I love Presents!!!

So....A few days ago David got this really cute looking package in the mail. He brought it to me and said "I know you love opening presents, so you can open my present if you want to." What a sweetheart! He really knows me. I would never let someone else open one of my presents.

Here is a cute picture of the surprise package. Looks cute. I open it and am surprised to find that inside are samples of Kotex Tampons and Pads. What?!!! Why was this addressed to Dave. Not only was it addressed to Dave, but it was addressed to "Mr. David Pendergrass." When you put "Mr." on the package, how obvious does it get? I think advertising is getting a little lazy and forgetting to check their demographics. Since when did Caucasian married male, father of one, resident of Utah get on the list for feminine product?!! Anyway we laughed over it for a while and I thought you would too!

Land of the Morning Calm

Don't be too shocked...be honest with yourself...you already knew we were crazy! David and I have always wanted to go on adventures. When Lucy was born we tried to live like two normal people with a baby, but we just couldn't hold out any longer and figured 10 months was old enough to to take Lucy along to see the world. (As David explained to some people the other day: "Wendy has always wanted to go on adventures. I mean, the poor girl wanted to go on a mission her whole life and then some hunky man came along, who she couldn't resist so she settled down and got married. It is time to take the girl on her adventures"). So, after some thought and prayer, David accepted a job teaching English in Korea, in one of the areas from his mission called Ansan. We leave in a little over two weeks! Crazy, huh? I told you! He signed a year long contract, so we won't be seeing you all for a while (but I can bet they have the internet and I will probably be obsessively blogging everything, so no worries!). Our apartment will be one room, no not one bedroom, just one room. We will sleep altogether on padding on the floor in the living room and put it away in the closet during the day (that is the way the Koreans do it) . I had to share that great part of our situation, because I am really excited to live the real Korean culture. It just seems so foreign, but I guess we will be the foreign ones (that will be a fun change!). I am also excited to eat like Koreans because they hardly ever eat wheat or milk (both of which Lucy is very sensitive to and I can't eat or else she gets it through her milk and breaks out with Eczema). It will be nice to feel normal. Okay, I guess with blond hair, I won't completely fit in, but at least if we are out somewhere I won't have to watch people downing bread and ice cream without participating! Dave's last day of work is today, and then we are just packing, and getting ready for a massive yard sale! Dave and I love going to yard sales...I guess it is our time to give back! And then a long long trip with a baby. I was starting to gripe a little about how long and hard the trip over there with a baby will be, but once you think of all the immigrants crossing to America on ships, and the pioneers crossing America in Covered Wagons, I guess 24 hours of travel with some layovers and long bus rides isn't much to complain about! Wish us luck! We are off to the Land of the Morning Calm (as Korea is also known)...

Seven Peaks Surprise

Yesterday, Dave called me while working at the BYU track camps and asked if we could be ready to go to the waterpark in an hour. We knew he was going to get free tickets to the park for working at the BYU Track Camps, but didn't realize we had to go at a certain time. What a fun surprise! I had no idea that we would be having such a fun evening!


Lucy was a little bit wary at first. The slightest splash or going just a little bit deeper made her cry. I half expected this because Lucy's one great fear is going through sprinklers. It always makes her cry. I was worried I had a wimpy child...


...but after some time in the wave pool and some laps in the lazy river she was right at home and had truly found her element! I think the key is to take things slowly with Lucy. She is quite an observer and doesn't really enjoy being caught off guard. (She definitely got that from her Dad, and not me. My Mom said I rarely thought twice about taking risks as a baby.) She would have stayed all day, but alas the night had to come to an end!
So we quickly bundled her up and changed her 5 lb soaked diaper. Next time I think we will buy some swim diapers! Yuck!
And just because we happened to have a cute little baby robe , I thought now would be a good time to use it! We call her our little Jedi when she's dressed like this!

Dave and I marveled on the way home that the time in our lives had come where the reason we enjoyed things was watching our child experience and enjoy them. There was a time I would have been thrilled to go down every water-slide, but you know you are a parent when you are perfectly content to just soak in the lazy river while watching your child splash. Just when you start growing out of things like theme parks and roller coasters, you have children who bring a whole new excitement and reason for going to them!

4th of July to Remember

I reached into the back of all my memories to compare and decided this was definitely the best 4th of July I have ever had. It was packed with fun and family, and what could be better than those two? I will give you a quick rundown and slideshow of our day from dawn to dusk!



I woke up early! Whoa! 5:45 a.m. early and was so excited I couldn't sleep. I read for a while and then got ready for the day, which might not seem so amazing to everyone, but the fact that Lucy outslept me by two hours was actually much more than amazing, it was a miracle. Starting the day with a book, shower and breakfast baby free is definitely a moment of bliss for a mother!

We booked it to get to the Parade on time and glory in our highly prized seats that David won (in the shade, might I add!) See the previous post for details on how he won the seats. Usually we get to the Parade in time to see the last 10 minutes, so being there for the full thing was really exciting and really got me in the spirit to celebrate our country! Lucy loved it! She watched intently and clapped every few minutes. It is so fun to share experiences with her and watch her take them in!

After the parade Lani, Sierra and Heidi took a trip to Wal Mart to deck themselves in Hannah Montana attire, while Dave and I relaxed, read, and chatted with my Mom, while Lucy took and extremely long 3 hour nap. Oh, what heaven! We ate good food and got ready for the show, complete with our Holiday Lucy Photo Shoot tradition and then started walking to the Stadium for the main event: STADIUM OF FIRE!!!

The show was amazing! Glen Beck gave a very inspirational talk about what it means to be an American, while Skydivers from all of the armed forces Skdived into the Stadium. Then the Stadium of Fire dancers put on a good show. Blue Man Group performed which was very enjoyable! They were really funny and unlike any musical group I have ever heard before. Of course Miley Cyrus sang (I actually wasn't that impressed. She only sang Miley Cyrus songs, not her Hannah Montana songs which are way better!), and then we watched the best fireworks we have ever seen! Lucy clapped all through the concert, she loves when we watch something and people clap because she knows what to do. I would rather bring her along to stuff than get a babysitter just because it is so fun watching her get excited and clapping! We were so close ash was falling on us! Lucy was really pretty good. She squawked a little toward the end of Miley and was getting really tired, but settled down and was excited as ever for the fireworks. Actually she was having a hard time at first because I was trying to cover her ears. She was really mad and wiggling all over the place. I finally stopped trying to cover her ears and she was completely happy watching the fireworks, loud booming and all! My favorite part of the whole day was watching her point up at the Fireworks, wondering what they were and why we were celebrating instead of sleeping. She was really in awe. Someday, Lucy, you'll understand why we are so excited on this day and why your life is the wonderful life it is because of our forefathers courage!

She just watched and wondered until a piece of ash got in her eye. We were all getting a little stuff in our eyes. I had to take her to the bathroom and wash her eye out, so I missed the finale, but it was such a great day I didn't care. In my hurry to get Lucy taken care of, I didn't bring my cell phone and then when we came out of the restroom the whole stadium was trying to get out, so i didn't know how I was going to find David. I went back to our seats, but David was gone. I wasn't really panicked because we don't live that far away and we would have met up eventually, but Dave had the stroller check ticket and Lucy is 22 lbs that I didn't really want to lug up the hill, in the dark, at 11:00 p.m. I decided I would go to the stroller check and look for him there. Meanwhile, I prayed. I asked very specifically if Heavenly Father would please let David know I was going to the stroller check. When I finished my prayer I felt confident I would find David there. I felt so confident I almost wasn't surprised when he came right up to me at the stroller check. I asked how he knew to meet me here and he just said "It was the only place I could think of." I love those small moments the Lord completely answers your prayers and you just know every minute of your life is being guided and watched over carefully.

We topped off the night splurging with some ice cream cake decorated with strawberries and blueberries to look like a flag by my fabulous cake decorating sister, Heidi. And, even more excitingly, I got to eat it because I timed it so that I was introducing dairy into Lucy's diet the last couple days! It was really really good, but Lucy did have a reaction to dairy so it might be the last scrumptious treat I eat in a while (speaking of my crazy diet, I have lost 10 pounds, in the last 2 months because of it! I don't really know if that is something to brag about or not! It is kind of like "yeah I look good, but can't eat normally and probably should not be losing weight so quickly.")

Anyway, thanks for letting me share this exciting Independence Day with all of you! Sometimes life is really really hard and then sometimes is really really awesome. I think it makes both parts of life better if we are able to share our woes and excitements with our friends (which is where blogging fits in), so thanks again for being excited about my day with me!

Hannah MANtana

Sometimes dreams really do come true and you really are the person who actually wins! Today was one of those magical moments!

Well, I will start off the story by relaying a short experience from a week ago. We were at the check out stand at Macey's grocery store and the bagger was a young and very friendly boy. He asked us if we had any fun plans for Fourth of July.

I replied "Well, we are hoping to somehow win Stadium of Fire tickets"

He answered "Oh, did you enter the contest?"

"No, what contest"

"Macey's is having a drawing. There is an entry form right there. You should fill one out."

We started filling out the entry form. Although there was only about a 1 in 1000 chance of winning, I was feeling incredibly lucky because I said I wanted to win tickets before I even knew of the contest.

So July 3 roles around, my family is in town, so I inform them we have to be at Macey's from 4-6 p.m. for the Stadium of Fire ticket drawing. We all go to my sister's dance performance at BYU. She had been at dance camp for two weeks and did a performance at the end. It was supposed to go from 3:00-4:00, but was still going at 4:10 p.m. I was sweating it because I knew they would draw our name and we wouldn't be there to claim our sweet fourpack of tickets! Lucy was absolutely loving the show despite my stress and the fact that she hadn't napped at all. She would yawn and start to put her head down and then just start wiggling and dancing to the music as if she was saying "okay, I've got to stay awake. This is really cool and I don't want to miss it!"

We dashed to Macey's to find out that the drawing wasn't until 6:00 p.m. Ahhhh, man... you mean I could have gone home and put Lucy down for a nap, but now it is 4:45 and I don't think we have time!We check out the festivities and spin the spinner to see if we win a prize, Dave of course does and so we got free Batman Premiere Tickets. Sweet, at least we won something!Then a nice lady informs us about the Hannah Mantana concert (spelled that way on purpose) it is a Karioke Contest for Dad's only. They have to sing a Hannah Montana song and whoever the crowd likes best wins 4 tickets to the coveted and sold out show, Stadium of Fire, where Miley Cyrus will be performing. I look at the list of singers, which is pretty short and start to beg Dave to please sing. Any of you who know Dave are probably wondering what I said to convince him, but somehow he agreed. Every once in a while there are just moments of pure and true love, this was one of them. Okay, I think partly he just plain really wanted to go. We have watched the fireworks from Stadium of Fire from a distance for a while and it would be awesome to finally see the show along with them and I think he realized the odds were much better this way as opposed to the drawing. My Father, being the most awesome Dad ever that he is, also signed up to do it, no convincing necessary( if you know my Dad, you know singing a song in front of hundreds of people is really just like a walk in the park for him).

They were both excellent, especially considering they had only heard the song about twice on Heidi's i-pod right before performing. My Dad sang "Best of Both Worlds" while Dave sang "Who said, Who said?" They were both very animated and really got the crowd into it. Sadly, I didn't have my camera or you would probably be seeing millions of pictures of this moment in history. (My Mom did get one picture that I will try to add later!And my sister videoed so I will let you know once they are posted on U-tube!)

You will never believe it, but my Dad took first place and Dave took second. My Dad won four tickets to Stadium of Fire and David won four Grandstand Seat Parade tickets. I just feel like the luckiest girl on the planet to have these two awesome men in my life! Well, we didn't win the drawing, but between 2 free Batman Premiere tickets, 4 Grandstand Seat Parade tickets, and 4 Stadium of Fire tickets, I would say we cleaned up the place!

I just want to take a moment to say Thank You, Thank You, Thank You for being brave and singing, Dave. You are truly the best guy there ever was or ever will be! And of course, Dad, thank you for singing and being the best Dad there will ever be! You are truly deserving of the Hannah Mantana title!