Family Photos Dec. 2013

My lovely sister in law Saren of Wren's Flight Photography took these great photos of my mini family yesterday. As she's pregnant though, and super busy with other real clients, I wanted to edit these photos myself. Honestly I just needed someone who knew how to actually work a camera take some shots for me, and boy did she deliver! All in about 15 minutes too! So, feast your eyes here:

Break. Shop. Work. 4 Months.

First off, EMMETT IS 4 MONTHS OLD TODAY. WHERE HAS THE TIME GONE.
Seriously though. What? Wasn't it just last month? Oh wait, it's winter now and he was born in the summer. Nevermind then.



It's been a crazy weekend, break, thing. It was super nice having Doug around all the time; I miss summer having him home whenever I wanted. And it's been good for him too. Fall semesters are the worst after all. We went on the Polar Express this weekend. That was fun. And Emmett sat on Santa's lap :)

Because this weekend was Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday is coming up, it's been crazy for me as an Etsy shop owner. I tweet, have a facebook, pinterest, deviantart etc. all of which promote my work in some form or another, among other things. And, to no surprise, the shop got sales like crazy! Which is fantastic news for me (I'm really hoping it will at least keep up somewhat even after the holidays) and it's kept me quite busy. I wish I was able to promote it all more, but I'm not really sure how to do that. So by all means, if any of you readers know what you're doing, enlighten me.

I honestly love what I do. I love working with my hands, I love created art and jewelry and bringing that to people. It's amazing how many different ideas I come up with all the time; problem is I either don't have the funds (for the really big things I would like, such as an embroidery machine for instance) or don't have the time. Turns out taking care of a baby while running an online shop isn't as easy as one might think... har har. Nevertheless, I still do it. Simply because it keeps me busy and gives me something to do that I actually enjoy. I'm honestly very grateful for it. 

Well. Now that I've ranted about my shop, if any of you feel so inclined to send people my way, feel free! I love nerds in pretty much all fandoms! 

https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheNerdNiche

Thanksgiving

It really is a blessed holiday. Is it possible to go wrong with so much food? I think not. It was a good day filled with family, food and a puppy, so really is there any way it could have gotten better? I don't think so. 

Especially because I made cake balls and those always make everything better.

I'm really grateful for this time I'm able to spend with my family now. Who knew I would actually want to be around them as a teenager? It's weird to think we may not even be in the state in a couple years. I will say, a part of me misses being on my own, like I was in Ukraine. But I don't think I could ever permanently live too far from all my relatives. Though I suppose this all just depends on what life brings us with jobs and location, but I surely hope it's relatively nearby.

Penguin Sliding

It's official. I'm just going to backdate a lot of entries as I can over the breaks and that'll be the end of my slacking. I'll just start afresh and add pictures and stories as I go.

Emmett really likes to be a penguin these days. He'll lay on his stomach, straighten his legs behind him as well as his arms and wobble back and forth! The only problem is he won't roll over because his arm keeps getting in the way. He hasn't quite figured that part out yet. 

Selfies are always a must since we have like 50 mirrors in our apartment attached to all the walls.

He's sitting really well. And he walks now. Obviously with help and me holding his hands, but still. It's pretty darn impressive. He's so strong, it's crazy! 

He's so stinking cute! And his hair is ridiculously long. At least his hair is finally thinkening a little bit. Ah, this kid is just awesome. I can't even begin to describe how grateful I am for this little man and how perfect he is, especially for Doug and my lifestyle. 

Emmett

This little guy was born on August 1st. His due date was today, however I had to be induced due to medical reasons, and after being at the hospital for over 12 hours, being in labor for a little more than 11 hours and pushing for about 45 minutes, Emmett Douglas Johnson was born at 8 pounds even and 20 inches long. This beautiful, wonderful little bundle of joy. 

It's been a rough few days. He had bad jaundice and already gotten more blood drawn than I wanted to see, been stuck in a bilibed for days, wouldn't eat and lost 15% of his birth weight and in turn wouldn't sleep due to starving. Rough days, to say the least. But now that he is being bottle fed, he has gained all his weight back and then some, as well as gotten over the jaundice. Yay! 

He's gotten his baby pictures taken, and here are my 4 favorites for sure. 

I hope for him to be just as much of a nerd as Doug and I are. If not moreso (though he would be hard pressed to do so). And honestly, he's the most adorable little boy I've ever seen.

He's also the strongest little newborn I've ever seen too. He's been holding his head up fine since he was about 3 days old. It's crazy, but I'm also a little bit proud of him too :)

I love this little boy, so stinking much.

July 3rd

Most don't know this, but July 3rd is a special day for Doug and I. Simply, it's the anniversary of the day I knew I was going to marry him. So, tonight we went out, possibly for the last time before the little one is born. I'm super excited and really terrified. But that's not for another month, so let's move on.

We went to Sizzler for Steak and all you can eat Shrimp. It was great. If you know me well at all, you know that I love shrimp like it's nobody's business and steak is my next favorite food. It was fantastic. And I ate myself silly. And I saw my old boss! Sometimes I miss working at the Jr. High. I had to quit back in January, but it was a nice, simple, laid back job that fit perfectly for me... except for working with chemicals and being on my feet for ~3 hours straight and being pregnant and sick... Yeah it didn't work. As you can imagine. Anyway, it was great to see him, even if the only thing he remembered was my maiden name haha.

I'm going to miss these nights Doug and I have alone together. While we'll be able to have some when people take Emmett for the night, it just won't be the same. So I'm going to cherish these days while I can... or try to anyway.

Finished.

I'm done. I'm officially done. I didn't take my last final because I completely spaced it, and it kind of killed my GPA because of it, but I still passed and I still finished and I'm officially done with college.

I'm officially a college graduate.

I am a Bachelor of Science in Family Studies with an Emphasis in Family Life.

Granted, I didn't walk (because who wants to sit there for that long in this hideous gown anyway?) so I have no pictures. But I'll have my lovely diploma in a few weeks, and that's good enough for me.

Oh, we've also moved out of Doug's parents house and moved to Orem! That was exciting, even though we had to do that before we even took any of our finals. But we've got our own place and it's got two bedrooms and it'll be awesome ^_^ I can finally do Emmett's Pokemon room! I'll post pictures as it comes along. Until then, toots!

Finally.

I'm no longer sick! It was terrible. I was even sick on my birthday back in January, and that was the worst. School has been a drag and really hard for me to go to. I missed an in class midterm a few weeks ago due to being sick and making it up was a pain in the butt. And I had an annoying TA to work with in order to even re-schedule it. All I know is I'm glad I don't typically have to deal with her.

I've hardly gone to my writing class; Brandon Sanderson has been gone pretty much all month on a book tour for the final Wheel of Time book. And when my group is essentially a Debbie Downer kinda group, it makes it hard to want to go and even see their faces.

Doug and I have been moving over the last week to his parents house. Our contract ends today, and frankly I was not a fan of our landlords. They were sketchy at best and kind of pains in the butt. So now we're here, though we have no idea how long we'll be here. We're hoping for not longer than a few months, but we'll see what kind of housing we can find. It just all depends on how we're blessed.

Sick.

I'm sick pretty much all the time. Nauseated anyway. It's awful and I never want to go to class. Sometimes I still wish I had dropped out for this semester, even though I am going to graduate after this last semester. It doesn't help that I don't like my classes at all. I'm too nervous in my writing class with Brandon Sanderson, and my group kind of really sucks super bad. And they're dirt bags. I don't even want to go half the time, which is just sad. Brandon is entertaining and very informative, it's just having to review each others work is more of a chore than anything, and just depressing whenever they speak. Anyway, so far so good in terms of baby. I go into my first real appointment on the 31st, I got blood drawn on the 7th. Sigh. It's going to be a long ~7 months...