Highlights from a CRAZY week!

At the beginning of last week I was getting a little depressed. It was FREEZING cold (the high temperature usually under 10 degrees), I had NO kitchen, NO car, and NO friends to go visit! Then I got an awesome pep-talk from my best friend Jennie, set some new goals, and said a little prayer before I went to bed... and then...EVERYTHING got better.

On Friday, I got a call from a lady in the ward telling me that the weather was going to warm up into the forties so she and a bunch of other moms were going to drive downtown together to the Field Museum for a playdate with their kids. She invited me to go and offered me a ride. YES! Finally I was going to get out of the house!

Then, on my way out the door, our landlord called and said she was sending in the maintenance guys that day to finish my kitchen!!! Hooray! Warm weather, a finished kitchen, and intelligent socialization! How could it get any better than that?!


We went to the museum and it was a beautiful day. We even got in for FREE! Brooklyn loved touching everything and being around other little kids. Her favorite was the music room. She actually understood the concept of using this thing and played some pretty good music.

The room was even soundproof so no one else had to listen but the people inside...VERY good idea. I wish our apartment was soundproof too!

Brooklyn also liked playing these bells, although I think she would have preferred ripping them off and eating them over making sound with them.

Here are some other pictures from the museum. We saw skeletons and sculptures, played with fossils, and pretended to be hatching dinosaurs and Mayan villagers.

In all, 23 people went to the museum and I learned all of their names! Now I have a whole set of new friends to call when it gets too cold and lonely!

When I got home from the museum, the kitchen was already finished. It was so good to know that I wouldn't have to wash dishes in the bathtub, make waffles on my living room floor, or store kitchen appliances on my hallway shelf any more!

This is what our kitchen looked like before. There were only cabinets on one wall and only 1/3 of our things fit in them. Also, we had a linoleum floor that had a huge bubble right in the middle!

This is what our house has looked like almost the whole time we've been here. Iggy and Leo were a permanent part of the decor as well. Brooklyn even started calling them "Daddy" when they would come every morning!

This is the finished product. A new sink and dishwasher, cabinets all the way around, new counter tops, and a new wood floor without a big bubble in the middle!

Some other random things that happened this week: The temperatures hit the sixties and all our snow melted so Brooklyn and I played out on our balcony. Brooklyn will finally sit still for a whole TV show without tearing things off the shelves. She also learned how to escape from her footie pajamas AND she slept in her "big girl" bed for the first time.

Also, not pictured on this blog: We went to a Chinese New Year celebration at our ward and met a million new people, had dinner at the Noorda's house in our ward, got new ward callings and an assignment to speak in church next Sunday, and I am getting really good at finding my way around...yes...I am actually driving!