I've never thought of myself as a flower person. When Eric and I got married I told him that for Valentine's Day or Mother's Day I'd much rather have anything besides flowers. I guess I still feel that way, but I'd like to have a bouquet of flowers sitting on my kitchen table on a random weekday. When I was growing up, I'd always pick some yellow roses from the garden and put them in a vase in my bedroom after I'd cleaned it up. It was the finishing touch! I took my parent's rose bushes for granted.

Last weekend I planted this calla lily in our front yard, and I can't get over how pretty it is! I really hope it doesn't die on me, or I'll feel really bad about it. I've never planted anything before, and I'm a little anxious about keeping everything alive. But I've had a lot of fun learning what I have about flowers, and I guess that's the important thing.

This is baby number one. She's pretty cute. Dang cute. Do moms ever wonder if their next kid will be as cute as their first? 'Cause I've wondered that....about the little one that's 12 weeks today.

We've been sodding our yard the last couple days, and Aspen's been in heaven. She's taken advantage of the opportunity to get as dirty as humanly possible.
I'd like to draw some attention to her mudded-platform sandals.....
I was actually glad that she was out enjoying the mud and dirt, instead of being afraid of it (which I feared she was due to previous events). Boy did it bring back memories. Mostly of my brother and I playing on our empty property with our two cousins (Matt and Bethany) while our parents built our house.

Look at these kids! You can measure how much fun we had by the amount of dirt on our wee little faces :)

Sometimes the rain ain't so bad

It's been really rainy here. And windy. It definitely stinks, but I have to say that there is something good that comes from it: I get my husband back!

The week before last found him outside in the backyard, every night. Getting our yard going has proved to be quite a task, and Eric is installing our sprinkler system.
Just before he could finish, the rain came down, and our yard has remained a groundhog's paradise. I know the weather's going to warm up soon, and Eric will be back in the yard, but at least I can enjoy him before it does.
And let's face it: there are some definite perks to having him do such manly things outside, in the dirt. Like this view here.

We spent last week in Steamboat Springs with some of our friends, Khale and Sarah, and their daughter Lily.

Of course we had to go snowshoeing while we were there! The weather was beautiful, and it was so fun to see our friends after almost a year of being apart.

On our way home from Steamboat we stopped at Dinosaur National Park in Vernal, Utah. Eric and I were soooo excited, being former archaeology buffs and all. That's a joke; I can't tell you how many people out there think that archaeologists study dinosaurs.
When we got to the park, however, it was closed and quiet. We went on a short walk following a quarry (supposedly full of fossils, but we didn't see any). It was pretty, though. It reminded me of Escalante, in southern Utah, where Eric and I did our field study (and where we met).

So we decided to stop at the Museum of Natural History in Vernal, and were not disappointed. There were dinosaurs everywhere!

Aspen loved them too. Maybe we've got a future archaeologist on our hands, he he.

Eric's parents got Aspen a bike for her birthday. Whenever we're at a store and she sees a bike, she wants to sit on it.
Now that she has her own bike, however, all she wants to do is push it around herself. This is partly because her legs are still a little too short for her to reach the pedals, but mostly because she likes to be in control of the bike. She does this with her strollers, too, which can get a little dangerous in public.

Meineke strikes again

Last Saturday we headed off to Steamboat Springs to visit some wonderful friends of ours. We had a marvelous time! More on that later.

As we left Boise and passed Mountain Home (about 45 miles outside of Boise), our front left wheel popped off. Not the tire, the entire wheel. Lug nuts, hubcap, tire, everything. Thank goodness Eric is a smart driver and knew how to handle the situation, thus all Aspen and I noticed was that our Jeep was tipping (of course after a couple seconds I realized the full situation).

The first thought that entered my mind was, We're alive! It's a miracle.

The second thought was, Meineke.......

As you can see in the photo, after the wheel came off the Jeep, we drug along the side of the road for about 500 feet, leaving a nice trail behind us. Honestly, I couldn't believe that we were okay, and that the only damage done was to our car. I am so grateful that we prayed before we started the trip, and that the Lord was watching over us. I'm also so grateful to my husband, who did not freak out, but simply slowed down.

We were delayed about 2.5 hours (I won't bore you with all the details), but were still able to go on our trip, thanks to Eric's wonderful family, who brought us their truck to Mountain Home, and let us take it on our trip.

Meineke has offered to pay for our Jeep to get fixed, and that's all I'm saying about that.