Adult Advice

There are a few things I have learned in my few short years of adulthood and I just want to share them. I'm no God, I don't know everything and i'm far from perfect but there are things that help me stay happier.

1) Going the extra mile will probably give you blisters and make you sore the next morning. Sometimes it's okay to call it quits. Like today, it was Monday. By noon thirty today Olive had already pulled out every pot, pan, cookie sheet, bowl and anything else you can think of out of my kitchen drawers. She had exhausted every toy she had, she was sick of her string cheese (which she worships) and is teething (I think/am praying that this madness has an end) Instead of coming up with something creative or bundling up to go play outside I went into survival mode. I stopped trying to clean up after her, decided that we were having frozen dinners from Costco and that I would crack open a Pepsi even though I usually only treat myself on Weekends. Going the extra mile is only for certain days, like Friday.

2) Over the counter medications work. Certain people are always saying that we take too many medications, that it's all in our head...yada yada yada. Well I'm here to tell you that if you have a headache just take the dang pill. Why do we try to fend off a headache all day when the first 15 minutes of our day we can cure it? They work, take the pill.

3) Fake it until you make it-if you aren't feeling happy, fake it. If you're tired, fake it. I found that if I pretend than suddenly I'm actually feeling the way i'm "faking."

4) Eat Vegetables. They help keep you regular, we all need that.

5) Someone is happy with less than what you have. It's true. Don't think about this one too hard otherwise it can get depressing. Be grateful.

6) If a hair tie won't go around your hair 3 times throw it away. It's useless. Invest in good ponytails.

7) Just when you think you are done with dishes you are not. Turn around, there are still pots on the stove.

8) Home is where the ugly is. Really though, you should be able to be ugly/not get ready and feel comfortable. Refer back to today when Olive and I were still in our pajamas at 4:00pm.

9) Dance. I've tried really hard the past two weeks to not let a day go by that we don't have a minute dance party. Glen is sometimes home and sometimes he isn't but dancing really can change your day, plus you can pretend you already exercised for the day (high five!)

10) Stressed spelled backwards is desserts. It's not a coincidence people. Eat more dessert, period.

11) "Nothing haunts you like the things you didn't buy." Treat yo self every once and a while. It's good for the soul to splurge every so often. But not too often because that results in other issues.

12) Keep it simple. Keep it honest. Keep it real.

Wouldn't be a blog post without Olive posing.

RIP Warm Weather

Mother Nature is a total brat. We went from 69* to 34* in one day! ONE DAY! She wasn't even nice enough to slowly ease us in. Every single time it gets cold I kick myself for not taking advantage of the warm weather when I should have. Olive and I attempted to bundle up and play outside but that only lasted 8 minutes. Mostly because i'm a baby and I made Olive come inside with me. I love when I bundle her up. Too much poof for not enough baby! Christmas story kid right here friends! It's hilarious, especially when she can't get back up. "Help I've fallen and I can't get back up!" I laugh and then she screams so I help her up. All this chilly weather means two things. 1) Christmas Decor is up 2) Starbucks will be getting too much money from the Bennions. (I feel like the Lego movie dude. I've never been happier to pay 20$ for a cup of delicious!)

 With this beanie she looks borderline homeless!

We try to stay busy inside but all my tricks are usually used up by 7:30 am. Olives favorite things to do is to destroy my house along with my sanity. She's a pro. She recently is obsessed with climbing in drawers, cupboards, boxes, closets and of course the dishwasher. I swear she is half feline.

P.S. I swear that shirt isn't the only one she owns. For some reason every picture I happen to take she's wearing it! 

The "Take too Many Pictures Mom"

I'm going to be one. You know, "those" moms! The moms that are always in their kids faces with a camera. I finally saved for a couple months, splurged and bought myself a nice camera. I was tired of using my point and shoot and wishing I could capture a better picture. I love my baby. I love Olive too but my camera baby is precious also. So far the picture taking of Olive has started rough. By the time it's in focus and I get the light right Olive has already swatted at my camera leaving slobbery fingerprints down my lens. Twice. Twice that has happened, I've only owned the camera for 4 days so ya it's rough. She's just really fast. To get back at her i've been taking naked pictures of her to show her friends once she's in grade school, so yah Olive, back off girl! I'm excited to start having a nice blog with nice pictures. So everyone shout "hooray" cause from here on out it only gets better. (Insert blog post written 5 months from now saying "I'm the worst blogger ever!" here)

Here are a few of my "figuring out my camera" pics! Some are decent and others..not so much! We went out to this awesome tree farm or something or other and took some pictures in the leaves. I'm still learning but I love taking a picture and being happy the way it looks!

 Olive's ballerina pose!

 Baldie!

 She's like my cat, loves boxes!

 Little pirate. Aren't you proud i'm teaching her good oral hygiene. 

 My boo!

 This is concerned olive.

Olive thinks it's too early to have a Xmas tree up so she has been underrating it all week.

 Daddy and Olive playing in the leaves. We love him!

 Walking like a champ.

 Love you boo boo!

 Good little tree climber, it's ok you guys, glen was ready to catch her.

Successful week full of random pictures and a decent walk in the park!

Blog Smog

Well here I am again ready to give another two months worth of fun in one blog post. I'm pitiful really, and terribly inconsistent in my blogging. Apparently i'm not the only one saying "Where the hell did September and October go?" Several people have made comments about Sept and Oct going by fast but seriously, I don't know what happened but suddenly they vanished into thin air, i'm so glad. So here is our lives through September and October in "Yakistan", as we like to call it. This post is long but mostly because it's pictures :)

September was birth to Olives first plane ride. I was nervous about flying with her, especially because I was doing it alone and all she wanted to do was crawl and rip through everything. Our first little trip from Yakima to SEATAC was cake, she slept the whole way in her carseat happy as a clam. From SEATAC to SLC was a different story, sorry fellow passengers for your ear drums. But at least she's cute right? Luckily we made friends with a kind Gent next to us and he held her and played with her so that helped the ride. She finally fell asleep on my lap 15 minutes before we landed, great. But we made it there in one piece with only a small amount of puke on my shirt and a small poop stain on my pants. My mom was so happy to see her, she ran up a grabbed her from me and spent the next 20 minutes telling Olive how much she missed her. Yep, i'm chopped liver now. No one can compete with Olive. We spent a fabulous week with no sleep in Mapleton playing with the Harlan's.

 Olives first plane ride, doesn't she look excited?

 We stopped by and held our new cousin Baby Brooke's. He is precious and a handsome chap! He's not pictured but our cousin Blaire is!

Olive also got to play with her 2nd cousin Eliza. Olive was a bit too rough, she kept screaming and trying to roll over on poor Eliza. It kept me amused. 

 We were able to be in town for our good friend Esme's baby blessing and had an amazing time eating food up the canyon! Nothing better than food, oh and friends!

 We were glad to see Great Grandpa Neal and Grammy!

Olive Loves Gramma Trina

Later in the week we headed up to Idaho Falls for Katee (Glen's Sister) wedding, the whole point of this madness of a trip! We stopped at the Zolmans in Brigham City on our way! Love you kids!

We arrived at about 1am. No thanks to our car top carrier that made me believe that car-planes are somewhere in the near future. It felt like we were taking off and landing over and over again. Fun, right? Glen left right after school and drove all night and met us there about 3am. We had plans for the temple to next morning. I woke up a few hours later to hear Glen puking in the bathroom. The poor man drank 4 Mountain Dews, a bag of spicy hot cheetos, sour path kids, and a pizza pocket for dinner. A man truly of my desires, however, he's not 16 anymore and can't handle it. After a few hours of that nonsense we made it to the temple and it was lovely! 

Love ya Glen, you look decent even after puking all morning!!

The next day we went to the temple and watched Katee and Mike get married for time and all eternity. It made me a bit emotional thinking about how amazing families are and how grateful I am for mine. We mostly took pictures all day and set up for the reception and then danced,  played, and ate all night!

 Olives Bennion cousins!

 All the Bennions!

 Grandma Nae Nae and her grandbabies!

 Glen and his sissy's!

 Sometimes how I feel about fussy babies.

 The Harlan's even came and celebrated! 

Our Friend McKenna went with Olive and I to Bills Berry Farm. We put on our boots and flannel and drove about 45 minute drive to the middle of nowhere...well except to Bills Berry Farm so I guess it was somewhere. We ate carmel apples, donuts, and hamburgers. We then enjoyed 5 hay bale rides (we kept forgetting things at the car). We watched fresh apple cider being pressed and then did a corn maze. The corn maze was awesome except after 45 minutes and a little sweat we started getting nervous, we ended up at the beginning again and asked the lady to steer us towards the exit, apparently the entrance and exit are the same. Wished they would've told us that before we wandered around for an extra 30 minutes. It was a perfect day to ring in Fall weather. 

We headed to Seattle to go to Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium! It was a fun day filled with animals and very tired moms at the end! Thanks Liz for the fun day!

 Olive loved the aquarium glass!

 That's a big walrus! (that's what she sai...nevermind.)

Polar bears are huge.

We had a perfect day at The Castle Playground. Most people wouldn't blog about a dumb day at the park but when your husband is in Medical School we live for these few hours when we get him to ourselves, no school talk, just fun. 

 Olive loves to swing!

Love my Boo!

My cutest little sister came out and kept Olive and I busy! We picked her up from her friend in Portland (she came bearing gifts-Voodoo donuts!) We took her home to Yakima with us where we shopped for a few days, watched movies and TV and then headed To Olympia to see our cousin Renae. The next morning we dropped her off at the airport, it was so sad to say goodbye. I wanted to cry. Glen, Olive and I took on Seattle that day. It was nice to show Glen around a few of the places I knew :) The pier was under construction (new seawall) so Ivers is going to have to wait. We did Pikes Place, the gum wall and of course we did some shopping! Hello Seattle. Goodbye Seattle.

 Dinner in Olympia!

 Olive loves pastries just like her Dad!

 She's happy to be living in the NW.

 Love my bae.

I threw Glen a little Birthday party! Happy 27th babe! We had a good time playing games and laughing with some of our friends! +Our friends know how to do Halloween cause check some of these costumes out!

 Baseball, typical Jared.

 Jack and Jill.

 Leslie Knope and Ron Swanson.

 Cops and robbers!

Our family costumes this year were successful to say the least + it kept me busy for a few days :) Olive enjoyed our Ward Trunk-or-Treat, I think I enjoyed it even more. Jimmy Kimmel would be proud cause I truly ate all of Olives candy in one night!

 Christopher Robin, Piglet and Pooh in the Hundred Acre Wood. Glen says "Wow the Hundred Acre Wood is really just 100 acres of trees." I married a smart man friends. Yes he's going to be a doctor.

 Halloween Day we headed up to a Cabin on Clear Lake with a few families from our ward. It was so fun and cozy! We had good food and learned a new board game. We even took the canoe out the next morning with Olive, she pooped and cried so my Pocahontas dream only lived for 5 minutes. But hey, it lived.

Our creepy food man!

Bring it on November!!!