well, it's true. tyler and i are going to have a baby! i'm 13 weeks now; baby is due late april.

we've been married for 3 years and for me this has been a perfect amount of time without any pregnancy/kids. we've been able to spend so much time just with each other - learning who we are and how to make each other happy. since i've been pregnant i've been a horrible wife. i can't stand to go in the kitchen so i don't make dinners anymore and i can't stand the sight and smell of dirtiness so i don't clean very much either. i always feel like i'm going to puke which surprisingly to me makes cuddling and touching pretty much impossible too. so i am so thankful i had those three years with tyler to be a really good wife. we also went on a lot of adventures together - living in arizona and texas, road trips, and cabin vacations - which i could see being really difficult with kids. i knew once we had kids things would change a lot and the last thing i wanted was to resent my pregnancy or my kids.

yes, i realize that i'm 28 now and no spring chicken, but my growing age never really pushed me to get pregnant earlier either. having kids absolutely terrifies me. i know i'm totally naive about it all, but i do know that it will be extremely hard and it never stops. i'm not the most energy-filled person. i love my breaks. i'm a dinner and a movie kind of girl; an ideal friday night is watching a movie on the couch with my husband. and i know being a mom will require endless amounts of energy. the responsibility is daunting too. i want to have smart, disciplined children that are strong members of the church and i know that will not be easy. i also wanted to have good experiences as my foundation before i tried to be a good mother so i'm really glad i was able to serve a mission and be a teacher for three years before having a family.

but i have always really wanted a family of my own, so here we are. we started trying to get pregnant in june. when i took the test in late august and saw the results, several different emotions flooded through me. my first reaction was gratitude. i have a lot of friends and family who have been trying for a long time with no success and i thought that would be me too. also, i'm pretty convinced that i have endometriosis. i've never been diagnosed but i have all the symptoms to a t, so when we were trying, i wasn't very hopeful. after i felt gratitude, i did have a moment of, "oh crap. what did i just do???" that feeling surprised me, but i think it's legit. this a life-altering, permanent change so, yes, it scared me a little. after that i just felt excited, mixed in with a bit of nervousness now and then.

i'd say my first trimester was pretty typical: a lot of nausea from morning to night, no throwing up but some dry heaves, strong food aversions (pretty much anything home-made), food cravings (pretty much anything fast food - especially subway and french fries), weight gain (8 lbs-all my pants are already a no-go), heightened sense of smell (i've been buying a lot of air fresheners), headaches, and exhaustion. i haven't experienced frequent bathroom breaks or moodiness...yet. just this last week i started to feel a little better. i don't feel as nauseous but i'm constantly hungry so i still eat a lot. i show a little bit in tight clothes but it mostly just looks like i just ate a cafe rio burrito.

i am really excited and really grateful to be pregnant. there is no greater calling than being a mother and while the depth of that scares me, i'm also excited to grow closer to heavenly father by taking care of his children. i'm happy with how my life's gone up to this point and i think there are good things to come.

i just made pumpkin coconut soup from justcookalready (compliments of jenna vela) for the third time and am wondering why i don't make it every day. tyler and i would both agree that this is the best thing i've ever made. it's sooo good! although it's still 90 degrees and green here in florida, i had to make soup today so i could feel like it was fall. i just have to keep telling myself that i will be so thankful for this weather come january. i wanted to include the recipe so you can make it. seriously, you won't be disappointed.

pumpkin coconut soup

ingredients

5 tbsp. olive oil

1 medium sized yellow onion

3 cloves minced garlic

1 inch grated fresh ginger

1 tsp. ground cumin

1 tbsp. chicken base or  2 bouillon cubes

3 cups chicken broth

1 can cooked chicken (or you can use 2 chicken breasts... but canned chicken is easier and tastes better in this recipe)

1/2 butternut squash, peeled and cut into cubes

1 15 oz. can pumpkin puree

1 14 oz. can coconut  milk

2 tsp. salt (more to taste if you'd like)

1-2 tsp. pepper

1/4 bunch fresh cilantro

directions

1. preheat oven to 425 degrees.

 

2. chop the onion into small, even pieces and grate the ginger with a fine grater.  in a large stock pot, add 2 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. once the oil has heated, add the chopped onion, ginger, and minced garlic to the oil and stir.  cook for about 5-7 minutes until the onion is mostly cooked through (it will be translucent).

3. while that's cooking, peel your butternut squash and take 1/2 of it and cut into about 1/2 inch cubes.  in a small glass pyrex dish, add the cubed squash and pour 3 tbsp. olive oil over top. add a sprinkle of salt and pepper. mix together so that all the cubes are coated in the olive oil. make sure the pieces of squash are in one layer (no overlapping) so that they can cook evenly.  bake in your oven for 25 minutes.

4. By this point, your onions, ginger, and garlic should be ready.  add 1 tsp. ground cumin and stir, allowing the cumin to get all toasty and fragrant, about 1-2 minutes. 

5. add pumpkin puree, coconut milk, chicken base, chicken stock, and drained canned chicken (or chicken breast). if you're using chicken breast, cook over medium heat in a skillet with a few tablespoons of olive oil. cut into small pieces. add to the soup once cooked through) stir together and mix completely.  up the heat JUST A TAD so that you can bring the soup to a simmer.  add 2 tsp. salt and 1 tsp. pepper (again, you can add more after this if you'd like.  depends on your taste buds.  mine ask for salt). allow to simmer for 25 minutes so that everything heats through and the chicken becomes very tender.

6. when your squash is done, remove from the glass dish, making sure to drain away any access oil, and add to the soup.  allow to simmer and cook for about 10 more minutes.

7. take a bunch of cilantro and rinse it, shaking it well afterwards in the sink.  remove the leaves from the stem and give it a rough chop.  when the soup is finished, dish into a bowl and add the cilantro leaves.  a squeeze of lime wouldn't hurt.

makes 3 large bowls or 4 smaller bowls

here are a few changes i make: 

* i use 2 cans of chicken instead of 1. if you like a lot of meat in your dishes, use 2 or perhaps 1 1/2. i didn't think 1 was enough.

* i actually skip the butternut squash altogether. the first time i made it, the squash was really hard for me to peel and took a long time to prepare. i found that it adds great texture to the soup but not a lot of taste. so for me, the added texture isn't worth the struggle and time.

* sometimes the store is out of fresh ginger, so i'll use 1/2 T dried ginger instead. fresh ginger is better, but dried ginger works too. 

 

ok now, try this recipe. it's so perfect for fall and winter and will make you so happy.
 

i got a job! whew, finally. it took me over 100 applications and six weeks of daily applying. i never thought it would be so hard. i'm basically an office assistant for a legal service company. i mostly process serves. i have no experience with law so i wasn't sure that i would get it, but for what i do, experience isn't really necessary. it's perfect for me though. it's relaxing, i get to sit down and go at my own pace, but the work volume is really high so i'm constantly busy and the time goes by fast. i'm so thankful it worked out. we fasted for just that one purpose this month and two days later is when i got called for the interview. it was the only interview i was even offered for all 100+ applications.

the weather's really awesome here; don't get me wrong. but i am feeling really homesick for fall. i love fall so much - just until december when all life dies - and there is no fall here. it feels like summer all year here. i miss utah more than i thought i would. but i always do get more homesick than i think i will whenever i move. it'll probably just take a few months and i'll get over it. probably right around jan/feb when i usually hate life in utah, i'll be liking the 70 degree temps here.

tyler's still working really hard in med school. he likes all of his classes except biochemistry. he studies all the time, usually until 10 p.m. and sometimes gets up at 5:30 to study before his 8-hour block of classes. now that i'm working until 6 p.m. too we never see each other.

well, life's good and i'm starting to get a little more comfortable with being here. i'm just really thankful for all the answered prayers.

here are a few things that i've been up to lately...

painting furniture

 frames

 pots

 chairs

 and mirrors

i mostly just work on our house all day and i'm really liking how it's turning out. it is nice to have so much time to just work on it. i've learned a lot about painting and crafts and such, all those things i never had time or energy for when i worked.

it's weird to think that if i was in utah i'd be starting a new school year right now. i am glad i'm not teaching - it really was not my favorite - but i'm also so eager to work, to be busy, to have purpose to my day. i'm still on the job search...

i've really been thinking a lot about trials lately and i can say from first hand experience that i know God allows trials in our life because they draw us closer to Him. i've thought more about Him and my relationship with Him lately than i have in quite some time because of hard things in my life, and that is a great thing.  

this last little while has been hard. we're finally in more of a "house" rather than an apartment and i've been anticipating making it a home. since we'll be here for four years i came out here with all sorts of ideas of what to do with it and how i can actually make it ours. well it's been more work than i thought. i don't think i thought it out actually. painting is not fun. painting furniture, yes, is ok. but rooms, no. every wall in our house has now been painted except the small bedroom. whew.

on top of all the house work, i can't find a job. i've applied to about 40 jobs and haven't heard a single thing back. i thought teaching for 3 years would have qualified me to do something, even secretary work, but apparently not.

i also just found out that i have an eye condition that doesn't allow me to be in the sun very much. me, no sun?? just when i move to florida! there are other things going on too that just aren't working out. the repeated disappointments and struggles have really been pressing down on me.

but i am getting through it and every day is a little better. a lot of prayer and blessing-counting is helping.

we've met a lot of the lds students that go to nova and most are from utah and really fun. they all have 2+ kids though. our ward is really interesting. i'd say it's about 60% haitian and the rest is latin american or white. some of the accents are so thick i can't understand them. they have baptisms every week but a lot of inactivity.

tyler's in his 3rd week of med school now and he's liking it. he's gone all day, except for an hour when he comes home to eat dinner. he's working hard and i'm proud of him.

dania beach, 15 mins from our house

 

we are in florida! it's been such a chaotic month: packing, moving across the country, unpacking, painting, tyler starting school...i'll write more later when my mind is more put together. the beach is beautiful. it's humid. and wonderful. we're busy and happy.

we just got back from a pretty epic northwest road trip. rather than mostly tell, i thought i'd show. enjoy the pics.

 

 tyler's driven over 80,000 miles with no windshield cracks. within the first few hours of our trip, we had this beauty and actually finished with two more.

 chillin at the cabin on hebgen lake, montana

 

 buffalo right by the cabin

 love the playmill in west yellowstone. saw dirty rotten scoundrels.

 hiking bighorn pass near the cabin

 camping at glacier np

 saw a bear!

 hiking the falls in glacier

 deer right by our tent

 fresh local wild in vancouver bc

 capilano suspension bridge in vancouver

 the cliff walk

 tyler aka sasquatch in stanley park, vancouver

 pike place fish market in seattle

 piroshky! a russian food we ate all the time in armenia. tasted nothing like it though.

 bellevue botanical gardens near seattle

 tabor czech food cart in portland

 powell's bookstore in portland

 rose garden in portland

 multnomah falls near portland

 camping on the beach in redwood np

 driving through the redwoods

 near our campsite on the beach

Effective Teachers

 i just finished my third (and last) year teaching. it was way harder than i ever anticipated. i don't know if it was the junior high age (can you say annoying?), full-time (i really don't have that much energy), or just teaching in general, but i don't think i could do that for the rest of my life. i have serious respect for the teachers at my school who have been there 20+ years.

although i didn't love my job as a teacher, i learned SO much from it and i think by my second year i was pretty good at it. i think that a lot of what i learned will carry over in my role as a mother and just as an adult as really, all adults are teachers to the youth.

so what makes an effective teacher? here are the top ten most crucial things i learned to be an effective teacher (all equally important)...


1. Be a teacher, not a friend. My first year I was concerned about the students liking me. I soon realized that is a disaster. Students will not respect you nor follow your directions if they look at you as a buddy. They really don't want a friend out of you, they want a teacher. Even though I felt bad for those students I know didn't have any friends, that wasn't my role.

2. Set clear expectations. Students need to know how they are supposed to act. The first few days of school I let them know what those things are. I also reviewed expectations at the start of every new term. I was very specific with my expectations and although I had a lot of "rules" the students knew exactly what to do in all situations at every time in my class.

3. Set serious consequences. Kids need to know what's going to happen if they don't live up to the expectations. We had a great citizenship system at my school where points were lost for every misbehavior and only those with certain amount of points were allowed to go to the frequent reward parties. I also held my own class citizenship day. Contacting parents is always pretty serious enough for any kid to shape up.

4. Follow through. The most important month of the entire school year is September. Catching things early and strictly makes all the difference. If you set a rule and a consequence you better be willing to follow through. If you don't, your whole system crumbles.

5. Make a routine. My students always knew what to expect in my class because there were certain things we did the same every day. Every day I was out in the hall, welcoming them in. When the one-minute bell rang, I closed the door and started taking roll. When the tardy bell rang, we began class. After instruction, their tasks for the rest of class were always on the board. My students were silent once the tardy bell rang because they knew that's what we did every day. They knew to look on the board to see what they were supposed to do next because that's what we did every day. You can vary things up in between, but the main structure of each day should be very similar.

6. No Child Left Behind. When I first started teaching I thought my role was to teach. Now I know it was to ensure that all students learned. I took responsibility for the learning gain by my students and if they weren't learning, I realized that there was something that I needed to do to fix that. Of course there are extenuating circumstances that are sometimes out of our control, but most students can learn everything they need to if given the right environment and guidance for them.

7. Focus on the positive. There is a lot of negativity out there and the 'tudes in junior high students are pretty unbelievable. I've never felt so disrespected and unappreciated. On those days when it seemed like no one appreciated anything I was doing, I had to think of the great students who worked so hard, followed rules, and showed gratitude. I frequently mailed notes home to students thanking them for their hard work. That always put me in a better mood.

8. Love. There were a lot of times where my temper or impatience could have taken a bad turn. But simply put, once I looked at the kid as someone's child and an important human being, love usually pushed out all bad feelings and helped me almost start over with a kid that just needed a little help. There are good reasons kids act out or misbehave and remembering that helps the discipline.

9. Pray. I'm thankful I have a belief in and connection with God because I know He helped me in my work with my students. I prayed daily for them, that they would have a desire to learn and be kind to each other. I prayed daily for the gift of discernment to know how to best teach them and the things they were in need of.

10. Silent Reading. This seems simple and small, but seriously it saved me. Whenever I needed students to stay busy while I did something or after their assignments were finished but class wasn't over, they read from their own books. If you like peace and quiet, you'll see the value in this. It may seem like busy work, but reading? Nothing bad gained from that.

i have this foreign sensation that i don't want school to end. there are three weeks left and i feel like it's going too fast. this is my last year teaching, probably ever, and although i haven't loved my job every single day, it's been my home for the past three years. i've had really great students this year and oddly enough, i'll be a little sad to leave. and i think a lot of that has to do with the fact that i won't be back. 

and i probably won't dance again either. 

i guess it's good that i'm enjoying my time right now. usually i hate may because tyler's gone, i'm living with my parents, and counting down the days. and yes, tyler is gone again. (it's been 5 weeks.) but i'm not living with my parents and the countdown, well, it's not really happening.

right now i'm grateful for contentment.

for the first time in my whole teaching career, i lost my voice this week. teaching without a voice, well, doesn't work. please pray for me that it will soon return!

byu dancensemble 2008

i just finished this book. i started it on friday and that's quite an accomplishment for a non-reader like me. i'm so picky when it comes to books. if there's any lack of interest, i won't pick it up again. but i'm proud to say i've read four books this school-year: a stolen life, heaven is for real, and half the sky, all which i highly recommend.

i felt so close to nie; it was so relatable to me, her being only a little older than me and growing up in utah. even though the event in her life was so tragic i found the book to be quite romantic. it's real, inspiring, and hopeful. i was surprised by her assurance after one date that she'd marry her husband; i was fascinated with her love for her kids; i was torn by her test but uplifted by her courage. most of all, i was encouraged by elder holland's thought to her to "be proud of [her] scars...they are a witness of a miracle."

how many of us consider our personal scars miracles?

i can't believe all nie has been through. and she seems so happy. read her book!

Last night my grandma passed away. I haven't had a grandparent die since I was ten. She's been really sick for a while; it wasn't a big surprise. But it's still a bit of a shock to know she's gone, my mother's mom, whom I remember so dearly from trips to the cabin and her home in Nevada.

My grandma had serious mental illness throughout her whole life. She had trouble growing up with her three sisters. The things my mom told me that she did to her when she was being raised used to make me cry. She never said "I love you" to her children. She would throw hot coffee at them. She would call them names, that they were fat and ugly, and constantly make them feel worthless. My mom moved out at 16 years old to struggle on her own because it was better than living with her mom.

Grandma Mary was always kind to me. I have all positive memories of her. I remember her being quite patient with me always wanting to play with her barbies at her home or being so welcoming and friendly to my friends at the cabin.

I can't say I never felt any anger towards her because of the way she treated my mom. But we really can never judge anyone because we can not possibly know exactly who they are and why they act the way they do. No matter how awful some people seem to be, every single person is priceless in God's eyes. Every person is His child. And our job is to love.

Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God. Doctrine and Covenants 18:10

spring break in photos

  

 huntington and la jolla beaches