SLR

I'm not sure if I can convince Brandon that an awesome camera is a wise purchase, but just in case I'm doing a little research into it. Does anyone have recommendations on an SLR? Things you like/ dislike about yours?
The Canon Rebel seems to be the cheapest out there, and I'm guessing it would serve my purposes for having quality pictures and the ability to expand my photography abilities a little. I don't plan on getting more lenses, but maybe down the road?
Tell me what you know... brands? features to look for? books that will help me with all the aperture/ shutter speed stuff I can't remember... etc. etc.

It's about time

I've always wondered why no one ever came out of a copy of Girl Scout's Samoas cookie. I wouldn't say these are to the quality level of the originals, but at least it's something to get you by until next year's order. Thanks Keebler, it was an exciting moment in my trip to the grocery store to discover Coconut Dreams.

Fill in a caption #4

The baby is...

A GIRL! The top pic is of her buff arm and a little clenched fist, and the bottom picture is of her spine. She is healthy and growing (as is my belly) and kicking and we couldn't be happier. Now to work on that naming part...

Happy 4th weekend

We had a good time celebrating the fourth (and the 2nd, 3rd & 5th). Calvin had his first experience with sparklers. But first, he had his first lesson on proper sparkler safety:Here is Calvin when he chose gardening over swimming at a family BBQ. I was a little disappointed in him:He used his cuteness powers, combined with his cousin's, to get sled rides from Uncle Paul:I would say it has been a very successful weekend. We also had some fun family bike rides, trips to the park, and a great time at Provo's Freedom Days. I am worried Calvin is going to think this coming week is really boring.

My Gay Sister

Over the past ten years since my little sister told me she was gay I have tried to understand what she is going through and help her deal with life. It's a rough road to grow up in an LDS family and have such strong same gender feelings. It's easy to feel evil and depressed. Although she has gotten past that stage in her life, it's still difficult to deal with. Since she is being more open with everyone, I thought I'd share what I've learned in case it can help anyone else relate better to someone in a similar situation. I'm not an expert at all, but at least I'm less clueless than I used to be. (And to those of you that know Heather, she is happy to talk more about it)
As her big sister who has all the answers (ha!) I've gone through different phases of trying to find solutions for her to be happy. Pray and it will go away. Fall in love with a boy and then you can just focus on him. Be single and be happy about it the rest of your life, just like straight people who can't find their match. Really none of those are solutions though because she has tried them all with no success.
When people are straight and single they at least have that hope that someday they will meet the perfect person for them. When you don't want to be in a gay relationship, but that is who you are attracted to, you feel hopeless and alone. It makes friendships difficult too. You want to have close friendships, but not too close that it's unhealthy for you. It's never fun to fall in love with someone you can't be with.
I guess some people are attracted to the same gender and then later are able to have healthy heterosexual relationships, but that isn't always how it works. I read the book, "No More Good-byes" and it talked about a scale from 1-6. People that are a 1 are completely straight, no sexual feelings towards same sex at all. 6 is homosexual. In between are people that are bisexual, or people that have a little more option in choosing gay or straight. If you are a 2 or 3 and want to live a heterosexual lifestyle, it's not that drastic to find someone to fall in love with and make a marriage work. But if you're a 5 or 6, that's just not realistic, as in Heather's case.
There are a lot of strong active people in the church that are gay, but don't act on their feelings. I'm sure it is very difficult, but what do you do when you love God and the church and are gay? Some people can't take it anymore and commit suicide. Even if God commands people to not have same gender relationships, I don't think He sees suicide as a better alternative.
I worry about the youth out there realizing how they feel and struggling to know what to do about it. I hope they will have understanding people to help them feel loved by God and everyone around them.
I'm sure it effects people in different levels of intensity. Heather is a very emotional person who puts so much into the relationships of her life. Being homosexual effects her everyday. I wish I had a solution for Heather. She has told me she knows she needs to live her values to be happy. The conflict comes because she has a value of having her needs met, by being loved and cared about in a relationship with a woman. However, she also has a value of following God and living the gospel.
I know she does all she can to reach out to others feeling the same way and help support them. She is an amazing person who deserves to have a happy life and I hope she finds a way to live all her values, even though right now the path is unclear.

Family time

We have been wanting to do some bike riding together, especially since we live by so many awesome paths. We put Brandon's old bike back together, bought me a bike and even found a nice used trailer for Calvin to cruise behind us in. We are all loving it!

Toilet

Sometimes when things are quiet and I haven't seen Calvin for a while I find him playing with the toilet brush in my bathroom and making a mess. Last night I found him in the bathroom and he didn't have the toilet brush (it was in the garbage can, he must have already finished with it) and for some reason his hair was all wet. I asked him why his hair was wet and he scrubbed his head with his hands and said,"washing hair!"
"How are you washing your hair?" I asked. He started to reach his hands into the toilet to demonstrate. ew! Washing his hair with toilet water??! What will he think of next?

Fill in a caption #3

I really like using photoshop to color my sketches, but I'm pretty new at it so I think these little "fill in the caption" blogs are a fun way to practice. I love hearing what people come up with too. Here are links to the two from the past: #1 #2

Calvin entertainment

These pictures are from when I told Calvin to go get some shorts and he came back with another t-shirt instead. He was really mad at me that I wouldn't help him put it on, and then even more mad at me when he tried to do it himself.

Instead of saying yeah to something Calvin would say "yeah I do", whether the question was Do you want to call Grandma? "yeah I do" or Should we go outside? "yeah I do" Is it green? "yeah, I do"

He'll say sorry to so many things. Like when he doesn't want to eat lunch and I offer him a whole list of things he'll say no to all of them and then say "sowwy" Or if he trips on a toy he says "sowwy" to the toy. Or when a kid tried to play with his toy he pulled it away, held his hand out to block it and said again, "sowwy"

Fox and Frog are said almost the same way. And I can't repeat how he says it. (F@%!) We're working with him on it.

He discovered that a lot of his diapers have a picture of Mickey and Pluto on them and every time he needs a diaper change he insists on "Mickey Dog!!" We have a growing pile of Mickey & Minnie diapers he's going to have to deal with at some point.

We were in the front yard and Calvin was running through the sprinkler when suddenly he took off sprinting down the sidewalk yelling "church!" "uh church!" The church is only a block and a half down the sidewalk, but I knew he wasn't really going to church on a Friday afternoon in his swim suit. As I ran after him it turned out he was running down to the neighbors house that has a dog out front. I guess he thought if he yelled "church" I wouldn't try to stop him??

Animals

Yesterday we went with some friends to Thanksgiving Point and Calvin just ran around and screamed the whole time he was so excited. He loves walking over to see the horses by our house and pointing them out every time we drive by them (which is every time we get in the car) He was SO excited to get to ride on one. When I asked him his horse's name he said "Calvin". And the same with the next horse he rode on too.
When we walked by a little baby goat it just sat in the corner for a long time until we were about to walk away it came over to the fence and let Calvin feed it a couple pieces of corn. I told him we were going to keep walking to look at other animals and he pointed at the baby sheep and said, "mine!" That's quite the souvenir he picked out.

June 2nd

If you are curious how the June 2nd prediction went, I don't know if I can say that was a magic day and suddenly I was better, but for sure a magic week. I would say 95% of my nausea is gone and what a difference that makes on my life. I feel so good, I even went to the track this morning and got in some walking/ jogging. Calvin even ran half a mile or so at the end as he ran around the track to get a little wet from the sprinklers. Hopefully we can make this a habit. Now we both need a nap!

A/C Heaven

It's been gradually getting warmer and I kept worrying that when we finally hard to turn on our A/C it wouldn't work. My nightmare came true. And just in time to have a pile of relatives over for Sunday dinner. We frantically called around and found someone to come by yesterday to see what the problem was. It was a simple fix and not nearly the cost I feared we would have to pay if it needed replaced. I can't even say how revealed I was to feel cold air coming from those vents. I LOVE AIR CONDITIONING!!

Name That Picture

I'm putting this painting in the BYU alumni show and I'm trying to think of a title for the piece. I usually do pretty boring titles like "Ice Skaters" but I think this time I want to do something more fun. Do you have a suggestion? These are some of my ideas so far:

1. Trying To Stay Warm and Not Fall Down
2. Emerald & Aqua
3. The Girl on the Top Right Just Realized She Doesn't Actually Know the Guy She is Waving at
4. Slippery
5. 67% Of the People in This Picture Can't Feel Their Toes

I'll throw a poll on the side if you want to vote, but really I would love suggestions.

(And special thanks to Katy for inspiring me to have a more interesting title)

Memorial Day

We threw together a last minute BBQ on Monday. A friend gave us a grill and Brandon got propane for it this weekend so we are set for the summer. No more oven cooking! It's all grilled this year. Here are some of the evening highlights:
croquet battling:
frisbee:
dancing:
cookie eating:The best part about Calvin's shirt is when you ask him what it says he responds, "daddy wocks!"

Sibling

That's right, a sibling for Calvin! My due date is on Thanksgiving. I have been very nauseous and if I am sick for the same amount of time that I was with Calvin then on June 2nd the nausea will go away. In the meantime, I have been eating a lot of watermelon and saltines with cream cheese. That's the flavor of the week anyway.

Competition

I was at Seagull Book today and I saw they have new tithing banks for kids. I am very familiar with the old selection. The cardboard one, the plastic one, and the modern tin one with color illustrations and a lock! I might be biased, but it was clearly the best one on the market, and yes, I get royalties on it and love it. So, NO! I am not happy that there is copy cat bank that is also tin, with a lock and key, and color illustration and less expensive! (smaller though) You can see them here. Just don't buy the copy cat.

Park

Whenever we go outside to play at some point Calvin will start running down the sidewalk yelling he is going to the park. It's the perfect size for him because the only thing at this park that made me nervous was the gap between the play area and the yellow swirl that seemed to big for him.
The other day he was getting better and better at climbing up the swirl without my help and eventually he got to the top, and pulled himself over to the play area. He was SO proud of himself, and even though I was scared he was going to fall, I was proud of him too.

Fishing

Yesterday we checked out Salem Pond. It was so pretty and a perfect day. Calvin had a blast and was very interested in watching (and helping) Brandon fish. I would love to see his reaction if Brandon really caught something. I guess we'll have to go back.
Do you love the super long basketball shorts Cal is sporting? It is his most frequently requested clothing item. It's his "daddy" shorts, because dad wears basketball shorts too.

Off to Russia

My little brother was in town for a few days before he entered the MTC. It was so fun to see him, and Calvin loved having him here. We don't get to see Chad very often since he lived so far away, but that didn't stop Calvin from crying when we said good-bye. No one else was crying, but as soon as he realized how far away Chad was getting Cal screamed "Cha! Chaaaaaaaaa!" It was so dramatic I had to laugh. It's not like Calvin has anyway of understanding that he won't see him for 2 years. I hope Chad felt loved.
When Calvin woke up from his nap later that day he asked for Chad and I told him he was at the MTC now to be a missionary. Calvin pointed to himself with both hands and asked, "and me??" I told him when he was as big as Chad he could go to the MTC and be a missionary. Later when Brandon asked Calvin about dropping off Chad he put out his bottom lip and said, "Cha. sad." I guess he is still a little upset about saying good-bye to uncle Chad.