Celebrating Collin

Collin turned ten years old on April 26. TEN years old! He has grown into such a responsible kid. He's always been extra thoughtful and tender with his siblings.
We celebrated at Cynthia's dad's house with her family. It was a perfect spring afternoon/evening! The sun was shining, it was relatively warm and it was very nice company.
Here are my favorite pictures of the day.
Collin grins with his cake:

I love this expression he shows when he's happy, surprised but a little embarrassed, too.

Ella went to town on this Diet Dr. Pepper.

Collin and his cousin, Zeke, have a boy to boy moment.

You can't help but love this kid! He's such a sweet baby!

For more pictures from Collin's birthday, click here.

Happy Birthday April!

Today we celebrate April's birthday! I hope you have a great day, Popples!!

Collin's 10th Birthday Video

This video is a big file, so I separated it into three parts so I could load it into the blog. The pictures came from Richard, Sandy and pictures I have taken:





Happy Birthday, Collin! You have brought so much joy to our lives!

Friday Night Videos

Our kitchen sink faucet is dripping and we will be replacing it this weekend. This video made me laugh so hard, because every night I can hear that damned faucet dripping! I remember this episode, oddly enough.


I bit stereo typical - the high maintenance chick, but it's pretty funny:


Check out the graphics on this game trailer:


Two networks wouldn't allow this ad to play because of cleavage:


Here's a Victoria's Secret ad that was allowed to play, though:

So what's the difference? Heavy girls versus super thin models. DOUBLE STANDARD!

Playing In The Park

Saturday, after I was up from my graveyard shift, we met Evan, Kirsten and Chance for dinner and then went to the park. Kirsten's sister, Sara and her husband, Brian and his boys: Richard and Keith, joined us for both. It was such a wonderful spring day!
My favorite pictures of the day:

Friday Night Videos

I didn't have any free time to search for clips for this week, so here is the meager list:

I'm not sure I'll really see this movie, but the trailer looks interesting. The film follows four babies from around the world, from birth to the first steps. Here's the trailer:


So, I'm thinking this song would only make a bad mood worse, but it's funny, none the less:


From Mormon Messages, LDS Charities partners with Food for the Poor to deliver food, clothing, and toys to children in the Dominican Republic:


I don't really get the lyrics, but I really like the song:


And, finally, I thought this was too cute:

Earthquake Headache?

This week I had the headache from Hell! It began on Wednesday, actually. Eric and I were running a couple of errands and picking up some dinner. It came on pretty suddenly. I told Eric to take me home. I went home and took some serious pain meds for the headache and went to bed very early.
Thursday, the headache hadn't really gone away, but I had to train...one of the hardest classes, as it turned out. Two people in class struggled to get basic computer principles...and all the while, my head was POUNDING! I deliberately kept my cool and was very patient, but I had to make a conscientious effort to do so.
I was headed back to our office (in research park) when the world began to vibrate. It's the best word for it. It made me super dizzy and I had to pull over and wait it out. When I got to the office, my nausea was too much so I went home and crashed.
Later in the evening (around 6:00), there was an 5.5 earthquake to the north of Salt Lake City. I didn't feel it, but I know many who did. Not long afterwards, the headache had subsided.
SO...I get to work on Friday, and my co-worker asks me if I still have the headache and nausea. I told her I didn't and she pointed me in the direction of several websites that talk about an increased incidence in headaches, dizziness and nausea before an earthquake. Up to 48 hours prior.
Here are just a couple of those sites:
1. springerlink.com
2. freewebz.com
3. angelfire.com

Another site I found was one that documents earthquakes around the world:
It shows earthquakes around the world in the last seven days.

Crazy! I'm not 100% sure that my headache was due to the earthquake we had, but I do remember having a similar headache/dizziness/nausea on my mission for two days prior to an earthquake we had there. I remember because I was laying in bed when the earthquake hit. My companion and I both had become very sick...in retrospect, it makes me wonder.

Here was my daily shot from yesterday:

Chicken Tortilla Soup - YUM YUM!

A couple of weeks ago, Eric and I received a "dinner in a box" from my friend, Shauna. We made it on Sunday and it was
D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S! We have plenty left over, too, for lunch.
I put in one extra chicken breast so it's thick enough to put into a tortilla (like chili verde).


Shauna always has really great ideas for decorating the house during the holidays...and how to entertain her kids (who are adorable). I love to read her blog for ideas. Check it out!

Friday Night Videos

It's been such a LONG week, but here's what I found:

I'm excited to see how the "new" Dr. Who season goes with a new Dr. Who:

I still haven't seen Avatar (or the Blue Ferngully), but I thought this was hilarious!


How sweet is this puppy!? I don't think I could have let him struggle for as long as the camera man/woman, but he's a cute little guy:


that's what I found this week. Impressive, eh?
So, here are some oldies, but goodies, that still make me smile:

Easter 2010

I woke up Easter morning to an egg/scavanger hunt - which lead me to the living room where I found the Easter baskets left by the Easter Bunny. Yay! It was very exciting to see what Eric had prepared and surprised me with.



Later, Eric and I went to his dad's house for Easter lunch/dinner. It was good food (as usual) and it was hard to keep the amount of food to a minimum because I knew we'd be going to my mom's house later.
Of course, what would an outting be without pictures of Chance?



And for dinner, we went to my mom's house for dinner with Richard and his family. The Easter Bunny brought the kids kites so we enjoyed the attempt to get them into the air. Instead there were a lot of mid air collisions and knots. Collin was very patient as the other kids followed him everywhere he went and then knotted their kites with his. tee hee hee.

Such A Surprise!

I came home from work on Friday to see a package on my doorstep. Eric reached the door first and told me it was from "Thompson." . . . . And then I knew! A dear friend had sent me a package. I was thrilled!

here are the contents and recipe:

Thanks Shauna!

Friday Night Videos

Okay, so it's early, early on Saturday morning, but to me it's still Friday Night because I was working all night.

An Easter Song! 21 Whopping seconds. :D


Screaming eggs! funny.


This weekend, fear the Peeps!









Happy Easter!

Dinner at Tepanyaki

On Monday, Richard and his family came to Salt Lake to have dinner with me and Eric, at Tepanyaki. Eric and I love going to Tepanyaki and we wanted to share the experience with Richard's family.

It is always so entertaining to watch the food be prepared in front of you. Marcus wasn't sure what to think.

I was thrilled to get this great picture of Collin. It's so hard to get him with a genuine smile.

Elise is either mesmerized or off in another land.

The onion volcano. Again with the flame.

Andrew

After dinner, we all walked over to Costco and invaded. "WE'RE HERE!" It was late and not very busy, so the kids released some of their energy.
Marcus and Elise joined me in the fridge with the flowers.


We picked up dessert (cheesecake) and went to my mom's house where we watched the kids have a pillow fight.