Our Little Surprise

Well, we've been keeping a little secret for a while now. And it's getting to the point that we're ready to spill the beans. 

I guess we can say that it started on UEA weekend when we decided to take advantage of me having 2 days off work so we could go down to the Monticello Temple (the last one on our list of temples in Utah to attend before the end of the year) and spend some time at Moab. I felt a little carsick on the way down, which is unusual for me. I attributed it to eating something that didn't agree with me while we were traveling. We went to the temple then headed up to Moab where we had our tent all set up so we could spend the weekend. The next morning we set out to explore Arches National Park, which was beautiful. We enjoyed ourselves and exploring new things we'd never seen before. However, before we  came home, Jeff wanted to do an ATV tour. I wasn't so sure to begin with, but he really wanted to so I let him do what he wanted and agreed to go. We had a two-person ATV, so he drove and I sat on the back. I did not enjoy myself at all. I got so motion sick it was all I could do to not lose my breakfast. Jeff kept telling me it was because I wasn't driving myself...but now I realize that there were other factors thrown into the mix. And we found out the next morning.

After we got home, I started thinking and did a little bit of math. I told Jeff, and he lovingly encouraged me to go find out. So, I headed to go take a little test that would change our lives. When I walked out into the kitchen, terrified and trembling, all I could do was show him that little stick with a "plus" sign telling us that, indeed, I was pregnant. All my queasiness throughout the weekend suddenly made sense. 

Once the initial shock wore off, we became very excited. It was fun keeping our secret, but it was difficult too, as I soon started feeling the effects of morning sickness. I was miserable for about 6 weeks, and some days walked out the door for work in tears because I felt so awful but couldn't call in because of the few number of days that I have each year. I eventually called the doctor and got something that helped me be able to make it through the days. Gratefully that was before we went to Boise to see Lance in his state swim competition, because even though I was miserable in the car on the way, I was able to keep it hidden from my family because I didn't want to tell them until we were all together and LaKesha wasn't there in Boise because of school. And seeing Jeff's family as often as we do, we were also able to keep our secret from them.

Our plan was to announce it to our families on Thanksgiving. We had Thanksgiving dinner with Jeff's family. He and his mom have a tradition of giving each other "monkey gifts" and we had found a monkey with a bib that I could stitch on. So we bought that, and I stitched "Coming June 2013" onto the bib. He wrapped it up and gave it to his mom before Thanksgiving dinner when all his family was gathered around. They were all very shocked. Mom's reaction was "You're kidding me!!" And that little monkey was put on the shelf alongside the pictures of her grandkids in the kitchen.

After dinner we got in the car and headed up to Idaho, arriving at my parents' house around 10:30. When we were all gathered around, they gave Grandma Good who rode up with us her birthday present. And then I said that we had an early Christmas present for mom. She has always said that she is going to cross-stitch a Christmas stocking for each of her kids' first baby to "curse" us for the rest of our babies, just like her mom did. So we gave her a kit to do just that. When she saw it she was very excited. After all, she has been a little grand-baby hungry. Grandma was also excited, as this will be her first great-grandbaby.

That was a few weeks ago now. The Wednesday after Thanksgiving, we went to our first Doctor appointment. I expected to maybe hear the heartbeat, but the doctor did an ultrasound and we were able to see our precious little baby. It was so fun to see the way it moved its little arms and legs, and to see its heart beating. That made it all real. 

We've enjoyed having our little secret, but it's getting to be hard keeping it so now. After all, my waist has outgrown my normal pants. So, we're now sharing it with everyone, and excited to do so. Our Little One is due in June, a week after school gets out for the summer. 

Ultrasound, November 28, 2012

End of the Month Gratitude

So, I started the month out with the intention to do a daily gratitude post...and failed miserably. Honestly. And I've got my excuses, but they're pretty lame. Like the one from when I was like a week behind and I was sick and slept all day. Or like how I'm so exhausted by the time I get home from work that all I want to do is sit down and put my feet up and not think about anything else. Or like how I sometimes bring home mountains of papers to grade. See? Lame.

It's not that I'm not grateful. I am so full of gratitude. I am so blessed. A year ago when I was getting ready to moved down here to Utah, I never would have seen myself where I am today. With a good job that I love. With an amazing class. With super supportive co-workers who have helped me get things figured out. Married to the most perfect man. Wonderful in-laws. A husband who is working hard to be able to finish school. A husband who is also working hard to help support our family. A...well, Never mind. I'm sure anyone reading this doesn't really want to hear all of my mushy-gushy-ness. Just know that I am grateful for everything that I have and the many blessings which are coming my way.

Grateful Day 11

Today I am grateful for Veterans who have served and are currently serving our country, helping us have a free place to live. On Thursday at school, we had the Veteran's Day assembly. I was in tears. It was an incredible experience as the entire student body (well, 3rd through 11th grade--and we were lucky we were able to go as they found space for us at the last minute) paid tribute to the many great veterans of the country. There were many Veterans present, and it was a very touching program. The entire time I thought of people I know who made the sacrifice to serve our country. To close the assembly, we sang the following song.

Grateful days 8,9, and 10

Grateful Day 8

I am grateful for my students. They always keep life exciting and wonderful at work. And they are so considerate of each other. I feel so blessed to be able to teach each and every one of them. This week one of my students said something that made me laugh so hard! I felt bad for bursting out in laughter in the middle of class, but it caught me so off guard. You'd have to know this student to really find the hilarity of it, but I'll do the best to explain. He is one of my African refugee students. At the first of the year, he was a problem for me. I couldn't do anything to get through to him. Now, with the help of one of the administrators, he is a star student and a wonderful example for the rest of my students. He regularly participates in class. This week we were talking about the difference between statement sentences and question sentences. I asked the students how they knew a sentence I had on the board was a question sentence. My refugee student raised his hand, and seemed very excited, so I called on him. His answer? With a HUGE grin, he says, "Because I'm smart!" I totally busted up laughing, it was so random and caught me off guard. Yes, dear student, you are smart. You are very smart. And I never know what is going to come out of your mouth next.

Grateful Day 9

I am grateful that I am able to speak Spanish. I had parent-teacher conferences this week, and was able to do several conferences on my own that I would not have been able to without a translator had I not learned Spanish on my mission.

Grateful Day 10

I am grateful for missionaries. Jeff and I are both RMs, and now my sister, LaKesha is waiting to leave on her mission to the Florida Orlando mission in March. My mission was one of the best experiences of my life and I honestly wouldn't trade it for anything. Jeff says the same thing about his mission to France. I am so grateful for the example that we will be to the children that we will have one day. They will know that the Gospel and sharing it is important to us, and I pray that they will also be able to support at least any sons we will have, if not our daughters too, on their missions.

Grateful Day 7

I realized last night after I posted what I meant to post. Yesterday was the 4 month anniversary of Jeff and my wedding. 4 months ago I married my best friend. The past four months have absolutely been the best months of my life. We have had so many wonderful adventures in the past four months. We have been on several vacations and just had an overall good time.

I feel so blessed to have Jeff in my life. He is such a wonderful, caring man. He has, since day one, put my needs/ wants before his own. He is so selfless. If I need something, he is the first one to make sure I have it. Since I started work, he has cleaned the house, done the laundry, gets up in the morning and makes breakfast and our lunches, helped cook dinner and then does the dishes, helped me grade papers.

Jeff respects me so much, and works so hard for our little family. He wants the best for us now, and, when the time comes, for our children. He is trying so hard with school and at his job.

Every day I feel so blessed to have been able to meet him and get to know him, and be the lucky girl to marry him. I thank Heavenly Father every single day for this wonderful blessing that has come into my life, and I am so grateful for the eternity more that I have with him.

Grateful Day 6

Today I am grateful for the opportunity and ability I have to vote in this free country. I expressed my vote this afternoon for new leadership in our country with hope to be able to turn things around. We are so blessed to live here in this free nation, and our Forefathers had such a wonderful plan for this country when we came, and the people need to be listening to the Spirit of our Father so they will be able to help us go back to where we once were, and to where, with a lot of hard work, we CAN be again! Tonight, I am praying for our nation, and the children that I will one day have.

Month of Gratitude

Yes, I'm a little slow, but I've had it in my mind to jump on the bandwagon of doing a "30 days of gratitude" post...or 30 of them. It is now the 5th of November, so I'm 5 days behind, but better late than never, right?

Day 1: I am grateful for temples. Jeff and I went to the Jordan River temple and did sealings with our ward. As we were in the sealing room, I reflected back on the day we were sealed and the great blessing that is. I am so grateful for my eternal companion and that I know that I will be able to see all of my family when I eventually return to my Father and that we will never be apart.

Day 2: I am grateful for my students. They are certainly a handful, but what 8 year old isn't? And I have 28 of them in my classroom that I need to take care of and teach each day, plus the I don't know how many students are in my groups throughout the day. I have learned so much about myself over the past 9 weeks as I have taught the wonderful children who have been trusted to me to teach.

Day 3: I am grateful for family. We spent a quick weekend driving to Boise to see Lance swim in the state meet. He only was in one race for the finals, but I know it meant a lot to him for us to be there. We hadn't seen my family since grandpa's funeral in September so it was good to see them for a little while.

Day 4: I am grateful for good friends. Tonight one of my good friends from before my mission invited Jeff and I to dinner. It is good to know we have friends we can count on and have a good relationship with and have things we can do things with. It was great to be able to go out and do something different than our usual routine.

Day 5: I am grateful for sunshine. As yesterday was daylight savings, it was once again light as I drove to work this morning. That made for a much more cheerful day, having seen the sun in the morning. And it was such a beautiful day, even though I dont' see much sunlight through the blinds of my classroom knowing it was there cheered me up.

As of late...

It has been a hectic month. I am now 3 1/2 weeks into the school year and have little time for much of anything besides school stuff. I figure I work 10-12+ hour days every day. I don't even want to imagine  how it would be if I had to come up with EVERY single lesson I taught instead of having them scripted. Yikes! I bring stuff home with me tonight, and I'm all...er... mostly caught up on grading. But grade reports aren't due for another 2 weeks so I'm golden, right? Probably not. But I really don't feel like it today. I might get to it later tonight. Anyway, I've got dinner started in the oven and have a few minutes, so I thought I'd take a minute to update whoever cares on our lives as of late.

Like I said, I'm 3 1/2 weeks into the school year. I've already had a nasty cold that one of my lovely students so graciously gave me. That was like week 1. Not even kidding. Then I missed half of Friday of week 2 to go home for my grandpa's funeral and then spent the next week feeling behind and totally out of it, even though I graded papers and worked on stuff the whole way up and back. Other than feeling behind, week 3 was pretty uneventful. But week 4... Week 4 has been quite the adventure. Monday afternoon I started losing my voice, and by the end of the day it was pretty tired and sore, but my class could still hear me. Yesterday, my voice was almost completely gone and it hurt to talk. My kiddos were very kind and, since they like being teacher, I took every opportunity I could to rest my voice and have them correct the work or whatnot that the students could do while I just directed it. Plus my instructor (aka full-time aide) was super helpful and taught part of the class. Today I woke up with a cold and no voice. Fantastic. I was tempted to call in and just sleep it off and rest my voice all day, but then decided it would be in the best interest of my students if I did go and just teach through it, since I only have 5 vacation/ sick days all year and have already used 1/2 of one. I had my instructor start the class out and direct the first 15 minutes of the day, but I had to teach the rest of the day, because Wednesday is our short day, and therefore the hour that she's in the classroom while I teach is her prep time. I had to teach my reading group, which came out barely more than a whisper. And math was a joke. The kids on the back row could hardly even hear me. Thank goodness it was our short day and I got to end 2 hours earlier than usual! Needless to say, my poor husband is living with a very silent wife right now. And I told my mother not to call me...not because I don't want to talk to her, but because I physically can't. Right now I'm just praying that I'll be able to make it through the next 2 days of work so I can rest my voice all weekend long. (Which, btw, is a total bummer because I love to talk and sitting in silence is driving me crazy!) But, I'm totally loving my job. I've got a good class. Like every class, there are the kids that totally push my buttons, but I love 'em anyway! And the totally amazing ones kinda make up for the stinkers in the mix :)

Jeff has decided to switch majors. He just wasn't happy doing exercise science, so he decided it would be best if he withdrew for the semester and just worked full time until next semester. So, he's working full time. And makes breakfast every day and keeps the house clean and does our laundry and the dishes and makes the bed and cleans up my messes that I leave around so our house is presentable 100% of the time. What a great husband! I am SO grateful for this, because by the time I finally get home from work after an almost 11 hour day at work and with a bag full of things to bring home and work on here I'm exhausted and we're lucky to get a home-cooked meal before bed. What a great man I married. And he still finds time for his video games. Like now. The house is clean, dinner is in the oven, and his wife can't talk, so what better to do than play on his Wii. And I feel that he totally deserves it after all that he does. How did I get so lucky to catch a man like him? Or better, how did I trick such an amazing man into marrying me? Anyway, he has now decided to go into Communications with an emphasis in Advertising. And discovered that he will probably be able to graduate faster than he would have if he'd stuck with the Exercise Science (with all those Math and Science courses that had to be taken in order and always filled up before he could register progress was slow-going). He seems to be much happier and super excited for this new adventure, which in turn makes me much happier and super excited.

We still like our ward. We've been called as ward missionaries with a focus on less-actives living in our apartment complex. We're super excited about that, and it really came as an answer to prayer because we were praying for opportunities to get to know people around us and have missionary experiences. We've also had the wonderful blessing to speak in church...which probably means we're off the hook for a good, long while :) This last Saturday we drove to Manti, making 10 Utah temples we have visited this year. When we started dating, we made a goal to attend every temple in Utah by the end of the year. Well, we have an appointment to attend the Brigham City temple in a few weeks, and the week after that, during my Fall Break, we are going to drive down to Monticello and attend the temple there. We will have attended all 12 operating temples in Utah (with plans to attend Ogden soon after it is re-dedicated, and the Provo City Center and Payson temples soon after they are dedicated), plus the Idaho Falls, Rexburg, Las Vegas, and Newport Beach temples this year. And we might be ambitious enough to drive to Twin Falls and attend that temple and we'll probably go to the Boise temple open house in November when Lance (my brother) has his State Swim Meet (Yeah, he's THAT awesome!! Qualified for at least 2 events, and is total BOMB in the water!!)

So yeah, That's us in a nutshell. Hope all of my readers...not that there's many of you, but yeah...are doing well!

Until We Meet Again

This afternoon, about 12:30 pm a great man crossed over to the other side of the veil. My grandfather, Jack Boyd Thompson was known and loved by many. I am so grateful that I grew up living only 5 minutes from him and could see him on a daily basis. I have so many happy memories. I learned many things from him, and he was such a great support. I don't remember him ever missing anything as I was growing up. He wrote me almost weekly while I was on my mission. On the wall of my apartment, I have 2 sconces and a shelf he made. He also helped my dad make my cedar chest. I am so grateful for those and will treasure them forever.

His health has been going downhill the past little while. For the most part, the changes were very gradual. He started walking with a cane, and stopped doing his woodwork and working in his yard. Then he was put on oxygen. They moved to Fairwinds (an assisted living home for those reading this who don't know).  He wasn't feeling well enough to be able to go to the temple for my sealing, which at the time broke my heart, but he did go to the reception that night. That is a memory I will always treasure. Those pictures are priceless.

Jeff and I were able to go home last weekend. He took a definite turn for the worse while we were there, and all our time with him was spend in either the ER or a hospital room. But I am so grateful for that time when I was able to see him one last time and say goodbye.

I texted mom after sacrament meeting this morning (and Jeff and I finished our talks) asking if she had any updates on Grandpa. She texted me back and responded that he would be gone within 24 hours. They made the decision this morning to start turning down his oxygen and giving him morphine. She called me 15 minutes later to say that she was on her way out, and that he would likely be gone before she got out there, and he was.

Mom told me that he went very peacefully, and that he looked very peaceful. He was ready to return home. He left with a long list of people to find, including his first wife and eternal companion, his parents, grandma's first husband and 2 little babies she lost, dad asked him to find his dad and tell him that he loves and misses him. 

I know that he is happy now. Yes, it is hard to say goodbye, but it really isn't goodbye, but rather "See you later." I am so grateful for the Plan of Salvation and the knowledge I have of where he is. I will see him again someday, and will be with him forever.

God be with you 'til we meet again, Grandpa. I love you.

New School Year

School is in full swing for Jeff, and I've spent all this week at school trying to get my classroom ready. Emphasis on trying. But more on that in a minute.

This semester Jeff is taking Trig and Physics, therefore is spending a lot of time doing homework. Which kind of stinks, because then I get to spend my nights sitting quietly as he works away. But I do appreciate his hard work and dedication, so I won't complain. (Funny thing is...on his first day of school I commented that I felt like I wasn't ever going to see him, and then 2 nights later I got into my classroom and have been working late almost every day since :S)

As for my classroom, I'll post pictures when it gets put together. Yes, school starts in 5 days. And yes, there is a weekend...a long weekend...thrown in there. But it's not my fault. I've done absolutely everything that I can. You see, it's kind of hard to put your classroom together when several of the things on the "Before School Checklist" require having desks in the classroom and your desks are somewhere between here and Timbuktu.  No one, not even the lady in charge of furniture for the school, knows exactly where they are. You see, to save money (because there are more important things like textbooks that we prefer to spend large amounts of money on--kids can learn with old desks, but they need textbooks and workbooks), we get desks from schools that are being closed all over the country and then have to wait for them to be brought here and cleaned. Mine haven't arrived yet. When I walked down to the breakroom to eat my lunch today, there was a large pile of desks in the foyer and I got really excited. I shouldn't have though. Because it just led to frustration and tears when I walked back into my classroom after a meeting to find that they weren't in there. There are only 2 more work days before the start of school. And I've all but given up on the fact that I won't have desks in my room. Which will mean a really late night getting them put together when they do get here and a class that will be harder to control and much harder to teach because they will be sitting on the floor rather than in desks.

But, on the bright side, wouldn't it be a great story to tell how my first year teaching I didn't have desks to start the school year?

Honeymoon

Our honeymoon in pictures

We started out in Las Vegas and went to a session in the beautiful temple

Then we drove to sunny southern California

And went to the beach

And watched the sunset

Walked along the beach together

And enjoyed the beautiful evening

Then we went to Disneyland and California Adventure

Rode lots of rides

Took our picture with the man who started it all

Met Minnie

And Mickey

 And Pluto.

Went to Sleeping Beauty's Castle

Waited in lots of lines

Took some silly pictures

 Watched the World of Color show

Enjoyed the different view of Disneyland at night

And went back for day 2 when we rode Dumbo

And Splash Mountain

And went to Radiator Springs

Ate snacks while we waited in line

Waited in more lines

Created our own hidden Mickeys

Took more pictures

Cooled down on a 3rd ride of the day on Splash Mountain

Met Goofy

And took our own private Honeymoon cruise on Story Book Canal Boats and It's a Small World.

When they saw our "Just Married" buttons at the Storybook Canal Boats, they gave us a candle with Cinderella's Slipper on it and some "champagne" (actually bubbles in champagne shaped containers because it's Disneyland)

On our last day, we paid one last visit to Radiator Springs

Rode Mickey's Fun Wheel

And California Screamin'

And Heimlich's Chew Chew Train

And Tower of Terror

Met Donald

And Dale

And Chip

And passed through Grizzly Rapids

On our way home we went to the Newport Beach Temple

Then made the very long trek home.

We had a great time on our honeymoon, and now it is back to real life and work and such on Monday. It was a lot of fun being able to spend time together, completely unfocused on things at home, but rather enjoying carefree time together.