It's that season again...

How can you not love this guy? I know I do.

17 minutes to spare? Please watch.

what we've been up to . . .

will and i have really enjoyed being back in utah. we've been able to spend time with cousins and friends, and will has been able to become reacquainted with all of his toys that he missed while we were in california. that being said . . . he really misses his grandma jenny and papa! luckily they're coming in town this weekend and he'll be able to spend lots of time with them :)

so here's a random little recap of what we've been up to the last few weeks (sorry, these are all iPhone photos, so the lighting and color are not too stellar):

will on his new stick horse. he loves galloping around the house!

he has been able to spend lots of time with his little cousin, mackay:

on saturday, we celebrated the japanese holiday, girls' day at my MIL's house. it was a lot of fun--yummy japanese food, lots of girl talk with all the cousins, and we got to dress in our kimonos. here's a picture of the traditional girls day dolls:

frandsen family home evening at bachi's house (bachi is what william calls his grandma frandsen):

and today, will and i had a fun morning at the dinosaur museum at thanksgiving point. he LOVES the science room and he had fun digging in the sand areas also. he doesn't love the all of the exhibits though . . . some of them are a little scary (like the giant shark coming out of the wall). but we had a ton of fun, just the two of us, exploring and playing with all of the hands-on activities.

and lastly, here's a glimpse of what i've been up to . . . just trying to get a few things accomplished before baby girl arrives!

i've made several receiving blankets (otherwise she'd only be wrapped in blue with all of will's old blankets!):

i made a couple of these little sleep sacks--which btw are the best invention ever for that stage when babies won't keep their blankets on! (and yes, i love that whale print! i was so excited to find it in both flannel for the blanket and fuzzy fleece for the sleep sack!)

and a car seat cover. yes, a little hippie-ish, but i thought it was cute :)

and maybe one of these days i'll finish my crochet projects and show those to you as well . . . but all in all, those are the fun things we've been doing with our time!

Mustache March

Happy March First Everybody!

Another year of mustache march is upon us and it's time for all you men reading this to start growing that upper lip hair. Mustache March is an Air Force tradition that spans back many years. A young, arrogant fighter pilot kept a mustache against all odds, shot down a bunch of planes and things, and lived to tell the tale. He believed his mustache was a lucky charm and kept him bulletproof. When he returned to garrison, he was ordered to shave it even though it was kept well trimmed within regs.

So Mustache March is celebrated across the air force to celebrate the bullet proof mustache. Many air crews will wear mustaches during the entirety of their deployment. Others of us occupy the upper lip in March in solidarity with our deployment brothers and sisters in arms, especially deployed, but at home station too.

So if you're reading this, you know someone deployed and it's time for you to start that mustache. So whether you have an important lawyering job, work in a hospital administration position, account for a swiss tech company, work in finance/securities, going to school on an island or elsewhere, or some other big fancy job/position, you can sacrifice a month of vanity in solidarity with your deployed service buddy. And when people inevitably ask why you have hideousness festering just below the nose you can remind them that we still have thousands of troops in the desert fighting the good fight. Don't be shy. You can do it. I believe in you.

Happy Mustache March! Uncle Sam wants YOU (to grow a mustache)!

our last day in sunny CA

today was our last day in southern california . . . we are definitely going to miss my parents and siblings and the sunny, warm california weather. to see us off, my brother, cort and his wife kim, and their kids came up to spend the day with us. we went to the outdoor shopping mall, the americana, which also had a farmer's market with a little petting zoo and pony rides. usually william does not get too excited over animals, and in the past has not enjoyed pony rides, but today, with kate's enthusiasm to egg him on, he had a blast! i think he was very proud of himself for riding a pony :)

after the pony rides we got lunch and sat on the grass to eat and let the kids run wild. and they were so wild. but these two little cousins really do love each other.

we are really going to miss seeing all of my family so often! it has been so fun for will to get to see his california cousins over the last two months. and he is REALLY, REALLY going to miss grandma jenny and papa. the first thing he asks every morning when he wakes up is where they are and what they are doing. if my mom goes anywhere during the day, or even just walks into a different room, will immediately questions where she went and tries to find her. poor guy is going to miss his grandparents :( but, on the other hand, us going home means that we're that much closer to having our baby girl, and also to daddy's return! so hopefully the time will pass quickly and the utah weather won't be too terrible! utah, here we come!

13.1

last weekend my husband joined the 13.1 club. you know what club i'm talking about. you're driving down the street and all of a sudden you notice the car in front of you has one of these stickers:

yep. that's right. the person in that car ran 13.1 miles. a half marathon. couldn't quite make the full marathon, but they ran a half. okay, okay, not to offend anyone with a 13.1 sticker, or even downplay a half marathon . . . peter and i always just thought seeing those cars drive by was kind of funny. not that running a half marathon is any small feat. it is not. actually, in my opinion, it's a really big deal (i don't think i've ever run more than 3.5 miles in my life. and that was huge for me.). anyway. back to peter.

about 6 weeks ago, peter decided that he would run the half marathon at a neighboring army base. so, he began training, and well, he did it. like it was nothing. hello. that's my man. just ups and runs 13.1 miles like it's no big deal. oh yeah, and his finishing time was much faster than any of his training runs. he's pretty awesome. especially considering the conditions.

the evening before the race, everyone from his air force base that was planning on running was bussed over to the army base around 4pm. then they were dumped into this tent, where they had some lush, comfy cots set up for them to sleep:

the morning of the race, they woke up bright and early to register for the race at 4:30am. then, peter got to wait a few hours (since it was a full marathon that one could either run solely, or split with another person) until the race started and his partner finished the first half. by the time peter started it was getting very windy. here peter is right before he began running:

and who doesn't like to run with a scarf wrapped around their face to be protected from the wind and sand??? makes for perfect race conditions. yeah right. i would've hyperventilated i think if i had tried to run with that thing around my face. i can barely breathe while i run as it is . . . this picture peter took of himself mid-run. notice the lovely scenery. at one point he even ran by a squadron doing tank drills.

and here's my stallion after completing his first half marathon. what a babe. (they're required to wear those safety belts btw.)

and to congratulate him on a job well-done, he had this little video waiting for him in his email after he finished (please ignore our morning faces . . . ):

good job, peter!!!! we love you!!!!

just a few disneyland pictures

we went to disneyland last week with elise, my mom, and kim, and her three kids.

we are just trying to fit it all in before we go back to utah!!!

Canine Dentistry...

All dentists get to work on canines. But only super special dentists get to work on K9's.

There are a ton a military working dogs in the combat theater. They have a variety of jobs. Some are bomb dogs, some are drug dogs, some are attack dogs. It's pretty cool to see the MWD in action. They respond to hand signal commands as well as verbal commands; so they too can be super stealth when they need to be. Either way, even awesome speciality trained dogs are susceptible to gum disease just like people. So a part of their annual treatment is getting them dental care. Since we are the only dental guys around, the veterinarian brings them to us.

He sedates them, and I do whatever treatment needs to be done. In this case, my tech and I just did cleanings for two dogs. In a couple weeks, we're going to do a major extraction case where we take about 5-6 teeth. At some point we might have to do some root canals as well.

Anyway, you can see, it was pretty cool. Dog teeth are pretty nasty, not to mention that our room smelled like wet dog for the rest of the morning. That being said, I'm glad we got to do it. The base public affairs office came and did a super cheesy write up about it too. If you read it, please note that even though I'm technically quoted, none of those are my words...

(click on to read the article)

our recent happenings

it's been a couple of weeks since i posted, and will and i have done some fun things. a few weeks ago, william, my mom and i went to arizona to visit my grandma. she recently turned 92, and so we went out for a few days to celebrate her birthday. my grandma's name is margie, and will lovingly calls her "grandma jenny margie." (my mom is grandma jenny, so i think it was pretty ingenious of him to put it all together in the right order :)) we had a lot of fun in az. here will and my grandma are in my grandma's three-wheeled bike.

we hung out and had fun relaxing at grandma jenny margie's house.

one day we went and met up with my best friend from college, krista, and her two kiddies at freestone park in gilbert. it was a great park. they had several little rides for kids and will couldn't get enough of the jet ski ride.

we also got to see my good friend from my az days, melissa, but sadly i didn't get a picture with her!

will has also had a fun time visiting with his cousins. last saturday night, my sister, whitney, had her baby girl! little kinsey. and she is a doll.

i had a trip planned to utah, but since my mom was down with whitney, my sister-in-law, kim volunteered to watch will for a couple of days. this was VERY kind considering kim has a three year old and twin one year olds. she already has her hands full! then to throw a wild and crazy little will into the mess is really very saintly of her! but he had so much fun. he loves his aunty kim, uncle cort, and cousin kate. here they are enjoying a fun snack together:

and then they came up with this pose all on their own! yay for cousins!

and while i was in utah, even though it was such a quick trip, i got to spend an evening with my friends and then go to lunch with my sisters-in-law. it was so nice to have some girl time and catch up with everyone that i've missed.

then, the other day, will and i took a super fun outing with my friend, lorraine, and her two awesome little boys. we caught the metro rail here in pasadena and took it into chinatown. we shopped around, let the boys run wild, and then stopped for a yummy lunch. it was the perfect outing for three toddler boys, and fun shopping for their mommas!

california has been fun for will and me . . . just a few more weeks here in nice warm and sunny weather before we brace ourselves to go back to utah!

Hurt Locker Anybody...?

It was one of those days. The only thing missing was that awesome green bomb suit from The Hurt Locker. We asked if we could put one on, we couldn't.

Today was probably the best day I've had on the deployment. It was pretty rad. So at our location, we don't have an incinerator. This is not important for any other reason for me, except that it means there is no way to properly dispose of expired or used medications. These tend to pile up in the pharmacy and need to be destroyed from time to time.

Lucky for us, there are people to blow things up every day out here. Enter EOD (Explosive Ordnance Disposal). You know, the bomb squad guys. These are the guys that disarm Times Square car bombs or really any other type of explosive device that needs handling.

So our pharmacist arranged for us to add our meds to their explosion of the day. We thought we might be lucky to see some cool boom with a brick or two some Jack Bauer C-4 or something.

Not even close.

We got to load this pack with all sorts of fun. All in all, 675 lbs of C-4 (540 bricks), plus grenades of all sorts, missiles tubes, 25 caliber shells, and lots of things that go boom. And we carefully, of course, and strategically laid brick by brick of C-4 onto this huge old pile of arms/explosives.

And on top of all that, we placed our dinky little two bags of meds.

The EOD guys were really cool and let us get our hands on and build the pack with the rest of them, explaining a bunch of the weapons to us clueless medics. In the end, they let our logistics NCOIC press the detonator to make this:

(we packed the bright one on the right)

The whole day was pretty fun. From the wild sandy, pile of rocks and holes road, having the humvee pull our van out of the sand, to playing with C-4, making a really, really big bang, and handling ordnance all day we pretty great. Didn't feel like a deployed dentist at all.

That being said, 30 mins after getting back to the clinic after the grand adventure, I was knee-deep in starting a root canal on a patient... Welcome home, I guess.

(the after hole, verifying the destruction of our meds)

hello baby girl

28 weeks and 2 days. the first picture was done with software that shows skin tone. seeing her on the screen at the doctor's office today made everything seem so real! and for that picture she even had her eyes open. we saw her blink and wiggle around. we're getting excited to meet our baby girl!