I had my first ultrasound this morning. I found out I'm 17 weeks along, and due around April 10th. And we are having a girl! I am carrying really low, her head is pretty low, and she was curled up a little in the ultrasound, as if to say, "leave me alone, I want to sleep!". I really love ultrasounds. One of the shots we got was of her hand up, and it's really clear, you can see the joints of the fingers. Another shot has her sucking her thumb :). I was a little surprised at how excited I was to find out she was a girl, I was in the grocery store and I wanted to stop random people and tell them i was having a girl. I refrained though. :).

Yum.

I started getting vegetables and fruit through Bountiful Baskets, an online business that brings in veggies and fruit at a discount. I have loved it so far, and I think it's a great program. You don't choose what you get, which I actually, so far, like, because you end up trying things you wouldn't normally try, or haven't had a chance to try. This week I got sweet potatoes in my order, and i do not like sweet potatoes very much. I foudn a recipe though, for sweet potato fries, and made them, and they are AWESOME! Seriously, I highly reccomend them.

Pre-heat the oven to 450. Cut the sweet potatoes into thin strips. Put the strips in a plastic bag and add some olive oil, just enough to coat the strips, add salt (I used Kosher Salt, the recipe calls for sea salt) and pepper and squish around in the bag to coat evenly. Dump on a pan, make sure none of them are touching, and bake for 15 min. I didn't trust the temp in the recipe so I put it in at 400 degrees, and just watched them closely, turning to brown. I wasn't watching closely, and accidentally burned them a little, and they got pretty dark, but they still tasted REALLY good.
www.instructables.com/id/Perfect-Oven-Sweet-Potato-Fries/

Bday parties, work, baby, and new calling

We decided that it would be fun to have a small birthday party for Ethan at Grandma and Grandpa Anderson's, since his birthday this week coincides with beet harvest (I think it's beets...). Ethan had a fun time opening gifts, and loved all of them. I still plan on having another birthday party for him and inviting some little boys over. I haven't quite figured out what i'm going to do and when, because I am now working part time, but I think it would still be fun to do.
this is Ethan battling Brandon with the light sabers (sp ?) Ryan got him and Brandon is using Boise Bronco noise makers he got for ethan. Ethan loved all the presents. I'm not sure the light sabers were a great idea for him, it will be quite interesting trying to keep him from breaking something with them.... :)

Another reason for going up to Grandma and Grandpa's was to announce that we are expecting a baby in April. We won't have a due date for a while, without random guessing, so we will wait until the ultrasounds to announce that. I heard the heart beat on Friday, and it's amazing how something so simple as the sound of the heart can make you feel such peace.

As I said, I am now working part time, in order to pay for insurance and help out with finances for the time being. I enjoy my job so far, I work as an in-home caregiver to a boy with a form of Muscular Dystrophy (sp?), and I'm finding that it can be a very rewarding field of work. The other caregivers that I work with seem to be very caring, compassionate people, and I think this will be one of those jobs with little co-worker drama. I do not like co-worker induced drama, so I hope it continues to be a good work place.

This next sunday I will also start being in the YW presidency as the 2nd counselor. It will be announced next sunday, but no one from my ward reads my blog, and no one that reads my blog knows anyone from my ward, so I think it will be okay if I put it on here. I was very overwelmed when they gave me the calling, but even though it's definately not a calling I would aspire to, I do believe it is right. Especially when the brother who extended the calling quoted almost verbatim a paragraph from my patriarchal blessing, I knew that it was something I needed to do.

So, that has been my crazy life lately.

New Blog Title.

I know I'm so random, but the "secret" was I changed my blog title....:) I think I'm funny.

Oh, and by the way.......

just wondering how observant all of you are....:)

Judging

I'm sorry my posts have been pretty boring and few and far between lately. One of the reasons is my camera is broken, and so I can't take any fun pictures, and the other is i don't have much to blog about lately.

Ryan had this picture on his computer, and I thought it was funny. It kind of ties into the following about being judgemental, in that we can sometimes get a little full of ourselves....:) it says :I'm sorry, I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am.

Right now I just felt like blogging about some thoughts that have been going through my head. I went to the RS Broadcast on saturday, and President Monsons talk has stuck in my head. How sad is it that we are all so judgemental? I know I struggle with this, and it hits so subtely that often you don't even realize you are passing judgement. My mom on sunday had a man at church come up and start getting upset at her because he saw her driving across the bridge in town talking on her cell phone, and he felt she deserved a ticket. Funny thing is, my mom doesn't own a cell phone, so it wasn't her, but he was insistent that it looked JUST like her and the same car and everything. She could then turn around and judge him for judging her. I wish I personally wasn't so quick to judge others. I find that I subconsiously categorize people: She looks mean, or she looks kind, she looks smart, they don't look very intelligent. Often we really don't mean to be rude and judge, but it's so subtle and it comes so naturally that we don't even realize we are doing it. One of my husbands greatest qualities is that he is almost completely non-judgemental. I really admire him for that. He sees people purely as people and doesn't think, oh I wouldn't want to be friends with them or they wouldn't want to be friends with me, he doesn't notice what people are wearing, or how they do their hair. He is friends with anyone who is kind to him. if someone is nice to him, he is nice back, but if they ignore him he shrugs it off and moves on. I'm working at being more like that, and not being offended and not judging or catergorizing others.

Really good recipe

My roommate Krsitina and I made this recipe multiple times back in college, and it is very delicious. I made this today and was reminded how much I loved it and decided to share it. I didn't have a photo of it so I found a picture of tomato soup off the internet. I don't think I would suggest putting cilantro with this recipe though (like in the googled photo).

Western Tomato Soup

3 strips of bacon cooked and crumbled (or more depending on your taste preferences)

1/2 cup finely diced celery.

3 tbsp finely diced onion

1/4 cup finely diced green pepper

3tbsp flour

2 cups milk

1 can tomato soup

16 oz can stewed or diced (whichever you prefer) tomatoes

1 1/2 cup tomato juice

saute onion, celery, and green pepper in bacon fat until limp not brown. drain most of fat, and add flour. Stir and cook for a minute or two. Add canned tomatoes and saute for a couple of seconds, and then add the milk and stir to dessolve the flour and deglaze pan. remove from heat. In a sauce pan combine the milk mixture and the soup. heat and stir until smooth, and then add the tomato juice. Stir until slightly thickened, and garnish with the bacon.