Z Sisterz Update

RACHEL

 

Last Week:

• Took Tuesday off and had a great day hanging out at home.  
• Pulled out every single item of Ken's clothes, had him try on each one, sorted into keep, mend, or pack away. It was a really fun project!  He's lost weight so he has a grand total of 4 dress shirts and only 1 pair of jeans that fit right now.  I have a list of the needs in each category of the wardrobe and now need to go fill them!
• Costco run.  
• Client meeting on Thursday.  
• Had my car detailed on Thursday as a bday gift from Ken.  It's so clean!
• Dinner with CZ and Jill at The Rio on Thursday evening.  So fun to get together.  That restaurant is good.
• Pack and drive down to NC on Friday.  Lunch at Chick Fil A.  Annee made Banana Cream Pie cupcakes per my request and they were SO good!!
• Friday evening we went to Anthro so Summer could get some items via CZ.  Then we ate a snack at Cheesecake Factory. 
• Saturday we made tons of progress buying decoration items I need for the Trunk or Treat.  We snagged the last spooky tree from Michaels.  Thanks to Summer's couponing I got it all for 75% off!
• Sunday I got to go running and we had a nice Sunday dinner.  We crafted away in the evening.  I love my felt garland!

 This Week:

• Finish off the tombstones and table top displays.  The coffin is lifesize so maybe we'll put that in the photo backdrop area.  I know, we're doing more than we need to, but it's really fun for me so who cares.
• Full-day training in the office on Wednesday.
• Friday is the last Truckeroo of the year.  Looking forward to trying out some of the new foodtrucks.
• Hopefully hear back about Ken's job interview.  The HR person was out of town all last week.  
• Run and craft every night.  
• BYU game on Friday night.
• Halloween party setup on Saturday.  I think we'll go as Jelly Belly bags.
• Defrost the turkey and cook it Sunday afternoon.  
• Visit teach both girls Sunday afternoon.
• Bake a pumpkin treat.  

SARAH

Last Week:

• Spent a day and a half moping around before I finally kicked it into gear and got my work project done. The black cloud disappeared at that point so I could finally think about and do other things.
• Did lots of yardwork out front. Still tons to do out back before our last green can pickup this week.
• The kids were on Fall Break Wednesday, Thursday & Friday. We didn't go away anywhere, so tried to do some other fun activities around home.
• I took Brenden bike riding to American Fork, Eagle Mountain, and Park City dirt jump parks. In Eagle Mountain we had a sad experience where not only did Brenden fall and hurt his hand so he couldn't ride for a few days (xrays showed nothing), but someone stole his GoPro camera that he'd left on a nearby picnic table. Brenden was quite upset and had a good idea of who had taken it, so we reported it to the police although didn't have too much hope it'd do any good. At 9:30pm that night the police officer called to say they'd found the kid who confessed to taking the camera and had gotten it back. Amazing to see the system work like that!
• I attribute my ravenous appetite to being pregnant, yet pair that with ingrained bad eating habits means I am definitely on the upswing of the weight pendulum right now. I don't mind the new-found cleavage, but had to pull out my box of transition clothes much sooner than I should have.
• Made a great cream of butternut squash soup and served it in bread bowls - Brenden and I were the only ones who ate it but we thought it was delicious.
• Went to the movies with Scott for the first time in about a year. Saw Moneyball - very good - and ate buffalo wings at Wingers. 
• Had Kelsey come over to bbsit on Monday when I had a number of back-to-back meetings. Thinking I should make that a regular weekly thing. She's great.
• Made my first couple christmas shopping purchases! I'm on my way. Need to come up with a plan, though, and not just purchase indiscriminately.

This Week:

• It's probably about time I do something about my hair. I have no idea what, though. Seems like every haircut ends up being the same no matter how new or different I think we're making it - all because I can't or don't take the time to fix it properly - or more likely actually don't know how to fix it properly.
• Prepare Halloween costumes - Huck & June are set and somehow miraculously June hasn't wavered since the original choice to be a BYU cheerleader (which then pairs well with Huck's BYU football player). Oli says he wants to be a nerd, so we'll head to DI to find a good getup. Brenden is at a loss still.
• Attend Brenden's school play - Shakespeare's Tempest. He's doing 8 performances over 2 days - probably we don't need to go to all of them, right?
• Oliver's Pinewood Derby is on Wednesday. Scott helped him finish his car today. He's hoping for awards in both speed and design.
• Attempt to cook Vietnamese Pho - I bought some paste to make the broth and Virimicelli noodles at a local Asian market so I'm hoping it's not too hard beyond that.

ANA

Last few weeks

• Had a baby! A whopping 9lbs after 18 hours of labor, and 2 epidurals. I don't think Jack hit 9lbs till he was 2 months old.
• Between my doctors visits and Will's doctors visits we have had 7 doctors appointments in the last 2 weeks.  It's been a much harder recovery this time around.
• Found my feet again.  They may still not be pretty but man alive are they skinny.  Maybe the rest of me will follow their example someday :)
• Trying to figure out how to manage a newborn, a 6 year old and work.  I made my first work calls in the hospital when William was 1 day old.  I miss maternity leave.
• Unbelievable gratitude for my blessings and all it's taken to bring this baby into the world healthy.

This week

• Convince William to sleep in his bassinet not on my chest
• Work...my busy week is fast approaching
• Get Jacks Halloween costume ready.  I tried to convince him to let us buy one this year but no dice.
• Sleep.  Ha. 

IE LI

Last Week:

• Preschool parent meeting.
• Checked out books from the library.
• Ie Ling got engaged to Blake!  Looks like we'll be in Los Angeles over Christmas break for the wedding.  I've been busy searching for wedding attire.
• Ran three times, including an 8 miler on Saturday.  I think I might need a hip replacement someday.
• We went on a fall drive.  We didn't get very far into the Shenandoah Valley before we had to turn back, but we did get to stop at a local park and play for a while.  I'm hoping we'll have another opportunity for a longer drive soon.
• Our ward trunk or treat.  Mei was Snow White, Stephen was Spider Man, Mi Na was a ballerina.  They looked awfully cute.Stephen preferred handing out the candy rather than collecting it.  Mei Li was timid about collecting candy, worried that she wasn't supposed to go to the same car twice.
• Had a relaxing Sunday, minus the whole copier fiasco in the library.  After dinner, we all walked to the field and played there until dark.  

This Week:

• Endure Steve's absence for a couple of days.
• Clean, clean, clean.
• Run, run, run.
• Bring dinner to my friend who just had a baby boy.
• Aside from running, I'm hoping to incorporate yoga and pilates into my routine.
• Visiting teaching.
• Halloween parade at Stephen's preschool.
• Go on a date with Steve.

ANNEE

Last Week:

• Substitute taught on three days.  That is really pushing the limit for me.  It's awesome to be in demand at the school, and it's awesome to have my ideal part-time job.  But when I sub three or more times per week, next to nothing gets done at the house.  By Friday many things were on the very brink of chaos.  Also when I sub, it makes it really hard to run.  I come home with the kids, and once they are all home, it's really hard for me to up-and-leave when my presence is so essential.  By the second day in a row of not running I was getting a bit cranky.  I decided to pack running clothes with me to school.  At the end of the day, I changed into the running clothes and ran the seven miles back home.  It was perfect.  
• One of the two days I wasn't working was a half-day.  By noon all the kids were back home again!  I think in the three hours they were gone I managed to run, do the dishes!  Not nearly enough to make me feel like Wednesday was productive at all!
• I finally executed my Halloween front porch decorations.  I've had this idea since October 1st.  Black painted branches, stuck into pumpkins with black crows clipped to the branches.  It's awesome.  I'm sad it too me so long to execute, but so glad that I didn't give up on the idea!  I'll post pictures soon.
• Thursday we got the kids out of school early and took them to the State Fair.  We bought so much fried food we should be embarrassed.  But we weren't.  As we were leaving, we discovered that I had exactly $5 left in my back pocket.  We stopped at just-one-more stand to see what fried item they had on their menu that we hadn't tried yet that was $5 exactly.  Henry tried exactly one too many fried items.  He woke up Friday morning sick to his stomach.  The 12 inches of fried cookies dough was determined to be the main culprit.  Live and learn! 
• Hosted the grand meeting of friends!  It was so great.  It just so happens that I am exactly half way in-between Summer, CZ and Rachel.  It just so happens that Summer was due a momcation, and hadn't seen CZ and Rachel in too long.  They all arrived about 6pm on Friday.  We kicked the weekend off with a whirlwind stop at Anthropologie before it closed at 9, followed by a three hour sojourn at the Cheesecake Factory.  It was too much fun!  I hope these girls need a half-way meeting point again sometime before we leave.
• Started the Hermione costume.  It's SO CLOSE TO BEING DONE.  But it's not done.  And I'm soooo tired.  When will everything get done?!  

This Week:

• Monday, said "good-bye" to our company and prepared to go on my final, longest, marathon training run.  The goal was 22 miles.  I should have settled on 20.  Right at 20 the outer edge of my right knee started having that old familiar shooting pain that caused me to drop out of the last marathon I ran four years ago.  I am going to hope that new shoes will be a good enough solution for now.  I am running this marathon!
• Tuesday, Henry is turning 12!  We have gathered a few gifts, but after sending him off to school, I need to go find the last two.  He wants to have dinner at Chili's, and come back home for the famous chocolate chip cookie dough filled cupcakes!  So I'll be doing lots of baking tomorrow too.  
• Wednesday, finish sewing Ruby's Halloween costume.  I won't do anything else on Wednesday until it's done!
• Thursday, stop by some thrift shops and find George's Halloween costume.  I won't do anything else until I have all the pieces I need for it!  At 2pm I have another massage scheduled.  I can't wait!  I can't wait!  I can't wait!  Thursday night, host book club!  We read Frankenstein (or I will have read Frankenstein by Thursday)!
• At some point before Friday make Henry's costume.  At least it doesn't involve any sewing.  Just crafting.  Maybe this can get moved over to Darin's list for the week.
• Friday, set-up the ward trunk-or-treat party in the morning.  Then fly over to the kids school to host one of the game stations at Ruby's class party, while hopefully sending Darin over to Jane's class to participate in her class party.  Fly home to get everyone dressed and ready for the ward party.  Somewhere in that day make a pot of chili and clean out the trunk in the van!  Then rush to the church for the big event!  Which hopefully will go off without a hitch.  I think Friday won't be very fun.  
• Saturday we've been invited to a family Halloween party.  Hopefully we'll be sleeping in and doing nothing for most of the day.  And hopefully since I won't be in charge of a single thing, the Halloween party on Saturday night will be a lot more fun than the Halloween party on Friday night!  
• Make hotel reservations for the marathon!
• Dream about sewing anything other than Halloween costumes!
• In the back of my mind I'm carrying around the idea of a fall foliage Christmas card photo.  We waited too long last year, and we had to just be standing on top of a bunch of fallen leave, but the trees in the background were bare.  Every time I see another leave hit the ground, a little panic button is triggered inside of me!  
• Order new running shoes to get here in time for another weekend run!
• Dream about falling asleep on Monday night and waking up on Sunday morning with everything behind me!