back it up back it up back it up

behold, a great feast.

Am I allowed to start with Thanksgiving to get caught up? Surely the blogging police won't arrest me for this late entry. We spent the holiday here in Wisconsin again, but this year, we decided to be exclusive to our own breed and not socialize. Carl was busy with school earlier in the week and I never set any plans in stone with other families, so this was the simplest (and frankly, most relaxing) plan. So for the sake of memory keepsaking, here's how our Thanksgiving went down:

I started preparing all our food for our little family in the morning:

Menu
- seasoned stuffing
- sweet potato casserole
- green beans, mother-in-law style (yum. hearty. simple. green beans steamed and then a little milk and butter heated on high to produce a delicious creamy "sauce")
- baguette
- cranberry jelly made from fresh cranberries
- king crab legs. KING CRAB LEGS. such a good idea to skip turkey for crab.
- mini pumpkin pies (I made these the day before)

Thanksgiving week was the first week in months since I had bought butter. and I used almost 3/4 pounds!

I finished cooking early, so we had dinner at 1 pm.. So delicious.

We were trying to decide what we should do for the rest of the day and spontaneously decided to go watch Frozen instead of waiting the next day. Why not? It was a good movie. and we all loved it! Well, Vivienne got bored halfway through, but still enjoyed it overall.

their favorite part - pie.

We came back and had dinner again around 5 or 6 pm. Still so delicious.

stuffed

all alone, no love. jk. just working on pie.

The kids went to bed around 7:30, Carl and I had 2nd trimester food babies in our bellies and laid on the couch pondering on our day. And then we finished the rest of the king crab at 9:30 pm. And it was still so delicious.

Holo.

I purposely spelled "hola" as "holo." I have been saying "holo" to Carl since we first watched MegaMind. So holo, guys :)

Wisconsin has been great! I am so excited that we are comfortable here. We have slowly, but surely, been making friends who are wonderful, wonderul people and most happen to have young kidlets who don't mind the company of Ezra. Our apartment is comfortable and becoming more "homey" everyday (especially since we hung up our pictures finally and have a candied caramel prailines scent swirling around the kitchen and living room everyday). We also got a bookshelf, which has been nice to sort through clutter. I won't comment much on the random tub of pencils, pens, paper, and random hiding in our closet still... but aside from that, we are settled! Our home sweet home for at least the next 15 months :)

(I know it would be fitting to post pictures of our apartment, but that would require me to actually take some... so maybe this weekend?)

This pregnancy has been fairly easy so far. I can't believe I'm already 18 weeks! Here is my latest ultrasound at 17 weeks, 4 days:

do you see the litle open mouth? awwww

We had the opportunity to find out the gender and... we didn't. Ah! It was such a challenge to turn away from the screen. I asked the tech if she knew what the gender was and I think to save me from the temptation, she said she tried not to look and pay attention :) Eek! But after the appointment, I was over the anxiety and feel stoked again  about a delivery room surprise baby.

Speaking of babies, my niece was born this past Saturday! We are thrilled to be an aunt and uncle again to miss Rylee Michelle! Mom and baby are well (and mom looked fantastic after birth!)

courtesy of facebook :)

April seems so far and close. It's so hard to imagine having two babies! Fortunately Ezra will be a little older by then and my due date is landing on the Monday of Carl's spring break. How convenient, yes?

Have a great day, everyone!

wiss-conn-sunn

We are here, we have been here for almost three weeks, and are halfway settled in. Carl started school last week, and we've been watching a lot of 24 when Ezra goes to bed at night.

Aside from school and watching 24, I feel so busy everyday. We go out almost every morning to take care of our mega to-do list we made prior to moving and today, we finally tackled all of the crucial things. We've been going to bed by 10 pm frequently too. I feel so old.

The move out here went fairly smoothly. I'm so glad we took a break halfway through the 2200 mile journey to see our friends, the Robersons, in their new home in the middle of nowhere (haha, wouldn't you agree guys?). It was a lovely break and they took care of us for a whole day and then some. So kind :) (PS- Shea and Katy, I keep trying to comment on your blog, but I keep getting denied because it says my account doesn't have access... what does that even mean??)

Our new ward out here is absolutely fantastic. So inviting, so sweet. Moving a ton can be difficult, especially when we don't have family nearby, but I think having our church everywhere we've been has made it so much easier over the past three years. It really helps to have something firm and consistent wherever you go, and the Church is just that. It's the same everywhere we are whether in Utah or Maryland :)

I wish I wasn't feeling so lazy right now because then I'd search for a cute picture of Ezra to post. But, that will need to be another day... for today, it will be words only.



have a lovely day!