Heidi's Random thoughts

There are too many thoughts going through my head and too many things that I want to do! I thought maybe blogging them might give you an incite to my days (and hopefully not expose too much of my crazy brain waves). This is why I don't blog every day because I seem to always have a hard time focusing on just one event and feel like I need to post it ALL. Then it comes down to it I just post about random things, rather than my actual thoughts. So here is a stab at what has gone through my head today.

1) Why did Anna wake up so much last night? Was she hungry, cold, overtired, or just wanting to keep mom up?
2) I don't want to go walking I'm too tired. Okay I'll go
3) Why am I out in this bitter cold?
4) I love walking with friends they keep me going
5) I cannot keep up with you Megan
6) I feel bad I didn't bring Mia
7) I want to run longer, but chores await
8) Anna finally fell asleep in the last ten minutes of the walk
9) Shower and work hard until Anna wakes up
10) Hooray I have gotten so much done in 20 minutes...
11) I have gotten so much done in 1.5 hours and Anna is still asleep in her car seat
12) phone calls
13) Perhaps we could go swing today, if it warms up
14) I should do something fun to celebrate Anna's 9 month birthday (can you call it that)
15) I love to sing random songs to Anna
16) I should probably check my email, but then I will look at blogs and get sucked in... must finish a few things first.
17) Hooray the dishes are done.. oops I found more
18) Anna is up, and SOOO adorable ("th th th" and "da da da" are her famous waking up words)
19) Let's eat
20) Anna is playing so well in her room ( I go in and in and find she has dumped her book basket out and is "reading" books with her mouth! (:
21) I love peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, especially made with homemade Raspberry- peach Jam.
22) I miss my mom's canned peaches (and of course my Mom too!)
23) Why won't Anna go to sleep on her own? Especially when she is so tired!
24) Anna is 9 months old today! I cannot believe it has gone this fast. She is amazing and learns new things everyday. She has to go get SHOTS today (yes, Childlifers I said SHOTS... I hate them!) I am not excited to hear her cry... but am excited to just cuddle her tonight!
25) I love wearing slippers all day
26) I loathe and love cleaning day... in the end it feels good and then I can actually play!
27) Why did Dave and I start a puzzle yesterday? It will take forever to finish and will sit here in my clean (an now more cluttered) living room until it is done... and do we REALLY have time to do a puzzle? (: Oh well, it was a fun "fall break" activity.
28) Why did I opt to get a black dog with lots of hair?
29) I love the fall leaves outside, perhaps Anna will go swinging instead of taking a nap.
30) I miss my Utah friends and family
31) Fine, I'll go get Anna
32) Okay after an HOUR of trying to get her to sleep, I gave her a bottle and she was out in 5 minutes (even with people working on my roof). I guess I needed to learn patience today.
33) Why is Chocolate so good?
34) I wish I knew more about the gospel
35) I wish I was a better reader, then maybe # 34 would come true quicker
36) Anna has been with me for 18 months, oh wait 17 months because she came early
37) Crazy!
38) I hope Dave us doing okay at school
39) I wonder if any wives really wake up and make their husband's lunch, I am glad Dave respects my sleep, especially after a night like that. But perhaps I should be better at that. Naa, I cook him dinner, clean, and wash his clothes, he can make his own lunch.
40) I have to change my hair appointment again! I am so embarrassed, I want to be blonde again. I miss Holly!
41) Oh no, I have forgotten to post something about Halloween on the ward website.
42) Why is blogging so addictive?
43) I hate hearing Mia whine, but don't want her out right now
44) I should have called someone this morning that I didn't because I didn't think I would have time to get together. Turns out I did. ):
45) I should stop blogging and get back to my "to do" list
46) I am excited to shop for meals ( I have looked through lots of recipes and have many I want to try. Now for the grocery list.
47) Luckily I have Randanzzos to save money buying lots of yummy fruits and veggies (I will post something about this later... It's amazing! Whitney, I am excited for Friday!
48) I should have vacuumed while Anna was being defiant!
49) I want to see Holly's cute baby belly
50) I want to see Tori's Babe!
51) I want to stop expressing my wandering thoughts so I will

If you have read this far you are truly impressive! I guess this was more therapeutic for me to get it out there. Who knows why.

Here's to getting things done while my baby sleeps! Goodbye

Awesome Ann Arbor Autumn

Try saying that title really fast! I apologize to you all that it's been so long since my last post (ok, just to Heidi because the readers probably don't care). :) I vastly underestimated how busy student life at the U of M would be. I'm really enjoying it here (minus the homework and tests, but who likes those?) and I think Heidi and I are both really glad that we chose to come to Michigan. We certainly miss friends and family back home, but we're grateful to have this exciting adventure. As usual, my post contains a bunch of pics, but that's better than a ton of words, right?

The fall colors here have been amazing, so we couldn't resist taking some leaves pics. The picture above and the following two were taken on a walk along some of the streets close to our home. We're surrounded by groves of trees, which makes for some really fun walks. Mia loves to run through the woods, which means whoever is in charge of "walking" her gets to go along for the ride!

It's not called Ann Arbor for nothing!

Yesterday, we had a blast going to a local cider mill about ten minutes from our home. Thanks to the Tophams for telling us about it. We enjoyed fresh cider (we actually tried a first ... a cider slushee) and homemade donuts (mmm... donuts). There was also a small "petting zoo", though no petting was allowed, as well as an optional wagon ride and places to take cheesy pictures (a must for any tourist).

Anna had a lot of fun playing around, seeing the animals, and seeing other kids. She is always happy and is easily the greatest thing that has ever happened to us.

After hanging out at the cider mill for a while, we stopped by a nearby pumpkin patch and picked out our "winners" for some carving. From lessons learned in carvings past, we decided to keep our pumpkin smaller this year. That way we won't be carving it for five hours!

Anna is definitely excited for Halloween, or as her shirt says, "Baby's First Boo". It's all she talks about. Ok, ok, so all she really says is "da-da-da-da" (yep, daddy won that battle!) along with a few other sounds that belong to some foreign language we have yet to find the translation for. Anna has her first Halloween costume all ready to go, but we're not giving away our secrets. You'll have to stay tuned to see!

Loving the Fall!

I cannot get enough of the weather and beautiful scenery. Today I went on the longest walk just enjoying all the leaves and their amazing colors! I wish I had my camera! These are pictures I took a few days ago. It was getting dark so they are not the best, but show a little of what I am enjoying!

Of course Anna enjoys it too!

"The Anna's"

These are the two little people I get to spend every day with! They are so funny and couldn't be any different. Anna is bald, Anna Belle has crazy long hair; Anna can roll all over the place, Anna Belle can crawl and pull herself up to a standing position; Anna has dark brown eyes and a large smile with no teeth, Anna Belle has the prettiest blue eyes and an little smile and two teeth; Anna doesn't sleep, Anna Belle LOVES to take 2 hour naps; Anna loves her stage 1 solids, and Anna Belle will eat Cheerios, little bits of food, and an occasional pig out session on pureed food.

Though they are very different, they both love to play, especially with any new toy that I pull out. They love to squeal and talk and feed off each other mamamama.... dadadada... babababa.... woawoaw. It is fun that I get to wake Anna up each day and say, "let's go to work, and see Anna Belle!" It is a great job for right now.

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Just a quick shout out to the "KING" of the home. Today Dave turned 27 years old. At first I wasn't excited that it was on a Sunday, but it turned out to be great. Because it was conference Sunday we got to spend almost the whole day together! We had friends over for surprise cake and ice cream and enjoyed a little too much steak and potatoes (and other things) for dinner. (Thanks to all that made it over and made the SURPRISE go so well! I think he really enjoyed it!) The rest of the week we are going to celebrate by getting free ice cream and buy one get one free birthday deals around Ann Arbor! Why not drag the birthday out as long as we can right?

I am so proud of my husband and all he does. He is truly an amazing man. I was thinking of words that describe him today and I will try to express a few of them.

Amazing, Dedicated, Funny, Creative, Driven, Writer, Singer, Sports Fanatic, Giving, High Achieving, Honest, Thoughtful, Good Daddy, Patient, Expressive, Hard Working Student, Forgiving, Spritual, Best Friend, Real, Friendly, Family Man, Animal Lover, Educated, Focused, Time Manager, On-time, Loving, and so many more things.

Most of all he is my Best Friend and the Father of my beautiful brown-eyed (after her Daddy) girl and I love him more and more everyday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVE!!!

For those who were asking...

Here are photos of our home. I feel like we have it just about where we like it. Though I lost a lot of decorating space in the move, so I'll just get to rotate things, especially with the holidays!

Here is the view of our living room from the front door.

The other view. The front door is on the left right by the stairs. To the right is our dining room and slider to the back porch. To the left of the slider is a door that goes down to the basement. I won't post pictures of these things for sake of time. The basement has a small t.v. room, small office and laundry room. Mostly it is Dave's studying cave and storage. (soon to have some craft things set up...hopefully.)

The kitchen looks out at our neighbor's porch and garden, not a bad way to wash dishes.

Here is Anna's Room (obviously) It has been fun to finally put her pictures up and decorate since we didn't get to do it in our home in Utah. The room came with yellow walls, so that took some time to get used to. It is a very girlie room and I love it! Hooray for PINK! (:


The window looks right out at a large green space. When we first moved in we didn't have curtains and the sun would come right in. Needless to say, Anna woke up earlier than needed. We found these curtains in our landlords stuff. They are not my favorite, but almost match her glider so it works.

I love the LARGE closets in this place! Though hanging clothes is a little different. People in Michigan like to put the hangers in backwards.

You don't see a rod in the closet? Well there isn't one, you put it on the back of the shelf which has a little lip on it. It has more of a cleaner look, but will take time to get used to.

Our sanctuary...not really, but we do get "some" sleep here, that is if Anna has a good night. We didn't do any painting or buy the curtains, that was all the landlord's doing, luckily everything went well with our color scheme. We love all the windows in this place, even though the front is shaded by the many trees, the light is fabulous. I didn't put a picture of our open closet, because the shelves are too high for me, so I tend to throw things up and it gets messy. (okay I kinda did that before the height was an issue, but we won't go into that.)

We are really comfortable here and have loved re-decorating a new home!

Bed Time?? What is that?

This was Anna the other night two to three hours after her typical bedtime. All she wanted to do was play. Playing in the mirror is one of her favorite things these days... and these are her typical "excited" faces.