Songs

I made my list today in between Hannah's less fussy moments.  It's late and I don't have much time to blog, but here is my list (Nathan just made his about 10 minutes ago).  For newcomers click here.

Happy Conference.

Rachel's list

1. #1      The Morning Breaks
2. #3      Now Let us Rejoice
3. #5      High on a Mountain Top
4. #6      Redeemer of Israel
5. #19    We Thank Thee O God For a Prophet
6. #26    Joseph Smith's First Prayer
7. #27    Praise to the Man
8. #30    Come, Come, Ye Saints
9. #41    Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise
10. #44    Beautiful Zion, Built Above
11. #58    Come, Ye Children of the Lord
12. #59    Come, O Thou King of Kings
13. #66    Rejoice, the Lord is King
14. #67    Glory to God on High
15. #72    Praise to the Lord, the Almighty
16. #81    Press Forward Saints
17. #83    Guide Us, O Thou Great Jehovah
18. #85    How Firm A Foundation
19. #97    Lead, Kindly Light
20. #98    I Need Thee Every Hour
21. #123  Oh, May My Soul Commune with Thee
22. #136  I Know That My Redeemer Lives
23. #142  Sweet Hour of Prayer
24. #156  Sing We Now at Parting
25. #220  Lord, I Would Follow Thee
26. #264  Hark, All Ye Nations!
27. #301  I Am a Child of God
28. #323  Rise Up, O Men of God
29. Beautiful Savior
30. My Shepherd Will Supply My Need

Nathan's List:

1. #1     The Morning Breaks
2. #3     Now Let Us Rejoice
3. #5     High on a Mountain Top
4. #6     Redeemer of Israel
5. #7     Israel, Israel God is Calling
6. #15   I Saw a Mighty Angel Fly
7. #19   We Thank Thee O God for a Prophet
8. #21   Come Listen to a Prophet's Voice
9. #23   We Ever Pray for Thee
10. #26   Joseph Smith's First Prayer
11. #35   For the Strength of the Hills
12. #41   Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise
13. #44   Beautiful Zion, Built Above
14. #58   Come, Ye Children of the Lord
15. #64   On This Day of Joy and Gladness
16. #66   Rejoice, the Lord is King
17. #67   Glory to God on High
18. #81   Press Forward Saints
19. #83   Guide Us, O Thou Great Jehovah
20. #85   How Firm a Foundation
21. #90   From All that Dwell Below the Skies
22. #98   I Need Thee Every Hour
23. #116 Come Follow Me
24. #136 I Know That My Redeemer Lives
25. #156 Sing We Now at Parting
26. #165 Abide With Me, 'Tis Eventide
27. #193 I Stand All Amazed
28. #220 Lord, I Would Follow Thee
29. #223 Have I Done Any Good
30. #259 Hope of Israel

Picture courtesy of lds.org

D-Day

Today was Nathan's "D-Day" (aka Defense Day)!

That's right. Nathan defended his dissertation and he is now officially a Doctor of Philosophy!

Here are some pictures that I took today.  (FYI, something weird happened with our memory stick in our camera and it wouldn't let me take any new pictures.  So, I had to take them with my phone, which is why some are slightly blurry.  Bummer...I know!)

This is the room where Nathan had his defense.

My favorite part of this room is the "window picture."  I thought it was funny and clever.  It could be 30 degrees below zero outside, and yet it can still look like this.

When a member of Nathan's committee walked in the room and saw the food that we brought they said "WOW!  This is impressive!"  I guess some PhD candidates are not as creative with bringing refreshments.  While Nathan defended, we all ate yummy grapes, delicious poppy seed muffins (that were homemade and were to die for!), bagels with cream cheese, and some tasty juice.

I knew I couldn't take any pictures of Nathan during his defense, so while I was in the room all by myself before it started I snapped a picture of his first slide.  I thought it was clever (the IT is supposed to stand for Instructional Technology, which is what Nathan's study population was).

This is a picture of Nathan and his committee.  I was SO IMPRESSED with this group.  They all came prepared for this defense and read the entire dissertation (which was about 200 pages long).  They were very helpful, and were all dazzled by Nathan's writing and presentation.

I have been more excited about this than Nathan has, as you can tell by this picture.  I feel like the only thing I have wanted to do all day is jump up and click my heels!

 After the defense we went and picked up Hannah.  I need to give a HUGE thank you to our awesome home teacher Lael for watching Hannah while Nathan defended.  Lael was kind enough to take a few pictures of Hannah and her silly-faced friend Sage.

After we came home and unloaded, I went on a walk with Hannah because the weather was perfect!  Later, I headed off to a doctors appointment (don't worry--it was just a regular check up) and when I got home we ordered pizza and watched some Home Improvement, courtesy of Netfilx.  And after dinner Nathan put Hannah to bed while I headed off to my sewing class.

That, Ladies and Gentleman, were the events of our D-Day!  Congratulations Nathan!  I'm so proud of you.

A dash of Sage

Today, Hannah had a friend come over and play.  Her name is Sage and they play pretty well together due to their 8 month age discrepancy.  I always love how tired Hannah gets on these play dates because it usually means that she sleeps pretty well that night (tonight however is an exception.  Hannah has woken up a few times already due to teething and just wants to be comforted--poor baby).

The funny part about today's play date was that when Sage or Hannah wanted to sit on my lap and read a book the other had to come and do the same thing.  Nathan grabbed the camera and we took a few snap shots of the kiddos.  I am thinking they are becoming good friends...

Thanks for playing with us Sage.

Hannah's first word

The title says it all.  Yesterday Hannah said her first word!

Hannah woke up.  I gave her a bottle, then we read a book or two (she was signing "book" to me while drinking her bottle).  After the books we changed her diaper, and got her dressed for the day.  After we were all done getting ready she and I said her morning prayers (which only last about 10 seconds).  At the end of the prayer I said "in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

After a brief pause Hannah looked at me and said "Amen."

I smiled at Hannah and after congratulating her I started to laugh.  Amen for a first word!  How funny is that.  It was not a perfect pronunciation, but it was close and it was clear that she was trying to say amen.

I wanted to get a video of it today, but she was just way to focused on other things that it didn't happen.  I'll try in the next few days.

**By the way, she has been saying mama and dada for several months now, but it's all been gibberish talk.  This was the first deliberate spoken word.**

Inspiring

Yesterday, Nathan and I attended the Worldwide Leadership Training broadcast and it was awesome!

During the broadcast, this video was played and I just found it so inspiring that I had to post it on the blog.  What a great example this boy is.  Can you imagine what would happen to the world if we all acted like Spencer?

I hope that Hannah can find a guy like this when she grows up.

A shiner that makes you look like Quasimodo

Hannah got an ugly looking black eye today that made her look like Quasimodo.

Hannah was walking from one couch to the other and as she lost her footing she started to turn around to go back to the other couch, fell down, and hit her face right smack on the wooden portion of our sofa.  I saw the entire thing happen and there was nothing I could do to stop it.  I grabbed her afterwards as I knew she had hit the couch (plus, there was a rather large thud) and I immediately saw that her eye was swollen, blue, and enough skin scraped off to have a small amount of blood.  Fortunately, however, I think the laceration was fairly superficial and didn't warrant sutures.  We'll see how it looks tomorrow morning.

On the plus side, Hannah did the sign bath for the first time on Monday.  It was so adorable that I had to take a video of it.  Hannah is actually getting pretty good with sign langage.  She can physically do about 6 signs, though she understands about 4 more but hasn't quite figured out the dexterity on how to do them yet.

FYI--the reason Hannah is naked in this video is because I was just about to put her in the bath (which she LOVES), but decided to grab the camera and capture this fun moment.

Quasimodo picture courtesy of Google images

A birthday in the WEEK-OF-DEATH

This week has been the week of death for Nathan and I.  All three of us (yes, including Hannah) have been sick with a very nasty cold.  Luckily, Hannah did not get it as bad as we did and for that we are grateful!  This cold was so bad that it literally wiped Nathan and I out for 4 days.  I am not kidding (one of the first days we were sick I was so out of it that when I was putting my clean Cutco knife away I tried to put it in my refrigerator).

But thanks to LOADS of dayquil/nyquil, LOADS of ibuprofen, Mentholatum, Vick's vapo-rub, 6+ boxes of Kleenexes (w/lotion of course), many hot showers, homemade chicken noodle soup, another spicy dinner to drain the sinuses, and some rest we started to recuperate from this nasty bug.  Thank you for everyone that offered to help--we really appreciated it. :)

In fact, yesterday I was feeling so much better that I was a cleaning machine and cleaned all day long.  I cleaned everything from the bathroom to the inside of my refrigerator, to wiping off the face of cupboards and door frames to Hannah's high chair.  I wanted that nasty bug out of my house!

As the week progressed, I felt bad for Nathan because it was his birthday week and this is not the most welcome way to spend a birthday.  He got behind in work due to being sick that he had to spend most of his birthday playing catch up.

We did have a few pleasant things happen this week: Nathan got a nice bundle of birthday cash, we got to go out to dinner this weekend to celebrate, he got to eat his favorite dessert for his birthday (cake batter ice-cream from Heyns), and he was able to spend time with Hannah.  It has been fun to play with her this week because she started to walk this last Sunday.  She gets so excited and has such a proud face as she is walking that it just melts your heart.  We took a video of her for the family to see, as some have requested walking videos.

One of the best highlights for Nathan (besides his ice-cream) was a conference call with his family (unfortunately, not everyone has web cams).  Look at Kronk all bundled up next to Nathan.  So cute!  By the way...can you tell that we were sick this last week with pillows on the couch with tissues and Mentholatum up are the back of the sofa?

Happy Birthday Nathan!  I'm just sorry that it had to land in the week of us being deathly ill.