Valentine's Schmooze Night

We planned an All-Church Fellowship (formerly known as a potluck) for Feb. 15th.  

The ekklesia band was gonna play a bunch of old love songs and fun stuff like that...but we've never done that before.  After several weeks of practicing and stress, I can say the program went great and we (the band) sounded really well!  

All set up and ready to play!

One last practice before the big show...

Shelly and I...why yes, I did wear Heart Ears the whole night.

Our tip jar :)

Ricardo likes playing with our camera--he got really artsy! 

I like this shot.

Although Mrs. Nichols might tell me that I need to curve my fingers more. 

All those piano lessons and I still play with flat hands.

Cupid made a guest appearance!  Worn out...seeing as how the day before was the 14th...

Daniel and Shelly.  They did a great job!

There was dancing...

If we could remember how...

And some "not-so-dancing".  :)

Learning new things...

I know all about what to do in earthquakes: yay for 

"Duck&Cover" drills in elementary school.  

But Dallas doesn't get those.  

What do we get instead? 

Tornados.

A year (or two?) ago, I realized I didn't have a clue what the drill was for tornados.  

Of course, that shocked my youth group, as they have the routine pounded into them in school practices and drills 

(much like our earthquake practices).  

Apparently, when you hear the tornado sirens, you are supposed to go into the central room or hallway of the house 

(preferably closed off from exterior walls/windows/and other dangerous stuff), 

and throw a mattress over yourself.  

Ummm...

By 11:30pm tonight, and the second time the sirens went off this evening, I had had enough.

They sound horrible too, by the way. They sound so deathly and mournful.  

I always get a sinking, dread feeling when I hear them, even for the 

routine-1st-Wednesday-per-month-lunchtime-testing-of the sirens.  

  

At least Ricardo was also home this time: first time I didn't have to wait through tornado sirens alone.  

I wasn't gonna even think of lying under a mattress.  Mattresses are too heavy, we have too many corners to turn to get it into the hallway...but, I figured I should try to be safe and so I grabbed every pillow from our bed and assumed that would be enough protection from any shattering glass or flying debris.

And I crankily sat in the hallway with my laptop.  

Not a fan of tornados.  Too much hype, and most of the time it's for nothing.  Give me an earthquake any day. 

 

Then and Now.

 I'm back!  (in Dallas, as well as bloglandia).  

The Seattle trip was wonderful. Lots of friends and family, which was exactly what I hoped for and was excited for.  

Some highlights: Baby and I got overwhelmingly spoiled, 

I escaped the 19 degree ice day in Dallas, 

and I got to have a tea party with Janae and McKenzie.  

Can't get any better than that!

Some pictures from the trip...

One more view out my window, last day of the conference. 

It snowed! Not much, and it didn't last long, but it was pretty and I loved the fog!

Hanging out with Janae and baby girls!

A night out with C-Group girls (getting chocolate, of course.  

I "borrowed" this picture from Ann...thanks?)

Sisters! A family friend and Kira threw a baby shower, and Alisha and mom flew up for it.  

All of us! (Mom, Kira, Calia, Grandma Judy, & Alisha)

Lots of really cute baby girl things...

Carrie & Calia

C-Group girls at the shower...Sorry for covering your face Alicia!

(back: Alicia, Abby, Ann, front: Calia, Angiolina, Emily)

Now...to the fun things! 

Abby pointed out that about 5 or 6 of us at the shower have all known 

each other somewhere around 25 years...

Proof: Angiolina, Calia, Abby, Andrea (she just visited one day), & Carrie at the pool!

Calia, Abby, Angiolina, & Carrie now!

Calia & Emily

We go way back...just for fun, here's the picture of our C-group when we graduated high school.

I'll have to look for more...

I'm sure I have some from college days, and some 

horrible ones from junior high and elementary school days. 

Abby and I!  (Ann gets the photo credit...my copy didn't turn out so well).  

I am about 2 months older than Abby.  

My baby is due in May, hers is due about 2 months after mine.  

I think our babies are destined to be best friends for always and forever.  

One more reason...

Dallas doesn't compare to Seattle.  

The view from my room at the conference.  Yep. That's the Puget Sound.  Ocean. Olympic mountain range (barely visible) in the background.

Another view, in case that wasn't enough.

Mt. Rainier was this direction.  Might be too light to see.  But notice the colors?  Blue water, green pointy trees, blue sky, green grass!

I walked a trail that included 180 stairs down to the beach at high tide.  And back up.  Good exercise for baby and I!

Just another reason (as if we needed more).

In the wee small hours

I can't sleep, and I hate being awake when I should be asleep.  So, I'm playing on the laptop until I'm tired enough to doze off.  Silly stuff, but every few years or so, I google "calia" to see what comes up.  

I have no clue what it's for or about. But I thought it was interesting/humorous. It could be that I've only slept 4 hours and I need more.

By the way...

Did I mention that this came in the mail last week? 

MLK day

No pictures today, just a quick update....we got a crib!  Baby's room is started!

We're not very close though, because the office needs to be cleaned out and reorganized before we have a baby's room, and that's not very fun work.  We're very slow at it.  I have all the books out of the bookcases, so those are ready to move, but we're living among boxes of files and sorted bags of papers to recycle, shred, and store in the "new" office/guest bedroom.  We got a new shredder with Christmas money (thanks Aunt Karyn!!) and are impatiently awaiting it's arrival.  

I'm sure once the room is cleared of office stuff and ready for baby stuff we'll have a lot more fun and maybe be more efficient.

So, the most exciting thing here lately is that we have a crib! But no picture, since it's still in a box.  We got a crib and matching dresser/changing table at Ikea on Friday.  It's always a special and fun trip when we get to go, since it's not really close and we have to take a toll-road...we make it a date and enjoy it!  We usually only go about once a year, but it's such a fun store! Ikea is wonderful!! 

Except for...

we also needed another bookcase.  Being students, our book collection has outgrown the shelf space available.  Our bookcases are from Ikea, so of course we were planning to get one more while we were there.  Ikea was OUT of our bookcases though!  Temporarily-out-of-stock read the label.  

Way to slow us down on our office-moving, baby-room-preparing even more Ikea!  

We decided to try to look for it online when we got home.   I found it available online for the same price in-store, $19.99, and was in the process of checking out when the taxes and shipping & handling fees were added.  Guess how much shipping & handling is for one $20 bookcase?  

$119.00

Yep...Don't think we're doing that.  

We'll just pay the $5 in tolls, and $15 in gas to go back up to Ikea and get it ourselves someday when they have it in stock.  

Just thought you might enjoy a little bit of that craziness.  

22 weeks and showing off!

This was mostly an excuse to play with our camera.  And for some reason I didn't change immediately into my pj's when I came home from work today, so I was still presentable later on in the evening.  

Our girl is getting "bumpish".  Is that the right word for it?  

Modeling the baby.  

And the door behind me opens to the brand new finished laundry room!

Ornery model?

Picture with flash--shows off the color of the wall a little better.