Things I'm loving

• The fact that my dad emailed this to me yesterday. He has sent me many serious Manti Te'o and gun control articles this month and I was totally expecting it to be a serious interview. So awesome.

• Another awesome thing is this blog post called Drops of Awesome.
• Jack, who won't get out of his crib unless I grab his jungle animals off of the bookshelf and then help him get them all into his arms at the same time. If the gorilla, giraffe, elephant, and teddy bear are not all in his arms at the same time, then a mini fit commences but honestly, helping him get his animals all under his short little wingspan is a lot easier than forcing breakfast through his glued-tight lips, so this has become a little breakfast procrastinating routine of ours.

I win, Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton's Kelly Clarkson photo bomb has nothing on mine:

I would like to give a personal shout out to Bill Clinton in case he stalks my blog: Thank you for giving me an excuse to resurface this 6 year old picture that I am so proud of. It is my goal in life to make sure that nobody forgets the time that my extremely excited face made it onto all of the Kelly Clarkson gossip websites.

On a not-as-significant side note: one time my dad and brother almost photo bombed a picture with Steve Nash, but their faces are so small that it is hardly worth bragging about.

And that is the extent of my family's claim to fame.

Weekend

Our weekend was was a simple one. We helped supervise youth conference, we survived the flu, we played lots of the card game "speed", we went to the zoo, and we attempted to feed Jack. (He's on a food strike again. HELP ME!!!)

Goals this week: Get something besides oatmeal down Jack's throat and learn this dance at the gym without falling off the treadmill and humiliating myself.

Pros and cons of insignificant matters

1. It is snowing in Birmingham today.

Pros: SNOW DAY!!! Apparently the people of Birmingham are not equipped to handle snow that barely even sticks to the ground. Spencer's classes were canceled! Businesses shut down! I love Birmingham's attitude toward snow.

Cons: It is snowing in Birmingham today and I am cold. It took Spencer 2 hours to get home from campus today when it usually takes him 10 minutes. He said people left work and school all at the same time because the snow started falling so the traffic was horrible plus people were sliding off the road or just abandoning their cars in the middle of the highway in the middle of the road. Crazy people. It was just a little slush!

2. My grocery store gave me 47 cents to take 2 jugs of grapefruit juice, 5 lbs of grapefruit, and a grapefruit knife.

Pros: I experienced a couponing "high" again. It's seriously so fun.

Cons: The free grapefruit was not as good as the free grapefruit on my parent's grapefruit tree.

3. I visited meetup.com to find more playgroups for me Jack. I also attended a "Fun and Fit" class at the library today with Jack.

Pros: I am interacting with actual adult human beings.

Cons: Spencer's reaction when he found out that I actually went to meetup.com to find friends. I also had a this is seriously my life right now?! moment at Fun and Fit when I was doing "choo choo", "airplane", "helicopter" and "sparkle star" exercises that were supposedly burning calories?

Result: I applied for three jobs this week.

AZ, one week later

I was in Arizona just long enough to realize how dumb I was to ever leave. I had no idea that life with a baby could be so easy but with perfect weather, with my hyperactive siblings who entertained and wore out Jack everyday, with my parents who watched Jack while I exercised and got ready for the day and took naps in the afternoon, with wide open space to play in at my parent's house, with friends' babies to play with, and with bobas anytime I wanted, life was pretty amazing. Jack was in heaven all week long.

And now, in no particular order, a (most likely boring to you but not to me) list of things we did in AZ with a ridiculous amount of pictures to go with it:

• Jack went on a date with baby Kelsie. Rumor has it she has lots of AZ boyfriends so we tried to win her over with bobas. 

• We played outside a lot

• I went running in the mornings and we went on walks. **Running tangent** I can never decide if I enjoy running in AZ or not. I love that my mom watches Jack while I go and I love that keeping track of milage is easy, but I get so bored on the long flat straightaways. However, it was definitely more enjoyable than the two times I attempted to run in high altitude, snowy Utah.

We went to the back of Alicia's house to see her new puppy and it almost convinced me that I wanted a dog. Almost.

• We went to the zoo. 

Out of all of the awesome animals at the zoo, Jack loved the goats and chasing the pigeons the best.

I'm pretty sure Jack is making a goat face right here.

• We went to Freestone Park. I was a little disappointed though because last time we went back in March, we we witnessed a wedding and a proposal all in one five minute train ride. It was impossible to beat that excitement and drama. 

• We went on a tiny, maybe two mile hike and I was so so sore the next day because that baby carrier was a lot more difficult to carry than I thought it would be.

• I got to see a lot of friends and two of them had their babies less than a week after I saw them!

Hawaii, Alabama, and England friends reunited for the first time in a long long time.

• When I was little, I would stand on my dad's hands all of the time. Now, Jack is standing on my dad's hands and I really hope he appreciates it because Isaac's children will not have that opportunity as my dad will most likely be in a wheelchair by then.

 

• Since we didn't dance enough in Utah, we made up for it in Arizona. Here, Elizabeth is attempting the moon walk and she thought baggies on her feet would improve her dance skills.

The end.
 

Things I'm loving

• W's advice on flying with a baby (ha!)
• The article, DIY is full of danger: a cautionary tale. My mom and I laughed about this for a while because something like that would so happen to us.
• Trader Joe's Sea Salt Butterscotch Caramels. I have never fully understood nor jumped on the Trader Joe's bandwagon, but I ate a whole package of this heavenly goodness in two days. They are extremely good.

• Diary of a Wimpy Kid 3. It is almost as good and as funny as the first one, and since the first one is on my top three favorite non-Disney movies, (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Inception, and While You Were Sleeping in case you were wondering) this one is pretty far up there on my list as well. Spencer and I have recommended Diary of a Wimpy Kid to many people who don't like it that much. If you are one of those people, clearly you have no sense of humor and please don't tell me you don't like it because I will not like you as much as I used to. 

• This baby

Home

Jack and I survived our flight (even with the stops in Albuquerque and Dallas) and joined Spencer in Alabama yesterday, but I think we all have post vacation depression over here. Our apartment is a wreck and I believe Jack thinks our little apartment is a prison compared to sunny Arizona at my parents' house (more on AZ later). He has been standing at our front door and crying all day long.

I will hopefully be spending the rest of the week organizing, cleaning, grocery shopping, doing laundry, starting a couple of online classes to renew my teaching license, convincing my mom to talk to me for at least five hours a day, and trying to entertain a 13-month-old who thinks Elizabeth and Isaac, my siblings, are way cooler and funnier and more fun than I am. He is so bored of me already.

I am extremely grateful for Bryce and Aubrie's wedding, for Spencer's parents, for my parents, for our Christmas Eve reunion with the Sheets family, for Spencer's once-a-year-willingness-to-dance, and for JCPenny's Christmas button promotion (we won over $300 in store credit, our Christmas miracle) that made the holidays extra special and memorable this year.

Now back to real life. 

Utah wrap up

The rest of Utah, in no particular order:

We went to Logan again last weekend for my cousin's wedding. We got to hang out and stay with my bro-in-law, Bryce, and brand new sis-in-law, Aubrie. Out of Aggie moral obligation, we ate Aggie Ice Cream (Papa and Grandma's treat!) even though we were beyond sugared out from Christmas.


I got Lemon Custard and Praline Pecan because they are the best flavors ever.

I took a picture of this picture at my grandparent's house and I'm not even sure how Jack is my child because I looked so different from him as a toddler...

We stayed at my Grandma Wirthlin's for Christmas with my family and her house has lots of fun things. My dad taught me and Elizabeth how to use a type writer.

 



Grandma Wirthlin made her famous and delicious Au Gratin potatoes. The secret is lots of butter, heavy cream, and cheese.
 
Four generations picture:
 
I will now proceed to the "Jack in the snow" section of this post. He loved the snow almost as much as I hated it.










And now the "other people in the snow" section...







We visited Grandpa Hall, who Jack was named after. I think Grandpa Hall looks like Carl Fredricksen from the movie Up.
 
By the way, my nephew makes the cutest facial expressions:

Jack's favorite thing to do at my inlaw's house was to dance under the piano while Spencer played Jon Schmidt music. (See how I sneakily implied that Spencer has amazing piano playing skills without actually bragging about his freaking amazing piano playing skills!?)
 
I got to eat Costco's Jalepeno Artichoke dip on Christmas Eve, which I had been craving for approximately 8 months. The 100 calories in every bite was totally worth it.
 
Here was the Wirthlin/Sheet Christmas Eve party about 10 years ago...
 
The WorthSh** Wirthlin/Sheet Christmas Eve party has grown a bit in 10 years. In case you haven't noticed, my sister's goal in life is to ruin every picture.
 
My mom's dollar store  infinity scarves and Christmas ties tied our Christmas jamies all in quite nicely.




 
Christmas morning:


Skyping James:

Awesome WAC Tournament sweat bands my Grandparents gave us for Christmas:
                  
And that is all. I'm really sorry there weren't enough pictures in this post. ;lkj