My Husband, the Multi-tasker

During a "Bachelor" commercial break (don't judge), I went into the kitchen and happened upon this...

My husband. Drying the dishes, having a brilliant idea, talking on the phone, and making me laugh all at the same time.

I love this guy.

Male Pregnancy Symptoms and Sacrament Meeting

Randi and I occasionally have conversations in church on my iPod Touch. I type her a note and then she types one back to me. Here is a sample of a conversation we had today for your enjoyment:

Alec: I think I am going to do a blog post today about my pregnancy symptoms.

Randi: Yeah, that would be totally awesome. I want to hear some.

Alec:

1. I sleep way more than I ever have (even more than when I was in high school).

2. I am hungry all the time.

3. More specifically I am hungry for Taco Bell all the time.

4. I want to put babies on my bare chest. OK that last one isn't true (note: Randi has a pregnancy book that has a section for dads-to-be and it says that a dad who is envious that his wife gets to breast feed can unbutton his shirt and put the bottle on his chest and put the baby right on his chest...weird).

Randi: Well, sounds like you've lucked out by not feeling any of the constipation and gas.

Alec:

5. I have constipation.

Randi: Nice. I should probably rub your feet when we get home. Also, I could massage your bowels to help you get through the discomfort.

Alec: That sounds amazing. Maybe you can discreetly massage my bowels during sacrament meeting. (Before I could show Randi this message she stood up and left the chapel). Um...you left to go potty before I could hand you this message so I guess I will just have to ramble on. Let's see, what other pregnancy symptoms have I been feeling? I haven't had a period since you got pregnant. Um, I probably threw up as much that one night as some pregnant women do their entire pregnancy. I think I pee more than usual. (Randi returns). Oh good, you are back, I was running out of things to write.

Randi: (edited).

Alec: (edited).

Randi: I don't know if I want you to do that (referring to the edited portion of the conversation...don't worry...it's nothing R rated). Also I really hope no one could read those last comments over your shoulder cause they would think we are very weird. So, do you want tacos for lunch?

Alec: I really, really, really want tacos. For pretty much every meal.

What I DON'T Miss About SLC

OK, so Randi and I had a WONDERFUL time in SLC with our family. Salt Lake is a great place. Hires. The Jazz. Outdoor recreation. Braza Grill. The list goes on. But there are a couple things about Salt Lake that I really just do not miss at all.

First of all, the winter inversion. The air quality can be absolutely atrocious in the winter and as a result, I am pretty sure I have friends from other cities who smoke but have better lungs than me.

Second, and much more importantly, I get really tired of the religious polarization in the city. It seems like there is a religious undertone to every debate that goes on in the town. The place I have found this to be most prevalent is on internet message boards, particularly on the newspaper readers' forums. The big problem with these message boards is that people who post on them generally do so anonymously, and so they feel free to say whatever disparaging thing they want without being held accountable. Case and point. I was reading an article on the Salt Lake Tribune's website this evening. It was about a man (named Van Meter) in Utah who pretended to be a Chicago Cubs player and used that fake identity to steal a car from a dealership. I clicked on the reader's forum for the article to see what people were saying about the article. Here is what came up:

"You really have to wonder if Joseph Smith's posing as an apostle to perpetrate HIS crimes has any bearing on Van Meter's posing as somebody HE isn't!!??"

Wow. Even so, I truly love SLC and plan to one day end up back there (or close by at least). I'll just stop reading the internet boards when I get there...

On a side note, as a Cubs fan, I can't understand why the guy would choose to pretend to be a Cub. Wouldn't you want to pretend to play for a team that actually wins? It's like when my little brother Geoffrey was really little, he used to play football by himself in the front yard imagining he was in the NFL. However, unlike most little daydreaming boys, Geoffrey's team would often lose in his fantasy games.

I can now park here

Hi baby

See you July 10th

Over Two Weeks of Holiday Bliss!

We had the best vacation ever in Salt Lake this year!

Christmas party/Santa visit #1

No coal for our adorable little niece :)

Sweet Nana and niece

Christmas party #2

Our nephew always looks like this. He's one happy boy!

Beautiful sister and her daughter

Hires deliciousness #1

I'm trying to grow my hair as long as Q's

Santa visit #2

Almost everyone is happy!

Bridal shower

My dear friend CJK is getting married!

Christmas Eve at Nana and Papa's house

Santa again! That red-face is priceless

Makeshift Nativity

Match made in Heaven

PRESENTS!

Christmas Day only has one picture (would you believe

it?), but it's a good one!

This hipster must have been good this year

Baby shower for my sister

Tying a quilt is a tradition

The glowing woman of the hour :)

My mother-in-law made my day

You can't tell, but we're at Cafe Rio. I love her.

New Year's Eve

Mmmm, sushi

Thrilled. Can you tell?

New Year's march

Cheers!

Al's brother is newly engaged!

Congrats!

Al's mom and dad got in on the engagement action by re-enacting some engagement poses of their own :)

Hire's visit #2

We miss all of you!

I ate too much...

We can't thank our families and friends enough for helping to make this the best Christmas vacation we've ever had! We love you!

On our way to this place...

Home Sweet Home.

Happy Holidays.

Church Art Samplings

What does Alec do in church all day? Have you ever asked yourself this? Probably not. For one, I am never in church all day. I am only there for a couple of hours. And only on Sunday. But just in case you wanted to know, in church I pay attention...sort of. I also draw pictures. Here is a sampling. Feel free to download them to your computer and save them as your background picture. I'll let you do it. For free. Because I am way more in touch than the music industry.

So, the baby's name in this picture is spelled "Chlank" but we pronounce it "clank." From time to time Randi and I get to talking about eventually becoming parents (interesting side note: in Utah where people stereotypically have babies really young we never felt pressure to get pregnant, but here in Oregon we feel like the only Mormon couple in the world without kids...which makes us want to wait even longer...). Though we're not sure when we will have a kid, we are sure that if it is a girl we are going to name her "Chloe" and if it is a boy we'll name him "Hank." Hence, Chlank. The unibrow comes from my side.

I just wanted to see if I could still draw Ninja Turtles. This is the first one I have done in probably 18 years. Not bad, though likely no better than the ones I did when I was six.

This one just just sort of happened. Looking at it again it look like a gay elf/flight attendant.

I drew most of the picture, but Randi drew the teeth and wrinkles. I got the paper from the US Air Force Academy. Cool story, huh?

This one is really stupid. As opposed to the other ones which are not stupid. OK, they are all stupid. You can still download them.

Since I was in church, I felt like I should at least draw something church related. What better than a scene from the Book of Mormon?

I actually drew this one in the MTC which is probably why it is better than the other ones. And serious. I lost all of my sense of humor in that place...

Merry Christmas.