Bear Lake

I can't believe I'd never been to Bear Lake before Josh. How do you live your whole life and not experience views like this?

Of course we did come down long enough to play:

Mostly I sat in the sun.....

...Because Dr. Man said I'm not allowed to go wave-running. 

Did you know pregnant ladies can't go wave-running? Who knew?

I did get to help Josh dig a big hole to sit in.....

And I got to eat some dang good pizza.

So even though the trip was short - it was a blast. It's always nice to go someplace beautiful and soak in the view.

Anniversary

Sometimes Josh & I ditch work to go to the movies.

But this time we had the day off for our anniversary and couldn't think of anything better to do than go see Harry Potter. So we did.

Then we went mini golfing.

We document "holes in 2" where I come from.

Except Josh. He documents holes in one.

We were behind a big group of little kids...we had time to take pictures.

After the movie, and the minigolfing we decided to be grownups and got some shopping done. 

Nothing says romance like Costco. 

It was a great anniversary - not like a trip to Alaska, but a great day anyway.

Belly Shot - Take 2

This is 27 weeks. 

Yeah, that's right, 27. 

As is "40 minus 27 equals 13".

Yesterday was the 20th. 

As in "T minus 3 months". 

Officially.

Are you sensing the panic in my voice fingers? (...whatever.)

Can you tell how many things I haven't done?

Are you laughing because you've been waiting for this moment?

Do you think it's funny that I have made zero life decisions about what to do post-baby?

Are you picturing the hilarious blog posts about how I can't handle it?

Are you laughing because you know I have a plant in my living room containing like 10 gallons of dirt....just sitting on my floor looking lovely waiting to prove how baby-unwise I really am?

Can you tell I haven't cleaned the cracks and crevices of my home that I really need to clean?

Do you realize you haven't seen any pictures of the beautiful nursery my child will call home? And did you realize that you haven't seen pictures because it doesn't exist now and probably never will?

Did you remember that Josh still has the "no buying anything big (bigger than a breadbox) in case we move" edict in effect?

On a slightly less hysteric note: I'm slightly prettier than last time, right? Other than the fact that I only have lip gloss on my lower left lip, and my eyes are screaming "I kill you!" I think it's a pretty great picture. Even if I don't get to show off how cute my shower curtain is....

Things that grow - the truth revealed

Remember how excited I was about my bucket garden? OK OK, and maybe I was a little proud.....I can't help it, when I'm creating something beautiful, I get a little proud.

Immediately after planting our beautiful strawberry plants we had some strawberries grow - and they were good. We picked maybe 4-5/day and we thrilled and couldn't wait for when they really "came on".

We're still waiting for that "coming on" business....currently the leaves are brown and look like they've been torched. Do you think our neighbors are scaling the wall and taking a blow-torch to the leaves while we're gone during the day?  Maybe tonight I'll swallow my pride and take a picture to show you just how sad they are. But this post is about my tomatoes.

We saw our tomatoes growing and had a little party for the first green one. And by "had a little party" I mean "opened the fridge and ate big beautiful store-bought tomato thinking about the day I'd have a fresh tomato from my very own plant".

The tomato and squash plants get droopy every day, so we water them (a lot) every day and we worry that they are getting too much sun and not enough water (or too much water and not enough sun....but when they look burned and droopy and the soil is dry we tend to think not enough water, too much sun), but all those worries floated away when Josh brought this beauty in from the garden yesterday.

Ain't she purty?

Awww...but don't be too quick to judge - the beauty of this tomato is really just evidence of my incredible photography skills. 

You wanna see the ugly truth?

I know what you're thinking: "My goodness she has a lovely thumb!" but try to look past that and focus on the tomato, which is the subject of this post.

Something is horribly horribly wrong and to be honest, I haven't the slightest idea what it is. Of course my first inclination is to call it a fluke (because I'm a tolerator and I tolerate.) but science (and the fact that Josh brought in 3 more just like it last night) is forcing me to evaluate.

Could it be the big stinky truck that drives through our neighborhood each night spraying for mosquitoes?  Or perhaps the fact that I live in the middle of an industrial park and am surrounded by refineries.  Maybe it's the lack of sun, the bucket it too small, I'm not giving the plants enough love and attention, they're too thirsty to grow?

Clearly this is not a phase a tomato can "grow out of" it's ugliness is permanent and will spread to the others if we allow it. The rotting bottom is evidence of.....I don't know what, but it certainly ain't purty.

This much I know is true: I am capable of growing a garden all by myself. I've done it before. Remember the cucumbers from 2 years ago? That was a great year, we couldn't even keep up with all the things that grew. We constantly had fresh produce rotting on our counter because we couldn't eat it fast enough.  I know it does't sound pleasant, but it was.

Somehow this year's efforts are not as fruitful. Which means that my mom (who I love) is going to have a lot more "help" using the harvest from her garden this year. 

Also it reminds us why sometimes it's not a great idea to "buy local" cuz sometimes local isn't better. (see photographic evidence above)

One time....

One time (three years ago) Josh and I got married:

It was all about the.....

 Friends 

Family

Strangers

Flowers

A tiny bit of shade

And an awful lot of sun

Food

Little boys

Big boys

A little dancing

A lotta kissing

Flirting

Splashing (shhh...don't tell my mom)

And most importantly, 

The Temple, MY temple.

What more could a girl ask for?

The last 3 years have been amazing, and whether we spend the next 3 in Utah or Montana (or in a van down by the river); whether we're rich or poor; whether we have an obvious adventure or just a regular old boring adventure; whether or not we remember every day how much we love each other; and whether or not we always get banana pancakes to pretend like it's the weekend.....with or without any of those things, I will always be glad we made the choices we made 3 year ago. Because that was the smartest thing I've ever done (granted, it's only been 24 years...I have plenty of time to think of something smarter....) and that one thing has made me happier than any other thing ever could.

Big yucky meat day:

I’m not a vegetarian. Just a sissy. I’m scared of meat that is yucky in any way shape or form. That includes, blood, fat, veins, ugly textures, and weird colors.

This includes all raw meat with one exception. Frozen boneless skinless chicken breasts. But if you thaw those very same boneless skinless chicken breasts, I’ll have a really hard time touching it much less preparing it for cooking. I guess I can handle raw hamburger, but only if it isn’t bleeding . I know I’m a big baby, and I know it’s not reasonable, and I know “poor Josh I can’t believe he’s still married to her!” but in my defense……… it’s yucky!

This also includes almost all red meat. Like steak. And ribs. And cows. And prime rib (which looks different from ‘ribs’…but says ‘rib’ in the name….what exactly does that mean? I have no idea what prime rib is.) And deer hot dogs.

Josh is a man. He like meat . I love him and I love that he doesn’t make me cook scary things for him. He’s perfectly willing (and un-freaked-out) to pick up a hunk of raw meat and do something to it. I don’t really know what you’re supposed to do to it…..but he does do something….and then he cooks it (sortof) and eats it. Ewwwww!!!!!! (if you said it right in your head, it sounded like a chorus of young kids who go “ew” when their parents kiss)

Bottom line, the man doesn’t eat as much meat as he wishes he did. Primarily because he’d have to prepare it for himself by himself and I would not participate in any part of the meal at all.

Enter the Church Office Building Cafeteria. Every Thursday they serve prime rib. I affectionately call it “big yucky meat day” and every Thursday morning when Josh drops me off at work I say “Do you wanna come to lunch? It’s big yucky meat day….” (I say “big yucky meat day” in my most enticing voice - you'd probably eat steamed broccoli if I offered it to you in this voice.) And he laughs at me and says “I don’t eat yucky meat. Do you?” and I say “No.” and hang my head in shame and walk into the building. (He’s trying to prove to me that it isn’t yucky, and that maybe if I didn’t call it ‘big yucky meat day’ he’d come….not a lesson I’ve learned just yet.)

Today was no different than any other Thursday. Until 10:30 when Josh called and asked if I wanted to take him on “a hot lunch date” at the Cafeteria. Of course I wanted to. And of course I wasn’t surprised when he walked straight to the big yucky meat line.

So, on one hand, I got to have lunch with my handsome handsome hubby who I love and adore. On the other hand I had to sit across from a guy eating a hunk of red cow all through my lunch break. Gross.

I took a baby belly picture.....

On Sunday I made Josh take a baby belly picture. And as far as I can tell, the rule is that you find the cutest shower curtain in your house stand in front of it, hold the belly, smile and snap the photo.

Apparently there's a lot more to this than I thought because.....ew.

You should know that in any situation I possibly can, I'll blame my gross-looking-ness on the photo and not on my own gross-looking self. So, next week we'll be trying a different room (who takes pictures in their bathroom anyway? That's weird.) with better lighting, a better face, and hopefully a better hair day.

In the meantime, I'm sorry for those of you who have to look at me in real life because I know the lighting isn't always great, and maybe you're looking at me from a harsh angle, or maybe your secret-super-power is that you have a built in flash, which is particularly unforgiving (and kindof a sucky super-power. I'd talk to someone about that if I were you).

Bottom line, on Sunday I looked like this. And the (floating) belly was this big. And I don't know how to use photoshop to make myself look like Jennifer Anniston even if it's not pretty, I'm all about capturing reality. (pffftttt!)

Sunday Afternoons

Usually our Sunday afternoons look a lot like this:

Last Sunday they looked a lot like this:

No wonder we love living close to our family.

My uterus is floating...and other baby news.

Baby Thomas used to like to chill right between my hips - probably because it was safe there. Hips are hard you know. It was cool to feel him growing and taking over more and more of my belly as he grew up above my belly button and headed toward the ribs. But this week it seems like something has gone wrong.

If my uterus were a helium balloon, whoever was standing on the string to keep it down between my hips where it used to live, has accidentally let the balloon go and it has floated up to the ceiling inside me....which is apparently made of my lungs and ribs.

It's not that Baby Thomas grew that big that fast, I can still feel the same small parts of his tiny bone-y self and the lower part of my abdomen has gone back to it's squishy nature, it's just that he's taken my balloon-uterus and relocated. He left the safety and security of my pelvic bones to set up camp in my ribs. Yesterday afternoon he punched straight through my lungs to the inside of my ribcage. Seriously.

If Josh were reading this (which is about the only thing I can guarantee he's NOT doing right now...or ever) he'd be dying laughing over my lack of knowledge about my own insides. "Ha ha ha." he'd laugh "you really think your uterus isn't connected to anything but a ribbon like a balloon? That it can float around your abdominal cavity at will? Do you even KNOW how many guts are in there? There's no room for floating!" he'd lecture. He'd probably get out his anatomy book and remind me of all the guts we saw at Body World so I could remember there's no room for floating.

Then he'd get started on my outlandish claim that my 14" baby can punch through my lungs to the insides of my ribcage in some crazy attempt to jump out of my chest.

Listen Josh. All I know is that I could feel him down there and now I can feel him up here. So any reasonable rational human being would conclude that he has moved from down to up. If that ain't floating, I don't know what is.

In other news his (Baby Thomas') hearing is strengthening which means that when Josh and I try to discuss if he really needs ALL THAT STUFF that Target (and every other store) thinks he needs, he can hear us. I think we'd better start spelling the words we don't want him to hear. "I bet he'll be just fine without a T-O-Y at least until he's 3...don't you think?" "I think we're ready for B-E-D but don't say it out loud or my bladder will immediately shrink."

Maybe I'm giving the kid too much credit. I doubt he's really swimming around in there like a kid trapped in a bubble choosing where he wants to set up camp for the next few days. I also doubt he has enough control over my bladder to make it shrink only at nighttime. And I bet he doesn't really breathe fire up my throat every time I lie down.

Even though these things never EVER happened until he lived in me, and even though I'm sure they'll stop when he's living out of me, and EVEN THOUGH any logical person would certainly link the strange things happening to the "parasite" growing inside me.....I'm willing to give the kid the benefit of the doubt. That's how  you know I'll be a good mom.

BUT you'd better believe that he and I are going to have a nice talk once he's coherent and capable of explaining himself. Because secretly I think he's doing at least some of this on purpose.

Mother Nature & I are like "this"

You know how summer is here and we've officially had the longest day of the year and now each day progressively gets shorter and shorter, until that blessed time of the year where snow covers the ground and one could (easily) go days without seeing the sun because it's dark when you go to work and dark when you get home?

Well, my days are getting shorter too. I would've slept until 9 this morning had I be allowed.
I would've gone to bed at 7:30 tonight had I been home.

That, my friends, sounds like a very long 13.5 hour day to me. I think I'm gonna beat Mother Nature to the blessed winter season marked by being awake only long enough to eat happy winter foods and attend a couple of parties.

Side note:

You should know that not one person in my ward has ever displayed fangs, tails, horns, OR pitchforks. It has only to do with me and my insecure self.

Or maybe they do and they just haven't shown them to me......

Anxiety

It's that time of the month. No. Not that time of them month. The time of the month when I know I'm teaching Relief Society tomorrow.

It's not like I've ever given a horrible lesson that resulted in anybody leaving the church (I hope...) or me getting excommunicated or anything. And mostly people give the lesson for me because my ward is really great like that. But none of that matters. I'm still nervous and uncomfortable.

The worst part? This feeling won't go away until I'm too distracted tomorrow afternoon to think of all the things I couldda shouldda wouldda said. Instead this feeling will get stronger and my body will only get shakier.

I read the lesson a few weeks ago. It's great. It's about temples.

I've been thinking about the lesson (and temples) for 3+ weeks.

But this week the panic has slowly been setting in. Sunday I listened to Elise teach her lesson and loved it (of course, I always do). That's when the anxiety started to descend and settle.

It starts with the comparison of me and Elise. I won't bore you with the details, but she's beautiful, and eloquent, and spiritually advanced. I'm me.

The next phase is realizing that I can't just stand there and read the lesson out of the book because that's boring. Which leads to me speaking. Outloud. In public. To public who will see me again. Soon.

Then I realize that I'm going to have to come up with something to say while I stand there in front of the class looking like....well, me.

At this point my heart starts to beat harder and my palms start to sweat and I picture everybody in my ward with vampire fangs, devil horns, and fire behind their pitchfork-holding perfect little bodies. I just know they're all waiting for me to say something stupid so they can attack me. They're waiting for me to trip over my own (trembling) feet. They're waiting for me to walk up to the front of the class with my skirt tucked into my underwear.

Starting this morning, my mind will not rest until I know I have 40 minutes of worthwhile things to say even though I've never said more than 10 minutes worth of anything....

My brain won't stop reviewing all of the embarrassing things I could tell the whole ward about me and Josh. That's a long list and it comes to me all day long.

It's Egbert's Law. Hand me a microphone and I will embarrass myself.

So, one Saturday of every month is spent locked up in my room, reading, researching and trying to write. Taking deep breathes and heavy sighs. Trying to come up with something, ANYTHING that will make this lesson worthwhile.

Tomorrow it only gets worse. I can usually sit through Sacrament Meeting OK, but Sunday School triggers the shaking, trembling, sweating, and nervous laughter. I can't carry on a normal conversation, or sit still, and by the time we're through the announcements at the beginning of Relief Society it's a good thing I have to stand at the front because if I sit in that chair one second longer, I know I will give a very educational display of spontaneous combustion.

So, farewell sane, unanxious world. Farewell to the non-crazies. I'll see you again tomorrow, but for now I join the land of the slightly psychotic and very nervous public speakers.

25 weeks

This morning I was standing in the bathroom doing my hair (just because it doesn't look done doesn't mean I didn't do ANYTHING to it this morning....I tried....sortof.) and Josh looked at me and smiled real big. “Hey! You’re pregnant!” he said. “Hey! You too!” I said. Then he stuck out his “gut” as far as he could and walked around “like a pregnant lady*”. I laughed.

Then he informed me “you’re gettin’ a tummy.” And I laughed harder because I’ve had a tummy for a good long time. Just not one with a baby in it. “You’re gettin’ one too!” I teased. Then he stuck out his “gut” as far as he could and walked around “like a pregnant lady” some more while I laughed some more.

Baby Thomas is starting to move more often – and on Sunday while I was laying on the couch staring at my belly I saw him punch.  I actually saw my stomach stick out where there was a tiny little fist punching through all those layers just to prove to me that he’s in there. It looked like something from a sci-fi movie and I guarantee Josh could have felt it if he was with me. But he wasn’t, and he still hasn’t felt him move.

The thing about 25 weeks is that it’s a really big deal. 40 minus 25 is 15. 15 is significantly less than 25, even if you subtract the first 5 weeks when you didn’t know you were pregnant. The point? You’re way past halfway. You’re downhill. And usually when you start going down a hill the closer you get to the bottom the faster you start to move.  Simple laws of physics tell me then that this baby is gonna be here before I know it.

Also, at this point if you count calendar months, we’re down to just 3 left (August, September, October). That’s only 6 paychecks. 3 Fast Sundays. 3 “don’t come back for 5-7 days!”’s. Probably 3 trips to the grocery store (Yes. I am that bad. Don’t judge me.)  3 more paymentnet deadlines, mortgage payments, and rounds of all the bills.

This week his hair has texture and color. I wonder what color it is? Will he have lots of dark hair? Will he be bald?  He’s getting fatter instead of longer now which adds to the “baby” look instead of the “freaky alien child” look. I wonder if he’ll look as creepy as the internet says he will. Or if he’ll be as cute as my nephews always are.

One thing is for sure - the farther along we get in this pregnancy the more excited I get to meet the little guy. 

Today I started to realize that I'm actually having a baby. With such a long wait, and with so many failed attempts, I still have a hard time recognizing that this is real. That in 3 short months I'll be holding this beautiful tiny baby in my arms. Feeling him move around in there makes it more real, and so does the fact that I look like and walk like a pregnant lady.

*I’m pretty sure it’s a bad thing that Josh’s imitation of “walking around like a pregnant lady” looks so much like a waddle already….but it does. I bought maternity clothes and immediately started to waddle. I can’t help it, walking normal would probably take WAY too much effort, but I wouldn’t know, I haven’t tried…. 

Vain repetitions

On Saturday night I prayed that as I prepared for Sunday I could have my mind and heart open to the things I needed to do in my life to receive further inspiration.

Pete Green bore his testimony about temples and how important they are. He talked about how blessed we are to have them so close and how much power is there in that building. He reminded me that it’s been entirely too long since I did a session there and that I belong there.

In Relief Society we talked about setting goals and “creating something beautiful”. I remembered (again) about going to the temple and how I can and should do it much more often. Then I set a goal to go 4 times this month and not to let little excuses stop me. I even wrote it on my yellow note-card AND my planner so I couldn’t weasel out of it. (Then I remembered that SL Temple is closed for 2 weeks….bah! Little excuses don’t count.)

After church I was reading next week’s lesson in RS (only because I’m teaching…don’t get all impressed with my ability to keep up with the lessons, I’m not that cool) all about temples and read again about the power there and how "we need a temple more than anything".

Mid-nap I remembered my cousin’s commentary on the “where to live” decision she was making in her life:

“Last week we made lists of pros and cons of both places to live. Monday we made the decision and went to the temple to think about it. We felt good about it and on Tuesday looked for apartments. Wednesday we signed the lease. Thursday we packed up the moving truck and Friday we moved.”

Bottom line? Although “keep my mind and heart open so I can understand the things I need to do” is a standard line in my prayers and I didn’t particularly think about it that night (that’s pretty much the textbook definitely of vain repetitions right?), he heard and answered me anyway.

For that I am truly thankful.

The nose.

I'm not sure why I thought I'd even come close to approaching the end of the list of things to worry about with Baby Thomas's arrival, but for some reason I did. I thought I'd exhausted my ability to be concerned for his well being and I thought I'd worried about every horrible thing that could possibly happen to my child.

Fortunately my mom is around to remind me of the things I've forgotten about.

This weekend while sitting around talking, she started wondering outloud about what Baby Thomas and Baby Taege, (spelling on that guys?) my brother's baby, will look like. It was all fun and games until she started to wonder "whose nose he will get?" 

I looked at Josh, and looked at me (in my head...) and started to panic. 

You know I'm all about the compromise but if he gets the round of my nose, on the tip of the point of Josh's nose....well that's worse than lose-lose.

Allow me to illustrate.

This is what Josh & I look like - please note the very different nose shapes.

I'm just a little concerned that our baby might turn out like this:

My mom said they'd love him anyway - plus it would be easy to name him.....

Secretly I hope the internet is smarter than my mom on this one (pffftttt....like that is even possible). Because this isn't nearly as bad.

Plus Thomas is a much cuter name than Cyrano, don't you think?

Fireworks?

Honestly Josh and I have never "been to" the fireworks together. It seems like we're always driving home from somewhere and see some from the freeway as we drive but we never get to see a whole show, or be close enough to feel the "boom".

This year was gonna be better.

This year we'd spending the evening staring up at the beautiful sky smelling the fire, feeling the "boom" from being close by, and oohing and awwwing and guessing which color the next one would be.

Eh, it was a nice thought anyway....

Friday night there were fireworks going on all over the place. We were home. We had no plans. We could have gone. BUT after spending the day Redboxing, driving to Heber, cleaning, more driving, more Redboxing, and shopping for maternity clothes, we were both wiped out. When we walked in the door at 6:00 and felt the AC blowing, Josh walked straight to the bed to lay down.

By the time I asked "do you wanna....." 30 seconds later, he was dead asleep. Not fast asleep (which you can wake up from) but DEAD asleep. I couldn't get a response from him for anything. I probably could have screamed that the house was on fire and he wouldn't have moved. So, it's a good thing the house wasn't on fire, or we would've been in trouble.

Finally (after about 10 minutes....what can I say? I don't give up easy.) I joined him and neither of us even moved until 4am.

We headed to Logan to spend the 4th with my mom's family, we tossed a frisbee around, ate good food, and my mom even performed the Wide Mouthed Frog.

This picture is posted for 1 reason only. This is my "maternity outfit" debut. I've been wearing maternity shirts, but not pants, until this weekend.
All I can say is: I'm converted. It might be worth being pregnant every other year for eternity if it means I get to wear maternity pants more often than not....

Nate & Wendy humored us with a few games of Hand & Foot before we headed back home for more Redboxing.

We just had to run by the McDonald's in Fort Union for a quick fix of a machine. We'd only be there for about 5 minutes, which would leave us time to hit the grocery store and a fireworks stand on our way home and light some stuff in the street when we got there. We were excited that it was only 8:30 as we pulled into the McDonald's.

3 1/2 hours later as we pulled away from the McDonald's we were less excited.

Turns out "5 minute fix" turned into a dead motor, an incompetent phone technician/programmer and poor Josh who couldn't get rid of either one. It just happened to be 1 of the 2 parts he'd never replaced before and the technician walking him through it on the phone wouldn't admit that she had no clue either. She wouldn't let him hang up, and she tried to talk him through the programming part of the process until midnight.

He had done his part, but just didn't know which setting the machine needed and couldn't finish the job without her.

So, another 4th of July has come and gone and we have yet to watch a real fireworks show or light our own together.

Honestly it's not my favorite holiday anyway, so I'm not feeling so bad about it. Except Josh was so excited to blow stuff up, and now...well it'll have to wait 20 more days at least. We'll see how that holiday weekend goes.

One thing I love about Heber

One thing I love about Heber is Granny's.

Iceberg doesn't even compare to Granny's thick shakes.

Things that grow

Someone once told us that "rich people invest their time/money in things that grow even after hours and during holidays". Then he talked about putting your money where you can earn interest instead of paying it even on Holidays, planting a garden, and raising kids. Josh desperately wants to be rich, so he listened to that guy. We have a CD, a money market account, a growing baby, and this year a bucket-garden.

Last year we were garden-less and even though we gladly mooched from our parents, this year we decided to be grown ups and plant out own garden.

Only we don't have a yard.

So we are experimenting with a "bucket garden".

This is a beautiful piece of our squash bucket. I love it when vegetables flower!

This is the squash-bucket in all it's glory. Yes there are some sad droopy leaves....but overall I think it's doing pretty well...what do you think?

And our champion tomato plant (which is now threatening to take over my pretty little strawberry basket....)

I just love what plants looks like as they're starting new sprouts. I love how bright green the new parts are, and how they're all tiny and squished up waiting for the right moment to lay out their beautiful leaves.

Here's hoping we get some good fruit from our labors (I love fresh tomatoes and yes mom even zucchini). Not that we've put a lot of work into the bucket-garden, but we do water them daily (because they get burned if we don't) and we try to take good care of them. Fortunately bucket-gardens don't come with many weeds - this enhances the gardening experience ten-fold if you ask me. 

Memories: Book It!

While we were in Montana we ate at Pizza Hut for lunch one day and as we walked up I could smell Elementary School.

Before you get all excited that my Elementary School served Pizza Hut for lunch you should know that it had nothing to do with school and everything to do with my BookIt button. Also you should know that only the Pizza Hut building has that smell – it’s not the same if the pizza just shows up at your door.

I don’t remember the details of the program, just that if we read a certain amount (minutes? Books? Pages?) we earned a hardcore plastic sticker. Which was made out of the same stuff as stick-on earrings…..not that I used my BookIt stickers as earrings or anything….geez, just how big a dork do you think I am? We could put the sticker on our super-sweet BookIt button and wear it around so people knew how cool we were. Not that I wore my BookIt button on my backpack every single year because I thought it was cool….just how big a dork do you think I am?  And once we earned enough stickers we got a Free Personal Pan Pizza from Pizza Hut! Say “personal pan pizza from pizza hut” 10 times fast.

You should know that it was really free. Not “Free*”

My mom faithfully took us to get our Free (not “free*”) pizzas every single time we earned them.  She is cool like that.

Usually the 15 minute drive to the nearest Pizza Hut (WAY down by Macey’s in Orem) also included a trip to the small pet store that was part of the same strip mall. I hate the smell of that pet store. I hate it with a firey passion.  I hate the birds (and vaguely remember a story of a kid that was eaten bitten by some horribly large bird) because they are often loose in the store and that freaks me out. A lot.

I think my little brother liked the pet store and always wanted to stay there longer than I did.  I still hate Pet Stores because of the smell.

BookIt gave me every single one of my “store-bought-pizza” experiences until I was like 17 at which point my friends FORCED me to pick up the phone and order pizza for the first time in my life. I was fairly certain the cops were going to come and take me to jail because I thought you had to be at least 18 to order pizza over the phone.

I didn’t do it again until my roommate worked at Papa John’s and assured me it was legal for me to order pizza and stuck the phone up to my ear again forcing me to overcome my fear of ordering pizza.

I honestly think I didn’t know people really ordered pizza from those places until I became “people” and went through my “Friday is pizza night!” phase with Josh.  My empty bank account taught me the same thing my mom did when I was young.

Pizza tastes better homemade.

Still a Pizza Hut building smells like books to me.