Being an Aunt

I have decided that being an aunt in just plain awesome! I joined this amazing aunt club last Friday when my first nephew ever was born into this world. I had waited around all Friday long to hear that he had made it here safe and sound and that all was well with the new little family. In the morning I tried to be productive and get things done around the house, but all I could think about was that my sister was in the hospital about to add a whole new life to the family.

I finally made my way out the door to go to work around 12:45. I knew that I had to be there by 1:30 to get things ready for the students who came at 2:30. I quickly stopped and grabbed some lunch on my way because in all the morning distractions I never made it up the stairs to eat anything. Once I got to work I kept waiting to hear news from Ben. Every time my phone went off I would jump with excitement and quickly look to see if it was him with news of what was going on. I am not sure that I got much completed at work, but other teachers were there so I am sure that the students were fine. Around 5:oo pm I got a message from Ben saying that it was slow going but that all was well. The second the last student was out the door and the books had been put away, I turned out the lights and headed home. I decided to stop and get food for dinner as well because I was not sure when the baby would come and I was sure that I wouldn't be able to focus enough to make myself dinner anyway. I was waiting at Five Guys for my food when I got the following message from Ben: 6:13 pm baby is almost here. Probably in the next half an hour or so. We are getting ready to deliver.

You can imagine my excitement as I was waiting for my food to arrive. It just couldn't come fast enough. It finally came and I ran home to eat it all the while waiting for more news. At home I found that my mom and Dennis were doing the exact same thing, eating take out and wiggle around with excitement. After I snarfed down the food in about all of ten minutes I decided that I needed to do something to distract myself. I choose to read a book. And let me tell you, that didn't go very well. I think I read the same page about five times. I found that my mom was having the same problem. She was working on the computer and kept asking if I had heard anything yet. Then at 6:45pm while laying on my bed trying to read some more my phone went off with the noise that means I received a picture message. I jumped with excitement to look at it and squealed with delight when I did. The message was from Ben and it was my first ever picture of my new nephew!

Breckin Claire Rood 6 lbs 5 oz 19 1/2 inches long

I was so excited and went running out to my mom who had received the message as well. Shortly after we received another messages saying that all was well with baby and mom and that they would be open for visitors around 8:30 that night. I couldn't wait for that time to arrive when I could go and meet my new nephew in person. When the time came we made our way to the hospital. They had not switched rooms yet so we waited in the lobby until they were ready for us. While waiting one of the nurses came by and asked us if we would like to go see him in the nursery. Of course we said yes, and followed her down the hall to see him. He was so cute lying there and you could just tell that he was Wendi's and Ben's. Babies are such a miracle and standing there looking at him my heart just filled with love. It's amazing how much you can love someone in so short a time.

Ben soon came out to find us and told us that Wendi was all settled in the room. We decided to go and visit her and see how she was doing. It was fun to see her all up and excited. She was doing well and we talked for while about the whole experience and the day that she had just gone through. She had the crazy look full of excitement and nervousness. You could tell from the look that she was full of love but knew that she and Ben and just embarked on a crazy adventure. One that didn't come with a map. While there Ben got to go and give Breckin his first bath. I choose to stay in the room with Wendi and keep her company.

When everyone got back Ben was just filled with joy. You could tell that he already loved his son. They said that Breckin did not like the bath at all. The nurse said that they would bring him down to the room once they got Breckin warmed back up. We decided that we would leave for the night and let the new mommy and daddy rest with their little one. We told them we would come back the next day to officially meet him.

Saturday came and after work my mom and I drove up to the hospital. We went straight to their room and entered in full of excitement and love. Wendi was laying in bed holding him in her arms. It was fun to see her in the new role as a mom and Ben in the role of a dad. We took some family photos and then my mom, now Grandma Julie, got to hold the little and officially meet her grandson. After her I got hold him and let him know who is Aunt Brittney was. He is such a cute little one and it was so much fun to just stand and hold him and watch his little faces that he would make. After we had stayed awhile we decided to leave and let them rest and feed him again.

On Sunday they all went home from the hospital. that afternoon we went up to there house with grandma and grandpa Whiting so that they could meet their new great grandson. This is number 2 for them. Once again we all sat around and held little Breckin in our arms. He is just so fun to watch and to hold.

Brackin in now 5 days old and all is still going well. The whole little family is at home and is learning and growing. They are so cute together and you can tell that their house is full of love. Breckin has been born into a great family with lots of people who love and care for him. I am grateful to be one of those people.

Friday's Fabulous Find

This last Friday I had a busy day. But I did manage to fit in a Friday Fabulous find. I choose a place that I have been to before. It is a place that I love and that I felt deserved to be on the Fabulous Find List. I know that I didn't technically find it last Friday, but I still love it and still think that it was quite the fabulous find when I did find it. This place would be

The Book Garden

Location: 2 North Main Street, Bountiful
Hours: ? Not sure, I know they close at about 6
Description:Used book store and exchange
Prices: Awesome!
Web Page:bookgarden2.com/blog1/

My mom and I came across this store awhile ago. I had wanted a bunch of books for Christmas one year. The whole Work and the Glory set to be exact. But I didn't really want to spend all of my Christmas money on just books. Don't get me wrong, I love those books and was happy to be searching for them, but I wanted a few other things as well. So my mom was on a hunt to find good deals on these books. A friend at her recommended this place and we decided to try it out.

Upon walking in you get a little overwhelmed. Everywhere you look there are books. Book shelves, book racks, boxes of books, and books just stacked around. At first you wonder how you are going to ever find anything. You just see books everywhere and then you realize that they have a downstairs as well and you almost want to turn and walk right back out. But, if you are a true book lover and are a little bit daring you will take the book garden challenge and continue walking forward into the store. And once you are truly in you will be hard pressed to get back out.

You will find that you can spend hours in this store. You will walk up an down the rows, weave through book shelves, climb up step ladders, and all the while be looking at all of the books on the walls. They have everything from childrens books, LDS fiction and history, murder mystery, action, young adult, picture, how too, history, romance, and oh so many more. It truly is a grand little store.

One other thing you can do at this store is exchange your books. You are more then welcome to just buy what they have, but you can also give them your old books as well. Maybe there was a book that you didn't really like, or one that you received more then one copy of, whatever the reason is that you no longer want the book you can take it here. With each book you bring in they will appraise it and its condition and give you a price for it. From there you can decide to leave it and take the money or in store credit or you can keep the book for yourself. Whatever you prefere.

So if you are a book nerd and lover like me then I suggest that you make your way to this store one day. Even if you never return, you should at least visit it once and I promise that you wont regret it. I have found many great and fabulous finds in this store and I keep going back for more.

So please, oh please,
we beg, we pray...
go throw your TV set away,
and in its place you can install
a lovely bookshelf on the wall.

No Fabulous Find

This last Friday I missed out on having a Fabulous Find. I wanted to find one, I really did, but I was kind of stuck...literally. I was stuck at home. No, I did not have a broken car. My car was in the drive with gas in it. And no, I was not babysitting or waiting for someone to show up or call. I was just told that I could not leave the house. For you see, I had strep throat and was still contagious.

My throat had started hurting on Wednesday night. I didn't think anything of it though because it only hurt on the left side and only when I tried to sallow something. Thursday came and it started to get worse. But it was weird. It didn't really hurt in my throat. It was more the back roof of my mouth that hurt and it only hurt when I swallowed. It felt like the muscles back there had gone through a workout and now had muscle fatigue or something. By the time I got home from work and ate dinner I was sick of it hurting. I asked my mom what it meant if the roof of your mouth hurt when you swallowed. She just looked at me for a second and then told me we were going to the doctor. I didn't really like that idea. I just figured that I would sleep it off and be good to go the next day. She told me to get in the car.

We went to the Intsa Care here in Bountiful and waited to be seen. Once I was called back they took my vitals and asked what I was there for. I mentioned what was going on and they decided to swab my throat. The doctor came back a few moments later and told me that I had strep and that I was to start antibiotics that night and stay home for the next 24 to 36 hours because I was contagious.
Well, that meant that I could not go to work, which I was not sad about, but it also meant that I could not go find a Fabulous Find. Therefore I spent Friday laying around at home.

It was weird at first and I really didn't know what to do. I couldn't remember the last day that I just spent at home and didn't go anywhere. I ended up cleaning the bathroom, tidying my room, hanging my Disney art from my trip, updating the blog, doing all of my laundry(which never happens), reading a book (yes, a whole book), painting my toe nails, and somewhere in there I showered, made breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and took a nap outside on the grass.

It was while outside that I decided that I was grateful to have strep throat. I know that sounds weird. Who is grateful to be sick right? But I was. I had just spent the morning getting things done that usually don't get done and I was know outside laying on a blanket on the grass and it was a bright sunshiny day. I had been reading my book and listening to music and I just realized that my day was Awesome and it wasn't even over yet. I sat there and started laughing because I realized that I was grateful that I had strep throat. I was grateful that I was forced to stay home. And grateful that it was just my throat that hurt and that I still felt good everywhere else and had the energy to do things. It was a great day, and even though I didn't get to find a Friday"s Fabulous Find, I still had a fabulous Friday.

The Homestead

Every year my singles ward does a ward trip. The first year I went we went to Jackson Hole which was a blast. We camped out and went to Bar J's and river rafting. It was fun to be there with the ward and fun to experience a new place. Last summer we went to Martins Cove. We went with the two wards next to us and a a wonderful time. We danced, pulled handcarts, crossed the river, and made friendships along the way. This year we went on our ward trip early because we don't know how long our ward is going to be around with all of the ward changes coming up. It was a short trip, only Friday night and Saturday morning, but still fun. We went to the Homestead.

This place was also a new place for me to visit. It is up in Midway and takes about an hour to get there. A bunch of us met in Bountiful and then carpooled up there. It was a fun and entertaining drive. But I guess that happens when you ride up with two boys, one other girl, and no one really knows where you are going. You throw in some funny stories, entertaining music, and you are in for quite a ride. We made it up there around 7. We found our host and then went straight to the main house for dinner. We all gathered around and had hotdogs, burgers, chips, fruit salad, and dessert. Then the bishopric spent some time telling all of us how each of them met their wives and how long it was before they were engaged and married. Some of them accomplished all of this rather quickly. They had met, dated and were engaged in four weeks and then married two months later. The other couple had known each other for awhile but then dated four six weeks and then were engaged and married soon after. Only the bishop and his wife dated for longer then a few weeks. It was fun to hear the stories but I am not sure if it encouraged us to date or discouraged us to even try.

Anyways, after that we had the night to play. A bunch of us ended up going swimming. We played in the pool and in the outdoor hot tubs and mineral pool. And let me just tell you, it is not a very good idea to put 16 people in a hot tub that has a maximum occupants of 12. Lets just say that you all get very close when it is that full. When they kicked us out of the pools at 11 (and no they didn't kick us out for bad behavior, 11 is when they lock up the pools) we all decided to go back to the main house and play games. The games included Foosball, which I suck at, nerts, which I am pretty good at, and pit. We ended up playing games there until 2:30 in the morning when we finally decided that we might want to get some sleep. By the time we got back to our rooms and actually went to bed it was almost 3:30am.

After a night of weird dreams and waking up at random times during it I was more then ready to get out of bed at 7:30. We got up and got ready and were back at the main house by 8:30 for breakfast. Watching people you could tell that no one got any sleep and we all knew that it was going to be an entertaining day. After eating our mountain man burritos we gathered into groups to go on a picture scavenger hunt. Each group got a list of things to find and take pictures of. We had one hour to find all that we could and then get back to the main house. The things on this listed included a homestead pen, homestead employees, whole group going down a slide, whole group in a mirror, jumping on a bed, licking a fire hydrant, drinking water out of the stream, a team member stuck in a fence, American flag, a tractor, spring flowers, a couple holding hands, group hug, whole team on front steps, standing barefoot in the snow, chicken fighting, afterglow cd, a fox, a dear, a white horse, group in a tree, team member wearing Tyler's swim trunks, two people kissing and one had to be from your group, and so many others. All of the groups went running off to take pictures and see how many points they could earn. My group did pretty well and were quite creative when it came to things on the list. We ran around like crazy people jumping, singing, hugging, snowball throwing, climbing, and most of all laughing, just like I am sure every other group did as well.

When the hour was up we all headed back to the main house to count up points and go through everyone's pictures to see how we each did. The pictures were fun to go through and the comments on them were even funnier. My favorite comment was "you would rather lick a fire hydrant then kiss a team member?" It was said because so many of us had people licking fire hydrants but we didn't have people in our group's kissing. It made us all laugh. Needless to say that the group who did actually kiss won. After the fun of photos we all headed back to clean out our rooms and drive back home. I rode home with the same people I went up with so once again I was in for an entertaining ride.

All in all it was a great trip. A trip full of laughter, love and friendships. I think it is great that my ward does these trips and am glad that I can be a part of them. The rest of Saturday went something like this: Running errands for linger longer the next day, baking cookies, showering ( I still smelt like a pool), Picking up 3 six foot subs, also for linger longer, dinner with a friend, and then crashing after a long day with no sleep the night before.

Friday's Fabulous Find

This last Friday I decided to go to two places since I did not go to one the week before since I was in Disneyland. Although, you could say that I had many fabulous finds in the park.

My friend had told me about some of the places that they have visited and what she thought of them. She recommended these two to me and I am glad I went and checked them out. They are pretty cool and unique. The first place that I went is called Chic and Unique.

Located: 778 South 300 West, Slat Lake City
Hours: Mon - Sat 11am to 7pm
Description: Antique Store
Prices: Very good

This store is not really what you expect it to be. I would describe it as an upscale garage sale. You walk in and the place is full of stuff, really cool stuff. There are tables, chairs, couches, benches, art, clocks, frames, cabinets, old toys, books, lamps, wall decor, and soo much more. If you are need of any furniture or just some some uniquely cool pieces then this is the shop to go too. They have this set of a black table and chairs for around $200.00. I mean, the prices are awesome and the stuff is pretty amazing. Some of the stuff you might want to paint or refinish, but it would be worth it for the cost of it. If I only had a place to decorate or a place that was in need of furniture. I would definitely purchase a few pieces from here.

The second place that I went to is called Ruby Snap. This store happens to be right next to Chic & Unique. It also happens to be one of the best cookie shops that I have ever entered.

Location: 770 South 300 West, Salt Lake City
Hours: Mon - Fri 10am - 6pm and Sat 11am - 5pm
Prices: decent
Description: cookies to die for

I just can't say it enough, this place has amazing cookies. Which they should, because that is basically all they sell. They do have some really cool gum packets and mint packets and a few drinks, but mostly cookies. You walk in and the place looks like it should be in the 50's. It is a retro cookie dinner. On there menu they name each of their cookies after a girl. They have the Lucy, Virginia, Ruby, and so many more. Each cookie has it's own style and unique recipe and are all made fresh every day with fresh ingredients. There motto is that if it is wonderful then it shouldn't belong in your mouth. And let me tell you, there cookies can belong in your mouth. They also feature a new cookie flavor of the month every month. I was able to try a sample of the featured cookie which was called a Lucy. This cookie is a lime cheesecake cookie. Just imagine a cookie crust with cheesecake in the middle, topped off with powered sugar and a lime curd. Delicious.

From there I sat and stared at the menu trying to decide what to purchase. They all sounded so good and I just couldn't decide. The lady helping me kept asking me if I wanted to try other samples. Lets just say that I ended up walking out of there with four cookies and had had another sample inside before I left. I got the following cookies: A Lucy, which I already told you about,
A Judy

A Virginia

A Lilly

And then before I left the store she had me try a sample of the Betty

And they had oh so many more that one could try and eat. It turns out that they also sell the cookie dough as well. So if you do stop by this store one day and fall in love with the cookies, then you can buy the dough to make them anytime you want. Could it get any better? And if I haven't made you drool yet, then do yourself a favor and visit there website at www.rubysnap.com. You wont regret it. Ruby Snap invites you to find a sense of yesteryear when all things were made with simplicity and goodness, and dare to discover…trust me, just go and enjoy.