Addicted

61%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

After I saw a friend do this, I had to try it. Just how addicted are you?

Just 15 minutes

This hike is just 15 minutes from our home. I think we will be going there again, and again......

I guess I'm the worst at Tag

Five things I was doing 10 years ago:
1. Getting ready to move out of my house in SJ and into my best friend Jay’s house.
2. Just finished a rigorous Christmas time singing schedule for my High School Madrigal Choir
3. Playing GURPS with my friends.
4. Talking on the phone for long periods of time with my little sister M who already moved to CA.
5. Participating actively in the Quill & Scroll Society, the Bread & Jam club* and the Croquet club.

Five things on my to do list today:
1. Study for the GRE
2. Hike in the Olympic mountains (in Washington - not Greece, though Greece would be nice too)
3. Play the Piano
4. Read scriptures
5. Catch up on my sleep – from my last underway on the submarine

Five things I will do when I'm a millionaire:
1. Get a house preferably close to family and a beautiful national park, or place to hike and camp
2. Save still
3. Go skiing with my father in law and wife
4. Try becoming a landlord
5. Go back to college

Five things I'll never wear again:
1. MC Hammer pants
2. The shirt “I got stitches from Sacred Heart Hospital” with a teddy bear on it, that I wore for two weeks straight in kindergarten before it got thrown away because it was filthy.
3. Diapers (hopefully)
4. Ensign Bars
5. Tights (for our Madrigal Medieval Banquet 10 yrs ago)

My favorite toys:
1. Hiking Boots
2. Ticket to Ride (board game)
3. the Computer
4. Settlers (board game)
5. Blokus (board game)

Five people to tag:
1. Ben
2. Jay
3. Tim
4. Bill
5. Caron

_____________________________________

* the bread and jam club was invented by some of my friends in High School as a club where we would meet after school and eat bread and jam. Someone would bring in homemade bread and homemade jam and it was delicious. I even listed being a member of the bread and jam club on some of my scholarship applications. You know, come to think of it, I got that scholarship too, probably only because of the B&J club!

Rolling

About 2 weeks ago MaryP figured out how to roll from her back to her tummy. (She's been able to roll the other way for a few months now.) Today she made a new stride, or should I say roll, in her progression. I left her on a blanket in her room while I took care of a few things and when I came back she was part way across the room. Yikes! I guess this is just the forefront of the "nothing is safe" part of life. But it's fun to see the new changes and developments!

Feeling Good

A few weeks ago a friend was telling me about an awesome workout class that she attends, and from what she described I knew the class was definitely not for me. Not that something like that wouldn't be good for me, it's just I know that at present I'm out of shape enough that I would pass out mid-class and seriously embarrass myself.

I have been wanting to get back in shape. Nursing and not eating lunch (I forget to when Wood is at work and MaryP is napping - I just get busy doing other things) has brought me down to below my pre-pregnancy weight. This is great because I wanted to lose weight pre-pregnancy anyway.

Unfortunately 1. I'm not nursing anymore (which I'm sad about but there you go) 2. I'm going to make a concerted effort to eat lunch - it just makes me feel more normal, and 3. Just because I've lost weight does not mean I'm in shape. I get worn out too easily.

At the library we found this great DVD and I liked it so much I bought it. This is big for me because I don't usually enjoy work-out videos more then once or twice, but I love this one. No, it's not intense. No, I'm not maximizing my work-out time. But yes, I am moving. I'm getting up and doing something. And it makes me feel really good and gives me more energy for my day. And, I love that I can do it with MaryP - I enjoy spending that time with her. MaryP is still not so sure how she feels about the video, she looks at me like "Mom, what are we doing?" But she tolerates it. I also got Baby Reps. We want to do a lot of hiking in this area, so hopefully between the three I can get to a place where I really feel good.

Twilight on New Year's Day

We drove to Port Angeles on Highway 101 today.

However, we didn't see any vampires, werewolves, or silver Volvos. Too bad.

Merry Christmas One and All

To all our friends out there, we hope you have a wonderful Christmas. We hope that the love and spirit of Christ's mission on earth can warm each of your hearts. Merry Christmas from our family to you.

(Of course MaryP is our poster child) She's so cute!

Going Bald

My older brother said that as a child I looked like a white Diana Ross. My hair has always been "large and in charge" so to speak. I've often had it intentionally thinned at hair appointments in an attempt to manage it. I usually still end up with a small afro by the evenings.

Lately though I've been worried about going bald. Well, not really, but about a month ago MaryP started taking more bottles (for a variety of reasons) and I'm only nursing about 1/3 of the time now. Ever since then my hair has been falling out and every time I brush it, especially right after I wash it, more hair ends up in my brush then I feel good about, and more in my hands too.

I've heard about post-pregnancy hair loss - how long does this go on for?

Hopefully not too long, or Diana Ross could end up looking like Sinead O'Connor.

The last month

We've been busy this last month here in Washington. Wood's work is in full swing and he's actually been on his sub (woo-hoo!). We helped make the decorations for our ward Christmas party a Who-ville theme complete with a 13 foot cardboard mountain for the Grinch. The decorations looked awesome - I wish I'd taken pictures. We're still rooting through boxes and trying to find/make a place for everything. I'm a good pile mover - I move piles from one room to the other. So I really need a place for everything to reduce my piles. We are official Costco members and have purchased gross quantities of diapers, dishwasher detergent, toilet paper, and other "bulk" items. We're trying to get to know people from our ward and the boat. We've been able to visit some family and hope to visit more. We've had sunshine, snow, and rain. Since they don't believe in snowplows around here, any snow, especially the wet, sticky stuff is pretty debilitating. Church ended early 2 Sundays ago for 3-6 inches of snow. We barely made it home (seriously). The next day Wood came home early because of severe flooding in the area. Fortunately we were fine, though many of his co-workers were affected. I guess they usually have a storm like that this time of the year, so hopefully it's out of the way and we won't have another one like that for a year!

MaryP has been busy too. She'll hit her 5 month mark on Tuesday. It seems like she's learning something new all of the time. Like grabbing my dishes at the table. Those little hands can be pretty quick! She's as cute as ever and a delight to both of us. Here are just a few pictures of what she's been up to.

Outgrowing her pajamas

So she got her first trundlebundle
(aka: soft footie pajamas with a zipper)

All clean!

Finding her feet

Getting ready for the ward Christmas party

I feel so lucky to have such a wonderful husband and a wonderful daughter!

Six Things

Someone challenged me to blog tag, so here are 6 interesting/little known things about me:

1. Thanks to my hubby, I now enjoy some techno music (particularly Daft Punk).

2. I've maneuvered the bucket on one of these bad boys for work.

3. My goal is to one day write a book/books for children - I love children's literature and storytelling.

4. As a child I though ET and the gremlins lived under my bed ..... I still won't watch those movies.

5. I don't have a problem with reading ahead in a book if I'm getting worried about the outcome. Then I'll go back and read the middle and thoroughly enjoy it.

6. I just discovered that I enjoy cranberries on turkey - who knew?!

Rice Cereal

Yummmmmm......

*My baby spoon is somewhere in my home (where is a very good question) so we used a measuring spoon instead. MaryP didn't seem to mind.

Arrival

So if you haven't been keeping in tune, we have moved from coast to coast.













We are safely in Silverdale, WA (right next to Bangor Subase). And what do you know! Only 4200 miles more on the odometer!

3 Months

MaryP hit her 3 month mark a week ago. She loves standing (with our help) and looking around. She could stare down anyone, she hardly ever blinks, making her look all the more intent on studying her surroundings. Her face lights ups when she sees her daddy, she loves to coo and talk and will sometimes "sing" along with me. We are amazed at how much she has grown and changed - she is a delight and brings so much light to our family. We sure love our little girl!

Here are just a few pictures of her - my brain isn't functioning properly and I need to finish packing but I wanted to post them before we left - so I will just let the pictures speak for themselves.

Clues

So, we are down to the last toilet paper roll
. . .and we like it that way.

We eat odd combinations of food:
like Pot stickers & soy sauce, BBQ chicken and rice, Jello, and oranges for dinner.

And we're making devious and conniving plans to confuse the mailman once again.

If you haven't guessed or heard the word, we're moving again. I think we are doing a better job of getting rid of all our food and supplies. I wonder if the post office will do a double forward? We are still getting mail forwarded from our last location.

The funniest thing of all to me is that back when Woodine name this blog "Into the Woods" I thought, "Oh that is so fitting, we live up north of Albany and there are lots of woods here." But we moved to Connecticuit, and Groton puts NY to shame for being woodsy. From what I saw of the Bangor WA area, it looks like we will continue the trend of moving deeper and deeper into the woods.

I'm really excited for this trip. We'll be able to see the PennHens (my brother & his family) in PA, John and Alison (two really good friends from BYU) in Wisconsin, Both sets of parents, four brothers and one or two sisters while we are in CO and UT.

We are looking for some good book on CDs or normal books to read on the trip. Woodine finished Eclipse, and I am reading Elantris. By the way, I really like Elantris and recommend it. Our problem is we usually get book on CDs from the library, and I don't think it would be prudent to take a library CD across the country. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

*This blog was started a few days ago and we're heading out tomorrow. Book suggestions would still be welcome. We didn't quite make it through our food. Does anyone need a large bag of sugar? Or an almost-full bottle of vinegar?

Apparently this is very comfortable!

Early Start

We got a great jump-start on our day today. A 3:40 AM jump start. MaryP was sleeping soundly, but Wood's alarm had gone off around 2:45 and we had fallen back asleep (can you blame us?). Somehow the time on his clock was set 4 hours ahead and so when we re-woke at "7:40" (aka 3:40) we thought we'd over-slept and that he was running late. We hopped out of bed and quickly started getting ready, only to notice the correct time on other clocks. With a relieved sigh we climbed back under the covers, almost with a sense of cheating time and getting extra sleep. Almost.

All dressed up

So things are pretty laid back here in Connecticut. We have lots of time to spend together which is a nice reprieve before we get to the boat and life gets busy and Wood starts making trips out to sea. We do go out and about - to the library, on walks, etc. We also spend a lot of time around the house. Although after the conversation last night, I think maybe I've been a little too relaxed.

Scene: Me- dressed in jeans, a sweater, and my hair not in a bun (I really need to get it cut!).

Enter Wood, just coming home from a flag football game.

Wood: Hey, what are you all dressed up for?
Me: Um, I'm not dressed up. I just decided to change out of my exercise* clothes and put my hair down.
Wood: Oh, well it looks nice.

If jeans and a sweater is dressy, maybe I'd better re-think my daily routine! I guess it is a notch up from my semi-formal wear - jeans and a T-shirt!

*Wearing exercise clothes may or may not indicate actual exercise occurred.

Maine

Two weekends ago we headed up to Maine. It was only a 4 hour drive from here - though this was extended by Boston traffic and an unhappy baby - she was bored? Once we got into Maine we saw some really beautiful fall colors! By the time we made it to the Navy Lodge it was too dark to do any sight-seeing, so we made our way to a restaurant to try some Maine lobster. We shared the dinner and it was one of those things that is fun to do once, but we probably won't repeat. We had New England clam chowder, lobster, muscles, and crab-stuffed haddock. That haddock was our favorite. I wish we had taken a picture of the plate with the lobster and the muscles, it looked awesome!

We decided that lobster is really a glorified way to eat butter - but we couldn't pass up the opportunity while in Maine! However, I decided I do not enjoy seeing the whole creature I am eating while eating it. First of all, it looks like a bug. Not to mention those bug-like legs that were flailing around while Wood cracked the thing open. And removing the intestines - blech. I guess I've seen a fish cleaned before, but that doesn't bother me as much. Yep, I definitely am not a lobster lover. Once was enough for me.

Saturday we drove down two peninsulas and onto some little islands. The Maine coastline is truly a must-see in my book. We didn't get out to take pictures (someone was sleeping happily as long as we kept moving) but it was just incredible. A very rugged coastline with rock and sand formations jutting out into the sea. Combine this with fall colors and you have quite a scene.

We also made our way to the Portland Head Light - one of the most famous light houses, and commissioned by George Washington. The weather was not ideal, but the view was!

Shots

Apparently our family is due for shots. MaryP just had hers (and is due for more soon) and Wood came home from work yesterday having received 5 shots, 1 PPD test for tuberculosis, and his blood drawn. Yuck. We are happy to report he does not have tuberculosis.

Great weekend

This last weekend my dad came down for a little visit. He had business in Boston Wednesday through Saturday so he popped down for Saturday evening and Sunday before he flew to Rochester for more business on Monday. It was so nice to have him here! Saturday afternoon we took him to nearby Bluff Point which is the " last remaining significant piece of undeveloped land along the Connecticut coastline." It's about a 3 mile walk and really, really pretty. MaryP slept through most of it, but I'm sure she enjoyed it too!

Saturday evening we ordered out Applebee's (which makes it much easier with a baby). Disposable is definitely my favorite kind of dishes. Thanks Dad!

MaryP sure enjoyed seeing her Grandpa B. When he was playing with her she was smiling and making noises that were about as close to a laugh as I've heard yet. It was really fun to hear. She coos for Mom and Dad, but I guess right now the laughs are for Grandpa!

My favorite part of him being here was just talking and talking about anything. Our year + adventure on the East has convinced me that I could be very happy living in this area. But I sure miss being close to family, so it was a real treat. I sure love you Dad, it was great to see you!