Washington is the best!

Can I just tell you how much I'm enjoying Washington?! So far, the weather has been not the greatest with mostly cloudy/55-60 degree days with the exception of a few marvelous sunny days. Although locals say this is really unusual for the summer and I'm going to take them at their word. Sorry its been a while since my last post. We have been busy little bees. PS: I've been working on this post since last Wednesday, but only now have a chance to post it...don't worry I made the appropriate updates. OK, let me tell you what we've been up to.

First, we've made numerous trips to Seattle for the furniture superstore, IKEA. Anyone ever been there? I think it is retail marketing at its best. First of all, its ginormous, probably the size of two Super Walmarts. You walk in and the whole front of the store is set up in a maze of different rooms of a house....kitchens, bedrooms, living rooms, offices, etc. Within each section they have decorated rooms. For instance, in the living room section they have a bunch of living rooms all decorated and set up. Then you look at each room, write down what item you want and where to get it and at the end of the maze is a warehouse with all the items in boxes ready for you to pick up. Pretty genius, eh? We bought a ton of Malone's furniture for really reasonable prices and we are putting it all together as we speak. Oh yes, part of the reason they can have such great prices is because you put it all together. Its been fun. Imagine me with power-tools! Here's a picture of the IKEA showroom.

Here's Malone, Cameron and her new IKEA highchair (only $25 and pretty sturdy!)

Then, we went downtown Seattle to the famous Pikes Place Market (been there twice already). Its the place where they throw the fish. Side note, anyone remember Real World Seattle where Steven slapped Irene as she drove off? For some reason I always remember that when I think of Pikes Place. Anyways, Pikes Place is this big farmer's market type of place with lots of fresh produce stands, fish stands, butcher shops, spice shops, fresh flowers everywhere and tons of little food carts, oh yeah, and the original Starbucks. It is awesome! If anyone wants to come and visit we will be sure to take you there. I bought some shrimp/prawns that were the biggest I've ever seen. Here's just a shell.

We had them the other night with Asparagus Risotto....So yummy! We bought some specialty sausages including some homemade South African Boerewors, our national sausage. Malone didn't think it was nearly as exciting, as she was fast asleep in her stroller the whole time.

Then we drove around downtown Seattle for a little. It is the most beautiful downtown I've ever seen. Its like Manhattan with lots of trees and much more hilly (I told Cameron to remind me never to drive my standard-shift Toyota in this hilly place). Here's a street performer hula-hooping, while playing harmonica, while playing guitar behind his back. Impressive.
Friday all of our belongings got delivered! Its amazing how I had forgotten how much stuff we have. Highlight- We actually slept in our own bed the last few nights. It was the first time in 4 months! We were excited!!!! Again, I'll post some more pictures once we get a bit more settled and there isn't boxes EVERYWHERE. Here's a picture of Michaelangelo painting our livingroom.

A few more random thoughts/things to tell you:

- I made some sweet potatoes tonight for Malone-- she loved them. No more bananas for now. The doc didn't like the fruit before veggie thing and her digestive track also didn't like it. Hence, veggies for now. Here's some pics.
- Love the house!
- Its Malone's 5 month birthday today. And to celebrate, she rolled over for the first, second, third and fourth time. She's a genuine rolling machine (back to front which is the hardest). She's pretty much awesome!
- Love the house!
- We're still trying to find a church. For the past 2 Sundays we visited a church called Soma Communities. It was really neat- meets downtown and is comprised of almost all young families. Interesting thing, their pastor/"elder" preaches a little but then they do discussion with the whole church. We were a bit nervous about the discussion because you always seem to have the one guy/gal who goes on and on about nothing relevant or makes really stupid remarks. But the congregation seemed to be really insightful, grounded and intelligent so it worked out well. I think we're still going to visit a few more churches, but found this one interesting.
- Love the house!
- Cameron got into the spirit of Washington coffee by buying a 5lb bag of Pikes Place Roast from Starbucks. Its huge!!!
-Malone is turning into the most beautiful little girl, see?
Its official that we have fallen in love with Washington....well, maybe not love, but we're definitely dating.

Hot Husband and Sweet Baby

So, I'm taking a break from watching American Idol right now, because to be honest, Neil Diamond night isn't exactly super exciting. Ahhh, my love/hate relationship with American Idol. Anyways, thought I would brag on my husband and little girl for a minute or two...

This past weekend, we went to Oklahoma City. Why? Cameron ran Sunday morning in the Oklahoma City Marathon! I'm so proud of him and incredibly impressed by his physical prowess (hey, hey, get your mind out of the gutter, I'm impressed by his athletic abilities). He finished the 13 mile Half Marathon in 1 hour 43 minutes, which is a really good time. What makes this feat so astounding is that he didn't really train that much. I think his longest run in his "training" was a 8-mile run. I have to train just to be able to run 2 miles, never mind 13. OK, lets just stop for a second and put that into perspective. Running 13 miles is running 52 laps around a track (Ughhh, that would be terrible), for you Colorado friends running from church to my old house, aka the Holt Manor, which would take me 20 minutes driving, running from one end of the town of Altus to the other end and back, or running for the equivalent of the amount of time it would take to watch a movie...there's me watching Mr. & Mrs. Smith while Cameron runs his half marathon. Can you believe it? Needless to say, I'm so proud of him. And now that he's gotten a taste of sweet running victory he'll begin training for the Seattle Marathon (26.2 miles) in November.

I always wonder what one thinks about while running for an hour and a half or more. Well, I'm about to find out. Cameron has convinced me that I too can train for a half marathon in Seattle. I'm a little skeptical because I don't exactly have a loving relationship with running. When I played sports in high school, running was used as a punishment for doing something wrong. Didn't rebound enough? "Get on the line!" our coach yelled. Didn't play with full force? "Get on the line!!" Didn't hustle enough? "Get on the line!" How do I rebuild my relationship with running when it was so horribly torn down? But I've decided to do it, have something to work towards physically and I'm kind of excited. Now, me mentioning this to you means that I really am going to have to do it. May I mention that I've had 2 knee surgeries?..ok, ok...you're right, I'm just making excuses in case I can't/don't do it. And unlike my competitive husband, I really could care less about the time in which I will run the longest 13 miles of my life. My goal is just to finish, just do it, as the Nike ad would say.

OK, so on to me being proud of Malone. First, she slept through the whole 2 hour drive to Oklahoma City. Then when we went to the mall, she just sat in her stroller and looked around, enjoying the Oklahoma people gazing as much as we did. Then, as if it couldn't get any better, when we went to dinner with our friends, Steven and Yami, she just sat in our laps and looked at the scrumptious P.F. Chang's food, being as quiet as a mouse. Isn't she wonderful? We went to sleep pretty late and had to wake up pretty darn early. When we arose at the ungodly time of 4:30am, she woke up, ate and went back to sleep as we got Cameron ready for the race. We were all ready to go watch him run the race, but unfortunately we weren't quite ready for the rain and 40 degree weather. So we sat in the car while Cameron ran the race. BUT....she slept the whole time, which made it a million times easier.

All this to say, I'm so proud of my husband for his perseverance and so proud of my little girl for being soooo sweet and good. Hugs and Kisses to them both!

Here's some recent pictures:

6 more weeks!

I had a dream about Malone the other night. I was holding her and she was so tiny. She had darker hair. I remember being overwhelmed in the dream by how tiny she was. All her features were so small and petite. Its hard to believe that in only 6 weeks (hopefully less) we will finally get to meet her. We're looking forward to finally seeing what she looks like (will she have her mommy's curly hair or her daddy's straight- as- a- stick hair? Will she have darker or lighter eyes?) and what her personality will be like (Will she be sweet or spicy?). Both Cameron and I are so excited and literally cannot wait. I think I'm probably a little more anxious than Cameron just because I'm ready to not have a baby sitting on my bladder, kicking me in the ribs or moving my intestines around any more. But overall, the pregnancy has by far exceeded my expectations in every way.

I think we're pretty close to being ready (would we even know if we weren't?). Her pack-n-play is set up, I successfully set up her swing by myself the other night (if you've ever done it, you know what a feat it is) and her clothes are washed. I've compiled my list of what to take to the hospital, although I can't get myself to get the bag ready yet. In one of my books, they said to have it ready by 35 weeks, but that's a little too early for me. I even thought about making some freezable foods like soups and lasagna the other day and then decided that a) that's a bit crazy, b) we don't really eat soups and lasagna and c) 6 week frozen lasagna just sounded gross to me.

We also have been trying to prepare in other ways. We often talk about how different a certain situation will be when we have Malone. For example, a quiet evening at home with Cameron working on his blog or reading a book and me cooking dinner or folding laundry will certainly look a bit different once she makes her presence known. Contrary to Cameron, I try to imagine the worst possible situation to make sure that a) if reality is really as bad as I had imagined, I'm ready, or b) I'm surprised by how great it is compared to what I had imagined. Cameron just is as positive as one can be, and when reality isn't that way, still takes it all in stride. How does he do that? One thing that we do know, life will never be like it is now. Not that it will be better or worse, just different.

Every once in a while I get a little overwhelmed by all the big questions. How will we know what to do? What if we're terrible parents? What if she's sick and we are super la la land parents and never know until its too late? Will I be the awful woman that everyone uses as an example of what not to do in labor? Will she be healthy and safe? What if we're terrible teachers and botch her whole view on God? These questions have a way of creeping in at the strangest times. But like they creep in, I just remind myself that millions of people who are way worse off than us have gone through this and had successful, wonderful children. Plus, again, Cameron is Mr. Super Steady Positive Man, which most of the time is really helpful.

6 weeks. Not long. Not long at all.

Black Friday

Black Friday. Normally known for the mad shopping people (or is it mad people going shopping?) are doing today. Although I think that for some people it refers to the day of recovery after the stress of family, too much food and travel. But for us, none of the above applies.

This year was the first Thanksgiving that Cameron and I hosted. Our friends James and Sara Martin came from Colorado to spend the holiday with us. Its been a great few days, filled with lots of blogging (the boys are obsessed with the latest blogging technology, such as Google Analytics and Adsense), food and relaxing. I made my first turkey yesterday. I think it was a success. Unfortunately, I don't have any turkey leftovers...those were obliterated last night. Its also the last Thanksgiving without any children. I was trying to imagine yesterday as I was scurrying around making making turkey, stuffing and all the random fixings what it will be like next year with Baby Malone finally being with us. By then, she might be walking, and if Cameron's educational plan is working, she'll be reading Shakespeare as well. Oh, how different our lives are going to be?

Today, I think we're just going to continue relaxing. The boys are about to go play racquetball. Sara and I might go get a movie. Our goal is to definitely stay clear of any kind of mall, shop or crowd, not that there really is any of that here in the grand metropolis of Enid, OK.

Here's some pictures of our Thanksgiving escapades so far:


The turkey before it was cooked. Doesn't it look fabulous?



Our Thanksgiving table


The typical snapshot of what Cameron and James are doing all weekend long...working on their crazy blogs (I'm just a novice compared to them)



All the leftovers that is STILL in my kitchen. When you're hungry, you can just graze...how fun?



Happy Thanksgiving all! I'll continue with my favorite things later this weekend...ps: I think I'm going to put up the Christmas tree Saturday....I love it!!! It is my favorite thing this time of year. YAY!

Favorite Things #2: Oh Sweet Citrus

Oranges. Sweet, fruit from heaven, oranges. This, my friends, is another one of my favorite things...probably my absolute favorite right now. I've enjoyed oranges since I was a child growing up in the jungles of Africa (just kidding about the jungles). We like oranges so much in my family that we used to buy those enormous bags of oranges and every night after dinner my dad would carve the orange flesh out of the skin and the white bitter stuff (I'm sure there's a name for it) with skill.

Needless to say, I loved oranges then, but lately my love affair with this orange fruit has gone to a new level, obsession. You see, I'm about 8 months pregnant. Instead of craving crazy things like pickles with peanut butter smeared all over them, I crave oranges. I wake up thinking about how I'm going to peel it, make sure all the gross white stuff is carefully scraped off, pick each slice apart and take the thin skin off, and eat the nodules, one by one. I have to limit myself to only a few a day....either a mid-morning or mid-afternoon snack and one after dinner. Otherwise, I would spend my entire day picking orange nodules apart like some lunatic. I even made Cameron run to Walmart (the base Commissary, where I prefer to get my drug...aka oranges, was closed at 9pm) the other night, because we were out. Is this not a sick obsession?

Oprah's favorite things include things like TiVo, Cashmere pajamas, and diamond encrusted watches but my favorite things so far is limited to Starbucks and oranges. I'm pretty cool.

Here's some pictures of latest victim:








I promise the next post will not be nearly as creepy :)