FHE: Jazz vs. Knicks

we wanted to take my mom to a jazz game so we bought some tickets on ebay a couple of weeks ago and had planned to go as a family to see the Knicks play. my mom decided not to go so i called my friend angela the day of and she was happy to join us. nick went down earlier in the day with a couple of friends to get autographs and they went and saw the Joseph Smith movie on temple square. i drove down with the kids and angela and got there just in time for the game.

nick was really excited to see nate robinson play and wore his "krypto-nate" t-shirt. nick has been following him since he played for the UW.

lucy loved playing with the chairs and dancing to the music. she did really well up until the last few minutes of the game. i couldn't have asked for anything more!

me, lucy, and angela

lucy being a big girl in her chair. she was funny and liked to yell and chant with the crowd.

ammon was excited about his ticket and kept asking nick and i if we had one too. one if ammon's favorite parts is the blimp. he loves to watch it.

angela caught a small jazz basketball during the game and nick was able to get it signed by her favorite player, kyle korver, after the game. it was a fun event, and nice to go to a game all together!

what we've been up to

25 things we have been doing lately...

1- nick finished mid-terms and is winding down on spring semester.
2- ammon thinks he has a baby brother in his tummy.

3- lucy has enough hair for pony tails!... small ones, but still!

4- i found a new band that i LOVE (from pandora) called bitter:sweet.
5- nick has been going to jazz games and getting tickets on ebay for a STEAL!
6- i went to beat poetry night up on campus, had a great time, and got a new mug!
7- my sister jess and i have been working on some blankets for our older sister mandi, she's having her baby girl tomorrow so we finished today, just in time!

8- the kids and i were having tons of fun playing outside in the warm weather riding bikes and coloring with sidewalk chalk. now it us ucky again.
9- we watched "annie" for family movie night a bit ago and the kids LOVED it. the look on lucy's face when miss hannigan came on the screen for the first time was priceless.
10- i have been trying to do spring cleaning at my house.
11- i bought some rye flour and i'm looking for a good recipe for dill rye bread (like the orowheat kind... yummy!)
12- i made lemon poppy seed scones sunday, mmm.
13- ammon is signed up for indoor soccer, starts next month!
14- nick had an emergency root canal.
15- nick and i played scrabble the other night and i won!! (this has only happened about 3 times in the last 5 years of marriage).

16- ammon is registered for pre-school in the fall!
17- nick lost his glasses while i was in reno and i found them this week!
18- i've been reading the shopaholic series and i'm on the last book.
19- nick and i are celebrating our 5 year anniversary next month.
20- lucy has learned how to open the fridge... it now has a lock on it.
21- the kids and i go to playgroup just about every tuesday. they planted flowers this week. well... lucy did, ammon opted for pumpkins!

22- jess found "follow that bird" and brought it over to watch with the kids today. it brings back a lot of memories!
23- i found the coffee table i've been searching for at the DI for over a year. i was so excited to paint it, but now with the weather it will have to wait a bit to finish.
24- the office last week was the best of the season, i can't wait to see what happens this week!
25- i bought jasime rice at the store a bit ago to go with the honey mustard curry chicken i was making. i am now in love with jasmine rice! it also makes delicious coconut rice pudding!

my amazing husband

nick told me a few days ago not to plan anything for monday morning. he didn't say why, i just assumed we were going to do something together. when it started getting closer, i started asking him about what we were going to do. he told me that it wasn't him, just me. my wheels started spinning and i couldn't think of what it could be. he was pretty good at keeping it a surprise, even with my constant questions.

on monday we loaded the kids in the car then he stopped at the bank. he came out with $10 in ones and handed them to me. now i was really curious! then he gave me a business card that said i had an appointment for a massage and a facial! he dropped me off at rejuvenations wellness and day spa and said he would be back in 2 hours. he had already paid for my treatments, he was giving me tip money.



it was AMAZING! i have had massages before, but never a facial and i have to say, both is the way to go! the facial was all organic and i had 4 different masques including chocolate mousse and sour cherry. when i came out nick said i was glowing, and i felt FABULOUS!



i have been having a lot of back pain and nick thought this might be better than a chiropractor appointment, i think he was right! and i think it was the most fun because it was a surprise. i have such a great husband! i highly recommend the people at the rejuvenations wellness and day spa and for all you students, check out your aggie coupon books, that's where nick found a great deal on my services.

a day of non-snowboarding

we went out to the intelligent design competition on saturday. it felt pretty weird walking on the slopes without hauling around snowboarding gear. i decided that i REALLY need to get out snowboarding again, and nick decided that snowboarding DOES look like fun, and he would like to go together some time.

lucy LOVED being out in the snow. it wasn't too cold, just enough for little hands and ears to get chilly. being little miss independent the way she is, she insisted on walking up the big snow hills herself. of course they are made for skiing and snowboarding, so they were pretty tough to climb, but she did it over and over.

ammon thought he was so cool and kept trying to "snowboard" down the mountain the way he saw the cool snowboarding guys do it. of course, he tennis shoes made this less effective. we really want to try and take him next year.

tommy czeschin was at the "verizon dome" waiting to meet people and sign autographs.

lucy got her turn too.

it was hard to see the whole course from any one spot. we pick the end to see the big tricks at the end. we could see a little bit of the half-pipe from where we were at.

shaun white was for sure the best one there. he rode faster and higher than anyone. it was pretty clear who the winner would be.

it was amazing to see shaun white do his stuff. you can see why they call him the flying tomato, and man!, did he know how to fly!

gold: shaun white, silver: charles reid, bronze: luke mitrani

nick and ammon with shaun white. by this time lucy had fallen asleep in my arms.

ammon with bronze winner luke mitrani

nick and lucy doing eskimo kisses... how cute!

lucy sure did fight with us about her hat and her gloves. every once in a while she decided that she didn't want to wear them anymore and actually tried to shove her hat under the fence and bury it so we couldn't put it on her anymore. she is silly!

our little family, we had fun but we were tired and ready to go home!

intelligent design

no, i'm not talking about the theory of how the earth was created and the documentary by ben stein (although it was very good and worth watching). i'm talking about the snowboarding competition in park city this saturday:

The Intelligent Design will take place on March 7, 2009, and will feature the top 20 male snowboarders in the world and $50K in prize money. Admission is free.

shaun white will be here, among others, competing for the grand prize. i can't believe that people are not as excited about this as nick and i are. this is very cool and i hope my little family is able to make it out there this weekend. maybe we will see some of you!

reno

i stayed out at mom and dad's sunday night so we could get on the road early the next morning. everyone had their doubts as to if we would really get on the road before 10am, but we left wellsville at 7am. my vacation had started!

the drive to reno was supposed to take 8 hours. that doesn't seem very long when i compare it to the 12 hour drive to seattle. i had made the drive before and i didn't remember it being so long. it was long, and not a lot to look at. to pass the time mom and i chatted, listened to some cd's i brought (juno sndtk, across the universe sndtk, and beth orton), and i read her a book that nick had bought me for valentines day (married in seattle, very cute).

there were some pretty sights along the way.

we stopped at a taco time for lunch, nothing better than a crispy bean burrito! oh, but there is better:the coconut cream empanadas dipped in whipped cream.

we showed up at the peppermill in reno at 5:08, almost exactly 10 hours from when we left wellsville. argh! the drive was a lot longer than we had thought, but we weren't in a hurry so it was okay. we checked into our room and tried to find the courtyard marriot where mom was having class for the next few days. it took us a long time to find it, then picked up some soup from olive garden and headed back to our room to relax. the peppermill was a great place to stay because we got a super nice room with a huge lcd tv on the wall, granite everything, and soft comfy beds for only $19/night. the down side was it was in a casino, but we didn't have to walk through the casino to get to the car so it wasn't too bad.

i had borrowed a bunch of books from a friend, the shopaholics series, and of course i left them in our car when nick dropped me off at mom's. i was disappointed because my whole goal for the trip was just to lie in bed and read while mom was in classes. this has always been my dream vacation and i didn't know what i was going to read now that i had finished my other book on the way into town. we stopped at a used bookstore and the lady suggested the secret life of bees. my sister in law, jordan paige, had told me how much she liked it so i snatched it up. the book was amazing, the perfect book to read on a trip such as this. i had also grabbed the wedding from mom's house so i had enough reading material. i didn't read the entire time, i spent some time in the fitness center, walking around the hotel trying to find wi-fi, and it took me 2 days to find the new york deli and my corned beef sandwich.

my other favorite part of the trip was the food! i have missed some of the food selections i had while living in the seattle area. some of my favorite food is greek so one of my free afternoons i walked across the street to a mediterranean place and had my first felafel sandwich. it was great! another day i went to a new york style deli in the hotel and bought a HUGE corned beef sandwich, also a first. the lady taking my order said i should probably get it to go, it would be too much to finish. of course i proved her wrong, ate almost the entire thing. but there was no way i was going to be able to eat dinner that night!

one of mom's free nights we went in search of souvenirs, a snow globe for me, a mug for her. neither of us found what we were looking for, but it was fun looking in all the shops and seeing the glitzy side of reno.

my last afternoon there i found a pho place and had another favorite, pho noodle soup. it is seriously one of the best, most simple things you can eat. i only wish i had room for spring rolls, another fave. i have figured out how to make these at home so i thought i should pass and not end up with another "corned beef" incident.

mom got out of class that afternoon and we headed for home. i read her half of the secret life of bees until i couldn't read anymore. the drive home took the estimated 8 hours and for that i was grateful. i had a great time, did everything i wanted to do, and was excited to come home to my little family. thanks mom!

jazz vs. lakers

so nick has officially crossed over and become a jazz fan. after losing his sonics to oklahoma, he decided that the jazz weren't so bad. he bought himself a jazz shirt and started rooting for the team. he picked up some tickets to last night's jazz vs. lakers game on ebay and took ammon with him to meet kobe bryant. they met him outside of the hotel the team was staying at and kobe was nice enough to stop and take a picture with ammon. ammon was super excited when i talked to him on the phone and talked about how kobe picked him up. it was a pretty exciting game to be at last night!

ammon by the jazz car

nick and ammon on the court

ammon with thurl bailey

ammon with kobe bryant

ammon in his "giveaway" hat

he was SOO tired when they got home!