Thursday, December 11, 2008

Lone Man in the Wilderness

Well, back in October Grandma and Grandpa Smith bought tickets for Kim and the twins to head to Oklahoma for a short 10 day visit. At the time 10 days seemed like a drop in the bucket, but it is the longest Kim and I have been away from each other since we were married, and it has proven difficult. Not to mention, I miss my little girls. Since Kim left on 06 Dec, I have found myself with little to do. Even though I am in my last week of classes and finals are just around the bend, I can't find enough to do to keep my mind off my little family. I finally had to shut the door to the twins room and the bed is colder than usual. Meanwhile, the couch has become my best friend (not to mention the tv). I count down the days until they'll return. Only 5 days left to go. I anxiously count the days, hours, and minutes until my little family returns.

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Time in Tulsa (actually Owasso, but that didn't sound right)

This year the holiday rotation is Thanksgiving in Oklahoma and Christmas in SLC, but since the twins turned 2 in Aug, flying has become too expensive. As a result, we played it up that we wouldn't be able to spend the holiday season in Oklahoma with the Smiths. Little did they know, we were secretly planning to surprise them. We left on Friday 21 Nov at around 4:00 pm (1600 hours). We had planned to leave earlier but Isabelle injured herself and we had to take her to the doctor (she is fine). We drove all the way to Burlington, Co where we stayed the night, then continued our uneventful journey to Grandma and Grandpa Smith's house. We arrived about 7:00 pm (1900 hours) and sent the girls to ring the doorbell. When Grandma Smith answered the door, she just stood there stunned. Finally Kim and I jumped out shouting "Surprise!" and it finally dawned on her what had happened. It was a complete surprise! The surprises continued as each member of the family arrived to Grandma and Grandpa's house. The time was great and many laughs were had by all. Thanksgiving dinner was a delight. Although our trip out to Oklahoma was uneventful, the rest of the trip did not follow suit. On Wednesday while watching the twins and their cousins, I sprained my ankle after stepping in a hole. It swelled up really big, and then when that drained it moved to my foot, so now it looks like I have elephantitis in my left foot. Then, before we were about to leave on Friday, Kim twisted her left ankle too. That was just the beginning.
The drive out of Oklahoma started innocently enough. We had pretty good weather and we made it to Limon, Co, where we stopped for the night, in good time. Before we left Oklahoma, I checked the weather along I-70 and snow was predicted for Friday morning in Denver, but clear skies for Saturday. Unbelievably, the weather predictions were wrong. Right after we left Denver, snow started to fall. Going up the Rockies was incredibly slow, and traffic even stopped at times. All the while, the snow kept coming. Luckily our van has traction control, which kicked in a couple of times and kept us from getting stuck. We pulled into Frisco, Co after traveling for a couple of hours (Frisco is only 72 miles from Denver) to eat lunch. After a brisk lunch, we got back on the road and battled the snow. Once we emerged from the Rockies, things got a whole lot better, weather wise. Just when we started moving, we had to stop again. A semi had crashed in Glenwood Canyon and spilled its load all over the road. As a result, I-70 was shut down until further notice. To make matters worse, there wasn't a detour; the police just sent people off the interstate and told them to wait. We ended up waiting for 5+ hours! In 10 hours we had only made 240 miles! During the wait we tried to keep the girls busy, which was quite a task. Luckily our DVD player and their new-found love in Dora the Explorer kept them entertained for a while. When the interstate finally opened, the police let the people waiting on the interstate go first, instead of everyone that they had told to get off. Those that were waiting the longest, had to wait longer. The people around us did not like it at all, and started to honk their horns at the police officers guarding the on-ramp. Soon, about 25 or more cars were honking their horns and people started yelling. All the while, we could see cars flying by on the interstate. I joined in on the horn honking, until the twins started to cry. After waiting another .5-1 hour, we got on the interstate. Things were moving well for a least a mile, then traffic backed up because CDOT had only opened one lane by the accident. It took us another 1.5 hours to go 8 miles. Even though we had left Limon, Co at 9:00 am on Sat, we didn't get home until around 2:00am Sun morning. It was a very long drive, but the trip was still worth it. While we were in Oklahoma, Kim and I toured a couple of Aviation Maintenance schools in Tulsa and Kim was able to accomplish one of her yearly goals, but I'll let her tell ya'll about that.

Sunday, November 16, 2008

All Hallows' Even

Halloween came and went this year in a flash. The festivities started early with a trip to a local pumpkin patch for playgroup.

Later on in October, we took a stroll down memory lane by going to a pumpkin patch in Santaquin, the same one we went to 2 years ago when the girls were just a few months old.

We carved (for those of us old enough to wield a knife) and painted these pumpkins on Halloween Eve, then did the traditional trick-or-treating the following night.

Trick-or-Treating started off kind of rough for the girls. We took them to the Parks' house first, where Matt was waiting just inside the door to hand out candy. He was dressed in an oversized, hooded robe, reminiscent of the Grim Reaper. He slowly opened the door, peering at the girls. Oh man, they were terrified! The looks on their faces were priceless. It was the saddest, yet funniest thing! I couldn't help but chuckle. For the next couple of houses, the girls were very hesitant to knock on any doors. We had to push and prod them up to the door. When we finally got to a neighborhood where there were lots of other goblins trick-or-treating, they relaxed and quickly caught on. They had a ball - we took them around Stonewood, a nice neighborhood just west of our condo complex. We had been practicing saying "trick-or-treat" all day long - but usually when they got to the door, they just stood there, looking cute, hoping the nice person with the big bowl of candy would have pity on them and just give them some chocolate already. It was easier for them when we made it to Stonewood because there were trick-or-treating veterans who would ring the doorbell and ask for the candy and the girls would just sort of fall in line. The girls scored in the candy department - they got about 3 or 4 full-size candy bars each (none of which they ate - daddy tax :) ) By the end of the night, the girls were exhausted and were asleep before we could even get their costumes off. Oh, initially Isabelle picked the butterfly to wear and Eliza picked the mouse (or rat, as she was called at one house we stopped at - I was slightly offended. Who would dress their daughter as a rat??? A mouse is much more feminine.) But, when they were getting dressed that night, they suddenly switched costumes. I guess such is the prerogative of being a twin - double the wardrobe, double the fun.

As a sidenote, I had a couple of proud mommy moments while we were out trick-or-treating. For the most part, the girls said "thank you" for the candy they received. Hallelujah, something I've been trying to teach them has sunk in! And I fully expected them when reaching into candy bowls to take a fistful of candy, but they very politely and delicately just took one piece - every single time they had the chance to pick out their own piece of candy.

And a lesson learned - never leave a bowl full of good candy sitting outside your door, expecting people to just take a piece or two.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

2008 New Year's Goals

10. Buy a minivan. Check.

9. Pay off credit card debt. Cha-ching. Thanks George W.

8. Continue with food abstinence program. (A few years ago, I wanted to see if I could give up pop for a whole year, just to see if I could do it. I was a major Dr. Pepper addict previously. I succeeded, and ever since then, I've been adding a food item to that list each year. So far I've "given up" pop, French fries, doughnuts, and this year I decided to give up sugary drinks, i.e. anything other than 100% fruit juice, water, or milk.) Check, check.

7. Run a 5k. Working on that one.


6. Wean the girls off of their pacifiers.
5. Have potty training completed by the end of the year. (I feel tired just by thinking about accomplishing #5 and #6)

4. Save $x each month to put toward debt payment. Check.

3. Hike Mt. Timp. Missed that opportunity.

2. Read 13 books this year, cover to cover, including the Book of Mormon. That equals out to one book per month, plus standard scripture reading. So far, I've read 5 and I'm in Enos in the Book of Mormon. Yikes!

1. Start a blog