Two Years

We celebrate our second anniversary today so I have been thinking about some of the highlights of the last two years:

• we drove across the country (Utah to Virginia) with all of our possessions packed into the car and the little space we rented on a trailer and listening to Harry Potter
• I did my student teaching, graduated from BYU, and had my first post-college job
• Roy has survived and done very well in 2 years of law school
• we moved within Virginia, just up about 6 blocks from our old apartment, but far enough to go to a new ward at church
• Abby joined our family
• we flew back across the country for a summer internship and brought a baby this time

For those who haven't heard our first date story, here it is from my perspective. A couple days after we first met, I got a phone call from Roy telling me that he had been set up on a blind date, but she had cancelled and wanted to know if I could go. In an hour. So I cancelled the "hang out" plans I had with an old roommate and hurried to get ready. For the next hour, I tried to remember what this boy looked like and how I had met him. I had only been back at BYU for a couple days and met a whole bunch of people and couldn't remember Roy. Then he came to the door and we had a pretty good time together. Then he ignored me for a week (he'll be so mad I wrote that, but it's true, even if it was because he was sick), asked me out again, and then that was the end of that.

Recently, we were talking about the fact that most of the time the Lord doesn't bless you with someone to marry until you are taking care of yourself and can take care of someone else financially, emotionally, etc. I joked that Roy was just taking care of me with loans, not his own earnings. His response, "The Lord just took pity on me."

So not only am I the back-up date, but I am the pity wife!

Quick Pic

My sister, Becky, came into town on Friday with her three girls. I was SOOOO excited to see them. It's hard to take good pictures with two babies, but here are our cute girls!

Alli, Abby, Holly, and Brynne

The Weekly Report

This week was exciting for all of the Northern Californians weather-wise. We were at or near 100 for a few days there. Thank goodness for family with a pool! In the world of the Zwahlen family, life was also exciting. Abby was introduced to peaches. They were a big hit. She pretty much loves food in general. She also got her second tooth, after a WHOLE lot of effort and chewing and drooling and impatience. We're very glad it's here. This tooth seemed harder than the first.

Abby with the Freebairn grandparents

We had two fun highlights this week Abby-wise:

We had a really hot day and we spent the afternoon playing hard and swimming. Abby was starving and exhausted. We had her in the high chair and Roy was feeding her. All of the sudden, we noticed that the eyes were very heavy, but the mouth kept opening. She literally continued eating while trying to fall asleep. As I said earlier, she's an eater so getting that food was very important to her. Her head kept falling, which would wake her up, and she'd open up for more. I was dying. So, of course, I had to take a picture:

We were in the swimming pool and Abby was hanging out with me. All the sudden, she wanted Roy, so she reached out to him, he took her, she grabbed his cheeks and gave him a huge kiss. It was, by far, the highlight of my day.

The Bucket List

We watched "The Bucket List" over the weekend (twice). It's a really good movie and has a good message about taking the opportunities we have while we have them. Besides, Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman are good actors by themselves so putting them together is just a great idea. So, you wonder, what is the message that we took out of the movie? I quote, "Never trust a fart."

A Whole New Meaning...

You have probably heard the phrase about putting your foot in your mouth. Abby is now quite talented in that regard--not in the "oops, I probably shouldn't have said that" way, but in the "oh, these look interesting...maybe they belong in my mouth" (along with everything else that can be held in her tight little fists). Since it is summertime, we don't have Abby in socks very often. Not that it makes a difference, because she does put her socks in her mouth too. Call me crazy, but somehow it seems a little less disgusting to put her toes in her mouth than a sock. This new ability makes changing diapers a very interesting process!

Last week I bought Abby this great stacking toy. I remember having one at our house growing up and wanted to get it for Abby. She loves it! The stacking toy is her new traveling companion and goes from Bedstemor's house (my grandma) to Mor Mor and Far Far's house (my parents) daily. She also enjoys her new stuffed animal blue monkey from Annmarie--he is her new backseat buddy and somehow makes those "long" car rides more endurable.

A Week of Firsts

Abby's philosophy this week: Why do one exciting thing when you can do multiple?

I now understand why mothers begin moaning when the word "teething" is uttered. I do know if could be much worse, but there was one day this week that I had a VERY cranky baby and I was ready for bed about 3 pm. But, lo and behold, the next evening I noticed a little sharp tooth corner poking out of Abby's bottom gum. By the next morning, we had the whole tooth out. So Abby has a tooth. She spent the next several days exploring her tooth with fingers, fists, her lower lip, tongue, toys, newspapers, napkins, and pretty much anything she could get her hands on.

This week Abby decided to surprise us all by sitting up on her own. Seeing as how she still has yet to roll over (yes, I do take partial responsibility) we were slightly shocked. Now she complains every time we try to do tummy time because she loves sitting up so much.

I learned that three is a charm--we were successful in getting Abby to go for her first swim! Yeah! Once she got over the initial shock of the gigantic bathtub and the colder-than-she-is-used-to water, she loved it! Here she is demonstrating that literally everything deserves to be used as a tooth sharpener:

Well, on to other Zwahlen news, Roy really enjoys his internship out here. He has finished projects earlier than the given deadline (typical for Roy) and done some interesting research. He might know more about the interworkings of Sonoma County after one week of work than I do after living here for basically my whole life. Abby and I went in to meet his coworkers last week so now they all like Roy even more because Abby charmed them. Ah, the benefits of having a baby!

Roy and I went on a 30 minute ice cream date on Saturday and left Abby with my parents. Abby only screamed for half the time (sadly, 15 minutes is an improvement). She ended up getting so choked up with snot that she spit up mucus all down my mom's shirt. When we got back, she wanted to be held by me (but not Roy--it must have been his fault we left), but was too mad to even look at me. About 10 minutes later it was like nothing had ever happened. If only we could all forget the traumatic things that quickly!

Abby Faces

We have tried to help Abby like the pool. If you look closely at this picture, you can see how she feels about it:

This week we flew from VA to CA. Abby was an angel on the flight. And since this was her first flight, we wanted to document her reaction. Roy pulled out the camera and our little one opened her mouth and was giggling. It's too bad pictures don't capture sounds too.