It's HERE!!!!!

If you notice a decline in the number of blogs I have over the next week or so, it is clearly due to the fact that I am in the middle of a couple great books...

Ah the dilemma though...I am fully into this Shadow Rising book ( I am on like page 605 I think) and really likeing it, but HARRY POTTER came out!!! Not just ANY Harry Potter book either, the last Harry Potter book....I have to read it to avoid people (mainly my mom) giving away all the surprises, but I would like to finish the Robert Jordan book first...maybe I will be nice and thoughty and let Wes read HP first...nah...then my mom will call to talk to him about all the surprises and I will overhear them...so, I guess I will just have to get busy trying to outread my mom...(I am not likely to succeed at that though, so I might just have to avoid her calls this week...)

Either way, I might be writing less this week-please enjoy my previous ramblings, try not to think too hard about them, they are not edited (Wes cannot read them without verbally editing...). Anyway-read, enjoy, comment, or just go read the new Harry Potter book and please, avoid telling me all the secrets! (Anne Clawson-I know you already read the last chapter-no giving anything away!!)

To Disneyland and back again...

As I have mentioned, I went to Disneyland with my kids. Most of you that would read this probably already know that about 4 months ago my aunt Cathy was diagnosed with brain cancer (melanoma in her brain). She was given a pretty grave diagnosis, and so she began to plan the things she wanted to do while she was still feeling up to doing them. One of the big ones was to go to Disneyland with all the family, more specifically with the little kids. So, we obviously couldn't/wouldn't miss that. My sister Melanie flew into Spokane to help me drive there. On Tuesday, June 26th we Mel, the kids and I) drove from Spokane to SLC. The kids and I slept at my in-laws house that night, BTW-it took us about 2-3 hours longer than the estimated 10 hours (estimated by mapquest) because of some construction through the mountains in Northern Idaho. The next day I was told we were aiming at leaving between 10 am and noon to drive to Primm, NV where we would be spending the night. I assumed, knowing my family that this really meant noon...actually it meant like 2...So, we drove on that afternoon/evening, stopping for potty breaks for a couple of cute little boys in the other car a few times. The next morning, we wanted to be up and out early so as to avoid the hottest heat in the Mojave desert, and to get to Disneyland that day. It shouldn't have been too long of a drive (like maybe 5-6 hours if I remember), but here's the hitch-my oldest 2 kids spent the early, early morning hours barfing all over our hotel room, and I got very little sleep. So, I knew it would be a long brutal day-especially know it was supposed to be well over 100 degrees the whole day. We did manage to be out of the hotel by about 7 am (or something like that), and get going, but I had to call my mom and sister in the other care shortly after beginning cause one of my kids had thrown up. To make a long story short, my kids kept throwing up and we kept having to stop. At one point, we were stuck in 110 degree heat in construction traffic in California somewhere with Melanie holding two little bucket of throw-up, one from each of my kids. This disgusting situation lasted about an hour before we could get out of traffic and to an exit to clean up. Needless to say, getting to Disneyland was not a fun or easy experience. But we made it!!!

In our little caravan, I had myself, Melanie and my 3 kids, and the other van had my sister, her 3 kids, my mom and my brother. When we got there, we met up with XiaXia, Papou, Cathy, Mary, Brooke, Tiffany, Lina, and Kris who had already been there a day (lucky kids got to fly out...) We went to Disneyland that day and had a great time. We did cut it a bit short as my kids were really still getting over whatever bug thay had. That was Thursday when we arrived. My dad flew in the next day. We were at Disneyland the whole day on Friday. It was a lot of fun and we got to spend a lot of time with the family. Friday night, Wesley's flight was supposed to arrive in LA at 11:3o PM, but had delay after delay, and my parents ended up going o pick him up at about 3 AM. At 7 AM, on Saturday June 30th (Wesley's 28th Birthday), we were back at Disneyland to take advantage of our early admission passes. We had already done this special little ToonTown early admission thing the day before, but this was our overall park early admission. So, we went in with all the kids and just did all of Fantasyland in about an hour, then was had to head over to a character Breakfast at the hotel by California Adventures. THe whole family, as in ALL of the family that was there had a reservation to eat breakfast together with the characters (another thing Cathy really wanted to do), and after which we took a big family picture. Thanks goodness for the newlywed couple standing outside the restraunt waiting for their table (they took all the pics for us). That is the picture you see at the top. We finished out our day at Disneyland and were all set to return home the next day.

I had planned to caravan back to SLC and then on to Spokane (according to mapquest it was only about 30-45 minutes difference tim-wise to go that way instead of just going straight up through Cali/Oregon way back to Spokane), but I had decided at that point, that saving an hour would be a big deal. So, I decided to drive home the omore direct way. Big Mistake! Driving out of Anaheim was ok, but as soon as I got past Six Flags, traffic got HORRIBLE going through this uphill part of this mountain range. It was practically stopped most of the time. So, we were stuck in this traffic with no exits anywhere, nowhere to really pull off if there is a problem as it was a canyon, and it was 115 degrees and we were close to overheating. I am sure any of you that have ever owned a car that had to be nursed through know that if you are close to overheating, the first thing to do to try to cool down, is turn on the heater, which I did. So for HOURS, we were stuck in 115 degree heat, with the heater on (windows unrolled-forcing liquids on the kids the whole time), going up this canyon. It took us over 4 hours to gor 90 miles. It was miserble, and my poor husband and dad who were still in LA area awaiting their flights home. I kept calling them in tears, freaking out that I needed help when really there was nothing they could do to help me. It was so bad. But, we made it through, got to our hotel VERY late that night, and eventually made it home the next evening, Monday July 2. Wow-talk about an adventure!


Was it worth going? Yes!!! We had a great time at Disneyland and we may never get the chance again to go do something like that with the whole family. It was great! And the coolest thing was to see Cathy doing so well and enjoying herself so much as one of her dreams was coming true to have so much of her family with her in the place she loves most! It was like she was back to normal! Look at what a blast she is having!

Would I do it again? Not in a car! This is the real kicker of the whole craxy experience. The day we left Spokane, Wes was telling one of the doctors he works with about our plan, and the doctor couldn't understand why we didn't just fly. Evidently there is an airline here in Spokane that only flys to like 4 places (one of which is the Ontario airport RIGHT near Disneyland) and is cheap! We could have flown us all out for less that the money we spent on gas! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Adventures with A

I realized I have not dedicated a blog to Armour yet and just wanted to share a little about him. He will be one next week, and we are so excited. He is always active! He learned to walk around the time we moved here, and now he is trying to learn to run. It is funny, cause he will get himself sturdy, look ahead, then just try to go as fast as he can-usually he goes about 3 steps bafore he has to stop and steady himself again.

We have stairs in this place, and he LOVES to climb up when we aren't looking. The first day Wes was at work, twice when I was in the bathroom, he tried to cruise upstairs and fell down. Now, he is great with up but not so good with down. I have been teaching him to back down the stairs, but he doesn't like that much. A few minutes ago, I was on the phone with our car insurance (just trying to fix a mistake in our new Washington coverage-no accidents!) (BTW-not to take away from this Armour spotlight, but as I am typing this, Solace is quoting the elevator monologue from the Disneyland Haunted Mansion in her scariest, most manly voice-she is even throwing in a fake vibrato...)

So, back to Armour...I was on the phone, and I suddenly hear this yelling "Mommmmmm, Daddddddddd, Dowwwwnnnnnn." These are three of the words Armour has figured out in his limited vocabulary. So I walk the direction of the screaming, of course to the stairs, and see Armour mid way up standing facing the bottom as if he was going to try to dive. Luckily, he thought better of it and called for help instead! Nice, he is learning!

Since I mentioned his limited, but rapidly growing vocabulary, let me just say, he may not know a lot of words, but man, he can communicate. He uses signs, words, and very loud noises to let us know what he needs or wants. He is loud enough that in a line the other day, an old man with a hearing aid that was yelling "what, what" to everyone he tried to speak to, commented on how loud our kids, particularly our boys, and even more specifically our baby was... So, I thought it must be the product of being the third child in a family of 2 very loud and attention needy older siblings. It is hard to compete, so you have to be louder and more attention seeking than they are-thus he loud LOUD baby...then I remembered Melanie is my families third and Andrea and I are possible as loud and attention seeking as my older two...so, maybe it's a somewhat flawed theory...Mel is a lot of things, but loud is NOT one of them.

It is an adventure every day with these kids, and Armour makes it even more exciting. For those that don't know, Armour is our tie breaker-there are now more boys than girls in our family. I come from a long line lacking boys...I have only one brother and he is only 9 (almost 10 I guess), and, my mom has only sisters (5 of them)...(Wesley's family is a tie-3 of each)...Basically, I have never had to deal with two boys, brothers together until now and man the constant wrestling alone was a surprise...ah...Life...gotta love it!

A Big Scare

So, this morning I decided to take my kids to this free family movie at 10 am at this movie theater. Some of the other moms in the ward were taking their kids as well. So, we went and met some friends there. When we got there Jamie and Carlie were there with their kids. We went into the theater, and Jamie sat at one end of a long row with her 2 younger kids, and Solace, Armour, and I sat on the other end of the row (we were trying to make sure we had enough seats for everyone). Ender and 2 other boys (one of Jamie's and one of Carlie's, who are actually closer to Solace's age) sat together in the middle of the row. Other moms showed up and filled in some spots. I was in and out of the theater with Armour screaming (it was his morning nap time). Finally, he fell asleep and I walked in and relaxed...for the last 5 minutes of the movie! When it ended, all the kids jumped up, and I told Ender to come by me. The only exit out was on the other side. I looked down to pick up Armour's fallen shoes and when I looked up, Ender had disappeared! I looked in the herd of children that were with our group and could not see him anywhere, so I panicked and grabbed Solace, kept carrying my sleeping baby as I ran out the door yelling his name down the hall. I did not see him or hear him anywhere. The only way out of the building was into the parking lot, but I didn't think he would walk outside without me, so I kept looking in the hall. Solace was helping me look and even volunteered to go look for him in the boy bathroom because she was sure he must be in there. After not finding him inside, I was about to my breaking point of panic, and about to go out in the parking lot to search for him (all the while still carrying my now awake and crying baby and dragging along a rapidly panicking daughter). I looked outside for a minute or two, came back in thinking I could maybe leave my now screaming baby and panicked daughter with the other moms while I continued my crazy panicked search on my own. As I walked back in, I ran into another ward mom that (thank goodness) had Ender, who apparently had never left the theater, but had just been hiding in the crowd! Ah...Scary!!! I am so dang grateful to that he was ok, but what a scare!!!

The Castaway!

Skipping right along...

I am going to skip right past the engagement and Wedding part and just skip straight to the Honeymoon! Nice, huh?! Well, here's a few things about those things...

So, we got engaged on Feb 4th, but I didn't have a ring until a few weeks later. Wes took me to regional conference at the LDS Conference Center in downtown SLC and after it was over took me for a walk around Temple Square. He proposed to me officially with the ring there at the fountain looking at the Temple. It was really sweet and romantic!

We were married on May 17, 2001. It was a great wedding and a fun filled day of activities after the ceremony. We had a great time.

On May 18, 2001 at like 4 am we went to the airport to fly out to Florida for our Honeymoon. We had done this thing for our honeymoon where we got the trip really cheap by attending a presentation one morning for time shares. So, the company we did this through arranged for all the hotels and stuff. Our first 3 nights were in Orlando and that hotel was alright. THe next coupl nights were supposed to be at a hotel in Daytona Beach. Wes was really excited about this part as the hotel was guaranteed to be right on the beach.

So, we drove away from Orlando to Daytona Beach, and started to look for the address. At first we could not find it in the plethora of awseome beachfront hotel along the street where the hotel was located, so we stopped at one of the hotels to ask where our hotel, "The Castaway" was located. THe guy explained that is was about 5 miles down the road because the street is split by east and west addresses and this was a west address...

As we got back on the road and started down toward the address, the neighborhood got progressively worse and worse, until we saw this run down shop on the left side of the street. It had towels in the windows with naked women printed on them, and a huge blinking neon sign that said "Exotic tobacco pipes" and had a neon sign style picture of a bong...lovely! As we were just getting over the shock on the shop, we noticed that our equally worn down hotel was actually right across the street. It looked like something out of a horror movie-looked abandoned, run dow , rusty...scarry! But we thought we would go in anyway and see how it was inside-besides, it was the only place we had to stay.

The one-toothed man behind the counter took 20 minutes to get our information in the computer, then said "oops, I messed up," and because he had evidently never known about a backspace key, he started the whole process all over again. When he finally got us checked in, we got into the elevator and pushed the floor number, and stood there in the shakey elevator of a few minutes before the doors opened up and another family got in with us. Then we all sat in the elevator for a few more minutes. Then decided it hadn't moved, pushed the open door button, and sure enough, we were still in the lobby. So we all relocated to the other elevator which slowly but surely got us to our respective floors. As the door on our floor opened, I was overwhelmed by the stench of fish guts and mold-gross, then when we turned the corner to our hallway, it looked exactly like the hallway in "The Shining". So, we sent into our hole of a room, and realized that there was not a door on the sliding door part, and that the balcony was just open and all the people around could come in and out of our room as they pleased.

We decided to just go on a walk on the beach and at least take advantage of the fact that the hotel really was right on the beach at least. We planned on a 1-2 hour walk at most. When we got out to the beach, Wesley saw a dock a wasy off and wanted to walk to that, so we walked. We walked, and walked and walked. And it got darker and darker and darker...And later and later and later...after who-knows-how-long walking, it was pitch black and the dock was not any closer. So, we decided for our safety, we would go ahead and walk up to the street where there was light and find our way back to the hotel. Wes was carrying his walet and we were both just in our swimsuits. I managed to get hit on a number of times (that was back before I had 3 kids), we saw 2-3 drug deals happening, 3-4 arrests going on, a police chase, and had a cop tell us we wer enot in a safe place and that we should find our way back to whereever we were supposed to be...it was CRAZY!!

I never thought I could be glad to see that disgusting hole of a hotel, but I was ecstatic! Gotta love the Castaway...

Omaha to Spokane...

Well, I used to be really good at sending out updates on our family in email, but I have not sent one out in a long time, and thought I would just post our update here instead. Maybe I'll send one out later anyway...we'll see.


Most of our friends and family know that the end of May/beginning of June we moved from Omaha, Nebraska to Spokane, Washington. On May 31 we had to be out of our dark little basement apartment in Fox Run, and we were going to be able to get our keys and move into our new townhome in Indian Canyon in Spokane on June 4th. So we decided to make a whole trip out of it. We got the Penske moving truck on the morning of the 30th and figured we would pack it up and clean up the basement hole that day and drive out to begin the journey early the next morning. I had already arranged a hotel near Mount Rushmorfor us to stay in the night of the 31 and 1st. I had arranged a hotel in Bozeman, MT for the 2nd, and a hotel in Spokane the 3rd. Then we could just go in and get our key early the 4th and move in and return the truck quickly. We had also arranged with our new ward to have some guys come help us unload the turck at 5 pm on the 4th.


Wes and I worked on loading and cleaning the basement from like 6 am until about 9 pm nonstop on the 30th, and still figured we had about 2 or so hours of work left, so we decided to go to our hotel in Omaha and come back to finish in the morning (the drive to Mount Rushmore was only supposed to be like 7 1/2 hours or something). So we finished and drove out about 12:30 the next afternoon. Wes was driving the big 22' Penske truck with the car hitched on the back. We quickly realized the truck had a "governor" on it that made it unable to drive over 65. So, it took us longer to get to all the places...

About 9:30 or 10:30 PM, we got to our hotel near Mount Rushmore. It was a downpur when we got there. I ran in the hotel lobby, carrying and dragging all 3 sleeping kids to check in while Wes tried to drive around the block and find a place to put the truck. As I was trying to sign the hotel paperwork, Wes called on the cell to tell me he was stuck and needed me right away. So, we quickly finished checking in, got in the ven and drove to where Wes has gone. The parking area he had gone into came to a dead end, and Wes was stuck with the Penske in the lot between 2 rows of cars. I came around to where he was, parked the Van out of the way, but in sight with the sleeping kids init, and we tried everything we could to back up the truck out of there. You might not know this, but you can't back up a truck with a hitch on it, at least not this kind, and it even said so on the hitch. We quickly realized that this hitch don't lie-it wasn't possible!

So, still in the pouring rain, we had to take the car off the hitch (which requires taking chains off the bottom/frame, and off the front wheels-which were kinda stuck as they were soaking wet!)! But we got it off and out of the way, then we unhitched the towing device and the two of us rolled it out of the way. Then we were able to back the truck out, reattach the towing device and park it where the hotel had told us to. We decided to wait to put the car back on the tow-er in the morning (it was about midnight by then).

We went to bed finally. In the morning we woke up, ate our hotels free breakfast and went up to Mount Rushmore. We had planned to stay up there and hike for a while, but our van kind of overheated on the way up, so after about an hour looking at all th stuff (with our kids going nuts), Wes and I decided that we better be responsible and try to get the van looked at and fixed before we had to drive further the next day. So, we left and drove back into town. The van was miraculously doing fine all the way back down, and we decided it was ok and that we would just take it easy the reat of the day and try to leave really early the next morning to get to Bozeman.

THe trip to Bozeman, and on to Spokane were fairly uneventful (there were the times of near overheating when we were stuck in a one lane canyon near Coeur D'Alene and stuff, but fairly uneventful). And we arrived in Spokane on Sunday July 3rd. As I was checking into our hotel I got a call from a family in our new ward that knew we would be there that day inviting us to a BBQ. So, we went over there and met half the ward on that first Sunday afternoon. It was a great way to meet a lot of people in the ward in a low key, fun setting.

THe next day we got into our apartment complex and it was so much better than our hole in the ground in Omaha! Not to say it is perfect, but I like it much better. We started to unload the truck at like 8 am (as soon as we signed all the paperwork adn got our keys and stuff). We unloaded all day (at Wes's insistence that he wanted it mostly done before anyone came to help at 5 pm). I kinda grumbled as we carried heavy items in all day, but I did work hard and try to help. It's a good thing to cause 5 pm came and went and nobody came to help us. By about 5:45, the van was empty of all but 3 thiings, 2 dressers and a heavy hope chest. I was dying by then, and shaking head to toe and literally about fell over getting the first dresser in the house. I was bad enough that we determined that I could not help anymore, but we needed some help getting the last 2 things in the house. So, we called our friend in the ward that had the BBQ and asked him if there was just one person we could call to come help us with these last couple things. He said he would be right over. So, a bit later, he and another guy came over and helped us, and their wives showed up with pizza and soda for everyone! It was SOOO nice! I really appreciated that! Thank goodness for the Molines and the Spencers!

We started to learn our new town and get used to everything for the next week or so, had some friends move in from Omaha, and started getting to know new people in our ward and in Wes's program.. THen the last week of June, I went to Disneyland with the kids and the whole family (I will blog about that seperately), and got back with mys sister Mel on the 2nd of July. We hung out with Mel here until the 6th. And now we are just finally getting the chance to settle in here.

We have a great ward, and we have park play days (basically like playgroups) once a week this summer, and we try to do other fun stuff through the week, go on walks, swim, go to parks, just hang out... We've met a lot of new people and are enjoying getting to know new friends. Spokane is beautiful and we really feel lucky to have matched into a transitional year where we still get to spend a lot of time with our daddy Wes! That's all for now!

Engagement...

Now, I could go through this date by date, but that would take a while. I will jst mention that there were a few other notable dates, the third was a whole event-went to a matinee movie with Stefanie (Wes's sister) and Jesse Heaton (after I got rear ended in a hit and run on the way to the theater), ate ice cream at Snelgroves (where I met Ashley-another sister), stopped by the Fairbourn's house to visit (that's my aunt/cousins), then went to a Utes Basketball game with Cathy, mom, dad, Mel, Spence, then of course, he kissed me the first time that night. That was also the night he realized he was going to marry me (I knew I was a good kisser, but I didn't realize I was that good!!) :)

Then there was the date where Wes tricked me into meeting his whole family, complete with grandparents and all (well, not all as Steve, Wes's dad was in Canada working on the temple). He told me he was going to cook Filipino food for me for dinner, abd we would eat hat his house. But when I got there, it was a full Thanksgiving-style dinner with the whole fam instead...scarry!!

We packed in a lot of dating in those few short weeks...I have always said it was 3 1/2 weeks before we were engaged, but I just looked at a calendar, adn it looks like it was actually about 4 weeks before we got engaged, sorry about that gross inaccuracy! But, that said, let's fast forward to Feb 4, 2001...

Just a few days before, we had talked about how we were definately dating exclusively and had been for a while actually without talking about it. By this time we were seeing each other basically every day. But, we were not going to see each other on this Sunday, Feb 4th for some reason. It was a Fast Sunday (in the LDS church, once a month, we have what is called a fast Sunday where we fast, or do not eat or drink for 2 meals basically. We are supposed to fast with a purpose in mind, and we are supposed to pray to begin our fast and to dedicate our fast to that purpose.). I had decided to fast that day to determine whether I should marry Wes, as the thought of marrying him had been on my mind a lot.

I went to church, and for some reason my family wasn't there that week, so I sat next to my x-boyfriend's mom, who also happened to be the stake president's wife. As I sat there next to her, and she was telling me all about her son (the x-boyfriend) and how he was doing on his mission and how he would love to hear from me and stuff, I was praying to have a big confirmation that I should marry Wes. I was afraid that if it wasn't a big confirmation, I might miss it completely. I got an answer that I should marry Wes while I sat there in church.

Like I said before, Wes and I were not supposed to see each other that day. For some reason I didn't think we were even going to talk-it seems he had something that was supposed to keep him busy all day. Needless to say, I was surprised when my phone rang in the afternoon and it was Wes calling to tell me that he had gotten a bad haircut. Evidently, he had made Jessice (his youngest sister) buzz his hair, adn she had never cut anyone's hair before, so it hadn's turned out quite as expected, and he just wanted to call and warn me. Then as we talked he mentioned that he would like to go do something fun tonight, so maybe we could go to his cousin Mickey's house and play games with Mickey and Natalie (his wife) in Provo. So, he called Mickey and arranged for that.

We played games over there and they even let me win some. It was fun. Evidently, everytime I turned my back, Mickey would harass Wes about how he needed to ask me to marry him. On our drive home (it's about an hour drive), Wes was talking about wanting to go to medical school. I asked where he hoped to go, and he said "I don't know, where do you want to live?" I kinda ignored that, but then he kept bringing up, "we" and connecting me to him future plans. So, by the time we got back to my apartment, I was wondering what he was trying to say, if he was trying to ask me to marry him. He walked me into my apartment and kissed me in the kitchen, and I said, "Do you really thing we are going to get married?" (He grabbed me by both shoulders and pushed me arms length away at that point) I said, "Have you prayed about it?" (he continued to stare at arms length with a horrified look, then without a word walked over to the couch and sat down. Then after an unbearably long silence he said, "come over here and let me tell you a story."

This is what he told me: He said that after our 3rd date, he had gone into his house, and knelt down and prayed to know if he should marry me. He laid in bed listening for an answer, and eventually got an answer that he should marry me. Then he asked me if I had prayed about it, and I told him I had and told him my experience of earlier in the day. Then he said "So, We're getting married?" And I said, "Yeah, I guess we are." Then he said he loved me, and I said, "you do?" He said "I wouldn't have asked you to marry me if I didn't love you." I said "Oh...I love you too."

And that is how we got engaged!!

Schemes and Second Dates

Do I blog too much? Yeah, probably. Do I care? Not really. Wes and I thought it would be good to get some of our life recorded and figured this was a good way to do it. So I can just record it here, print it all out and put it in a book to keep. So, I thought I would go on with the dating stories...

So, After our first date, I waited like 2 days for him to call me, but he didn't. I didn't really want to ask him out for the 2nd date, I just wanted him to ask me. So, I called him on the evening of the second day without a phone call (this is step 1 in getting a boy to ask you out). We talked about nothing for a really long time and I kept trying to give him chances to ask me out again and tried to clue him in to the fact I wanted him to ask me out. While I was on the phone with him talking about nothing, I came up with a scheme about a date night that weekend. (The schemeing in my head was a lot like JD on Scrubs...) I decided I would tell him that my friends and I had a date night set up that coming Friday and that I didn't have a date yet. So, would he maybe want to be my date?! He of course said yes. I told him I would get back to him with the details...because of course, there were no details because there was no date night...

Step 2 in my plan to get Wes to go out with me without actually asking him out explicitly...Arrange a date night...
At that time, I was in a performing choir at the LDS Institute called Encore. We met EARLY every morning to practice and/or do morningsides (like firesides, but in the morning). So, when I went to Encore early the morning after the phone call, I talked to my friends about this date night that we needed to have on Friday. No one wanted to spend a lot of money, so we decided I would make Lasagna for dinner (I was famous for this lasagna and it was something I used to bribe my friends into doing stuff for me-like going on imaginary date nights and making them a reality...), other poeple would bring bread, salad and pies. We were also able to arrange cheap tickets to a comedy troupe show that night. So, the date night plan quickly came together, and my imaginary date night became a reality...

That Friday Wes and I went on our second date. We ate good food, saw a funny show and ate some great Marie Calender's pie. The only hitch was that one of the girls that came to the date night was one Wes evidently had a little thing for because he couldn't stop talking to or about her all night...oh well, he got over that eventually...

Blow up Toys, Bowling, and Butt Pinching...

So, I know you must be asking yourself what happened after the first meeting...I will tell you, Nothin! After Wes and I met early July of 2000, Wes started to date someone else, and by the time he broke up with her, I was dating someone. So, it wasn't until January 2001 that we even saw each other again.

End of December 2000, I was pissed and a bit depressed because my boyfriend had broken up with me right before Christmas. This was a very new experience for me, as no one had ever broken up with me before. So, I reacted as any logical adult would, and stayed in my apartment, eating chocolates and watching old holiday movies. Then I got a call from Penni telling me to get off my butt, stop whining and get back in the game (the dating game of course). In order to get me back in the game, she said she would set me up with her hot friend I had liked, Wes. So, the set up plans began. I did not want to go into this date cold (it was set up for Jan 6th), so the week preceeding the big date, I went out with a different boy every night until the 6th.

Eventually the night came. To make me a bit more comfortable (usually I refused to go on set-ups) Penni and Tyson (Wes's brother) were going to go with us, so it was a double date instead of a single. Our first activity took us to a place called Some Dude's Playground. It was a place with a bunch of big blow up toys (nothing dirty...things like the blow up jumpers, sumo things, racing mats, etc). Wes and Ty thought we should go ahead and get the longest pass-the 3 hour pass. After about the first hour we had done everything, and were pretty much finished with this place. However, if you know Wes and Ty, you probably already know that if they paid for 3 hours, then dogonnit, we were using 3 hours!! So, Wes and I basically sat around and talked for the next 2 hours in Some Dude's Playground, and had a really fun conversation.

Our next fun activity was laser bowling-it was a blast, adn the really notable thing there was that Wes pinched my butt once while I was going up to throw the ball. That kid will do anything to assure a win! Actually, this butt pinch has been a greatly debated moment...Wes always claimed it was Tyson, Tyson denied the accusation, and I was SURE it was Wes. However, Tyson has recently admitted that it was in fact him...I still blame Wes... :)

That date was fun and I really liked Wes by the end, even though he pinched my butt...I think I liked him more than he liked me though as I had to totally trick him into taking me on a second date, but that my friends, sounds like another blog...

Rock Hard Abs and Cold Stone...

Wes and I were talking about how we should put up some of the old school stories about us and our little family. So, what better place to start than with how I met that stud of a man that I married, so here it goes...

In the summer of 2000, my roommate Penni and I were talking about boys, as was our usual conversation. She told me about these two great guys she knew that were cousins, Mickey, who she had dated a little, and Wes, who she considered to be one of her best friends. She wanted to go out with both of them when they got back from their missions. Mickey got engaged too quick for anyone but Natalie to go out with him (way to reel him in quick by the way Nat!), so Penni decided she would call Wes as soon as he was supposed to get home for a date, so as not to miss that chance too. I was similarly wanting to go out with a friend of mine from high school when he got home, Anthony, and as it turned out, Anthony and Wes got home the same week.

So, Penni and I set up this date night with the two guys. On the night of the big date, I picked up Anthony and we were to meet Penni and Wes at the Murray amphitheater where Penni had arranged for us to have free tickets to see "Lil Abner." Anthony and I were running a bit late, and ran in right before the show started. I somehow ended up sitting between the two guys. I thought Wes was totally hot, but I was on a date with Anthony, who was one of my best friends and did not want to ignore him. As it turned out, I was a crappy date for Anthony anyway! Sorry Anthony!

For those that don't know the musical, there is a part in the show when all the wimpy guys come out and they are suddenly super muscly. When they came out, I said, "Oh My!" I believe I said it very shocked and a bit grossed out by the overly muscly actors, but Wes thought I said it like I was totally attracted to these mega body builders, and spent the rest of the night (well, lets face it, the rest of my life) teasing me about it! So, we flirted a little bit...

After the musical, we went to Cold Stone for ice cream. It was a really long line, with no open tables to sit when we arrived. After waiting in the line for a few minutes, a table opened up and we tried to send the boys over to save the table while we bought the ice cream (we DID ask them on the dates...) Wes said "OK," and walked right over to the table. Anthony refused to go because he insisted he was going to buy the ice cream even though I asked him out, and he and Penni sent me over to wait with Wes at the table. We talked and flirted a little while we waited. Then they came back and we all ate our ice cream together...here's the kicker about the ice cream-Anthony paid for it all cause he thought that was the gentlemanly thing to do...funny!!

And that my friends is how we met...I will tell more in another blog.