Our Christmas (Out of Order...)

Here are a few pictures from our Christmas. It was a great Christmas, and I am such a little kid when it comes to Christmas! We had some of my family come up and stay with us Christmas Eve, and then we went over to Derek's Family for dinner, all of us. It was wonderful! The first two pictures are from us hanging out before hand.

It was fun having some little kids for Christmas, I forgot how cute it was. But we had to get up earlier Christmas morning than we usually do. My husband does not like to wake up early...

those two little dollies in front of the tree Bekah made in like one day for Kristen and Baili. They turned out so cute!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year!

Happy Birthday to me!

Well, yesterday was my 30th birthday. All year I have been a little bummed about turning 30, but now that I am (and can't avoid it anymore!) I think I'm ok with it. It also helped that it was a great day for me.

I had so many well wishes from friends and family all day long, that it really made me feel good. some of my sisters made a special post about me in their blogs and said such nice things, I feel so grateful for my wonderful family.

Here a a few highlights on my day and I did.

This is the present Derek got me. I actually opened it Chistmas evening because he was to excited to give it to me to wait for my actual birthday. Many of you have heard me mention my favorite bath and body store: Lush Cosmetics (lush.com) Well, he got me the motherload! They have different gift packages, and this is the biggest with the most variety in it. Many of the items I have never even used before. I was so excited about it!

Here is the cute husband making me a cake. He likes to make the double round cake to show off his culinary skills. I chose funfetti this time.

Another gift from Derek. He "claimed" that the florist at Safeway just gave it to him because she heard it was my birthday! Funny guy. After he finished the cake we went out on a date. We went to a nice place to eat, then hung out at Barnes and Noble until it was time to see our movie, "Marley and Me." I have read the book and I would recommend it to all of you to read. It is well written, and I thought they did a perfect job adapting the movie. It was just as I pictured it. I really enjoyed it but, maybe bring a tissue.

On they way to the mall we saw this bus. Who do you think rides in this bus?

Well, now I am embarking in my 30's. Someone at work said, "thirty, flirty, and thriving" Well, here I come!

Thanks again to all of my wonderful friends and family for thinking of me!

I delivered a baby!

Last night something pretty awesome happened: I delivered a baby by myself. Now, many of my coworkers have delivered a baby before, it occurs often in the job of a labor and delivery nurse but in my three years it hadn't happened yet... until last night. I like to think that I'm pretty good at getting the doctor there in time. An hour before the patient delivered I called the provider to let them know the patient was ready to start pushing. Then 30 minutes later to see if they were on their way because she was doing so well. Then, just as we were going to wait until we saw the provider because it was close...the patient got sick and started throwing up. Well, that did it, and I barely got gloves on in time, and delivered a healthy baby girl all by myself, with two of my wonderful coworkers that came just in time to help after she was born. It was so smooth, and I did things automatically like I had done it before (I guess all the times my eyes saw it transferred it to a physical memory). It was such a rush, and I couldn't stop grinning afterwards.
One of the midwives is always hinting and nudging me to go back to school to become a Certified Nurse Midwife, and though I have been hesitant to go that direction, this was an experience that has gotten me thinking...maybe someday.

As a ps on the weather it is suppose to snow another 4-8 inches both Sunday and Monday. And on top of that it is still FREEZING!!!! The "high" today is 3. I think a White Christmas is in the bag....

Snow Day!

Well, I'm sure many of you have heard that Spokane has received some snow....yeah, try two feet! The roads are terrible, because there is the deep layer of snow, and underneath it is a sheet of solid ice. But, it is really pretty to look at. We both had the day off, so we took some pictures. We got one we both liked to make into a card, that hopefully we'll get out sometime in the next few weeks.

My mom gave me this hat a few years ago, and it makes me laugh.

It comes to just above my knees!

When Derek fell back the snow caved in on him. You can see how it is still several inches above him when he is lying flat.

Some kids came over and started throwing snow at him while he was lying there. Derek retaliated. I think he got the last word...

Spouses and Christmas Trees

I was cleaning out my purse today and found a newspaper clipping that I meant to quote with the last post about getting our Christmas tree. I thought it funny, so here it is (This is quoted from "The Slice" section of the Spokesman Review):

"A slice reader noted the similarity between Christmas trees and spouses.
'Both look incredibly good when you first see them and it isn't until you make a commitment (both financially and emotionally) and get them home that you begin to notice the flaws. the only thing you can do is try to turn the bad side toward the wall.'"

Haha, I thought it was cute. Hope you enjoyed it too!

Catch-Up

All right everyone, here are some pictures, that don't really go together, but different things we've done in the last few months. I took the pictures, intending to blog about it before, but hadn't gotten to it. Well, now I am!

Here are a few pictures from the fall when we made caramel apples. When we go to Seattle we stop a chocolate store that makes these incredible caramel apples with all kinds of gooey, yummy extra layers and here is us trying to duplicate a few of them. They turned out really good, but don't look as pretty as the ones we buy!

We learned by trial and error that the caramel is really, really thick and sticky and even though we had wax paper down it stuck to it like crazy so we had to pick it off. Very tedious work! And we'll make our caramel next time. This time we reheated the little caramels.

My husband is better at putting up with me taking his picture for the blog's sake.

Our finished products: all have a caramel layer, then some have were dipped in oreos, some half white/half dark chocolate, white chocolate and toffee, and then just chocolate.

Next of our activities has to do with a Men's Health Magazine subscription. Derek has recently taken a subscription to it, and I like it because he sees recipes like this:

and wants to make them. This is just one of the many recipes he has cooked for me since reading that magazine. All of them are pretty healthy, and very good. some other meals were fish tacos (actually they were really good!), and some shrimp stir-fry. This meal was called the Big Kahuna burger. The recipe is here: http://www.menshealth.com/cda/article.do?site=MensHealth&channel=guy.wisdom&category=mh.weekend&conitem=e18ab3b874664110VgnVCM20000012281eac____

This last weekend we went out to get a Christmas Tree. I love December because of Christmas and family time. I admit that I am like a little kid when it comes to Christmas morning. I love getting together with the family and all the many things to do leading up to it. I love especially the wonder of the Savior coming to earth in all the humility of a newborn baby, born in a manger. It is a special, wonderful time. And it also happens to be the month of my birthday. So, anyway back to our Christmas tree shopping. We went to Greenbluff, to a tree farm. there wasn't a lot of selection, but we found one that worked for us. It still needs to be decorated, but I'm hoping we'll do that tonight, and i'll post some pictures when we do.



We dont' have any snow yet. It was a beautifully sunny, but cold day.



this was facing the sun. I had my eyes closed until just before we took the picture and I could barely keep them open for that few seconds. Too bad the shadow is in the way...
As you can see these trees aren't quite ready yet. They need a few years yet.

Found one! It is tall enough, but just barely... I supervised.

A few days ago I came out of the gym and everything had a pinkish look to it. I thought about that phrase, "...through rose-colored glasses..." I hurried to grab my camera. No special effects, this is really what the sky and everything looked like!

Stay Tuned...

I have a whole bunch of pictures that I plan to post and update you all on the Wood Household. So don't give up on me yet, and stay tuned...

Black Friday

The last few years I have looked forward to the day after Thanksgiving for all the sales. It started when my sister Rebekah got married and we had all the family together for Thanksgiving, because their wedding was the next day. Me and my other sisters looked at all the ads and planned our attack for the next day. Friday morning, before it dawned bright and early, we were rubbing the sleep out of our eyes and hitting the stores. I went to Joann's mainly because you could buy flannel material for $.99 cents a yard. I think I went to best buy too and got a mini DVD player. That was when they were first starting to come out. Anyway, since then I have been interested in going out on Black Friday. The lines and crowds are crazy and sometimes aggressive, but it is also fun to do. And since texting got big also me and my sisters (and my brother Ian now too) keep each other company in line where ever we may be.
One of my favorite things to get though are the seasons of TV shows. Normally for a set it will be $49.99, but after Thanksgiving you can get them for $15-20! I started getting the show 24 and have branched out to other shows. If you haven't seen 24, you should, but beware... it is addicting! You will want to spend the next 24 hours in real time to watch it because you have to find out what happens next. It's way super good, and Keifer Sutherland is awesome in it.


Here is the preview for the first season. It makes me want to see it again just watching this preview!!! Oooh, it's so good!

Update...

Just to let you know there hasn't been any snow yet... So much for my prediction!

Ring around the Moon

I went out to get something from the car this evening and I looked up to the almost full moon and saw a ring around it. I dont' know if any of you have ever seen one, but they are pretty neat looking. I've always been interested in the night skies, in fact when I was in 6th grade I wanted to be an astronaught. I never lost that interest in it even though I pursued other paths. I have seen very few, this was only about the third time I've seen one, but I always look for them. It has pretty much only been in the fall that I"ve seen it. The thought is that it indicates a change in the weather.

Here is the theory behind them:

"A Ring Around The Moon
The ring around the Moon is caused by the refraction of Moonlight (which of course is reflected sunlight) from ice crystals in the upper atmosphere. The shape of the ice crystals results in a focusing of the light into a ring. Since the ice crystals typically have the same shape, namely a hexagonal shape, the Moon ring is almost always the same size.
Less typical are the halos that may be produced by different angles in the crystals. They can create halos with an angle of 46 degrees.
Moon Ring Weather Folklore has it that a ring around the moon signifies bad weather is coming, and in many cases this may be true. So how can rings around the moon be a predictor of weather to come? The ice crystals that cover the halo signify high altitude, thin cirrus clouds that normally precede a warm front by one or two days. Typically, a warm front will be associated with a low pressure system which is commonly referred to as a storm.
It is believed that the number of stars within a moon halo indicate the number days before bad weather will arrive. Give it a try the next time you observe a moon halo."

Well, I didn't see any stars inside the ring, but it was pretty bright with the almost full moon. I will then predict snow in the next 24 hours (but at least by this weekend...). I'll let you know if the snow flies!

Glorious Fall!

A few weeks ago Derek and I went driving around and took some picutes of the trees, before they all fell. I'm glad we did, becasue since then, and especially today it has gotten very windy and most of them are falling, or not as vivid. Spokane is a beautiful place to live and I'll let these pictures speak for themselves...

Final Leg of the journey

Ok everyone, thanks for being so patient with me while waiting for all the different parts of our trip. The last leg was from Zion's National park up through Southern Utah, through Bryce Canyon and to Spanish Fork where we stayed a few nights with Kimmie, my sister. From there we went straight home. We had an incredible time and saw so many wonderful things, but we were glad to get home by that last day. Bryce Canyon really was a nice ending to our trip. It has this canyon, filled with these stone formations called "Hoodoo's" It's a fun word to say!

The colors were so vibrant, but here you have the red and white sand, with the changing trees. Very pretty.

It had just finished a downpour, that we barely missed, as you can see by Derek's hat and sweatshirt.

Me, Bryce Canyon, and the hoodoos :)

the next few pictures are on the highway to join back up with the interstate. As you can see through this whole trip, everything we saw was so varied.

This was kind of odd, these trees grew in clumps like this. Sometimes the highway went right through it and leaves are only in the top few feet, otherwise this tall, bare trunk.

Near the end of our trip we saw this rainbow. We truly were blessed with a safe, fun, peaceful time together, and we have such a greater appreciation for all of the beauty God created in this world for our enjoyment and happiness!