Beat The Heat

Charley and I have been OVERHEATING since we moved to St. George!

(being 9 months pregnant isn't helping either)

The last few days I've been hanging out in the yard getting some sun while charley digs holes in the shade and sits in them ha haha

(I had no idea dogs did that?)

and if we aren't outside we're inside sitting RIGHT in front of the fan!

We've about frozen Brandon to a solid every night with 2 fans and the air conditioning down to 65!

It's SO hot outside i've started putting ICE into charleys water dish when we come back inside!!

The other day we came inside and charley just flopped right in front of the fan for a few hours...

Can't WAIT for July!

May 7th

So I made this collage a few weeks ago with the intention of posting it on March 7th and when that day finally rolled around I completely forgot about it! 

So lets all humor me and pretend it's May 7th 2011 so I can do my post 

:)

2 years ago today I was in St. George Brandon.

He woke me up at 5 a.m and asked if i'd like to go on a date that started in 10 minutes.

semi-annoyed I said yes and crawled out of bed...

Brandon took me to a park where he surprised me with an item to check off my bucket list!

A hot air balloon ride!

(This was one item on my bucket list I honestly never thought I'd do)

At the time I was expecting a proposal because I hadn't picked out a ring yet...

I had one that I LOVED but it was a bit out of the budget so the search remained :(

Brandon kept asking me if i'd say "yes" if he proposed with a "ring from a cracker jack box"

and I always told him I would...

so thats exactly what he did! 

Once we were up in the air he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him!

He held out a ring box and when he popped it open it was the most HIDEOUSLY fabulous Cracker Jack ring I've ever seen!

I loved it!

Since steering a hot air balloon isn't really possible so we landed in the middle of a neighborhood and instantly drew a crowd!

Brandons dad and sisters showed up and he got down on his knee again?

I said "what are you doing? we already did this remember?"

and he said "yeah but I figure you only propose once so you better do it right with the right ring"

then he popped open a 2nd ring box and inside was the ring I've been dying for! 

...He loves to tease and torment me...

2 years later, he still surprises me everyday with how much I can love him!

He might make me crazy sometimes 

(who's spouse doesn't?)

but he's perfect for me in every way and i'm so grateful to have him.

Love you B!

Kat-Kong

So Charley doesn't understand the difference between cats and dogs...

she LOVES to play with other dogs and therefor assumes cats feel the same way about the rough housing game...

The first time she saw a cat I let her run right up to it and get clawed on the nose so she'd learn that cats aren't friendly!
{good parenting skills i know}

Well, even after getting 4 razors sharp claws to the snout she is STILL convinced cats want to play!
 but that all changed when we moved to this new house...

There is this cat that is just as big

(if not bigger)

than charley is! 

I wish I could have gotten a pic of it standing up because seriously I thought it was a bobcat!

This cat sits in the road by our house and charley just stands completely frozen at the end of the yard, too scared to move in any direction and all she can manage to do is squeak out a little whine every once in a while.

ha ha ha 

It is so sad how BADLY Charley wants to befriend this cat and so funny how scared she is of moving toward it!

I'm glad she's a wuse about it though otherwise i'd be planning a dog funeral

Sneak Peak...

We got the crib all set up

the walls painted

and the crib liner, curtains and blankets sewed!

Now for the wall art and finishing touches and our nursery is ready for its big debut!!

Mothers Day

This Mothers Day was a fun one!

It was the same weekend as graduation and my family was already down here so we didn't have to play the

 "which mom do we go see and which mom do we leave in the dust" game this year! YAHOO!

First off, I didn't even THINK about me qualifying as a "mother" this year?

At church that morning they asked all the moms to stand after sacrament meeting so that all the deacons can run around and give them flowers, and like every year I remained seated and was surprised when I was immediately scolded by Brandon for not standing with all the moms?... 

...weird... 

I'm not a MOM!

Later that day we made a huge dinner at the Valantine home 

*yumm*

and then opened presents

I gave my mom and mother-in-law the gifts I got for them and then Brandon passed ME a card!

I whispered "who's this for?" thinking I was to pass it on to his mom

and he said " it's for you! why are you thinking your not included in mothers day this year?!"

I honestly hadn't even thought about it?

I don't feel like I've done anything that merits me being a "Mom" yet?

There is so much more that goes into being a mom before you can earn the title of "Mom" and I feel like I haven't even done any of that yet?!

(other than taking my vitamins and not standing too close to the microwave?)

this is my first mothers day card

It says "I love you" on front...

Brandon and I write to each other in chinese a lot

I do it so he can keep up on his reading skills,

he does it cause he thinks it's funny when I try to guess what it says...

He drew a picture of our little family inside ha ha ha ha how cute

Disclaimer: "Evie"  is our compromise name for the baby right now :) 

Both the names we like the most start with an "E"

so her initials will be E.V so we've kind of started to refer to her as Evie for now...

In my card it says "good for one free backyard hammock at our new place!"

Brandon knows how much I LOVE hammocks,

 about 3 years ago I said to him 

"as soon as we have a backyard i'm getting a hammock!!"

Well, he must have remembered cause as of 2 weeks ago we officially have a backyard and I already have a hammock promised to me as soon as I find one I like :)

I'm also counting this picture/blog post as my "baby update photo" 

so I'll do my little pregnancy update thing today too.

35 weeks!

-holy moses! that came WAY too fast! Most people are like "get this baby out of me!" but i'm like "no, no you can stay in for another month or so..."

-I think she might be trying to escape through my stomach because she is constantly shoving her arms and feet through my skin, it's fun to watch but hurts after a while.

-I'm almost certain i've got at least 3 broken ribs

-I wouldn't recommend anyone who is 9 months pregnant to move to St. George. Especially if they've never lived in heat like this! Charley and I have been camping out on my bed with 2 fans pointing right on us!

-I crave "cakey" things. doughnuts, cake, Swiss Rolls, Pastries, Ding Dongs. During the last 2 week moving process I put down 2 dozen doughnuts almost entirely by myself!

-She gets hiccups at LEAST once a day! (she's like me that way)

-My Iron levels have dropped to where they were 2 years ago and i'm  back to chewing ice ALL DAY LONG again.

- I officially only fit  in 3 shirts that I own and 3 pairs of capri pants.

-I FINALLY started on the nursery! (blog post coming soon)

In an unrelated note:

Charley made a new friend last night! He's a black lab named A.J and they endlessly wrestled each other until I made her come inside and she barely made it to the bedroom before she immediately fell asleep! 

so this morning I woke up at 9:45 to this...

and this is how she stayed till about noon when I made her go outside

ha ha ha ha ha ha

I love her*

She makes me so happy!

Ciao, Meg

Spring Semester 2011

Since 2 a.m is slowly approaching and I'm up with heartburn, leg cramps, hot flashes
and a baby who never takes a break from the hiccups I guess it's a good time to blog...

This last year I accomplished something that I have NEVER come close to in my entire life! 

I do lots of things well and have my own talents but school is just not one of them... 

I won't go into detail but lets just say if I came home with a C+ on a math test (or really ANY test) it got put on the fridge...

This semester I decided to set a goal to get a 3.5 GPA and see if I could bump my overall GPA up a little just before I leave college for good... 

Well...

Yesterday I checked my grades and...

4.0!!

I have NEVER come close to a 4.0 in my entire life and I got one this semester! 

I couldn't believe it! 

Straight A's!

So to celebrate my good graded-ness I'm going to give you a brief look at some of my work from this last semester :)

First off Ceramics class! This class I was hoping to get a B- in because I STRUGGLED!

This little cup and bowl I did for my final :)
We could pick any large scale item to make for our final and when I told my professor I wanted to throw a 10 lb bowl
 (which is what most the class was doing)
she told me I wasn't allowed to throw that big of a ball of clay cause i'd hurt myself ha ha ha.
She told me to make a little cup and saucer for the baby instead so here it is!

Silkscreen was a bit more work then I thought it was going to be but it was so fun! 

Here are some Relief Prints I made

If any of you know the Vincent side of my family you know I come from a long line of VERY talented painters...

this semester I decided to take painting 1 and hoped I wouldn't shame my family name ha ha ha

these first 2 pieces were just color and texture studies (basically just learning HOW to paint and mix colors)

This is my landscape painting. 

I took this photo last summer while I was four-wheeling with my family.

It's on my dads favorite mountain in Monroe Ut. and he loves the photo so I attempted to paint it for him for his birthday. It was SUPER hard and took me forever but I'm happy with the outcome.

 I honestly enjoyed painting a lot more then I thought I was going to but it's way too expensive to keep that hobby going. 

Last but NOT least! My only photo class. It technically wasn't even an actual "photo class". I only took 1 credit of this class so I only had to do one assignment. 

The series is called "The Things I Know" and it's kind of a documentary style homage to the places on campus that i've practically lived in for the passed 5 years.

I went against all the structured rules I've had in all my photo classes and did it just the way I wanted.

I shot with a VERY old 35mm camera with B&W film and didn't edit at all, 

so those who aren't "film purists" are gonna look at these and be like "wow... she did 5 years of college for this?.." ha ha ha try to enjoy :)

 Hannahs spot in the ceramics "fish tank"

 My glorious Dark Room... lots of good times in here...

 The Dark Room

 The Print Making Lab and Dark Room

 Print Making Lab

 Print Making Lab

The Push Pin Gallery

 and lastly the Painting studio.

So there it is. My last semester of hard work. 

My next blog post is going to be a long one...

-graduation

-the move

-mothers day

-baby update pictures

and etc. so be prepared!

and now that my restless legs are finally gone I think i'm gonna head to bed :) 

good night!

Meg.

Homeless

We decided to move out of our apartment on Saturday so we didn't have to pay any rent for May.

The move went really smoothly, my mom and I packed and cleaned all week and then Friday Brandon got all of  his buddies to come over and put it on the trailer. It was a little frustrating because I had 10 people yelling at me every time I tried to pick up a box or use cleaning supplies so I pretty much sat in a chair and told people where to put things...

Now even though we moved out on Friday the 29th we can't move in to our new apartment until the 9th! 

So that means I have 10 days of drifting around homeless!

Most of those 10 days would luckily be taken up by finals week BUT being the 9 credit art major that I was this semester

(lets not kid ourselves)

I really didn't have any finals ha ha ha

I was kinda freaking out because Brandon has TONS of really hard finals and I would either have to spend my 10 days at his parents house or his Aunts house while he studied for and took his finals. Since our home would be packed up into boxes and stored in a trailer for the week there wasn't much I could do at those 2 places but watch every movie they own.

Then Brandon suggested that I just go back up north with my mom after she helps us move and then come back down with the family for graduation on Friday!

*PERFECT!*

So this week I've been up in SLC and I've been LOVING it!

My mom has been working really hard and has lost a lot of weight this last year so I pulled her into the salon and got her a short fun flirty new hair style for the summer! :)

(Next stop NEW SWIM SUITS AND SUN DRESSES!)

She is lookin' so cute!

We've been doing some shopping for my new apartment too.  

new rugs, making art for the walls etc.

(thank you Ikea!) 

and getting ready for the baby to come! 

(Which went from "omg this baby is never going to come!!"

 to

 "omg this babies almost here and I'm not ready!" in about 4 days for some reason?)

I've been loving having so much time with my mamma!

I've been missing her like crazy lately. 

Now I just wish my sister was here and this week would have been perfect!

My mom has been helping me "feather my nest" as she calls it. 

She's an interior decorator so we've been trying to spruce up my house with DIY projects and fixing up things I already have so be prepared in the next 2 weeks to get a blog post full of pictures from my new cute, low budget house!