The greatest month of the year

When I was growing up February was probably my favorite month.  February always rivaled January for the most snow back home and I built a lot of snowmen and snow forts.  When I got to old for that stuff I would play snow football with my (now bigger) younger brothers.  Snow football for Corrys consisted of me kicking or throwing the football straight to my younger brother then pummeling him into the snow.  This was always best played when the snow was at least a foot deep so as to lessen the blows.  Another time I'll write about how I taught my brother to take a charge in basketball.  To his credit he won most of those games on free throws.   In my own mind I take a sliver of credit for Mark being an allstate wrestler and football player.  I had nothing to do with the javelin.

February is also the month of my birthday.  Nothing beats a birthday when you're a kid.  Everything is about you.  Sure I had to share the week with my younger brother (his birthday is a mere 4 days before mine), but celebrating with a bunch of dead presidents was always pretty cool.

Nowadays February is not so cool.  I miss the sun, I miss the warmth and birthdays are just a reminder that I'm 30 something and longing for the future.  (Alright it's not that bad, but I need to create some dramatic effect here)

With that in mind I have a plan to get over the midwinter doldrums.  This is a long term plan so it probably won't take effect for a few years, but when it does it's gonna be nice.  First off I'm going to move away from the land of clouds.  I've written before about my love of Cedar City so I won't belabor that now.

Second I am going to take up snowboarding.  February of 2011 is going to forever be known as Jake's Snowboarding month.  Sure, I could go snowboarding here, but that's kind of like Manti* pulling out his surfboard to hit the waves at Benton Harbor.  Plus it's expensive and I'm a tightwad.

When I get too old to snowboard I'm going to buy a bunch of snowmobiles and put tracks on my side-by-side. We'll be spend much of February at the cabin (not built yet) building fires, making snow caves and maybe playing a little snow football.  This step of the plan is obviously a few years off yet.

When the kids are all grown up and moved away and it's just Melissa and myself at home we will enter the last stage of the plan.  This stage is referred to as South America February.  I'm not sure how we're going to do it, but I think you get the picture.

So there you have it, my infallible plan to turn February back into the best month of the year.  Melissa will be learning about this plan for the first time with the rest of you readers out there.

I welcome any of your suggestions on how to improve on my plan.





*For you non South Benders, Manti Teo is a Notre Dame football player from Hawaii, and Benton Harbor is a beach town on Lake Michigan.

Tiger - new and improved

I have a general rule that I avoid posting for a short time after Melissa has posted something to give her some front page air time.  Today I'm breaking that rule.  It's not just because I'm embarrassed to have such nice things written about me it's also because I really want to comment on Tiger's appology.

I watched the appology today on espn.com and I was impressed.  Sure it was a written apology that was prepared beforehand, but it was straightforward.  There was no hiding.  I didn't see any hidden agenda and I truly believe he wants to change and has taken steps to that end. 

At the end he asked that his fans would come to believe in him again someday.  That day for me is today.  I hope he can fix his family.  What he did today (and for the past few months in therapy) makes him a hero to me.

Happy Birthday!!

Today Jacob turns 33!! He is celebrating by being on-call. Shocker!! But when you look at it from a certain point of view could there be a better way to celebrate your entry into the world then aiding lots of other little ones to enter into the world?

Recently, a friend lost her husband to a fight with cancer. This hit me hard and our hearts go out to her and her little girl. Since I found out I have found myself often thinking of her and then wondering what in the world I would do if placed in her shoes. I ponder on this for a time until I mostly end up in tears and feeling all the worse for her.

These things are hard to reflect upon (they are hard to write about as I find myself straining through tear streaked eyes), but I am grateful for the opportunity it affords me to remind myself of just how much I love my husband. Sometimes, I think, in the day to day of life we get caught up in routine and it tends to take over. In the last few days I find myself very humbled and very grateful for such an amazing man in my life. I could go on for pages about how much he does and the wonderful husband and father he is. I will just sum it up by saying I can't possibly imagine my life without him.

I love this man. I am so grateful that I agreed to that blind date almost 10 years ago! I am so grateful to be sealed to him for time and all eternity. I love you, Jacob!! We truly are, One For Eternity!

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Etsy Shop Revisited

So I have made 3 sales now on Etsy and I have to say it is quite fun to get that little email that says you made a sale. I get so excited I haven't even minded having to take the packages to the post office.

When I first opened my shop a lady sent me an email saying she was interested in starting to quilt but had no idea where to even begin. We emailed back and forth for a while and I think I gave her some helpful advice and some ideas of possible quilts to start on. She thanked me and that was that. It got me thinking though, about how many people out there might want to give quilting a try but don't want to invest all the start up costs of a new hobby. With that I started throwing around the idea of making a kit of one of the quilts I have already made. It would have all the material already cut out, the binding made, and the instructions of how to put it together. I have been throwing this idea around for about a month now.

Well yesterday was my third sale. Fueled by that excitement, I decided to put my thoughts into action and made a quilt kit for my Crazy Coloring Kids Quilt. It was a bit of a challenge at first trying to type up all the instructions but in the end I have to say I am quite proud of the completed project. I made sure to add 4 pages of general instructions to help those that are first time quilters. We'll see how it goes, if it sales well maybe I will be adding more quilt kits of different patterns :)

Oh, and I added a button and a some thumbnails of what's at my shop just to the side. I think they are pretty cute !!

As the other contributer to this blog I'm not sure how I (Jake) feel about all these etsy buttons off to the side there.  I feel my manly blog slipping away from me.  Apparently we need some more posts about sports on here.  As long as Melissa keeps letting me spend some of her etsy money on ebay I'm going to have to let it slide.  I'd start a new blog, but all my faithful readers would just stay here anyway and I like pretending that you are enamored with my keen wit and that's why you keep coming back.  Live the dream!

A Breath of Fresh Air

I started my penultimate month of OB on Monday and I had my first call yesterday.  I haven't had and OB month in almost a year so I was the tiniest bit nervous that I would feel like an intern all over again.  To my great joy I have found that OB is a lot like riding a bike.  Yesterday was a fabulous day.  The day was pretty busy with deliveries and triages, but it started out wonderfully.  The first delivery of the day was a couple having their first baby.  They were excited.  Grandma was there and she was excited.  Then I saw a BYU bag on the floor.  Come to find out they met at BYU and both graduated.  They almost kicked me out of the room when I told them I graduated from the U.

OB as a resident is so filled with babies that weren't planned and oftentimes not even wanted that it is incredibly refreshing to have a few deliveries with people who are genuinely excited and emotional about having a first child.  I remember that feeling when Spencer was born and while the birth of each of our children has been special the feelings leading up to Spencer's birth were unique and it was good to see some of that in the faces of that couple yesterday.

On another note I'm reading "The Undaunted" and it has been wonderful to picture the images of Cedar City and Southern Utah as I read.  I felt like I was back home when the characters were camping in Zion and making their way up Angel's Landing.

Who wouldn't miss that?

Lastly this song is on the playlist on the blog of one or our cousins and I really like it.  Sappy? Maybe, but oh well.