Just some silliness

Because I have nothing much to blog about, I thought I'd post a funny little video I took of Marlee in December. It was her first taste of orange. One of my favorite moments is her eye twitch around the 26-second mark. I'm happy to report she's much more fond of oranges these days.

Oh the weather outside is freightful

Isn't weather such an exciting thing!? Many people think the weather is mundane and boring, but I legitimately enjoy a good weather conversation. Plus, it's always a good tension breaker, especially when I'm working.... "excuse me, ma'am, can you please relax while I stick this tube up your urethra? Boy, isn't the weather just lovely today?"
That being said, I will tell you about the cuh-razey weather we had here in the 'folk. Our little town even made national news, or so I hear. Anywho, we had an epic hail/rain/wind storm on Saturday. Apparently, we had around 3 inches of rain and massive amounts of hail that led to flash-flooding and a lot of property damage. Here's a few pictures I "borrowed" from various web sources as proof

If you enlarge the picture you can see there's an abandoned car drowning in the middle of that water

No, that's not snow, it's a hail drift. Crazy!
p.s. I do not know who this man is, but I'm sure he doesn't mind me using his picture (I found it on foxnews.com)

Of course the flash flooding occurred right as I was driving to work, so I ended up stranded on "higher ground" (aka the Salvation Army parking lot) for 15 minutes while waiting for the flooding to dissipate. Luckily, I was safe. Not so lucky, both of our vehicles received hail damage (not covered by our struggling student budget insurance). Also not so lucky was the ER department of the hospital. It flooded with 4 feet of water.

One of the ER exam rooms after the water was gone. Those are hail clumps deposited on the floor.

Overall, I can say there's at least 2 positives that came about due to Saturday's storm:
1)I have enough conversation material to last me for at least a week.
2)We now live in lake-front property. Go ahead, be jealous.

Go baby go!

This post is mostly for Jamie. He's away in Omaha for a month (again...) doing a pediatrics rotation. Since he's gone, he misses some of the daily going-ons around the house. This is what happened today...pretty exciting stuff around these parts!

A few pics from my day

I'm sorry, but I can't help but chuckle every time I look at this picture of Marlee. She recently discovered that the hole in her nose is a perfect fit for her finger, so this has become a new favorite pastime for her. I obviously try to discourage her from sticking her finger in her nose, but I kinda think it's weirdly cute. At least she hasn't tried digging for gold (yet), for now she's just satisfied using her nose as a garage for her finger.

This is a scene from earlier tonight. Can these two get any cuter? Tonight was just one of those simple, lovely nights. We grilled some steaks, and then went on a walk in the field outside our door looking for pheasants. Yes, this is Nebraska and that's what we do. We walk through fields looking to scare up pheasants, and then go tip cows when they're sleeping. Try it sometime.

This is our current appearance. Talk about a happening Friday night! I'm sitting in my robe blogging (obv) while Jamie watches the Jazz on some *cough* very legitimate website. Typical scene in the house of Olsen.

This little girl had a birthday

Well, Marlee up and decided it was time to turn one on Sunday. It's bittersweet. I miss my sweet little baby but love the fun, spunky, and sometimes mischievous little lady Marlee is becoming. I'm so grateful for this little girl who made me a mama, and find myself loving her more and more each day.

For her birthday we invited just a few family and friends over to help us celebrate. I did a rainbow themed party, and was actually kind of impressed with how her cake turned out (mind you, when it comes to domestics and all things crafty/creative, I usually flop).

The rainbow fruit spread

Blowing out the candle

Enjoying her piece of cake

Since she's the lady of the hour, I'll write a little about Marlee at 1 year.

-She loves food (a girl after her mama's heart). Some of her favorites include avacados, pears, and chicken. She gets super jealous when she spots someone eating something she doesn't have in front of her.
-She's (almost) completely weaned. She still nurses once in the morning, but to be honest, it's because I'm just too lazy to open the fridge and pour her milk when I first wake up (well, I suppose if I'm being completely honest, I still enjoy the extra calories I burn nursing, so I hesitate a little to give that up). However, the days of mama milkshakes will be over very soon.
-She loves her Papa more than her Mama. I have accepted this fact, and I'm okay with it. In fact, I don't blame her, her Papa's a pretty good man.
-After suffering through numerous "sick" months during the winter that disrupted her sleep (darn germy daycare), she's finally turned back into the champion sleeper she once was
-She's not walking yet, but she'll sometimes stand up on her own in the middle of the room.
-Her favorite activity includes emptying any cupboard, bag, or drawer that gets in her way.
-She has 8 teeth and gives the best cheesy smiles

-When it's time to pray she folds her arms for about 2-3 seconds (we're still working on this one...), but it's pretty much the cutest thing ever.
-She loves other kids, and squeals with delight each time she sees one. This makes me feel a little better about dropping her off at daycare when I work.


Anyway, we love our Miss Marlee dearly, and are relieved she survived her first year with us as parents (quite a feat!). Here's to many more adventures!

One day...

One day, I'll do a better job of updating our blog. But it's easy to procrastinate when taking care of this...

Most of my time is spent cleaning up after this...

And this...

And trying to keep her hands out of this...

One day, I'll stop taking pictures like this...

 Look at those sexy sweat-pant buns! There's some major VPL (visible panty line) going on;)

One day, my husband and I will be mature enough to stop performing silly "Christmas talents"  such as this...

Acting out a scene from the life of the Olsen family pet George (RIP). This picture in particular captures George's pre-bathroom ritual

And one day, I hope to get over my addiction to food like this...

But for now, I'm just going to enjoy this...

One man's trash.....

    I have a confession. I have a secret passion that involves greed, scheming, metal bins and waste. It's called dumpster diving. Generally, I personally try to avoid the "diving" part, that's what my husband is for:) Anyway, my love of dumpster diving began innocently enough. When we lived in Des Moines, I noticed that whenever I saw a moving truck in the parking lot, the apartment dumpster would usually be overflowing with goods. I noticed a broom handle sticking out here, a picture frame peeking through there, but it took me a while to muster up the guts to take action. Well, on one said 'moving day' I noticed a perfectly good book shelf sitting next to the dumpster. Immediately, I began scheming (because heaven forbid anyone should see me taking the trash in instead of out). Finally, when it got dark outside, I grabbed my accomplice (Jamie) and pretended to take out the trash. After a few nervous glances to make sure no one was around, we grabbed that puppy and scurried inside as quickly as two people awkwardly carrying a book shelf while trying to appear nonchalant could.
    The bookshelf was just the beginning. Since that day (well over 2 years ago), I have rescued a swiffer sweeper, a vacuum, a ficus tree, an office chair, a body-length mirror, and an exersaucer from the trash (just to name a few). Now, every time I drive past the dumpsters at our complex, like magnets, my eyes are drawn to the metal treasure chests on wheels and I perform a quick scan to see if there are any precious gems beckoning me. My confidence has increased as well. I used to only go out at night and take Jamie with me, but slowly I began solo daytime diving. I guess you could say I've become a regular ol' dumper:)

*Although, I feel I should clarify that I've never actually crawled into a dumpster, I just grab the stuff placed outside it or within an arms reach (I don't care to catch a disease)*

    Anyway, I just want to bear testimony that one man's trash will probably end up becoming my treasure. Oh and here's a picture of something I didn't find in the trash....love that girl!