Old Lady Alert

See Amber. See Amber age.

See Amber age while being spoiled.

(For those of you wondering if Brian spoiled me...yes. The answer is yes!)

See Amber age while being spoiled and enjoying gluten-free goodness.

See Amber age while being spoiled and wishing on enjoyable gluten-free goodness.

See Amber age while being spoiled, and seeing the wishes made on gluten-free goodness come true. :)
28 isn't so bad. I think I'll survive...I think... :)

Our 2 Little Ladies Star in "What's in a Name?"

(Disclaimer: This blog post in no way states that the involved parties are liable for children anytime in the near future. No plans, expressly written or otherwise, are in the works. The writer is not responsible for mental disturbances caused by the reading of this post. Names have been changed to protect the innocent, and maintain some semblance of surprise. Please keep you hands and arms inside the ride at all times...)

So, I think I must just be posting this because I am trying desperately to avoid taking down our Christmas decorations. I honestly can't think of another reason, because I promise at the end of it, you'll think/know that I'm nuts. But for whatever reason...here we go...

Those of you who know me well know that I've had my first two little ladies named since I was a teenager (yes, sometimes I am such a girl). Lucky for me, when Brian came along all those years ago, he quickly jumped on board, fell in love with the names, and whala. Our little pseudo family was born. Middle names were eventually added, hope chests began to fill with things that "will look so cute on Little Lady 1" or "will be perfect for Little Lady 2", and when we talk of kids it's not "when we have our first girl", it's "when we have little lady #1". Yes, the first two girlies are named and part of our little family.

Well, the last month or so, I've been having this recurring nightmare. Over and over. It's always the same. Picture this: One of my dearly beloved friends/family (that would be you) steals one of our names. I proceed to calmly tell them that the name has been dibbed since the 90s, and they proceed to tell me that they know, but don't care. I calmly tell them that's not very nice, and people don't just do that to each other. They say they don't care. I try to explain the sentimental meaning behind each name. They tell me that not only are they naming this one "Little Lady 1", but...wait for it... they are having twins, and will be using "Little Lady 2" as well. This is where I snap.

Those of you who know me well also know that I am not a violent person. I can't even let Brian kill a spider, let alone do it myself. So, imagine my shock when I go totally WWF Wrestling on them and beat them to a pulp. It would almost be comical if I wasn't so upset... I just go...ballistic. And I must confess, even the sweetest and most loved of you out there haven't escaped my fury. (Alisa, I fear I...death dropped you or something! It was definitely Hulk Holgan-esque. And Carly, your poor face was quite carpet burned when I finished the good-cop bad-cop routine with you. And that's just the beginning...don't get me started with the rest of you. It's awful. Kinda comical, but AWFUL!)

But perhaps the worst part of the whole thing is that I wake up feeling...crushed. The violence has luckily worn off, but I just feel...deflated. Like my dreams have been dashed. Worried that it will happen in real life. Really affected. (Yes...some times I really am SUCH a girl. Can anyone out there relate?). Brian doesn't understand it, but tries to help. He's told me that our friends/family aren't evil and love me. He's told me I'm being crazy, and it won't happen in real life. He's laughed (probably not his wisest move). He's cried (ok, he hasn't cried. But if I get to look crazy in this post, he might as well too :)). Nothing works. It takes me a good few hours to snap out of it, and then I can look back and laugh. Almost. :) Off the charts on the crazy scale yet? Yes?

Well, that's really all. I hope it's provided a good...laugh? Your daily dose of fear? Something! But I guess the moral of the story is, please don't crush my name dreams anyone. Or, I might just...crush you? :)

Why?

I just don't understand it: why did "Christmas break" go so so so fast? I mean, it was three whole weeks.

Three weeks of sleeping in. Two weeks of spending full-time with my boy. Three weeks of being spoiled rotten. Three weeks of seeing family and friends we hadn't seen in way too long. Three weeks of constant taste-bud satisfaction without counting a single calorie. Three weeks of zero responsibility. Three weeks of snuggling the cutest babies around. Three weeks of snowy winter weather. Three weeks of movies, and games, and more movies, and games (some of the reviews: "Sherlock Holmes" was a lot of fun, we LOVE "Up", and if you haven't played "Sort it Out" it's a super fun board game). Three weeks of flannel sheets and heated mattress pads. Three weeks of being introduced to new fun things, like Cribbage, and Wynco and Vampire Diaries. Three weeks of my favorite restaurant EVER (we made it to the Mandarin twice!). Three weeks of... just pure fun!

Hm. So why'd it go so fast? I just don't get it! :)

Here's some of our favorite pictures from the trip. We hope your Christmas was fantastic. And Happy 2010!!

My Sweet Thing & The Festival of Lights

Yep, that's my sweet thing, helping me make...sweet things? :) (Keith Urban's new song...one of my favorites...)

We did our holiday baking Saturday. I guess it's officially tradition now. We always did it with my mom growing up--some of my favorite holiday memories are of baking all day (fudge, spritz cookies, sugar cookies, wedding cookies, peanut brittle, toffee, gooey caramel bars, etc, etc, etc....it was an all day shin-dig), and then delivering the delicious looking plates to neighbors that night. Brian and I decided to give it a go last year, and had a riot...so this year, we baked up a storm again, with a slightly modified "menu" (I just don't think some things would be the same gluten-free and didn't want to experiment on neighbors and friends :)) We made chocolate cookies with peppermint frosting, melt aways, caramel corn, fudge and divinity...and had lots of fun doing it. Brian was a dish washing extraordinaire--I think the record was the same pan washed 5 times throughout the course of the day. (It was kinda fun to run to the sink with the offending saucepan and say, "It's baaaaaaaaaaaaack" in my best, "You really really want to wash this pan because you think I'm incredibly cute and not at all obnoxious" voice...)

But perhaps more impressively, I was taking care of getting some cookies in the oven, and turned around to find he had expertly frosted and sprinkled the chocolate cookies! They looked better than the ones I'd done!! (Between that and him expertly dying my hair on Tuesday... hmmm... :) ) We wish you were all nearby so we could bring you a plate... both because we love you, and because the leftovers are wreaking havoc on our waistlines! Please say this picture tempts you into traveling the many miles to DC to save us from our pre-holiday binging!!! ANYONE?!!! No takers? Darn. We're in trouble.

Last night we kicked the festivities up a notch at the Washington DC Temple Festival of Lights with our good friends the Jacksons. Gorgeous. It was a really foggy, misty night, and the lights and temple looked phenomenal. If you're in the area, you HAVE to go!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! We hope you have an amazing holiday season. And for those of you in Utah...watch out... here we come! :)

Finally...a date night.

Ok. So I shouldn't say finally. We do pretty well at making sure we spend lots of time together--chances are, if you see one of us, you see the other. In fact, some people have begun to wonder if we're the first ever male/female set of conjoined twins. :) Ok...so I made that up. But I wouldn't be too surprised (if they thought that, not if we WERE the first ever set...I WOULD be pretty surprised by THAT). But with all the hustle and bustle, and holiday travel, and online shopping (I've become a hermit), and ward mission stuff, and ward marriage class (no...we're not in therapy, although that would be a good story. Everyone in our ward is supposed to take the class, and the last 7 weeks it was our turn) we were just feeling like a lot of our time lately hasn't been out and about with each other...so out and about we went this Friday. Which brings me to the Top Ten Reasons to Visit the National Harbor at Christmas time:

#1-The big ole gorgeous tree overlooking, well, the National Harbor. :)


#2-The fun parking adventure. Ok, actually parking was a breeze, or could've been. We knew we weren't supposed to pay the outrageous Gaylord Resort parking price, so we headed into another garage, then decided to u-turn and see if the other garage was even cheaper (which is about where Brian said, "Oops...there's a police man behind me"), then saw a meter and u-turned to take that spot only to find it was more expensive than the garage (this is about where I said, "Um...isn't that the same police man?"), then u-turned to head to the other garage, then found that the other garage was the same price but farther, then u-turned to go back to the original garage (I was giggling too hard to point out the policeman...who was obviously in a very Christmasy, no-ticket mood), then missed the turn in to the other garage and u-turned... ANYWAY. You must try it.

#3-The first and only Peeps & Co store. We highly recommend spending the $6 it costs to fill up a tiny bag of Mike and Ikes. The green apple and raspberry ones are to DIE for.



#4-The Sizzle Meter in the Peeps store. Apparently Bri is "Smokin'" and I'm "Fiery"...ah cha cha! youch!

#5-Walking up to the Gaylord Resort and totally feeling like you're sneaking in illegally because there's no WAY someone as un-posh as us can go in THERE... it's PHENOMENAL! All the hotel room doors face out into an indoor atrium that has trees and a creek and little Old Town looking buildings... awesome. And it was DECKED out for Christmas, complete with a glass, 7,000 pound tree hanging from the ceiling.

#6-The choir at the Gaylord.

#7-The indoor fountain show set to Christmas music. Kinda like a little mini-Bellagio shin-dig. Really cool.

#8-Watching the little kids in this picture shriek, and I mean SHRIEK, with delight every time the fountains shot up. As soon as the water died down, they'd get as close as they could, and go into spasms the next time it went up like they were totally shocked it would do that... :)

#9-Walking along the pier you can pick up some pretty good looking boys, like this one here...

#10-Hmm....well...that was anti-climatic. I really only have 9 good reasons...didn't plan that one out very well, now did I. But uh... go. Just go. :)

Also, totally unrelated side note (which I know is totally unexpected coming from me...a random interjection?! NEVER!!) I recommend the DC temple in the first snow storm of the year. Beeeeeeeeeautiful.