Baby Pictures

My mom posted a couple pictures on our family website and I thought I'd put them here too. I love the little bracelet that I have on ... I learned early the importance of wearing jewelry and having well-styled hair ;) And this one is priceless - my Grandma Woodward came to visit us in Oklahoma when I was born. Apparently it didn't take me long to realize how to open my mouth (and haven't stopped since...)!

The Frosty

I have issues with Wendy's. Not because I had a bad experience with a weird piece of something in my food once (I didn't), not because I never went there in the middle of the night in Provo to get chicken nuggets and a frosty, but because last year they did something that goes against the very trademark that makes them who they are. What am I talking about? The introduction of the "Vanilla" Frosty. I am sorry but "Frosty" by definition means chocolate. No vanilla about it. Who craves vanilla anything?? I just have a hard time hearing people say "vanilla frosty."

I have had this conversation with a number of people, including a random lady at a Nationals game. I was standing in line for soft serve ice cream with a few friends and we got into the chocolate vs. vanilla frosty conversation and I told them what I thought about it and the boys were giving me a hard time. All of a sudden, this lady turns around and said "She's right - a frosty is chocolate." She then went on a rant about hormones and women needing chocolate and that a frosty is not vanilla, and because she was older than them (she was directing her comments to the boys so they would stop playing devil's advocate with me), they should listen to her. It was hilarious.

I'd all but forgotten about my take on the Frosty until last night, after I'd been craving ice cream all day. I was out running errands and saw a Wendy's and thought to myself, "ok fine I'll cave in and get a frosty." So I pulled my way up to the drive-thru lane and the man (who didn't speak English very well) asked for my order and I said "just a frosty please." He then mumbled something that I didn't hear, either because he was speaking too fast, with too heavy of an accent, or it was too muffled by the microphone for me to understand. I said "what?" and he got kind of annoyed - he said "no 'what' - vanilla or chocolate or mixed?" Ok I about lost it and yelled at him! I really wanted to scream "CHOCOLATE" into the metal box in front of my face, but I resisted. ha ha I don't know why I am so passionate about this (its not like I have a Frosty more than a couple times a year even), but I have strong feelings about the frosty maintaining its original purpose - to satisfy a chocolate craving! For all the people out there that like vanilla things, go to McDonald's and get an ice cream cone...

Happy 28th Birthday to Me

28. Wow. That sounds old. Oh well, not much I can do to change it, so embrace it! Regardless, today was a great birthday. Of course a good part of the day was spent in church, but then tonight we had a Mexican Fiesta at my house. What did that entail? Cafe Rio food of course! Ok well not exactly, we couldn't really cater Cafe Rio on the East Coast, so we made our own rendition, including sweet pork, lime cilantro rice, black beans, and all the fixin's, including the awesome creamy cilantro salad dressing. YUM. That's an understatement.

Before the party began, I finally opened Jenny's present that she had been dying to give me. Oh my gosh it is the coolest thing EVER. Seriously. I wondered what could be so big to fit in this huge box that she had wrapped for me.
When we were in Minneapolis at the Mall of America, we went into a store called "Field of Dreams." While I was being wheeled around the store (in the wheelchair, from the near-fainting episode previous to our mall tour), we saw this display case that I immediately fell in love with, and said something about wanting to have one of those in my baseball room someday. I forgot about it after that, but Jenny did not. I don't know how she did it, but she found one and ordered it for me. Basically, its a display case shaped like home plate, with shelves and places for baseballs. They had embroidered baseballs in it, which is my next task - to fill it with all the balls of the stadiums (teams) I have visited. I'm so excited! Sharyn gave me a couple baseballs to start my collection - and amazingly enough she hadn't even coordinated with Jenny on this present, yet they went perfectly hand in hand together. I'm so excited for my new fun present!

Everyone started coming over around 6pm and that's when the party began. We had an awesome dinner and everyone just sat/stood around talking and having fun (at least I hope everyone had fun). I did. Jenny made an incredibly delicious cake - it was a cinnamon vanilla cake with chocolate cinnamon buttercream frosting. Wow. It was so good. It only had one candle - so I didn't have a problem blowing it out. Until I realized that it was one of those trick candles. I blew it out twice and then smothered it with my fingers so it wouldn't keep re-lighting itself! It even had edible flowers on top ...
You can kind of see to the left of this picture the inflatable sombrero drink holder that we had ... I am sad we didn't take a picture of it because it was great!

I am so lucky to have so many great friends who mean so much to me. Friends were so generous and brought me some wonderful gifts, including some awesome (and hilarious) birthday cards, as you can see in the array here.
And now ... for the party in pictures, thanks to Katie for putting my camera to good use:
Megan and Ben eating cookies that Sharyn brought.
Dave, Megan, & Mark chilling on the couch, probably laughing at something Megan just said because she is hilarious. Liz trying to pretend she doesn't know Mike is stuffing his face full of a burrito.Michelle, Darci, Dave, & Cubbie pretending to like each other (ha ha). Neal, Becky, & Lisa full from dinner, waiting for dessert.
Tyler & Taylor ... I am not exactly sure what they're doing, and I'm not exactly sure I want to know.
Tess & me posing cute for Katie taking the picture.Seabreeze, Roshelle, & Tess happy as always.
Dean, Sharyn, me, & Katie hovering by the food table.

There really isn't a much better way to spend a birthday than with some of my greatest friends at my house. I was also able to talk to everyone in my family today and hear from friends all across the country. I really am lucky to have such an awesome support system of people who are so wonderful ... fun (and funny), talented, spiritual, successful, adventurous, witty - the list goes on. Thanks to everyone who helped make it a great birthday.