. It was so good to see Laurs again! We were both tired the whole time (she was jet lagged and sleep deprived, and I am a pregnant lady), but we did manage to go on a nice long 4 mile walk and go to the Winter Quarters Temple in the short time I was there. I LOVE YOU LAURS!!

Best friends!

Some things never change...

Ready for the temple!

The night before I left to drive home, there was a huge sleety winter advisory storm where the DeNys family lives, so it took a good half hour to defrost, de-ice, and chip the car out of the whiteness.

Must Be Santa!

Special night, beard that's white.... MUST BE SANTA! Ok, I couldn't resist quoting one of the greatest Christmas songs ever written. Here are a few random pictures of what's been going on in and around the Nook this month:

Our finished Christmas tree, complete with garland, my old favorite ornaments that Mom mailed us (thanks!), and some presents... a few of you may recognize some of them because I wrapped all the ones I'm going to mail and put them under the tree to give it a happy Christmasey look.

I used our Christmas Tree's clippings to make a rustic wreath for our door-- wreath-making is a lot harder than it looks if all you use is yarn to tie the green stuff together!

Out here at the Boone Home, the first 2 weekends of December are Candlelight Tours!! Jeff spent the last few weeks washing thousands of mason jars and a couple hundred lanterns for the event. Unfortunately, I am rather bad at taking night pictures, and Jeff was only able to leave his duties briefly, so we have this one ok picture of the little Boonesfield Village lit up with candles. It was pretty pretty.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The other reason Jeff didn't take more pictures of the candles is because on the 3rd night of the event, he managed to accidentally dump a gallon or two of boiling hot chocolate on his foot, and we spent that evening visiting the hospital. I think his ballooning blisters are too disgusting to post straight onto this blog, so you strong-stomached few may view them by clicking on this:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/photo.php?pid=30227127&id=116900710&ref=nf

And now for the Must Be Santa portion of our program: I found a cute craft idea online and adapted it for my own purposes: a tin can Santa! Yep, there are tin cans underneath all of those cotton balls! Last week, Em, Cammie, and I made lots of English toffee, so I put some of it in the Santa-heads under the hat for gifts to some friends!

Em-- I TOLD you they'd be cute!

If you want to see the site where I found this idea, feel free to check it out:

http://crafts.kaboose.com/tincansanta.html

So when you are lucky enough to have the cutest nephew on the planet, it only makes sense to post a picture of him every now and then, even if Em does do an adequate job of photographing him. So Steve has learned all about my "bag of tricks," which means he knows that since I'm a pregnant lady now, I never come visit him without bringing a bag full of my snacks. Steve loves to explore my bag, pull out a baggie of cereal, bring it over to me, and do a cute little begging dance until I share some food with him. In this picture, he is anticipating some Honey Nut Cheerios.