Nothing big, just an update

Hello all. It's Luke again, filling in for my very busy and nearly 6 months pregnant wife. Look at her! Gorgeous isn't she?

A lot has happened since we last posted about that homemade butter. I won't go into too much detail but I'll try to touch on everything a little bit.

I guess I'll start with Passover. My Mom obtained from some neighbors that used to be in our ward a little booklet of a passover ceremony, LDS style, and she has made it a tradition in our family to celebrate passover every year near the end of March. It's really cool because it goes through all of the things that the Jewish passover ceremony does like leaving a door open and a place set for elijah at the table, eating bitter herbs dipped in salt water, matza, drinking wine (we use grape juice of course), eating horseradish (if that's how you spell that), all the while reading different little things that talk about the bondage in Egypt, etc. etc. The difference is it's been modified to talk about how the saviour has already come n'stuff I think. You know, to tell you the truth, even after doing it 3 or 4 times I don't really know what happens, and Andrea and I showed up late this year so that didn't help . . . I guess it's time that I started paying more attention. At any rate it's fun, alright? Eveyone gets to read, sing, and eat their little bitter herbs n'things in turn so it's a very involved and non-boring ceremony in my opinion. It was extra fun this year because along with our family we had Andrea's family and a few of the Sparks family as well. It was a ton of fun.

It must've been that week that I turned in my portfolio and application to the U of U Graphic Design Program, and that friday I found out that I had been accepted! Woo-hoo! We were pretty excited about that.

Then it may have been the next weekend that it was easter. On Saturday Evening we went to Layton so that I could go to priesthood session with my Dad and brothers. That's always nice. It's fun to see old friends from high school there at the ol' stake center. When we got home we dyed eggs with Caleb, James, Paul, Jackson, and Alanna. That was really fun too. I was trying to teach Paul how to put the egg in the dye without splashing or breaking the egg and he kept pulling away insisting that he could do it himself. Later, I splashed the dye and HE told ME to be careful and not splash. That was humbling . . . he's only three (right sis?) Alanna kept sampling the dye, and Jackson had fun experimenting with as many colors as possible on one egg. Mom bought doughnuts as is tradition (she always buys them when we go to priesthood for a treat when we come back). Andrea spent the entire evening making hot cross buns. It took FOREVER! Luckily while we were waiting for the darn dough to rise in-between stages of the recipe we got to watch "The Blind Side" cause Lauren brought it with her. We ended up not getting to bed until like two!

That morning we woke up to watch the kids go and do their easter egg hunt. Grandma gave them silly string to play with as well, so we shot each other with that a bit and then Jackson and Paul said we should use the rest on Caleb's car, so I helped them as any uncle would.

After that Andrea and I went to her house to watch the rest of conference, and it was also Dad Wright's birthday. So we had a fun time there and then as is tradition in the Wright fam, we all sat down and told Dad something that we really love about him. It is such a cool tradition! I love it. It's weird, cause I'm definitely an introvert (those of you who know me can attest to that) but on these birthday things in the Wright fam it's pretty easy to express your feelings to each other. I dunno how to explain it, it's just awesome and I'm glad we do it.

Besides that it's just been a lot of school. OH! Andrea is going to do her graduation ceremony next week I think it is! She's still one class short but they said she can do the ceremony if she promises to finish by august, so she's going to do it! We're both very excited and I'm very proud of my wife! So that was the big news for this week.

Do you all like how I put in every detail that crosses my mind? One last picture. This one is almost candid . . . Andrea told Kaden that if he touched her tummy he might be able to feel Peter (yeah, his name's Peter) kicking, and immediately everyone had leapt across the room to put a hand on Andrea's belly!

Looks like Peter won't be wanting for attention for a loooong time!

Well I think I've said enough. Have a great week everyone!

WAIT!!! ONE MORE THING!!! I have to tell you about banana treat. It's an amazing dessert that Andrea and I have been making. Get out a pencil and paper, cause you're going to want to remember this recipie. You will need . . .

Sliced frozen bananas

Milk

Put sliced frozen bananas in a blender. Put milk in the blender. More milk makes more of a milk shake texture, less makes a soft serve ice cream texture. However you do it, don't submerge the 'nana's completely in milk, just almost. I'm sure that any sort of milk would do (rice, soy, cow, whatever). Blend it up. Serve.

IT'S AMAZING!!! You don't even put any sugar in it or anything, it's just a completely wonderful dessert that may even be good for you!

We encourage you to try it.

NOW I'm done.

Homemade Butter!

I saw instructions on someone's blog on how to make homemade butter, and had to try it myself. It seemed deceptively easy, but when I tried it, it turned out to be just as simple as it seemed! It was too much fun! All I did was pour almost a quart of heavy cream into my bosch blender (a kitchen aid, food processor, and etc. would work just as well), turned it on, and about 7-10 minutes later it was butter! And buttermilk, too! After rinsing it of as much buttermilk as I could in cold water, we took a picture.

Wonderful, isn't it? Luke keeps checking on it every once in awhile. He keeps expecting to find it turned all soupy or something, he can't really believe we made butter! Ha ha ha! If you want to take a similar plunge into adventure, the post about making it can be found here: http://www.kozycarrierblog.com/search/label/Homesteading.

Andrea's Birthday

My birthday was so much fun this year! I was showered with love and fun surprises. We had the traditional family dinner with my fam and Luke's parents on the Sunday preceding my birthday. My mom made some delicious enchiladas and the most beautiful spring birthday cake I've ever seen! I will have to post pictures once I can get a hold of them. After dinner we all gathered in our family room and everyone went around saying something they appreciate about me. This, too, is a family tradition, and let me tell you it is just so nice! It's so nice to hear all your siblings and everyone tell you how much they love you, at least once a year. It turned out to be a great day.

On my actual birthday that Wednesday I woke up to surprise Toaster Strudels for breakfast! They are one of my favorite breakfast foods! (That should really be dessert, considering the sugary fruit-flavored filling and icing on top!) I ate three of them immediately, and consequently felt rather sick. Then, rather than give my body a break, I ate the FastBreak mom and dad Perkins had given me for my birthday (my favorite candy bar) and several oatmeal cookies that night. My body was seriously displeased, as it had every right to be, and I swore not to eat sweets again for awhile. I didn't last. Sweets are too yummy! But I have been good about just having a little bit on the days I do have it, so I feel pretty decent about that.

The following Saturday Luke took me on a surprise date. We went out for lunch at a little place near our house called "Flour Girls and Dough Boys." They make soup, sandwiches, meat pies, and desserts all from scratch, and it was soooo good! We tried a tomato basil soup that was divine, as well as a chicken and guacamole panini and a fresh green salad. We topped it off with a mint brownie (the kind with a layer of mint ganache on top, and a chocolate topping over that). It was very rich, but very good! Luckily we were just sharing one, since they are huge! I certainly couldn't have eaten it all on my own, and Luke had to finish it off for me as it was.

After that we went to see Alice in Wonderland in 3-D! Now, I have never in my life seen a movie in 3-D, and I was slightly worried that it would freak me out if anything came flying at me out of the screen, but it ended up being so cool, and not the least bit invasive. :) Also, my opinion on the movie itself: SO MUCH FUN!!!! I was completely expecting it to be somewhat weird/creepy, considering how the posters make it look and the fact that Tim Burton is the director, but it wasn't! It turned out so cool! Luke and I want to own it for sure. I would suggest everyone go see it! There is a somewhat scary creature in it (the Jabberwocky), so maybe little tiny kids would not like that part, but other than that it was so fun and fanciful, and just great!

After that we went to Barnes and Noble to look around, and I found a book called Raising Boys that I decided to buy after sampling a chapter or two in the store.

Thus my birthday was one of endless bliss and happiness (aside from the sugar damage mid-week). :)

A Wish Come True!

Hello Everyone, it's Luke. I thought I'd take the pleasure this time to post about my upcoming greatest joy: MY LITTLE BABY BOY!!! Or "our" little baby boy I suppose. As you can see from the sonograms that I have provided, he's the handsomest little guy you'll ever meet.

This picture is his hand. If you can't tell he's saying "Please, please, hold the applause. I know I'm amazing already, thank you."

Here you can see him curled up inside Mommy from above. The two long horizontal shapes are his legs, the halfway cut off part on the right is his head/chestish area, and I believe that the diagonal swoosh is part of an arm.

This picture is his profile.

This one is a confirmation of his boy-ness.

This last one is his tiny foot!!! Isn't he just adorable! This is so much fun for me! I love it!

It was funny when we were there with the Sonographer, Philip, because he said "it's a boy!" and Andrea said "How can you tell?" and Philip whispered to her "He has a penis!" I'll never let her forget that. It was such an amazing thing to see him there all developed and looking just like he should and he was even kicking and moving around! SO MUCH FUN!!!

The following is our beautiful baby boy from the outside at 19 weeks:

Isn't Andrea GORGEOUS? Like I said, the kid doesn't have a chance. With genes from a gal like her and a guy like me, he's destined to be a heartbreaker.

After we did the sonogram thing all I had on my mind the whole rest of the day was babies! I just can't wait for him to be here! When we got home that evening we went to the library and picked out a baby name book and "The Happiest Baby on the Block" DVD that I, yes I, had on reserve and we spent the remainder of the evening going through EVERY boy name in the book (about 30,000). It's going to take a lot more work than that though. The book had some pretty stupid names, it even suggested "Primerica" as a name. Girl names are easy for us. They just have to sound nice, pretty, and somewhat classic. Boy names are TOUGH! You can't just name him anything. The name's gotta be strong and steadfast, and worthy of a man like he's going to become, you know? So we'll be working on that for a while.

We also found a little break that night to watch the "Happiest Baby . . ." DVD. It teaches you how to calm your baby when it's crying and upset. It was awesome! I hope that stuff really works. In fact, I was so excited about the techniques that I had to try them on Andrea to see if they would make her "The Happiest Wife on the Block." So I swaddled her:

She claimed she hated being so confined, not being able to move and all that, but as you can see from the picture, she's clearly loving it!

This is Luke, signing off.

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day was always one of my favorite holidays growing up. My mom would often make us heart-shaped pancakes with strawberry topping and whipped cream for breakfast, and you got to give little Valentine cards to everyone in class and make cool pouches or boxes to put them in, and of course there was tons of candy! My Dad would bring home roses for all his special girls too, and who wouldn't love that? Thus, Valentine's has always been a favorite with me and Luke has done a wonderful job of making it a special day for me too. This year he woke me up bright and early to see my surprise roses. He also got me two Bath and Body cream lotions and body wash all in my favorite Japanese Cherry Blossom scent. I am so pampered!



I really have the best husband in the whole world for me. He always does simple little things for me that make me feel loved and beautiful. To show him my appreciation for him, I gave him Valentine's balloons with heart-shaped love notes inside and a bag of his favorite cherry Juju hearts. I wanted to put them inside the balloons too, but after a long fight with the first one I gave up and just gave him the bag. Have you ever tried to put candy in a balloon? It's HARD!


After doing some spring cleaning, making a trip to the D.I., boxing up some of our stuff to put in storage, and going grocery shopping, we enjoyed a delectable dinner of fettuccine alfredo with red peppers, broccoli, and chicken in the sauce. It was sooooooo good.


Wonderful as the whole day was, we didn't escape without a bit of a tragedy. We made heart-shaped pancakes with strawberry topping and whipped cream for breakfast to keep tradition, and naturally had the butter out to put on them. Well, I was going back for seconds, and I knocked the top of the butter dish off the counter and it shattered on our kitchen floor. This wouldn't have been such a big deal, if it hadn't been the very butter dish that Luke proposed to me with. I bawled for an hour, and poor Luke had to sit and hold me the whole time. Ha ha ha! It was pretty devastating. But I've decided maybe it's better that it happened now, so that later on when one of our poor kids accidentally broke it (as break it they must, sooner or later) they wouldn't have the wrath of their mom come down on their heads. Luke's going to make a new one, and it now seems inevitable that it too will end up broken at some point, but now we'll just laugh and add it to the pile, so to speak.

The remains of our butter dish.


All in all, it was a wonderful, simple Valentine's Day, and, aside from my devastation with the butter dish, I wouldn't have had it any other way!

Baby's Heartbeat!

We had our second prenatal appointment today. It was so great! Last time the midwife we met with couldn't find the baby's heartbeat because it just wasn't quite big enough, and I wasn't far enough along. This time we met with a midwife named Brigitte who we have chosen to be our permanent midwife for the rest of my pregnancy. She squirted the gel on and put the little machine to my belly and two seconds later we were hearing our baby's heartbeat thumping 150-160 beats per minute! It was so cool! How neat to actually hear the little baby that's growing inside me!

They also took my blood this time. I was pretty nervous, never having given blood before. I was worried I'd be able to feel it being sucked out of my veins and I was just sure I would die. As it turned out I was perfectly fine! I even was watching as my blood filled up the three little tubes and was somewhat fascinated. Poor Luke had to look away. Blood just doesn't agree with him. I'm so glad he was with me though. He is so supportive! He's already the best husband ever, and soon he'll be the best daddy too! Ha ha!

Now for the most exciting news of all. Next time we go in for a prenatal appointment, which is roughly a month away, we will find out what blood type I am (which will be really fun for me, since I have no idea what it is) and a day or two later we will have an ulrasound to see that all is well with the baby and to find out what gender it is!!!!!!! Woo hoo!!!!! I can hardly wait. :)

Me at Three Months

I can't believe my first trimester is already over! And I must say I'm grateful for it. I don't feel grossed out near as often, although I still like to sleep a lot. And the baby is getting so big! Okay, so maybe I'm not exactly showing yet, more like just looking thicker, but still! The baby is now three and a half inches long (the length of a lemon) and is making faces and peeing! Ha ha ha! I love it! Anyway, I just wanted to post this picture, and hope to continue posting one once a month from now on to show my/baby's progress.