Under the Weather

Mar 10

I have started to feel the icky feelings of morning sickness, nausea, etc. Everything involved with the first trimester. I felt so exhausted that I decided to take a nap. When I woke up, Nate had made me dinner!

He's never made stuffed peppers before, let alone something completely NEW on his own! I knew a married a keeper!

Mar 11

I finally finished the puzzle!

It took awhile with all the dark areas and the different shades of the grass, but I finally finished! Nate helped a little bit.

Mar 12

Nate and I went to the cannery to get some canned food from the church and get some service in with Randall. I filled our order and Randall's while the boys helped move large bags and boxes of food. Soon a scout troop arrived and we weren't needed as much so we left.

This week, Nate has his Spring Break. We'll see what he does on his school vacation. ;)

Busy Friday

March 8

What a day!!! After finishing up with lesson plans and teaching this Friday, we then had to turn around and go to our monthly district meeting. This time it was at LaPoint Elementary--about 40 minute drive from Vernal. It started out okay, but soon gravitated to something out of control. Recently we had been talking about the power standards for next year. Each grade in each school was supposed to come up with what they thought needed to be a power standard for the next school year. A member from each grade team in each school met and decided what they were to be. But apparently, that didn't matter... Instead of focusing on what we were supposed to get through before 4 pm, they decided to argue about the power standards. They had already been decided on a district level. Why argue about it further?! Seriously, I swear some individuals in the district first grade just want to argue to argue. Waste of time!
Needless to say, not much got done.
Mallory and Randall came by to pick up Nate for their concealed weapons permit class. It's all the hype since the school shootings and potential gun laws. I decided I would get one if I needed it, this time wasn't going to be it. Nate is pretty excited about getting a gun. It is all Randall and Nate seem to talk about when we get together with the Dunbars.

Good News!

March 4

I had been feeling funny at school for the last few days and so Nate suggested I take a pregnancy test...

it came out with two bars instead of one. Fearing it would be a false positive, I waited a few days to take it again. I had had a pretty bad day and felt like nothing could lift my spirits. I took it again and then couldn't wait to show Nate...

WE'RE PREGNANT!

Cecily's Baptism

 March 2

Nate and I went to Ogden for our niece's baptism. She was so excited! I am so proud of her and her decision. We first stopped off at Emily's for lunch and to celebrate Jonathan's and Cecily's birthdays.

We ate some lunch, opened some of Cecily's presents, a few of Jonathan's and then ate a little cake. While we were eating and socializing, Brittney and Seth announced that they were going to have their 3rd come September. :) How exciting!

It soon came time for us to head over to the church for Cecily's baptism. I am so proud of her making this decision. You could just see the large smile on her face as we waited for our turn to move toward the baptismal font. Cecily and Shaely are close cousins. As soon as Shaely saw what Cecily was doing, she told everybody, "I'm ready to get baptized now, right after Cecily." Haha We watched Rob baptize her and then Nate, Seth and I had to head out quick to catch the light. Nate and I didn't get a video wedding shoot like I had planned and wanted, so we decided that this weekend was the one to do it. Brit helped me into my dress and off we went to Bountiful. It was a race against the sun. 

Once we got to Bountiful, we nearly had to turn back. The temple was closed for cleaning. Luckily, Seth and Nate snuck in the opening of one of the gates and found a security/cleaning guy. He was nice enough to let us in to use the grounds for our video. We made it in the knick of time!
We got the shots we needed and then headed back to Em's so that I could change. Shaely was so funny. She really wanted to help me out of my 'married princess dress'. I let her help me as much as I could for a 3 year old. We soon left to spend the night at Seth and Brit's.

The following morning, we ate breakfast, went with them to sacrament meeting and then headed back home to Vernal.

Date Night

March 1st

Nate and I haven't been out on a date since we left for Denver. So we went out to dinner at Ichiban's. It was to die for!!!

 Yeah.. he's pretty cute!

Vegas roll! Our favorite!

Thanks for great date Nate!

UAEA Conference

February 21- 23

A co-worker of mine knew that I am into art and teaching art. She suggested that I attend this art conference with her in St. George. It counts as professional development so I don't have to take any PTO time and it involves art. Sounds like my kind of tea. Plus, it's in a place a lot warmer than Vernal--I'm down. After getting out of school, I met up with an art teacher from the district that was going later than the big group. We carpooled down driving from Vernal to St. George. It was a long drive in my little Saturn. I would have traded off, but she didn't know how to drive a stick shift so it was just me. I dropped her off at her parents place and then continued onto my way to my hotel.

Pretty nice, right?

I woke up the next morning and headed over to where the UAEA conference was being held. First we had a guest speaker from a private boy high school. He had some interesting points on how he taught art. He mentioned something that as a high school student and especially college, I can see, understand and agree with. But with an elementary classroom, it gets a bit foggy in how this works. He said that having students copy from a picture/photograph isn't teaching them how to draw. It is just having them practice moving their hand. To learn how to draw or paint, you have to practice and kind of figure it out on your own.

After the guest speaker, we all moved to the auxiliary gym for some hands-on lesson plans. They had many different venues for you to experiment with and learn how to do several different lesson plans with different grades. I didn't find too many art lessons that I could do with a class of 60 + first graders, unfortunately.

This is so cool! Condensed paint + eye shadow applicators; who knew?

After the hands on part, we had a variety of classes that we could choose to go to at different time slots. Different workshops that weren't as simple as the hands on part.

Around 12:30, we broke for lunch catered by Kneaders. Fresh bread, salad, tomato basil soup, chocolate dipped strawberries and a canoli. Delish!!

After lunch, we went to a few more workshops before calling it a day. Instead of going to dinner with some of the other educators from Uintah School District, I popped over to a family friend's apartment to say hello. Her family was in town helping her pack up her apartment to go to Orem. Colleen had dinner waiting for me and Kellyann told me the awesome proposal story that knocked her socks off. I am so excited for her to be married. John seems like a great guy. 

Once I left her place, I decided to do some shopping and headed back to the hotel to chat it up with Nate before going to bed.

The next day, we had a few more workshops to attend before going home. A large storm was making it's way down the wasatch front toward St. George so not too many people stayed for all of the workshops. I stayed for most of them and continued to learn a bunch. Including Zentangle!

They are so cool!

I did a bit more shopping before picking up Lindsay to head back home. With Nate's help, we were able to find a way back to Vernal without getting the blunt of the storm. We travelled through this canyon that would take us to Duchesne from just north of Beaver and caught a chunk of the storm. It got ridiculously foggy, icy and snowy making it hard to see. I am kinda thankful a large semi-truck was in front of us, even though he was going REALLY slow, beyond safe slow. I will say I have never been so grateful for the road grooves that make noise when you cross over them. Because otherwise, we probably would have ended up in a ditch. As soon as we got out of that canyon, it cleared up like night and day difference. Lol We made it home to Vernal safely. Other than the crazy challenge of driving in a snow storm, it was a pretty great weekend in St. George!

Denver Adventure!

Feb 15 - Feb 17

Nate and I left after I got out of school on Friday. On our way out of Utah, just past the border we came across a town literally named Dinosaur. I know this area of the states is famous for sedimentary rock and Dinosaur bones and fossils, but really? Name the town Dinosaur? It allowed us to laugh and funny signs such as this:

Maybe Dinosaurs didn't become extinct after all and found religion somehow...

We continued to drive for about 6 or 7 hours. Part of the long drive was on account of this very large/long tunnel. They were only letting in one car at a time, on the two lane road (in the tunnel), every 500 ft. So we were stuck on the freeway, with no exits available, 3 lanes of traffic, waiting to go into the tunnel, for TWO HOURS! The tunnel itself was probably a mile or two long. Once we got to the other side, it was night and day difference--sunny and pleasant coming in to foggy, snowy and windy coming out.

 When we came in toward Denver, we passed an exit for a town called 'No Name'. Lol Colorado, you're killing me with these crazy names. We checked in at our hotel and then went to the temple in Littleton, CO. 

 I was surprised by how small some of the rooms were in the temple. But it was wonderful to go. After we got out, Nate took me to Red Lobster for our Valentine dinner. I love lobster. Mmmm... It was a nice, quiet evening in the restaurant. We got the seafood platter to share (definitely the way to go) and skipped out on dessert. What a great night! 

The next day...

We woke up pretty early to make it to our appointment for our full body, 1 hr, Swedish massages. Nate went first, so I got to wait on these wonderful bad boys! 

Our masseuse was phenomenal!!! She was telling me she was from a place called Latvia and how she came to the states. I enjoyed learning about her story while she worked her magic. 3 1/2 hours later we were on our way to Gateway Park to play at the arcade, mini golf and go cart racing. 

It was a blast!!! 

We did a little shopping afterwards and ate at a restaurant called Las Fuentes. Delicious mexican food! We called it a night and went to bed.

Sunday

We packed up our stuff Sunday morning and left to spend sacrament meeting with our friends, Millie and Casey, that had moved out to Denver a few months earlier. 

We love these two! They are going to be great parents!

After church, we had sunday dinner and went to the park to play bocce ball and this fun ring toss game. When Casey got home, we played some games and watched a few episodes of Castle. It was great to just relax and hang out with Mills and Casey. 

The next morning we ate breakfast and headed back toward Vernal.

 We ate at this little pizza joint that was really good. We hopped on the road and after asking a few places, we finally figured out where the ice castles were located. 

 They were incredible!

 And to think this was made by somebody; pretty impressive

 Do you see how tall this is? Nate is 6 ft flat. 

Eventually, we grabbed some hot chocolate and headed back to home to reality.
Catch ya later!

Valentine's Party

February 14th

My class got to celebrate Valentine's Day and was super excited about it. We had different centers for the students to go to and quite a lot of fun. Nate came in just after lunch and surprised me with a bouquet of flowers and my favorite candy. 

When I got home, I shared my many gifts with Nate telling him how much I felt loved and appreciated by my students and their parents. I am so honored to be their teacher. 

The 100th day of school is usually close to Valentine's Day. I made a "100 snack" for my students and little gifts for my Valentine's treat to them. I figured they would get enough candy from the party and classmates, so I got them little toys instead. 

Since Valentine's Day fell on a Thursday this year.... we decided to wait until the weekend to celebrate it--in Denver, CO. :)