Weekend with the Savages

Baby T.J. (Cheyenne's little sister's future husband)

Amelia, T.J., Cheyenne and I... I tried to turn to the side to appear skinnier, but apparently that has the opposite effect when you are pregnant! This was also taken close to midnight, that is why Cheyenne's hair is in her eyes and I am looking a little tired!

Cheyenne and T.J. - the hair in her eyes is driving me crazy when I look at this! I remember my mom always telling me to get my hair out of my eyes, haha, now I understand.

Cheyenne with her baby doll that was mine when I was younger

Amelia's 24th and Jeff's 29th birthday

I probably have about a million posts that include "the Savages" as the title... they just have a cool last name, it is too fun to call them anything else. When we were first friends at BYU, we brought over my Pocahontas soundtrack to their house one day and blared: "Savages, Savages- barely even human!" Don't know whatever happened to that CD unfortunately.

Anyway, Trent, Amelia and T.J. came up from Gainesville for a quick visit. Thankfully, Jeff has all of Saturday off, but unfortunately it poured the entire day, which seems to happen every time they come to visit! We were able to relax around the house a lot, so that was nice. Amelia's birthday was a couple days after Jeff's so we had a little double birthday party. We went to Red Robin (about an hour away, but so worth the drive!) for the free birthday meals. The funniest part is that all four of us ordered the same meal: Whiskey River BBQ Chicken Sandwich with bottomless steak fries. Go try it, you will not regret it! They also gave Amelia and Jeff free Sundaes... Red Robin is the best for birthdays. When we got home, we had publix cookie cake and ice cream- delicious!

One of my first duties in Primary was to find a Sunbeam sub for the week and I swear I called every person in the ward and couldn't find anyone. Amelia did me a HUGE favor and taught Sunbeams while she was on vacation! Jeff had a football meeting so he left church early to eat something before he had to go, but Trent drove him and he forgot to bring a key or garage door opener so he was locked out of the house! He ended up making it to the meeting on time though. For dinner we had salad and delicious grilled steaks! So good!! Jeff even got to enjoy Amelia's leftovers at work the next day... he was pretty happy about that!

We had so much fun with you guys and wished you could have stayed longer! We need to get together again after football season when Jeff is home more. Thanks for all the food you got us too! Cheyenne has keeps talking about baby T.J. every time she sees a baby. She will probably call the new baby that! P.S. we forgot to take pictures of Trent! He was here too.

Elbert County Season Opener 2010

Wendi and Wesley

Jeff with his headset on

Maddie and Cheyenne

The whole group: Wendi, Amelia, Trent, T.J., Jeff, Cheyenne, Stacey, Maddie

Cheyenne and I

Amelia, T.J., Cheyenne, Stacey and Maddie

Jeff, Trent and T.J. after the game

Jeff had his first football scrimmage Friday night. I don't know why they have a scrimmage, it is basically a real game, except the special teams are not live. It was really hot, but so much fun. I went to the game with my friend Wendi and her two kids. Her husband was assigned to referee the game and it was the first game she had been to watch him ref football:) Cheyenne was loving having Maddie and Wesley there to play with and she was sooo much better than last year. She just sat on the bench and ate her snacks and played with Maddie and Wesley. She loved clapping when everyone else clapped. Our other friends, Trent and Amelia, came all the way from Gainesville, FL to watch the game! They made it just after the game started and they brought their little 2 month old T.J. Elbert County won 20-13, so it was a good start to the season!

Jeff's 29th Birthday

We celebrated Jeff's 29th birthday on Thursday. I got up early and made him cinnamon rolls for breakfast (the pillsbury kind, not homemade). Cheyenne and I drove to Elberton (where he works) and we went to lunch at Subway. Some of his students window painted his car, brought him a breakfast biscuit from Bojangles, and even bought him a cake! So we went back to his classroom after Subway and ate some cake. Then Jeff had to go to Study Hall and football, so Cheyenne and I went home. This is what we had for dinner:

This is the cake I made for him. I had way too much fun with it. I LOVED it when I finished with it, I didn't want anyone to eat it. It is funky tie-dyed. The candles also say 29. It was cool when he blew it out and all the lights were off, the 29 glowed for a couple of seconds. Cheyenne and I practiced singing Happy Birthday all day. She would sing the "Happy Birthday to Daddy" part, and I sang the rest. Before we ate cake, we put the song "ice cream and cake" on and we all danced around. Every day for breakfast since then, Cheyenne has said "ice cream and cake and cake!" I told her its all gone... haha, really I have been eating it all! I know it sounds mean, but if she knew there was any left, she wouldn't eat anything else! Ever since we gave her apple juice when she was sick, she wont drink water or milk. I have since told her there is no more apple juice, but she keeps asking for it.

For Jeff's birthday, I gave him sportspak from Directv, so we can get all the Husky games for Jake Locker's senior season. I think he liked it especially since I have been talking about canceling satellite altogether.

Hope you had a great birthday Jeff!! We love you and are so grateful for you and all you do for us:) Happy 29th!

Toddlers and Tiaras

So I decided I am going to enter Cheyenne in one of those child beauty pageants. Here is her ensemble.

Haha... just kidding:) I bought these Jessica Simpson hair extensions a while back, they were 80% off at Trade Secret after Christmas... I think I only wore them a few times, they are not very good, no wonder they were so cheap. Anyway, I found them and Cheyenne was just sitting there so I put them on her. I couldn't stop laughing, she looked so funny! She thought it was pretty funny too. I already got her Halloween costume, but I may have to change it so she can wear this on Halloween because it cracks me up... maybe I could make her a witch or something... so funny.

Uncle Aaron, Cheyenne, and Pregnancy

Look at me- two updates in the same day! Uncle Aaron (my brother) came to visit this week, which was such a fun surprise! He is a pilot for Delta which is excellent because he is based out of Atlanta, so that means we get to see him sometimes if he is on call. Cheyenne has been going through major stranger anxiety lately (see previous nursery post), so I was expecting her to freak out when I left her with Aaron so I could go to a Dr. appointment. But, thankfully, she warmed up to him right away... it may have had something to do with his awesome iphone full of games for her to play with... but I don't even think she noticed I was gone! She called him Uncle mostly, she had a hard time with the Aaron part, mostly it sounded like Uncle Jaron, but before he left she had it down. She said bless Uncle Aaron in her prayers and talked about him for the next few days after he left.

Cheyenne also had a Doctor appointment this week. Dora and friends are painted on the walls of her Doctor's office, and this was the first time she knew who they were, so she kept saying, "swiper no swipin!" followed by an "oh man!" I thought it was hilarious, but one of the Doctors (who I have never seen before, so she must just be one of the other doctors that practices at that office or a nurse or something) was like, "who is that?" I informed her that it was Swiper and then I pointed out Dora and Boots as well... she gave me this look like "who in the world are they?" This annoyed me because I think if you work with children you should be up to date on thing that children are interested in- especially when they are painted on the walls of your workplace!! Maybe the look was more like, "your daughter should not be watching tv yet." I don't know. But, seriously, I am home with her all day, we run out of things to do, I don't think there is anything wrong with her watching Dora, or Curious George or Sesame Street (or sometimes all three, haha)... she really only watches a few minutes anyway and then plays with her toys and randomly looks up and comments at the screen. Anyway, that was way longer than I meant for it to be...

So, updates on Cheyenne are that she is 32" tall and 23 pounds. Her Doctor never tells us the percentile thing, but when I looked it up on the internet, it said that her length is between 25 and 50 percent and her weight is between 10 and 25 percent. It is sounding like gymnastics may have to be her thing rather than volleyball or basketball! haha... she talks all the time when we are at home, but in public, it is hard to get her to say a word. She says sentences/phrases, and uses prepositions (in, of, under, over, etc.). She loves to say all the time "we goin to the beach, to swim in the wawa." She has started to replace wawa with water recently, which makes me sad, because I think it is so cute how she calls it wawa. She has also started to sing songs with me which is so fun. She sings I am a child of God the whole way through with me, although she only gets the last three or so words right in every line, but she definitely knows what words are coming. She loves to sing Jesus wants me for a sunbeam, really I sing it and then pause at the parts where she sing "sunbeam." She loves to run when she is excited. She loves the water and has absolutely NO fear of it, which is a little dangerous. She loves books. She loves the alphabet and can name about a quarter of the letters and the sounds they make. She loves swings and slides. She loves to eat. Her favorite foods are pancakes, hot dogs, cheese, strawberries, applesauce and yogurt. I only ever let her have one hot dog at a time, but she always gobbles it up and says, "more hot dog?" Today she kept asking for a hot dog for breakfast-gross! She loves to sit on the "little potty." Although, we rarely take her diaper off, we just let her sit on it, because I don't think she has any intention of actually going to the bathroom on the potty. I was hoping she would want to so I did a dance after I went to the bathroom a couple of times, hoping that she would want to follow my example. Now, every time I go to the bathroom, she does a dance. It is hilarious because I had forgotten about the dance thing, since I decided I am not going to deal with potty training until she is at least 2. Then I went to the bathroom and she started doing the dance, it made me laugh. Anyway... that's all I can think of that is new for her.

I am about 29.5 weeks along and have definitely entered the 3rd trimester. I feel way more tired all the time, I have to pee more frequently, I wake up at night all the time either because I have to pee or my back is hurting very badly, and I have now gained 15 lbs. I am hoping everything goes well when I go to Washington in a few weeks because I just found out I am not really supposed to fly when I am that far along, but I didn't even think about that. That would be a nightmare if something happened while I was on the other side of the country, with no insurance coverage there! Everyone say a prayer for me that little baby girl will stay put and stay healthy while we are gone!

This pregnancy is so different from Cheyenne's. With Cheyenne I was counting down the days and I was always so paranoid something would go wrong. As soon as we found out she was a girl, we easily found a name. With this one, I am more nervous for it to come out. I am not sure I can handle TWO babies! I don't feel any connection to it yet, like I don't really feel like there is a real human baby inside of me. With Cheyenne, as soon as we found out she was a girl, I felt a connection like it was my daughter. I worry that I won't love this baby like I love Cheyenne, and it almost seems impossible that I could. I worry that instead of loving and adoring each other they will be jealous of each other, make each other feel bad, and fight. I worry that because Cheyenne was so easy, this next one is going to be extremely hard to make up for it. I guess, whatever is supposed to happen will happen and I am just going to have to trust in the Lord that he has a plan for our little family. I know she was sent from God to be with us when we needed her. I will have to have faith that I can handle it! Are these normal feelings to have for your second baby? Or am I suffering from some weird thought syndrome? Help!

Young Women and Primary

I love this picture. I love it even more because it was painted by an art professor I had at Dixie, Del Parson. He was one of my favorite professors I ever had and is such a funny, down to earth guy. He would always ask me if all the boys were afraid to talk to me, because I was so buff! Of course that made me like him right away, haha! He also painted this infamous picture:

Anyway... the beginning of August we got a brand new beautiful stake center, which our ward gets to meet in. It is so pretty and everything is new, but it is also 20 minutes from our house (about 6 or 7 minutes further than the last building), so it is a trade-off. The last building was fine, but it was pretty old and it wasn't very big, so many classes had to be held in random places such as the kitchen or the chapel. Also, our YW room was in the giant storage closet behind the stage so there were no windows and it was teeny tiny. It is pretty refreshing to have a new place, I will admit.

Last Sunday, Jeff and I were called in to talk to the Bishop before church started. I figured Jeff was getting a new calling or another calling, because he is a teacher in Sunday School and a ward missionary. I was in Young Women as the Personal Progress leader, and I had only had the calling for about 9 or 10 months. I was so surprised when I was the one getting the new calling. At first, I was really sad, because I was finally starting to feel like I was getting a hang of the Personal Progress one. I had started to work on my own personal progress, which for those who don't know, is a great way to study scriptures! I had kind of a bad attitude about it when I first got the calling because when I was in Young Women I hated personal progress and refused to work on it. I thought it was so dumb and I would get annoyed whenever they had an activity just for it. I totally did not want to be the one making these girls do it! What helped me change my attitude and feeling toward Personal Progress and my calling was the Young Women. They liked personal progress, they worked on it without nagging (although when I instituted a chart with stickers and treats, they did get a lot more done faster, haha). I was just so impressed at the hard work the girls were putting in and I never heard them moan or complain about having to work on it. They were such a good example to me, and it convinced me to try it out myself and I actually really like it now. I am going to keep trying to finish it even though I am not in Young Women anymore.

Anyway, so I got a new calling to be a counselor in the Primary Presidency. I was in the Primary Presidency in the Elberton Branch, but I don't really count that, because there were only like 4 kids, so it was a lot different. I felt very overwhelmed and underqualified to receive the calling, but thankfully I believe that the Lord will make up the difference between what you are actually qualified to do and what you can accomplish. I am really excited to get to know the other women in Primary and hopefully I will be able to focus and apply myself and help the children to feel the spirit and gain a testimony of the Savior and his gospel. I am getting excited about this new calling and just hope that I can do my best. I will miss Young Women a lot, I loved the other women I worked with in the calling and the girls were all really great too.

Also, Cheyenne has been in the nursery (for kids 18 months- 3 years) since June. The first month or so she was great and went in with no problem. One Sunday she skipped her nap and was so tired and cranky and cried the whole time, and she hasn't been a fan of nursery ever since. It is so hard to leave her in there when she is crying "mommy" and reaching for me. It breaks my heart and makes me feel like I am abandoning her. She hasn't made it through a full 2 hours of nursery since June and has to be delivered to one of us before church is over, because she is crying. I wish she would like it. I think it is partly my fault because she is never not with me. She is with me all day everyday, we never get babysitters, so the only time she is not with Jeff or I is in nursery, and that is probably hard. I think I am going to need to get together with people who have kids in nursery so she will get to know the kids better and feel more comfortable. That is my new plan of attack! I love Sundays, they are so relaxing... this is our last week of a family Sunday together, then Jeff has to start having football meetings every Sunday:( That makes me so sad. Oh and these meetings are serious meetings, like he will be gone most likely at least 5 hours... here we go.

5th Anniversary

So on July 22, Jeff and I celebrated our 5th anniversary!! That is so crazy it has been 5 years. I remember when I first got married and people said they had been married 6 months, that seemed like so long to me. I feel so so so blessed to have Jeff as my husband and I feel like the longer we are married, the more I realize what a good decision it was to choose him to be my husband. He is such a good husband and father and really so perfect for me. He is so patient with me and helps me be a better person. I love our life together and I am so grateful that I get to spend the rest of this life and all the experiences that come with it, together with him. I am so happy that we got married in the temple so that our entire family can be together for eternity:)

Our engagement picture in my mom's backyard:

A picture at the temple on our wedding day:

A date night we had a few months ago... do we look any different??

Summer 2010

Ever since we made our blog private, I have been such a slacker about updating! I really want to blog more, so I am setting a goal to update every Sunday:) It is really fun to have these posts to go back and look at. This summer was so much fun, but it felt like it only lasted about one day! We took way too many trips this summer and have vowed to stay home next summer and save our money!! We will see if that actually happens...j

We started off going to Gatlinburg, Tennessee with some good friends in our ward, The Clantons and the Weidlers. My sister Heather's in-laws own a cabin there, and were able to get us a great deal for a weekend stay. My favorite part of the trip was tubing down the river... my least favorite part was losing our 3 week old camera!! I am still so mad about that! Here is a picture my friend Wendi took with her camera, but sadly that means she is not in it!

A few weeks later (I think, it has been so long, I am getting the order of things all mixed up...) I turned 26! Jeff threw me a little birthday party and we had delicious shish-ka-bobs and he even made me a cake. He also got me a new camera since I lost ours in Gatlinburg.

Then a couple weeks after that, my best friend since my sophomore year of high school came to visit me! Carlos and Natalie are expecting their first boy a couple of weeks before me (the beginning of October). We had such a good time with them. We all went to Hilton Head, South Carolina and Savannah, GA for a little weekend getaway. The beaches on the atlantic ocean are much nicer than I expected, but Florida gulf beaches are still my favorite. This picture is us in front of Jeff and my favorite restaurant, Sonny's. The girl taking the picture for us kept telling Natalie and I we looked like sisters, we get that all the time and I love it!

After Natalie and Carlos headed back to Utah, Jeff had a coaching clinic in St. Simon's Island, which I think is in Georgia, but it could be in Florida, I don't remember... We stayed there for a few days and hit up the beach in the rain. Then we went to Gainesville to visit our good friends from BYU, Trent and Amelia Savage. They had just had their first baby boy, TJ (Trent Junior), a few weeks prior. He is the cutest little baby and we had a great time there. We got to go to a Godfather's pizza buffet, which was a childhood favorite of both Jeff and I. Jeff and Trent got in several games of x-box football of course, and Amelia, the babies, and I took a long walk to the park which was some much needed exercise! They are hopefully coming to visit us again in a couple of weeks, so stay tuned for more adventure stories! Oh, this picture was at the national park where gators roam free, but they were all hiding in the water this time around... we only saw a couple of heads floating...

One of the biggest highlights of this summer was a visit from Jeff's mom, dad, sister and nephew. Jeff's parents stayed for about 2 and a half weeks and Jenny and her son Will came out for the weekend and we all went to Myrtle Beach! It was so much fun and went by way too fast. Unfortunately Cheyenne got too much sun, because she got sick the last night at Myrtle Beach and it lasted for about a week until she was fully recovered. Here is a picture of the Bennum clan outside a restaurant in Myrtle Beach.

We stopped by University of South Carolina on the way home and right when we pull in, Steve Spurrier pulls up in his black BMW! Jenny was so brave and hopped out of the car, "Steve! You'll never believe it! We came all the way from Washington and Utah just to see you, so you gotta let us get a picture." He of course said yes, but insisted he stand by Jenny!! She was so smooth and said it as if she knew him, I could have never done that! haha... he had a three minute conversation with us and was on his way.

We had to get a picture of all of us before Jenny left, so we got this one on timer. It turned out great!

We had such a great time! I am really lucky to have such great in-laws... whenever I told people my in-laws were coming for 2.5 weeks, they were like oh no! I was like, no I am really excited! It was so much fun to have them here, we didn't want them to leave. We are still trying to convince them to move out here by us! Frank mowed the lawn every week for Jeff, Connie was always doing some sort of housework, and they both weeded our side plant area, which was a big project, we got to go on walks in the morning (or they would take Cheyenne and I got some time off). They also babysat for us so Jeff and I got our first real date night alone in several months and it was awesome!

Jeff went back to school the beginning of August, so our summer is sadly at an end... we were so spoiled getting him home all the time (he only was gone 3-4 hours a day in the summer)- now it is hard to have him gone again:(

I wanted to write more, but Cheyenne just woke up from her nap, so I better go get her. Stay tuned for more regular updates in the future- hopefully!!