The Last Two Months

I guess it's time to play catch-up with our lives. The last two months have flown by. Here's a rundown of what we've been up to.

1) November 14-16: Cathi went to Colorado for the BYU/AFA football game...the last game BYU won this year. Sad, but hopefully things will go better next year. We had quite the crowd at the game. Unfortunately for Dad, he was the only one rooting for Air Force.

Brian, Susan, Ashley, and Janice (Cathi's parents)

April and Bryan (Cathi's aunt and uncle)

Cathi and Sarah (cousin)

and, of course, Grace

(the only Wiechmann grandchild for a few more weeks)

2) Thanksgiving in North Carolina. We drove down the day before and stayed with Kim and Jason (Bryce's sister) for two days and Bryce's parents for the next two. Sorry, we are horrible at taking pictures so we only have some from one event...Thanksgiving dinner at LaDonna's dad's house in Kinston, NC. Jack (her dad) cooked up a 100 pound pig so we had a pig pickin' for dinner instead of the traditional turkey dinner. Pre-dinner entertainment was provided by our niece and nephew, Lonna and Bryce:

Lonna, 4, and Bryce, 3

Lonna is actually quite a good driver. She took us around the outskirts of her aunt's farm and showed us the horses and chickens.

The chickens weren't afraid of being picked up

As we drove around the other side of the farm, little Bryce wanted to drive. Marilyn (Bryce's mom) helped him with the pedals while he steered. Lonna was sitting in the passenger side and Bryce and I were in the back facing the rear. Little Bryce didn't seem to entirely grasp the concept of driving. In other words, he would often take his hands off the wheel and gaze around.

Uncle Bryce: "Bryce, you need to look where you're going"

Lonna, being 4 and an expert at driving: "Duh!"

The rest of the weekend was great too. We enjoyed playing games, watching some football, the boys went golfing, and we all went to dinner to celebrate my and Kim's birthdays on Saturday night. Biaggi's must have known that a party of 8 adults and 4 children would be high spirited and put us in our own separate room. The kids did really well, but it was nice for them to not have to be strapped to a chair after having had a busy day. We drove home in the rain on my birthday, but thanks to an alternate route, didn't get stuck for hours on I-95.

3) Christmas in Colorado. I went out to Colorado Springs on Saturday, Dec 20, and Bryce followed on Monday after his test. I got to stop by the wedding reception of a friend from high school who was marrying another friend I had at BYU. Small world. Congrats Ashley and Shane. Susan, Brian, and Grace arrived on Sunday night and Grammy and Ted got there on Wednesday. It was a full house. My father has the tradition of waiting until about noon on Christmas Eve to start his shopping. Crazy, you might ask? Yes, but the problem is it always seems to work out. He even managed to find a Wii for Brian at 5:30pm...after trying about a dozen stores. Who knew the Walmart near our house had 20? Apparently not very many people. We did have to run to the mall to help him with a couple gifts for Susan since she was shopping with him, but it all worked out.

Christmas morning was fun with Grace. She was a little tired when she came up to see what Santa brought her (a play kitchen), but quickly perked up and proceeded to help everyone else open their gifts in between playing with her own.

Grammy, Brian, and Grace with her stocking

Grace helping Bryce open one of his presents

Alligators were abundant this Christmas, thanks to my sister, Joy, who is serving her mission in Mississippi and Louisiana. Grace and Baby Harbertson got stuffed animals and Dad got a real alligator head. He thought it was great and it will probably end up in his office shortly. We enjoyed getting to talk to Joy for a while that night and are excited she'll be coming home at the beginning of April.

And, of course, Grandpa Ted taking a nap between presents. At 89, I will probably be doing the same thing. He had already gotten a box of chocolates and couldn't have asked for more.

During the rest of the trip we spent time with family, played cards with Grammy and Ted, spent a couple of nights with our friends Heather and Tyson playing games and hanging out, and made a quick getaway to Denver to celebrate our 2nd anniversary. We enjoyed two weeks away from everything and were sad to have to come back to reality.

I guess that means in only a few weeks we'll be adding a third to the family. So, here's an updated picture of me pregnant. The kid is running out of room in there and continually tries to find new ways to stretch out (much to the dismay of his mother). We're excited to finally meet him in 7 weeks!

Five Things, Eight Things, Too Many Things

So I had a couple of friends (Cari and Heather) tag me. I would like everyone to notice that I am the death of any tag (meaning I tend to not tag anyone else). If you want to do it though, consider yourself one of 13 people I was supposed to tag.

5 things you want to do before you die
1. Take Bryce to Italy
2. Learn Spanish
3. Get in really good shape
4. Read a lot of church books
5. More volunteer work

5 things that make you absolutely happy
1. Spending time with family
2. Pictures
3. Cooking
4. Real Bryce time
5. Good friends

5 places you want to visit
1. Italy (I know I’ve been there, but I’d love to have unlimited funds and a few months to see everything)
2. Switzerland
3. Egypt
4. China
5. Chile

5 favorite places you have visited
1. Italy
2. Hawaii
3. Mexico
4. U.S. Virgin Islands
5. New York

5 people you admire
1. My dad
2. My mom
3. Grammy
4. My mission president and his wife
5. Prophets and Apostles

5 things of sentimental value or things you cannot live without.
1. Bryce
2. My leg pillow and stuffed bear that acts as a second pillow to keep my back straight while I sleep
3. Mission journal and pictures
4. Technology that allows me to keep in contact with everyone
5. Family

5 things on this weeks to do list
1. Christmas presents planning
2. Work on the nursery
3. Sleep
4. Catch up on emails
5. Blog about Colorado

5 of your favorite smells
1. Freshly laundered sheets
2. Roses and lilies
3. Old Spice Deodorant
4. Any good candles
5. Rain

5 favorite foods
1. Pizza (especially while I’m pregnant)
2. Ice cream
3. Strawberries
4. Cinnamon rolls
5. Queso (well, chips and dip in general really)

8 TV Shows I enjoy watching:
1. House
2. Biggest Loser
3. The Office
4. 24
5. Project Runway
6. Top Chef
7. Law and Order
8. What Not to Wear

8 Things that happened yesterday:
1. Woke up
2. Ate breakfast with my family in Colorado Springs
3. My niece, Grace, stopped and put her hand over her mouth mid aisle at seeing my parents, me, April, Bryan, and Sarah all at church when she arrived (despite the fact we’d just seen her 15 minutes earlier at the house)
4. Timed reaching DIA perfectly (got through security, stopped at the bathroom, filled my water bottle, and got to the gate just as they were calling my seating group.
5. Got delayed (not bad) in Chicago because of snow (I’m going to miss snow this winter)
6. Bryce picked me up at the airport
7. Came home to clean clothes
8. Went to bed at midnight (yes, I know that’s late for a pregnant person, but I did sleep til 7)

8 Things I am looking forward to:
1. Bedtime
2. Thanksgiving
3. Pig roast for Thanksgiving
4. Putting the nursery together
5. Our baby boy
6. Christmas
7. Seeing Joy (my sister gets home from her mission in a few months)
8. Having Bryce time during Thanksgiving and Christmas (he has tests just before those breaks so he won’t have to study during them. Yeah!

8 Things on my wish list:
1. laser vision correction
2. Go to Italy tomorrow
3. Better sleep
4. More energy
5. More time (and desire/energy) to exercise
6. Get paid every week without working
7. Have all of my friends move to the same city/area permanently and we’re there too
8. A few more maternity clothes (I have enough to get by, but it’s like the mission where you just start to get sick of the same small wardrobe and look forward to having other things to wear again someday.

8 Things Bryce did yesterday:
1. Went to church
2. Took a nap
3. Studied
4. Watched a football game
5. Picked Cathi up from the airport
6. Made himself dinner
7. Laundry
8. Listened to a talk by Stephen E. Robinson

What? Bryce cooks?

Yes, I do. It may come as a surprise to many of you, in particular my sisters, but I enjoy cooking. I'm not very good at it, but I have fun. The main problem is that I often don't have the patience. I've lucked out in that Cathi can cook really well, whereas I can only help her with basic stuff. That being said, I like to challenge myself every once in a while.

About a month ago some friends from school and I went out to eat after one of our tests. The appetizer we had was called Asparagus Phyllo. We all thought it was really good so I decided to make it myself. I finally got around to it on Friday. I tracked down the phyllo dough at the store, had my sister email me the recipe I had looked at a few weeks ago and started to get everything ready only to realize that the dough had to be thawed for 2 hours first. Lame. I didn't want Cathi to know until they were done, so I had to be creative in hiding the dough and finding the time to finish them. I had already hid the asparagus in the fridge, but since I had already cut some of the stalks, I decided to go ahead and eat it before Cathi got home. Just as it finished boiling, she walks in. I had to stand in front of the stove and wait till she left the room to drain the water and put them in a tupperware container. Before she walks back in, I hid them up in one of our cabinets. Once in the kitchen, she actually asked why it was so warm by the stove. I played dumb and got away with it. While we were making dinner, she opened the same cabinet, the one with the asparagus, to pull out some noodles, but fortunately didn't notice the asparagus just sitting there. Then, while she was stirring the noodles, I had to stealthily pull out the phyllo dough I had hidden under some other food in the freezer and place it on top of the fridge. I was pretty surprised she didn't ask what I was doing because she's normally very suspicious of me. After having dinner, she left for a church activity, allowing me time to finally make it.

As for actually making this stuff, working with the phyllo dough wasn't easy but it turned out ok. The rest was easy. All you have to do is cut the asparagus, brush the dough with melted butter and add Parmesan cheese. The dough definitely wasn't cut the straightest it could have been, and I'm sure anyone familiar with working with phyllo would have been laughing at my efforts. I think that was one reason for waiting till Cathi was gone, so I could make it up as I went.

I think I've managed to make this sound cooler than it was, so here's a picture to prove I actually did it. Kim, Kristen, Erin and Ashley, you can now pick your jaws up off the floor. And by the way, Cathi said they were good.