My New Excuse for Everything

So Announcement! I am pregnant! Not THAT pregnant. And when I am as big as her I won't be as artsy as this lady to get this pose.

I am 11 weeks along. Due April 11th. Don't know the sex yet but had my first ultra sound to see the heart and the alien inside of me. I am one of the LUCKY who didn't get very sick. I just had a couple weeks of wipeout! Where you feel like the train hit ya. After that I felt great.

The last two weeks have been fabulous! I feel like me again. Don't tell anyone cause its a great way to get out of...just about anything. For example..."Why haven't you updated your blog?"..."Oh, I've been feeling kinda sick, you know, the critter growing inside of me." The possibilities are endless as to what you can get out of.

Even Rusty has enjoyed using this unborn child to get out of a thing or two. Mostly he has been enjoying the snacks I bring to church. It seems as though he enjoys church a lot more. Should have thought of that sooner.

Open House!!

I made it through another open house! Talk about a long day. I left at 7:00 am to go to work and left my class at 8:00 pm to go home. Yikes was I tired!

It was great though. I had a chance to talk to many parents. Discuss their child's strengths and those things that are making life...hard for me. I had a constant flow of questions and discussions with parents for about an hour and a half. At 7:45 It finally died down. I drove home watched some olympic divers. And it was time for bed.

All those discussions with parents, all though very helpful for both parties in the classroom, Gave me way too much to think about in my dreams. I woke up at 2:30 wide awake with a million things on my mind. Ok 21 things...my students. Now thats crossing the line. I need a little break from those guys and sleep is that break. Needless to say today I am exhausted. I need some Ice Cream...spoon fed. Any volunteers?

Mexico Anyone?

Let me start by saying I have been a bad blogger lately. What is my excuse? Work. Thats right summer is over. Well atleast the vacation part is. Its still dang hot and humid, especially in the classroom.

Lets go back to when life was care free, when we couldn't understand all three hours of church in a liitle place called...Baja.

Rusty had never been to Mexico. Fun! I loved showing him something new. Like a little kid or something. We relaxed in La Paz. Saw some of the sights, enjoyed amazing sunsets. Rusty even got a mexican hair cut. That's brave! He was a little nervous because his spanish is...how you say...muy mal. So my dad had to tell Enrique what Rusty wanted. Rusty is lucky he didn't end up with a white head of hair like my daddy.

We saw many other parts of the baja Peninsula. La paz is in the middle and Cabo San Lucas is at the very end. Rusty and I took the water taxi(glass bottom boat) to see the very tip where the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific ocean join. Lalo, our taxi driver, showed us a cave. He said in spanish two go in and three come out. After struggling to translate in my head and then to Rusty I finally got what he meant. He was saying two people go in there and make a baby. Lalo...so funny. There is a beach over there called lovers beach and he dropped us off for ten mins to look around hte surf was up pretty high and guess what we saw...TWO SKIMMERS!! I was so excited. I wish we had brought ours. Next time!

WE also checked out some sights a little closer to La Concha, our Resort. One was Tecolote. Rusty and I decided to rent a jet ski. Too fun! And hello, have you ever had a mango on a stick! Now that is the life. They cut it up all cute like a flower. Oh then Rusty and I caught some octopus..you know, touristy kinda stuff.

The other place that we really loved was Balandra. It Famous for its mushroom shaped rock. A rock that Rusty concoured... with a little help from a local mexican. I'm so proud. The place had much more to offer. Star fish, blow fish, friendly rainbow fish from the 80's that come up to your feet, and little rays. They hide really well in the white sand but get them on that lettuce like kelp and they aren't so hidden. We had a blast!

One of the high light os the trip for me was cruisin around Spirito Santo Island. We saw and entered amazing water caves and natural windows. We collected shells from the beaches. We saw dolphins jumping around our boat. We even went snorkling with the wolves...los lobos as the call them in Mexico. We know them as sea lions. These things were masive. THey kept grunting or barking in the water. The biggest one was easily 700 lbs. The pictures don't do them justice.

Thanks Mom and Dad for a great trip!!

We're Back!!

I have so many pictures to go through from our trip. One thing that sped up the process is that I lost all of my pictures from Idaho...technical problems...bummer. The Mexico pictures will come soon I promise.

So Latest news for me is that I got a hair cut. One thing I have found when you have long hair is that most people don't even notice when you get one. I could cut off a foot and most people don't even look twice. I thought this one would get a double take, but only a few noticed. So here is the before and after pictures.

Before and After

Its a good change. Shorter hair is so much easier...why do I ever let it get that long. Anywho Rusty and I have been getting back into the swing of things. He leaves for work, I try to stay busy for 10 hours while he's gone and then we eat dinner and play for a couple hours before bed. Good times. Lately we have been going on bike rides. Rusty found a bike under the porch and fixed it up. And I got a bike from Walmart. It makes for a fun evenimg. We just take our bikes along the beach path that starts at Sharks cove and ends at Sunset. We don't usually get that far. Even at night it gets pretty warm. When we got home from our mainland trip my bike had made a friend with the vine under our house. It was actually remarkable how the vine intertwined its self around anything that was thin...like the spokes, the brake wires, and other parts of the bike.


Another bike experience we had was when Rusty and I went out for family night and about 5 min. into our ride it started pouring rain. We camped out under a big tree for another 5 min. until the rain died down then booked it home. Rusty's prized bike doesn't have a splash guard on the back tire. Poor Rusty.

Our Front Yard

wE HAVE BEEN BUSY! mY sUMMER BREAK STARTED ON MONDAY AND i HAVE BEEN SPENDING ALOT OF TIME STUDYING...HAHA. oKAY, i HAVE BEEN SPENDING ALOT OF TIME AT THE BEACH. aLL THIS TIME HAS LEAD ME TO FIND A GREAT TREASURE THAT'S BEEN RIGHT IN FRONT OF MY FACE THIS WHOLE TIME AND i NEVER DISCOVERED IT. itS A BEACH CALLED tHREE tABLES. tHE NAME COMES FROM THE REEF FORMATIONS. tHEY COME OUT OF THE WATER TO FORM TABLE TOPS. wELL THIS IS A FISH PALACE.

tHERE ARE LOTS OF FUN CAVES AND LITTLE ARCHES TO SWIM THROUGH.

tHE OTHER DAY WE WERE OUT WITH OUR FRIENDS nATHAN AND hEBB (HER NAME IS lIZ & SHE SERVED ON TEMPLE SQUARE...LAST NAME WAS hEBB) wE SAW A hUGE tuRTLE! sO FUN! thIS THING WAS WAY OVER 100 YEARS CAUSE IT WAS HUGE. tURTLES ARE SO CHILLED OUT. iTS NO WONDER IN nEMO HOW THEY MAKE THEM ALL "SURFER DUDES". i WAS THINKING THEY JUST SOUNDED HIGH. pOINT BEING IS THAT THEY ARE SO RELAXED IN THE WATER AND LET YOU GET SO CLOSE WITHOUT A CARE.

oN THE SIDE OF THIS BEACH THEY HAVE BIG LAVA ROCKS THAT MAKE TIDE POOLS WITH FUN FISH, URCHINS, HERMIT CRABS, AND SEA CUCUMBERS (SEA SLUGS). tHE ROCKS STAY REALLY WARM BECAUSE THEY ARE BLACK. eVEN AT NIGHT THEY ARE STILL WARM. wE WENT THE OTHER NIGHT TO WATCH THE SUN SET AND THE ROCKS WERE LIKE A HEATED RECLINER. iT LOOKS LIKE rUSTY AND i WILL CONTINUE TO ENJOY ANOTHER FEW YEARS OF OUR HONEYMOON HERE IN hAWAII.

No Hot Water...or cold.

Rusty and I are pretty easy going when it comes to the constant struggle we have with our water heater. We have solar pannels on our roof that are supposed to heat our water, and when those don't kick in due to cloudy weather we have a flip switch...a pricey flip switch. When things aren't just right you can imagine our showers are pretty quick.

A few days ago we would have been happy to have cold warm hot or a combonation of any of the three. I got home form work and went to the beach to escape the summer heat. After a swim and a little nap I went home to get dinner ready. No water! It's funny how when your power goes out, (seems like a common occurance here in Hawaii), you still try and flick on the lights every time you go into a room. Well the same thing happens when your water is out. Its crazy how often we use water for the simplest things. Brushing your teeth, dishes, rinsing my hands after handling food, washing hands before preparing food, and of course showering after the beach.

I couldn't go to bed in my "condition". So rusty and I in the true spirit of the North Shore went for a night swim. After our swim we walked down to Sharks Cove (5 min walk) and took a shower in our bathing suits at the beach shower. Good times. The next morning we had water again. The End.

Our New Pet

wHO KNEW GEKOS COULD BE SO FRIENDLY?

sO rUSTY AND i LIVE ON THE nORTH shORE OF hAWAII. iTS PRETTY COUNTRY, SMALL TOWN. wE LOVE IT. wE HAVE ROOSTERS AND CHICKENS THAT KEEP AWAY THE CENTIPEDES, AND GECKOS THAT KEEP AWAY COCKROACHES. wELL AT LEAST THATS WHAT i THOUGHT THEY DID. wE HAVE A WINDOW IN OUR BEDROOM RIGHT BY OUR COMPUTER. tHIS VERY LARGE LIZARD WOULD ALWAYS BE HEADING OUT WHEN i GOT HOME. tHEY LOVE SUN BATHING ON OUR FRONT PORCH, WHO WOULDN'T.tHESE ARE NORMAL GECKO ACTIVITIES. bUT YESTERDAY i DISCOVERED A NEW PAST TIME FOR THESE FRIENDLY REPTILES.
a GECKO PLAYING wii? nOW THATS AN ACTIVITY i WAS UNAWARE OF. i COULD TAKE THIS GECKO TO THE CIRCUS AND MAKE A BUCK. dON'T KNOW HOW GOOD HE IS AT wii BOXING BUT WE'RE ON TO SOMETHIN'. tHIS IS NOT THE END OF OUR NEW PETS TRICKS. tHIS LIZARD WAS VERY TINY SO TO GET A GOOD PICTURE i HAD TO GET EXTREMELY CLOSE. i COULDN'T BELEIVE HOW BRAVE HE WAS. sO i THOUGHT, BEING THE ANIMAL LOVER THAT i AM, THAT i COULD TOUCH THIS THING. tOUCH HIM i DID. eVEN BETTER HE JUMPED RIGHT ON TO MY HAND. hE PROCEEDED TO CLIMB UP MY ARM ON MY SHOULDER. hE MUST HAVE BEEN ENJOYING THE HEAT THAT WAS RADIATING FROM MY SKIN AFTER A FEW HOURS AT THE BEACH.

i GAVE rUSTY THE CAMERA AND TOLD HIM TO GET A PICTURE OF THIS. tHE GECKO LIKES PHOTOGRAPHY AND JUMPED FROM MY BACK ONTO THE CAMERA. rUSTY WAS A LITTLE STARTLED BUT NOT NEARLY AS STARTLED AS WHEN THE gECKO JUMPED FROM THE CAMERA TO HIS FACE! i AM LAUGHING HISTARICALLY AS RUSTY sPITS AND THE GECKO LANDS BACK ON HIS HAND. aPARENTLY rUSTY DOESN'T LIKE BABY GECKO FEET IN HIS MOUTH. i WAS JUST SAD i DIDN'T CAPTURE IT ON FILM. tHE BEST TRICK OF ALL IS THE GECKO EVEN HELPED ME WRITE THIS bLOG. oKAY HE PROBABLY JUST LIKED THE HEAT FROM THE COMPUTER. wHAT A CUTIE! hE SERIOUSLY HUNG OUT FOR ABOUT THREE HOURS. cAN i KEEP EM' dAD?! cAN i?!