yes its true. i'm about give up my last physical claim to being from california-the license plate. ah! i gave up my california diver's license last august... i had a really difficult time handing the DMV lady my license. pathetic i know. i hesitated when she asked me for my current license. i thought of things that i could say (aka a lie) to some how keep from having to forfeit my license to the state of az. i went through a few stories in my head quickly, but before i knew it my hand was moving toward her with my license in tow. ah.... stop! stop! she snatched it before i could open my mouth. i may have put up a little tug when she went to grab it. a small part of me died that day. haha.
and now its time to give up the last little part of me that keeps me rooted as an "out of stater." i like that my car let's other people know that "i'm not from here." not that i have a problem with az. i did like that it made me more "normal" while i was in utah. i like that i didn't have to claim utah with my plates. but now its time to move on... how superficial am i?
internally i'm still fighting to keep my california plates. but in two weeks the fate of my car will have been decided. should i keep the california plates...? there are risks with having a az license and a-out-of-state car... aka a hefty fine... grow up jen. move on. right?
on that note, if i do have to give up my claim to "normalcy" i'm going to do it with some personality and go for personal/vanity plate. i've always wanted to... and this is the time to do it. bry, my sister, and i have been bouncing ideas back and forth. still need to decide. opinions are welcome... here are some choices so far... feel free to add any suggestions:
WCKDLVR (Wicked lover... as in the muscial)-mom is against this one =) my favorite IBLDBLU (I bleed blue)... sadly i checked... and its taken... i want to meet the person with this car DGRENIFY (degreenify) DFYGRTY (defy gravity)... DFYGVTY is already taken BLEDBLU IHRTOZ (i heart oz) WZRD N I (wizard and i) ELPHIE SWNKFYD (swankified) ASNTACO (asian taco) JENBUG (my nickname from the fam)... sadly taken and i don't have a bug LVSAUTE (loves a ute...hmmmm) goes great with the "Y" sticker on my car BITESZE (bite size- a nick name from college)
i'm taking any other suggestions.
Paige's suggestions: SHRTSTF - short stuff BWLNGQN - bowling queen
...i'll be there waiting for your call...cause you know in california there's something better for us all..."-Plain White Ts.
a couple of weeks ago Lee and I headed to california for a carefree weekend! earlier that week we just decided to jump in the car and head to the sunny state. it happened to be father's day weekend, so that worked out perfectly for me to spend the day with my dad.
our road trip started in the classic lee and jen date... with chick-fil-a. its our "chick" date. yum. we cruised to cali experiencing new tunes from the plain white ts (new to us that is) and fell in love with the song sunlight by them. we stopped twice to use the restroom. now i'm the type that goes for distance and doesn't stop unless its an emergency. however lee was fair enough and let me know about her only flaw for a road trip "i'm pretty much perfect with the exception that i have a small bladder." love you lee.
friday we spent the day shopping for swim suits and hanging out by the pool. lee experienced in-n-out for the first time.... and need less to say she was hooked after the first bite! we went back for seconds before leaving california. that night i met up with amy (!) and heather (!) to see the proposal. good flick. oh amy how i've missed you. good times. "my new phone made me all these friends"
saturday was filled with old friends as well. i met up with andy and quinn to eat dim sum with the grandparents and my dad. we caught up with lee and the democrat at south coast. "she's on your team" "she's my team... my team" andy and quinn had quite the time checkin out all the hotties at the mall.
after the sun decided to finally come out. we headed to the beach. the five of us read and took in the brief period of sunlight on the coast. it was actually perfect. "i love the sun... its probably not the best thing... but i just love the sun."
for dinner that night we went to a little place called TK burger. i opted out of the burger experience. wasn't feelin' all that great. stress related i'm sure. lee was all about the burgers this trip. chalk another one up for a tasty burger experience. i'll make sure to get in on that one next time.
i pretty much slept the rest of the night while aaron and lee hung out in the spa and watched walk the line. i was just overwhelmed and needed a time out. but had a good conversation that came at the perfect time to settle what i was feeling.
sunday i made breakfast in bed for my dad and my mom. i made yummy pancakes and eggs. for lee i made just pancakes because she doesn't like eggs. the sausage didn't get thawed in time. bummer. it has little pieces of pineapple in it. so good. oh well maybe next time.
on our way back we did make a stop at the rite aid in desert center. lee was feeling a cold come on and needed something to catch it before it got worse. she opted to try these chewable things... bad choice. "it started out tasting really good and then all of the sudden it was like chewing this chalky metal stuff" wow. she'll stick to the coldeez or however you spell it. i also introduced her to thrifty's ice cream! LOVE it. my favorite is chocolate malted crunch. yum.
so as you can see there is only one picture of all the adventures of that weekend. just one. but its a good one. love you lee. i'd road trip with you any time!
Update update… gosh where to start. I have been a blogger slacker. Let’s start with my birthday! “It’s my birthday…” ok well its really not my birthday now… but it was. It seemed like March was pretty much my birthday ALL MONTH. With scheduling and planning the birthday celebrations spanned over about two weeks!
We kicked off my birthday with a dinner with friends up at Greasewood Flats in North Scottsdale. Bry had heard of this place and always wanted to go and check it out. My birthday made for a great excuse to do so. Bryan organized it all and a group of about 30 to 40 of us headed up to celebrate.
Before we left Court and Lexi gave me the cutest charm for my juicy bracelet!
We enjoyed great bbq and good music. The company wasn’t too shabby either. They had horse shoes and open fire pits going. Bryan, Courtney, Austin, and I played a few rounds of horse shoes. Let’s just say it was a learning experience. Court and I didn’t have the distance thing down… but we had so much grace and pose. Bryan and Austin had the distance thing down, one had the lob approach while the other took the line drive approach. Both approaches proved to be superior to grace and pose (haha). I hit the post once. Doit (Court) had the most style points. The real horse shoe players were Chase, Jordan, Austin, and Matt. They were sharkin’ everyone.
The best part of that night was the country dancin’. Bryan and LeeAnn two stepped with an older couple that was there taking their bi annual trip to Greasewood. BryanBryan’s 40 some girlfriend asked him to do shots with her… love it. She could have taught him a thing or two I’m sure outside of the two step. Lee had a great time. She looked like she was having a blast. Love you Lee. Thanks for comin’. found another cougar! She pounced on him like a little birdie. “Don’t get cocky… you’re getting’ cocky.”
Later that night Bryan and I headed to PF Changs for a delicious dinner. After dinner and fortune cookies we went swimming at the Phoenician Hotel. It was a low key birthday night. B got me the cutest tennis outfit. It’s a white nike ruffled skirt and a BLUE nike top. LOVE the skirt. And the top too. He also added a dainty dogeared golden apple necklace with a little bite out of it. LOVE it too.
After that my family came in town. My sister, Jacks, and her daughter Olivia came in for a wedding. My parents came down for the same wedding! It was perfect, except for the face that Brad wasn’t there. Bryan and I drove down to Tucson the next afternoon after Bryan's play practice with Tom just in time for the ceremony.
We stayed in Tucson that night with my family and then headed back up to phoenix on my ACTUAL birthday. That night our families met for the first time at my birthday dinner that Bryan's mom put together for me. It was amazing. One thing that my mom and Bryan's mom definitely have in common is that they know how to entertain. Bryan's family graciously hosted a birthday party for me and my family.
Olivia even got her own special sippy cup. The food was great. The ambiance was great. Everyone got a long so that was great. My cake was an ice cream cake from baskin robbins... yum my favorite. chocolate cake with chocolate chip ice crean. it has orange and yellow polka dots on it which matched the theme of the decorations. my sister bought these sparkler light candles and informed me that i'm getting so old that she had to buy two packs of candles for the cake. sigh.
my parents gave me the letter pendant "j" from tiffanys. side note: still have to think about which way it faces when i put it on. reminds me of karen and her "k" on mean girls. my sister and Liv (and brad too) gave me two cute sweaters and a Hello Kitty Birthday Crown. oh and one of those old school Sanrio plastic wallets from way back in the day. haha.
Bryan's family is good with words and quite clever with puns and such. So as a personal gift from them they wrote me a poem that went something like this:
so wikitionary should be more selective about the people they let post definitions. little do they know that they could be endorsing incorrect and false information.
Bryan may have just started it all on his own and added a #9 to the list. thanks beave.
Here is a post i wrote for my kindergarten blog. the kids loved it.
On Monday we read a story called The Night Before St. Patrick's Day by Natasha Wing. In the story we learned about Leprechauns and the mischief they get into around St. Patrick's Day. We had a lot of questions about Leprechauns that we decided to write Mr. Leprechaun a letter. We also that it might be a good way to trick him and catch him. Our class really wanted to get the gold that we all know leprechauns have!
We learned about how to write a greeting to the person we write a letter to. We also learned about the body of a letter and how to close a letter. We filled our letters with questions and told him how excited we were about St. Patrick's Day.
That night I left out a shiny coin I had brought with me from home. In the story it told us that Leprechaun's like shiny things. I put the coin just on the edge of the desk with the letters we had written and close to the trash can hoping to have the Leprechaun fall in it as he reached for the letters and shiny coin.
I tried to get in touch with Mr. Leprechaun last month to see if he would come by our classroom for a visit. I knew I needed to talk to him in advance because he must get a lot of requests to come and see children. He said that he would try. So I crossed my fingers before I left the classroom that night hoping he would come.
The next morning I arrived at school and to my disappointment there was no Leprechaun. No mess, no gold, and no little man in a green suit. I was so sad. I got the room ready and left the shiny coin out just in case. I thought I heard little foot steps up in the roof and I was hoping he might still come.
The bell rang and it was time to get the kids. Still, no leprechaun. But little did I know that we were in for a surprise. During the time it took me to walk down the hallway and back with the kids from the playground he had COME!
We walked quietly down the hallway to not scary him off in case he was near by. When we opened the doors all the lights were all and to our surprise our whole room was a giant mess!! He had COME! The letters were gone. The coin was gone. And all that was left was a mess! Or so we thought.
There were foot prints all over the room. Tiny foot prints to match the tiny little boots of a Leprechaun! They lead all around the room from table to table, over chairs, over books, and over the rug. But where did they lead?
Madilyn found a mysterious package on the table with a letter attached to it. It was a plain white box with some letters on it. I shook the box and there was a commotion inside. Was it him? Was he stuck in the box? There was only one way to find out.
We read the letter attached to the box and then opened it to see what was inside.... it looked like... GOLD! Well sorta... it was chocolate wrapped in gold foil. Which is a yummy treat. Mr. Leprechaun left us a treat and a nice letter. He told us he was sorry for leaving the mess for us to clean up, but that is just what Leprechaun's do. He also told us that it looked like we had been working hard and that he read some of our journals and was very impressed with our writing skills.
As we kept looking we noticed that he had taken the letters and the shiny coin I had left for him. What he is going to do with them I'm not sure. Maybe he'll write back to us. We'll have to wait and find out!
i'm going to skip past somethings that i have been meaning to blog about and get to the most recent event in my life... valentine's day. so for those of you that know me, know that i love holidays because of the fun you can have with them and such. i love 'em partly because of the excuse it gives you to be cheesy and stuff. anyways... valentine's is probably up there with christmas and my birthday as one of my favorite holidays. and for sake of argument we'll put it up there at number 3 of jen's top three favorite holidays. ok... 'nuff small talk.
where to start... where to start... well let's see a few weeks ago bry had mentioned that he may "disappear" for a while seeing as spring training was about to commence here in arizona and that he just wanted to give me fair warning about his love for baseball and most importantly the chicago cubs. and then the idea hit me for his valentine's day gift. it couldn't have been more perfect. so i went to work. i went online and researched game schedules, looked for the perfect cubs hat that he didn't have, and made a list of everything you would need for an afternoon baseball game out on the berm. then... i was hit with another glorious idea. so that took me to michael's. giant sugar cookie lollipops... frosted in the cubs logo. i was so excited to try to create what was in my head and make it a reality for him. he was going to LOVE it! crossing my fingers. i'll spare the details of the late nights of baking and frosting. not to mention the long details about the hand made card filled with puns because puns are the new black with us (i just have to say that i did hand weave the infield).
the basket was delivered by my wonderful roommates to his door while he and i talked on the phone. thanks brooke and leeann. i couldn't have done it without you. here are some pictures...
In the CUBS basket:
BIG LEAGUE chewing gum
2 IBC root beers
baseball sweat bands (not to really use, more for decoration)
a HUGE Hersey's almonds chocolate bar
good and plenty's
lemon heads
red vines (for me b.c. i don't like NIBS)
NIBS (for bry)
a baseball filled with baby ruth's (the official candy of the MLB)
sunflower seeds
a CUBs hat
6 baseball base eggs (each filled with something that i love and admire about him)
5 large hand baked and hand frosted sugar cookie lollipops
2 tickets to a game of his choice
2 tickets for hot dogs at the game
Cracker Jacks and Peanuts would have been included, but unfortunately i couldn't find any at the stores i went to... lame right.
a few nights before i gave him another card asking if he would be my valentine... it goes with a previous conversation he and i had about what our views were on guys and girls roles during this "holiday." i also made him a clay heart in kindergarten and made a photo array of some of our pictures to put somewhere. he loved them all. of course right? lol.
on friday night bry surprised me with flowers. they were awesome. non traditional. and that is what i loved most about them. picture speaks for itself. it included all of my favorite flowers.
that night we went to a YSA activity and i saw two of my favorite people from utah who were visiting and both thinking about moving down to az. i'm all for them moving down here. come to azjordan and 'nessa! we'd love to have you.
i was up that night until 4 in the morning trying to finish valentine's stuff for bry, bry's family, and my roommates. sigh. i got 4 hours of sleep. and the next day was going to be a busy day. i had no idea what we were doing. i was just told to be ready by 2 and to bring a jacket. my roommates helped me with what to wear. and then it was all unknown from there.
bry picked me up in the mini and told me that we were going tosedonafor the day! i was so excited. i have never been up there before andleeann had just gone up there the past weekend and gushed about how gorgeous it was. so for the next hour and a half or so we chatted and enjoyed each others company. upon arrival we went to a small market place calledTlaquepaque. There we walked through the small galleries and little shops. we ended up at a place call How Sweet It Is...and i would finish that with ...loved by bryan bluth. lol. we got hot chocolate and picked up licorice caramels for jackie.
so we had some time before sunset. bry of course had a plan. in the back of the mini was a picnic for two! but not just any kind of picnic. it was a picnic of heart shaped peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, martinelli's, and grapes! so cute! it has a back story too (birdie), but you get the picture. i managed to eat my sandwich with a grin across my face. we ate our yummy picnic in the car, then bundled up to watch the sunset on the red rock of sedona. oh my goodness it took my breath away... oh and the sunset was good too.
there watching the sunset we sipped our hot chocolate, took pictures for other couples, had our picture taken, and i almost got knocked over by a woman who lost her footing on the slope. oh and she called me a peanut to her group of friends after apologizing. lol. oh and a guy commented that bry and i could do a coffee ad together with our cups. here are some shots of what that ad may have looked like.
and then... yes there is more. so lucky right. we went to the local theater and bought tickets for confessions of a shopaholic then jumped back in the car to scope out where the restaurant was from the theater. movie-funny. a good pick.
....drum roll... dinner. yum. but... when we pulled into the restaurant parking lot bry said that it was time for my present. i was a little shocked seeing as earlier in the day when he got his present he commented that he was sorry he didn't get me anything. so he said he lied and that he did. first the card. Laughed.."FRRRR!!!" lol. so sweet. carried it with me in my purse since then... then came a black and white polka dotted wrapped box. i was nervous. i had no idea what to expect. i wasn't really expecting anything at all... i was happy with just the super cute wrapping paper (simpleton).
i slowly took off the paper... and under it read a black matte box...."marc by marc jacobs" i almost peed my pants. lol. in my head i'm thinking..."oh my gosh... oh my gosh... oh my gosh..." haha. i finally opened it, after requesting help from bry because i'm obviously opening boxes impaired. and to my delightful surprise its was watch. a totally cute watch! i LOVE it. it was more than i could have asked for. thanks love. he had noticed that i didn't wear one and thought it would be a wonderful idea to get me one.
dinner. food. we love food. bry's parents recommended the place we ate at. they had loved it so much the night they ate there that they went back the next night for some more. it is calleddahl & di luca. it was named the most romantic restaurant in sedona! look out. the menu was mouth watering. bry was having some blood sugar issues and looked like he was going to pass out or something. so we munched on a few gummy bears and took in the scenery. have no fear our waiter Caesar got bry an appetizer asap to help calm the stomach. that of course was only after telling there were all out of the portobello mushrooms. lame. i had the lamb and bry had the fillet. and we topped it off with flour-less chocolate cake and ice cream. mmmmm....
the lamb later we found out should be cooked more than i like my steak.... "you should be ok with it medium...." yeah should have thought twice about that one.
and that was that. we drove home that night. stopping to chat with the cashier at the local chevron. bry had a red bull to stay awake. i did not and therefore fell asleep for about an hour or so. the next morning... i woke up, saw my flowers next to my bed, and sighed. awww. haha.
this is by far the best valentine's day ever. all around best one! thanks bry! here is a picture of the v day stuff i put together for his family. we had borrowed a few vases for a previous valentine's day celebration the last weekend (birdie). i could just return them without anything in them...so here is the idea i came up with. there were also valentine boxes filled with lip and heart sugar cookies. yum.
Hey! I'm Jen. Welcome to a place for me to dump whatever is on my mind, whenever I get a spare second to do so.
I've been told that I'm a jack of all trades, but master of none. lol. I grew up in sunny southern California and later studied Early Childhood Education at Brigham Young University. I graduated in 2008 and taught Kinder and First grade for 6 years before staying at home with the littles.
Bryan and I were married in the Newport Beach LDS Temple in November of 2009. We had some ups and downs with starting our family and later welcomed William in 2013. We added to the bunch with Winston in 2015. We have made our home in Arizona and are making the most of life.
