Workacising

I have yet to wake up early and work out. Because honestly, I hate getting out of bed, even if I can't go back to sleep--the bed is just so warm and comfy, and I talk myself out of getting up unless I absolutely have to. So, I finally made myself work out around 10 am today, and Violet was so excited to "workacise" with me, which is what she calls it. Here are two videos of her exercising with me. 

I find that if I work out I have more energy and motivation to do everything else I need to do. I'm much happier as well.

  In the above video she is holding her blanket bunched up in her arms, which she then calls her baby...

Sweet boy.

 This smart, sweet boy is growing up way too fast. He has discovered the concept of love, as in girl and boy love. He has started asking me questions about it... not sure how I feel about this, lol. Some days he still looks like his little toddler boy self, but other days I see hints of an older boy peeking out.

Sweet Girl

I have decided that Violet has got to be the most adorable girl ever born. She keeps surprising us wth the funny things she does. She is definitely over-brimming with personality. She comes and cuddles every morning, and I love feeling her next to me in the bed, cuddled up against me as close as possible. I love her little smile.

She started saying "I love you" and now we have conversations saying I love you back and forth, lol.

 

She loves to dance, and draw. She loves to draw on everything, which has become a problem. She has held her drawing utensils correctly since the first day she picked up a pencil, and she draws patterns of circles and lines over and over on everything from printer paper to walls.She is very particular about what she draws, and it is always the same stuff over and over again. I've had to remove all writing utensils to a higher location, but they don't seem to stay there, and she inevitably gets ahold of one and then gets into trouble for drawing in mommy's books, or Ethan's library books, or the wall, or the bills on the desk, or the checkbook. She cries, and says "sorry!" over and over. She is cute when she says sorry. "sorry I 'lelled''" "sorry for 'plashing' in the tub" "sorry for being mean". This morning she told Ethan (of her own accord) sorry for waking him up, lol.

 

Violet fell in love with Heather on our visit, and cuddled with her as much as possible (this is on Heather's couch watching a movie). Just now she saw the picture on my blog, and whispered "shh, Heaver afweep". :). Sarah got us a really nice hotel room at the hotel she works at, and so the kids also loved playing in the hot tub and pool. Sarah loves lotions and perfumes, so she had tons for Violet to look through which made Violet happy as Violet loves them as well.

 

Violet loves stuffed animals and babies, and turns everything into a baby doll--even water bottles. She loves to dance, and dances to all music. She even tries break dancing, which cracks us up. I am excited for spring, because I'm going to put Violet in Ballet, and I know she is going to love it.



Wyoming...

So here is a list of funny and odd things we have noticed about Wyoming so far:

• they have strange building codes. Driving down the street and looking at houses is entertaining.
• The favorite past time of locals, at least in Lander and Riverton, seems to be drinking alcohol. Every Restaurant boasts alcohol as their number one selling point in the advertising. Mainly it is just home brewed beer. Every grocery store, including walmart, has a sepearte, large alcohol store attatched--even the local grocery store. When you ask non-LDS locals about where is a good place to eat, their list of pro's always lists the resturants alcohol as the number one reason for liking the place. I'm guessing the food doesn't matter much after you are drunk.
• waitresses/waiters are confused when you say you don't want any alcohol or cofee.
• They have an Octoberfest celebration, which of course we didn't witness since we moved the last week of October. Another point towards the locals love of alcohol.
• People cross main street on horseback.
• A guy picked up his daughter from school the other day riding his bike, and pulling a trailer thing he had made himself. She was 10 or older, so it was a rather large trailer made of plywood and other materials.
• Houses are expensive here. Our Burley house would be close to $200,000 here.
• Wyoming schools are impressive. Ethan's Elementary school is the fanciest school I have ever been in.
• There seems to be a large percentage of hipsters in this area... A lot of the locals are from Denver, or have ties to Denver, which also has a large percentage of hipsters. Honestly, I think a lot of them look ridiculous, like when they wear their hats barely on their head, so that they look like Dopey from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. And the guys all have beards.. the same scraggly kind... they all look the same, which I think defeats the purpose of a hipster as I thought they wanted to be known, which was to stand out from the crowd...
• I don't think the missionaries get fed much. We have had them to our apartment twice now, and one of the elders (who is skinny and boasts constantly about exercising a lot and eating healthy) seriously devours everything we put in front of him, and still looks hungry. Sunday I made lasagna... he finished off the tray himself.
• I'm looking forward to summer here, because it is supposed to be a great area for outdoor activities, though people keep telling us it is not safe to go camping with young children in this area due to bears... and they are serious, not joking trying to see if we would believe them...
• You have to fence your garden and flower beds, and put fencing around your ornamental or small trees, or deer will eat them.

Finding a new groove

• That was the craziest move we have had to date (9th move). We found out Ryan got a GREAT job the friday before Halloween, when his new boss came up from Wyoming just to interview him. The following week was spent packing, and we moved that saturday. We were very grateful for Ryan's parents who helped us with this move-- it was greatly appreciated.  
• several things that have been bothering me lately (this is not meant to be negative, just things that are bothering me but I'm planing to fix):

     
          -I gained 10lbs this last year. People are starting to ask if I'm pregnant...
          -I have been feeling extra old looking lately, mainly from stress and lack of sleep.
          -I am having trouble feeling grounded here, though I am really happy about the job and schools.
          -I ran out of watercolor paint (hey, it lasted 10 years, so I can't complain) and paper. So, I can't do any new art projects until I get the payment I'm expecting from one of my paintings I sold. It is in the mail though, so it won't be long.
          -It is very hard to maintain motivation for housework each day, especially since that is all I currently have to do each day. Each day is the same as the day before... it is very hard to wake up eager to wash dishes, put away laundry, pick up toys, etc.
          -At this very moment, my cat Hunter is outside the front door crying. He is in a lot of trouble because he decided to pee on my brand new shirt I got from Maurices. I am so mad, but I'm not the kind of person who could get rid of a family pet, especially one we have had for several years. But I can't have him in our apartment if he won't go in the litter box...
          -Violet is waking up EARLY every day and coming into our bed. Then, she proceeds to ask for cereal for the next hour or two until Ryan's alarm goes off for him to get ready for work and me to get up.
          -Some person hacked my blogger account and got access to my yahoo email account, and then took an old blog that I had deleted and converted it into a blog to sell decor items under my name. I have no idea why, it doesn't make any sense. It is unnerving.

• So, I am a plan person. Lists and plans make me feel better, like I can accomplish things and things aren't hopeless. So, to solve the above list of concerns, this is my plan:

      -I'm going to begin getting out of bed early. I'm already awake (despite not being a morning person) so I might as well take advantage of it.
      -I'll do P90X each morning, while Violet eats her oatmeal and then her cereal.
      -I can then launch into cleaning the house, and then when Violet is down for her nap (as a result of how early she wakes up) I can do art. Once I buy supplies.
      -I'm going to bed early from now on.
      -For the time being, Hunter will remain outside all day. I don't know what to do about him other than that.
      -I'm going to start using one of those sleep masks that you chill in the fridge. And I bought new makeup and concealer, lol.
      -Yesterday and this morning I spnt time deleting my yahoo account, changing passwords, notifying blogger of a false impersonation/identity theft, and giving the thief a "cease and desist" order that I hope they take seriously. And if not, I'm hoping blogger simply deletes the blog for me, since I can't gain access to it. Crazy people, lol.

thoughts and projects

• I've decided to convert Violet's room back into my art studio. She insists on sleeping in the same room as Ethan, and so I figure it is pretty silly to waste a room just for clothes and a bed that no one sleeps in. Tonight I'm going to get Ryan to move her bed to Ethan's room (she has been in a pack n' play in Ethan's room for several months now, she might as well have a mattress to sleep on), and then we will get some plastic to put down in Violet's room to protect the carpet, and I will set it up to do art.
• I have been very motivated to do art recently. I have several commissions I'm working on, as well as some art that I promised to do and hadn't yet done. I have a large painting/project that I have decided to do that will take a year to do and will be amazing if I can pull it off. I'm pretty excited and I want to start it immediately, but that is hard when one of my main characters in the painting lives in Salt Lake, and another is moving to Montana... it will all work out, and it will be awesome when it is done. And I'm entering it into the 10th international church art contest next fall.
• I'm working on a commission painting, and about a week ago I put it aside because I ran out of orange paint. I figured I'd start up again once I had a chance to buy more orange paint.............did you know that red and yellow makes orange? Yeah, so did I. But I forgot. Last night all of a sudden I remembered, and did a head slap of "oh brother" type embarassment. So, I've started the painting again.
• I went to google some artwork from my favorite watercolor artist, who also was my watercolor teacher at BYUI... and found out that he died last year! then of course, knowing my brain doesn't seem to work as well as it used to (after all, I forgot how to mix red and yellow to make orange) I wonder if I did know and forgot that he died. But, in any case, I felt a sudden loss at having him gone. I was friends with his grandson, who was going to BYUI at the same time, and I have happy memories of painting on location, and of hanging out at Brother Bird's house with Rylan and another friend, Celia. When Ryan and I moved to Salt Lake, one day I decided to break out my paints, and I discovered mold growing on them. I panicked and called Brother Bird. He playfully scolded me for not painting enough with them that they would grow mold, and then told me how to clean them.
  

This is one of Brother Birds watercolors that hangs on campus at BYUI, and it is one of my favorites.

 
 

What can I say, I love food :)

I finally created a good recipe for oriental style noodles that involves ingredients that are not hard to find. They were also ingredients I happened to have in my house, so that was a definite plus. I hate oriental recipes that are basically soy sauce and brown sugar, so I have been trying FOR YEARS to come up with a simple dish that I wasn't dissapointed in the moment I took a bite. This one was actually pretty good, if I do say so myself. I might tweak it some more the next time I make it to make the flavor stronger, but overall this recipe is a keeper.

12 oz spaghetti noodles

2 scallions, diced

2 carrots, peeled and julienned

1 can water chestnuts, drained

1/4 to 1/2 cup steamed broccoli

mushrooms

2 tsp sesame seeds

1/2 cup water

1 1/2 spoons Panda Express orange sauce

2-3 tbsp soy sauce

1 spoon barbecue sauce

1 tablespoon sesame oil

2 cloves minced garlic

2 tsp grated ginger, or 1 to 1 1/2 tsp. (depending on how much you like Ginger) powdered ginger.

Red pepper flakes (Optional)

Cook noodles, drain and rinse in cold water. set aside. Saute carrots and the white part of the green onions in olive or peanut oil for about a minute or two. Add the garlic, ginger, sesame seeds, and red pepper flakes (if using, red pepper flakes are optional. it only takes a tiny pinch of them to get a pretty spicy/hot flavor, so this depends on how you like your food. I didn't use any, but thought some people might like that). stir around until the garlic become auromatic. Add water, soy sauce, orange sauce, and barbecue sauce. Stir for a minute or so, then add the mushrooms, chestnuts, and noodles. continue to stir until the water is completely evaporated. add the sesame oil, stir, and then add the broccoli. stir until you are afraid it is going to burn on the bottom of the skillet, and then remove.

I tend to "wing it" when it comes to cooking, so this is the best guess I could make at amounts of items. I rarely measure out amounts unless i'm given a recipe by a friend. Then, I try to follow it. Feel free to adjust the amounts of things, as I said it was a little less flavorfull than I wanted so I might tweak the sauce amounts. the spices were plenty though, it would be more of tweaking the soy sauce, orange sauce, and barbecue sauce amounts. I didn't want it dripping in sauce, and I didn't want it tasting like orange sauce or barbecue sauce. Anyways. :)