Thanksgiving and Everything Else I have Slacked On...

THANKSGIVING was wonderful and relaxing. We stayed home and did our own thing with just the three of us. We cooked a turkey for the first time which was fun and yummy. I just didn't enjoy fishing for the guts. Yuck! I probably should have taken some pictures, but...like I said: we RELAXED, so I wasn't worrying about pictures for blogging.

I guess I should mention our new ward. We are in BURBANK 1st WARD and we LOVE it! Everyone is very fun and friendly and there are lots of young couples that we look forward to getting to know. We do miss our friends in Lancaster but luckily we only live an hour away from them so hopefully we'll be able to still see them often. We spoke in sacrament meeting 2 weeks ago which is always an experience. As hard as it is to speak in front of so many people, I always love learning so much while preparing talks. My topic was on the nature of God and Nick's was on how our Heavenly Father uses His prophets. It was fun, but I'm glad it's over with!

I finally went and saw NEW MOON last Wednesday with Lindsey Dunn. I couldn't believe the theater charges $12 per ticket! Call me cheap if you want, but that's almost as much as the DVD will cost when it comes out and I was used to the $8 per ticket in Lancaster. Oh well, I don't regret it because I had a lot of fun with Lindsey here in Burbank and the movie was pretty good. Can't wait for Eclipse to come out this next June!

Nick SPRAINED his KNEE again a couple weeks ago while playing basketball. Turns out he tore his ACL and MCL so he will be going through physical therapy for a while and having SURGERY on the 29th of this month. So, he will be home for another 3-4 MONTHS with Eli and I. LOOKING for the GOOD in the situation...it's always fun getting to see Nick a lot and it will be especially nice having Nick home with Eli while I go through my first quarter or two at the design school in LA. Now I will be able to go full time so I can either graduate sooner or take less classes at a time when I get to the harder classes. I will also be able to enjoy school more knowing that Eli is with his dad. I LOVE my boys!

Halloween

I know this is quite a bit late but I wanted to post it anyway. I have a bit of catching up to do since we moved. We've been really busy unpacking and commuting back to Lancaster to finish the semester at AVC. It's been hectic but this is our last week of school which will definitely call for a celebration! Since things are starting to slow down for me, I now have a little time to catch up on blogging. HALLOWEEN was lots of fun. I put together some "Incredible" costumes for all of us. Eli made a super cute jack-jack from The Incredibles.

The three of us as the Incredibles at the Wynn's Halloween party, which was lots of fun!

Mrs. Incredible

lil' Jack-Jack
Mr. Incredible! No, that is NOT a muscle suit...hehe
Eli & Nicholas
Eli at the Sierra ward Halloween party
The most adorable Alice EVER, in her custom made dress, and I at the ward party

Eli & I ready to go home. Nick wasn't able to stay for the ward party because he had to go to his drawing class.

Moving in 2 Weeks!

It is OFFICIAL! We signed the contract today to live in this cute little 2bedroom/1 bath place in Burbank. We love it and are excited to live there, although it will be quite stressful at first since we have to move in two weeks and then commute back to the Antelope Valley to finish the semester at AVC. But, that won't be too bad hopefully. It will be worth it in the end. Anyhow, it is perfect for us and we feel good about it.

This is the front view of the house (duplex) we'll be renting

Our landlord remodeled the whole thing so that is why there is still some tools laying around and stuff. He is finishing up the last few things. The above picture is the view from the living room when you walk in the front door.

Another view of the living room. I LOVE the windows throughout the house; there is SO MUCH natural light, at least compared to where we are living right now. I especially love the window in the front room since it's so big and it has such a wide ledge.

View from the dining room

View of the little dining room that our table will fit perfectly in. We are so glad there is so much storage space!

One of the bedrooms with construction stuff still on the floor.

Bedroom closet

Linen closets next to the bathroom. More storage space! Yay!

Second bedroom. They are pretty small but they will still work. Eli loved getting into all the construction stuff.
Closet in second bedroom

Bathroom. I know...it's pink. lol

View of kitchen from hallway

Highchair is going to go right next to these cabinets.

View of the BEAUTIFUL kitchen! I LOVE it all! The cabinets are awesome! I don't even know what I'm going to put in them all...

View of laundry room from kitchen

Laundry room and service door leading outside

View from service door to the front yard. The gate is open at the moment.

View towards the back yard from the service door. There is a producing lemon tree back there and it opens up to the right where we will probably put our grill. It is still under construction back there though.

View of kitchen from laundry room

View from our front door

View from our front yard looking left

View from front yard looking to the right. Lots of nice places to walk and run in the area which will be nice, especially for Eli since he loves being outside. This will be an ADVENTURE for sure!

Eli: The Happy Sick Child

For the last THREE MONTHS, Eli has been, or at least has sounded sick. He started slightly wheezing 3 months ago but he was happy so we didn't worry about it. But then it got worse and he got sick with really high fevers. Turns out, he had an EAR INFECTION and BRONCHITIS. So, they gave him an antibiotic and cough meds but his wheezing/horribly loud, gurgling breathing didn't stop and kept getting worse. After taking him to his doctor several times with no improvement, we finally took him to a Ear/Nose/Throat SPECIALIST to make sure his vocal chords weren't paralyzed. In the picture below, Eli is happily waiting to see the ENT specialist.

His vocal chords were fine though and the ENT doctor couldn't figure out what was wrong either, except thinking it was still bronchitis so he prescribed meds and a chest x-ray. When we took him in for his chest x-ray to check his lungs, we found a SURPRISE!

Eli had SWALLOWED something! We're assuming it was a small coin. He eventually passed it though so everything was alright, even though we never found it! His next x-rays showed up clear. His breathing was still horrible though so we decided to take him to an ALLERGIST because we thought he might be allergic to milk or something. The allergist was wonderful! He knew almost IMMEDIATELY what was wrong with Eli. He had a horrible SINUS INFECTION! No allergies! All he needed was an antibiotic.They sent him to get a CT scan and they showed us that ALL of his sinus' were completely blocked. The doctor said that on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the worst, Eli's infection was a 20! He has to take the antibiotic for 24 days, which is a really long time! But his breathing got better in almost a week so I won't complain. He doesn't purr like a kitten anymore and he's back to his normal self just in time to start TEETHING again! Oh the joys of parenthood...

Apartment Hunt

We decided that we....DON'T WANT TO LOOK at the above view of downtown LA everyday. Yesterday Nick and I went driving around downtown LA, Hollywood, and Burbank looking for somewhere to live when we move in December for me to go to FIDM. Although we may not have found a specific place to live yet, we did narrow down the area that we will be looking around in. We found an area in BURBANK that is PERFECT for us! It is right by several studios so Nick will be VERY close to work and it is also not too far from downtown, but at the same time, far enough so we're not too close to all of that LA chaos more often than we have to be. It is SAFE, CLEAN and there are beautiful RUNNING PATHS. We were really impressed with how many families were out walking together or riding their bikes. So, we're going to focus our search in that area. We did find a few places there that we might be interested in living at but we want to keep looking to see if there is anything better and cheaper. It's so HARD to keep being PATIENT! I just wish we could know where we're gonna live already! Oh well, I'm sure it will all work out eventually...
Yesterday morning, we went to the LA Temple to start our day off right. We love going there. Everything and everyone is BEAUTIFUL and FRIENDLY. It's the most PEACEFUL place on Earth! We plan on going again this next weekend before we head back to Burbank to continue our apartment hunt. At least one nice thing about moving will be that we will be closer to the temple. I love going to the temple because it always knocks my priorities back to where they are supposed to be. It's a lot easier living life, having faith, and overcoming adversity when you have an ETERNAL PERSPECTIVE to pull you through.

Our Little Helper

Eli really likes to help his mom and dad. This is how we found him taking care of a basket of clean clothes yesterday. He's such a big helper!He's always so happy to assist us! What a good boy, determined to leave no items of clothing left behind!

Motivation

I've been having a HARD time feeling motivated to go to the gym lately. I realized that my problem was that the gym is boring. I hated having to get my pass and work out towel, get in my car, drive to the gym, and then WAIT for a machine, since I swear that half the gym equipment is usually OUT OF ORDER. So...I decided to just go RUNNING, like I used to all the time back in high school for track and cross-country. All I have to do is get dressed, walk out my door, and RUN. That was all I needed to get motivated. I had forgotten how much I LOVE IT! I really hope my kids love sports too because exercise is so wonderful and beneficial! Participating in sports was the best thing I did for myself in high school. It's much easier to get a better workout when you have a destination to propel yourself towards and to be out in the open air. I've been running one or two miles everyday now for the last week and it feels great. I think it's doing me much more good than the gym was. Hopefully this BEAUTIFUL WEATHER lasts for a while so that I can keep running outside. Nick sprained his knee a week or two ago playing basketball otherwise he would be running too. HOPEFULLY he will be BETTER soon so we can run together! Exercise is GOOD for the BODY and good for the SOUL!