Long Overdue

I just realized that I hadn't posted about a very important event in our lives... Josh's birthday!! :) Last Saturday we celebrated Josh's 27th birthday! Josh and I started the morning with breakfast for him- chocolate chip pancakes, of course! We just hung out at the house all day and enjoyed some time together as a family. Then we headed to my parent's house for a joint birthday dinner for Josh and Ellen. Josh got to pick what was for dinner, and he picked Hot Dog City. This is a meal that his family loves, that was totally new to my family! It's basically just lots of hot dogs, and every imaginable topping for them- chili, cheese, cole slaw, relish, ketchup, mustard, dill pickles, and lots more! We hung out, told stories and let Elena entertain us all evening! We definitely missed our 3rd March birthday- Jess!

Look at all those candles!! Elena had to help Daddy blow out all 27 candles! :)

Modeling the new onsie that Elena got Daddy for his birthday! Funny that a "gift" for Josh can now be a onesie! :)

It was a lot of fun, and I never mind celebrating the awesome man God brought into my life! He's such a wonderful husband and father!

On another note... some cool weather around here yesterday. March came in like a lamb (beautiful, sunny, 60s) and is definitely going out like a lion! We had thunderstorms complete with hail yesterday afternoon. I took this video because I thought it was cool. It's amazing how LOUD it is, so be prepared!

Truman has been obsessed with going outside lately (must be spring fever) and the hail didn't deter him at all. He was very careful to stay uner the eaves, though!

Elena Says...

HAPPY EASTER!!

Here's hoping this Easter finds you remembering the true reason for the holiday- Christ's death, burial, and resurrection.

Beautiful Day

I know it's been entirely too long since I've posted on this blog, but I've kind of been waiting for pictures from our trip to Illinois to get here. However, I got some great pictures yesterday, so I'm going to have to subdue my OCD and go (slightly) out of chronological order here!

For those of you in Missouri, you know that we have had absolutely FABULOUS weather this weekend. In the 60s yesterday AND today. So, since Josh and I had a long-overdue weekend at home together, and the weather was so nice, we decided to take advantage of it. Despite Elena's ear infection (she stayed home with Daddy on Friday, but was feeling MUCH better by Saturday, thank God for Amoxicillin) we had a wonderful, restful day.

We started off with one of our favorite things to do on Saturday mornings: breakfast! We headed to Hyvee for some good, simple, inexpensive breakfast before we went grocery shopping. A quick trip to Walmart, and we were home for the afternoon. We watched a movie and took a nap. Then we decided to really get out and enjoy the weather, so we took Isa for a walk. We hadn't actually tried to take Isa out with the stroller and everything, but she basically totally ignored the stroller, so it worked out well. We wandered around the neighborhood for an hour or so, just talking, which was sorely needed for Josh and I.

Then for supper, we kicked off the barbecue season! We fired up the grill and cooked some chicken legs and thighs (our favorite thing to grill), made some corn on the cob and cole slaw, and had a regular feast. The best part was just hanging out with the whole family outside while the chicken was cooking. We cranked up the Tab (Benoit), opened a few (root) beers, and had a great time.

It was a day of rest that Josh and I were really needing, particularly before this week, which is going to be a crazy one for me. I just wish it wasn't going back to highs in the 30s for the rest of this week! Oh well, the brief glimpse of the coming spring and summer was awesome and refreshing!

Out for a walk... can't forget the shades!

Hanging out on the back porch... this was our solution to letting Elena be out there with us, out of the reach of Isa (not that we don't trust Isa, but she's a LITTLE energetic!) without having to hold her all the time. She seemed to love it!

Even Truman came out with us... and found a nice, high spot to survey his kingdom from.

Elena, hittin' the sauce a little early!
A man and his dog... need I say more?

What a blessing this weekend has been! Hope your's was the same.

The Big 5-0

Well, life has been crazy the last few weeks, but I finally have time to post about Mom's 50th birthday party! It wasn't anything too exciting, but we definitely had a good time! Well, except that I was sick, and managed to get everyone else sick while I was there! But, we still had fun...

The Birthday Girl... all smiles! :)

Even though I felt yucky, Lena obviously felt great!
Trying on the new hat Grandma Price got Elena, isn't it adorable! It's a little big now, but next summer it should be great, and with her "porcelain" (i.e. PALE) skin, Elena will need to get very used to wearing hats! :)
Well, Ellen couldn't resist the hat, either!

We hung out, we ate good food, we laughed, and we told stories. It was the perfect Price birthday party! The girls also broke out Mom's birthday present- Mexican Train dominoes while the boys actually cleaned the kitchen (what a great birthday present for Mom!).

Happy birthday, Mom! We all love you!

My Josh

The best daddy... What is his name? Josh

How long have you been together? Wow, that's a long story... we met my sophomore year in high school, we've been married for 4 years in May.

How long did you date? Again... long story! We dated for about 5 months in high school, then another 8 months in college, then engaged for a year!

How old his he? 26... turns 27 in March! :)

Who eats more? Typically him... unless it's something I love, like ice cream!

Who said I love you first? Ok, so I kept reading everyone else's responses to this question and felt REALLY guilty because I couldn't remember... so I finally got up the nerve to confess this to him, and he didn't remember, either! :) So, I felt better... when we thought about it longer, we thought it was probably him, mostly because we're pretty sure I wouldn't have the guts to say it first. The funny thing is, we also think it happened in the doorway of the house we own now... funny how life works sometimes!

Who is taller? Josh, but only by a couple of inches... great excuse to wear flats ALL the time!

Who can sing better? Him, for sure

Who does the laundry? Well, we both do, but I'll freely admit that he typically does it more often.

Who pays the bills? Me, actually, which is funny since he's the banker!

Who sleeps in the right side? me, but only since we moved... I had to switch so I could sleep on my left side and be facing away from him (we both need our space) while I was pregnant.

Who mows the lawn? Definitely Josh-- I grew up in the country, we knew it was time to mow when we couldn't see the dogs anymore for the grass! Josh has less of a tolerance for tall grass!

Who cooks dinner? Typically me... although Josh can cook a pretty good meal himself...

Who drives? Depends... sometimes me, sometimes him... him most of the time, but if we're in a hurry he'll let me drive because he thinks I drive fast. I don't, he just drives like a grandpa!

Who is more stubborn? Yeah, it's definitely a tie-- it's hard to find people more stubborn than we are, which will make our children VERY INTERESTING!

Who kissed who first? The first time around, definitely him- on my parents' couch while we waited for his parents to come pick him up after we'd gotten into a wreck on our way home. The second time around, well, him again...

Who asked who out first? Definitely him the first time... when he asked for my number in high school, I told him it was in the phone book! He was (obviously) determined! The second time around, he still asked, but he copped out by doing it in an email!

Who has more friends? Josh for sure, just compare our facebook profiles!

Who is more sensitive? That would be me...

Who has more siblings? Me- I have 2 sisters and a brother, he has one sister and one brother

Who wears the pants? Josh does, though I'm not afraid to make my opinions known.

Well, that was fun! I've enjoyed reading everyone else's!! If you haven't done it yet, get on it! :)

NUTS

Wow, so this morning, it was 55 degrees when I left for work. By 4:30, when I left work, it was 15 degrees, snowing, with a wind chill of -5. This is what my back porch looks like now...
Isabelle says "PLEASE, Mommy... Let me in!!" She's not even interested in getting off of her rug now.

Driving home actually looked really awesome. It was LITERALLY snowing sideways the wind was blowing so hard. The snow swirled and spun, it looked like waves. It was pretty neat, once I was home and inside my warm house, rather than outside trying to keep my big ol' van from blowing off the road!

It dropped 40 degrees in 12 hours. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE Missouri?! What the heck?

City Museum

Well, it was time for the annual MHBC Youth roadtrip to do something fun and go shopping. This is a fun event that we take every year on the Saturday of MLK, Jr. Day weekend. We try to go to different places each year, but they almost always include a mall, for spending the Christmas gift cards! Last year's trip was less than spectacular, because we went to Crown Center in Kansas City, thinking it was a good mall. But, it's not a great mall for kids to run amuck in, because it just didn't have a lot of chain stores that they would like (i.e. AE, Hollister, etc.). About the only chain was Victoria's Secret (not so appealing for teenagers). So, this year we wanted to make sure that we would have lots for them to do! We headed to the other side of the state this year, to St. Louis for the City Museum and then to the Galleria.

The trip was pretty uneventful, until we got into St. Louis, and then we took several wrong turns because the driver had directions to the art museum, instead of the City Museum! Then the bus lost me (in our van, with Elena, Ruth, and Mom) in the middle of Forest Park due to a yellow light. And when we called Charlie to ask where they had gone, he told us "Go to the end, then turn right on Delmar." Well, if you haven't been through Forest Park, about every 15 feet there is a "Y" in the road... so, which one was the end?! Needless to say, we never found the bus, but everyone did manage to find their way to the City Museum! The City Museum is really like a giant jungle gym... it has all of these cracks and crevices, a fake cave you can crawl/walk/squeeze through, these giant spring things that you climb through to get to other levels, an arcade, an aquarium, just more stuff then you could ever do in one day! Ruth and Elena and I mostly stuck with places that the stroller could go- so no crawling through caves for us! But we did find some fun stuff to do, and had a blast going through the aquarium. We even got to pet sting rays, which were a little weird feeling! Then Elena and I got to slide down a tunnel that went through one of the tanks in the aquarium. Anyway, we had a great time running around, even if we had to stick to areas that were stroller accessible!

After the City Museum, we headed to the Galleria. We spent a couple of hours shopping, which was interesting because of the rules at the Galleria- any kids 16 and under have to be with an adult, and adults have to be 21 or older- so Ruth and James didn't count as adults. But we had a good time anyway, even though everyone had to go to some stores they didn't care about... see Charlie and Scotty at Baby Gap! :)

To finish up the evening, we stopped off at White Castle, where James and Charlie just couldn't resist splitting a case (yes, A CASE) of burgers. The case holds 30 burgers, so they each ate 15!! We discovered afterwards, that 15 burgers and an order of fries is the same as 2900 calories! They were both looking a little sick by the end of the case, but managed to make it home anyway!

All things considered, it was a great youth trip. Only the one snafu with the directions, which mostly just gave Mom, Ruth, and I a chance to do our "I love to be right" dances, and provided the priceless quote now used for all direction-giving- "Just turn left at the end and right on Delmar!" And I can't wait to go back to the City Museum, maybe without Elena, so I can really enjoy it!

Weather

So, seeing as how it is January, these pictures don't looks so unusual, since you would assume that it's snow... but it's not! It's actually hail outside my work. Yesterday there were major storms that moved through MO, and it made for a pretty interesting afternoon. There were tornado warnings everywhere, buses had to be turned back to their schools, and at the daycare the entire infant room spent the afternoon in the teacher's lounge (I bet that was AWESOME). True to form, I spent the majority of the storm standing on the front porch of my office building (yes, outside) watching the storm move in, then watching the hail pummel the parking lot. Thankfully, the hail wasn't big enough to damage the cars, at least not mine. It was pretty cool to watch, though, and the hail was pretty good sized. I picked some up and took a picture with my hand to show the size. It was a very cool storm, but, thankfully, no tornadoes in Columbia! And no hail damage to the new ride!

It's Official...

I'm a minivan mom! So, these are my new wheels. Not sure I really feel old enough to drive a minivan, but I guess I am, since I do. It's a 1999 Plymouth Voyager SE and it only has 64,000 miles on it. It was awesome, such a God thing. We had looked at a few different cars: a Mazda minivan that made a weird noise and had a kinda gross interior, and a Protege5, which is a wagon, but the backseat was too small for Elena's car seat, and the salesman was an idiot. So, as of Wednesday, we were facing turning in the rental car on Friday, with no car possibilities on the horizon. But Josh talked to Dean (who works at Machens Toyota) at church on Wednesday, and on Thursday he called and said that they had this van, which they were selling for $7,000, but they would give to us for $5,000. So we went and drove it, and it's very nice inside and out... so we bought it. We'd been praying that God would just let us know when the car was right, and He did. And now I drive a minivan... :)

Price Christmas

Well, our last big Christmas celebration was bright and early Christmas morning at the Price Ponderosa! We had the traditional Christmas breakfast, which meant EVERYTHING! We had biscuits & gravy, egg casserole, pancakes, bacon, orange danish rolls, and cinnamon twists... it was awesome! Then we passed out presents, and let the ripping and tearing begin! Actually, we all had to watch Mom open her first present, which was from most of the family. They all went in together to get her a laptop of her very own! She's going to hate me for the pictures... but oh well! :)

"You guys are too much!"

And the final product!

In the midst of the wrapping paper mess, Aunt Ruthie read Elena a book, while the dogs begged for treats...

Of course, we had to put another bow on Elena's head!

It wouldn't be Christmas without some good natured... sword fighting?

Mom's favorite job...

There are no words...

The last Christmas we celebrated was in Springfield, and we had a great time visiting with our family down there. It always shocks me to see my cousins, because it seems like they grow up so fast! Morgen is driving now, which just astounds me! They are turning into pretty neat young adults! The best pictures I have from that, I put up on the baby blog...

That's the end of my Christmas posts! I hope everyone had a Christmas as merry as our's! :)