Do you think she knows how dumb she looks...?

Sometime between 8 and 10 this morning, my dog went from this:





To THIS:




Check out how huge her fluffy head is compared to that shorn leg.

We're still laughing at her.

Texting, Episode III

My cell phone inbox is FULL which means good times for all! In the process of creating room for new messages, I once again have typed up the best ones for your viewing pleasure, sans names or context. Hooray!

-------------------------




Did he get fired? Most companies nowadays fire on first offense. Costco castrates then fires. It's awesome.


I totally just flooded the toilet in [my husband's] mom's bathroom. Worst few minutes of my life.


There is a mom in Sacrament meeting letting her kid suck on her chin. For like 10 minutes. It's obscene.


A hideous dog.


Our power is out. We're sitting here under a blanket. [My husband] is playing Bejeweled and he just started singing Amazing Grace. WHAT?


Haha, "Dangliest".


Look it up, he is dead because Obama hated Jurassic Park.


I just used eggs for brownies that expired May 7. Is that bad? [let it be noted that I received this text on October 21st]


3 and a half inches long. That's huge!!!!


My predictive text always says "Jerrie" before it will say "Jessie".


Someone sent me a text that was supposed to say "good" but they misspelled it and it said "goob". I laughed for days.


No, he just called me a wet blanket because I didn't want to cuddle.


I could feel my heart beating really fast today and it reminded me of super-tacky, then I had the ticky tacky song stuck in my head all day.


The old poo and wander is a classic.

--------------------------

There you have it. Feel free to nominate your favorites, post good ones from your OWN phone on your OWN blog, or just forget you ever saw this. I am so sorry.


The first and second of these posts can be found here and here, respectively.

This post is not necessary

1) Jon refuses to take Penny in to get groomed. Poor thing looks ridiculous. I'm constantly smearing her eyebrows back so that she has at least partial vision.





and 2) Make sure you watch this video.




Is anyone else reminded of this picture? No? Maybe?

PS - I think I might have decided against cutting my own hair (at least until I own a pair of scissors other than kitchen shears.)

That is all.

Catch-up. Sort of.

Okay, it’s been forever. I’ve been delaying this post because really, there is nothing to report. Things are winding down from the holidays, I’m back to the grind in the office, and there’s nothing newsworthy to write about other than this: Jon and I spent a good hour about a week ago rounding up all the pens in our apartment and whittling them down. Since he’s always going to medical conventions and stuff, we’ve accumulated lots of pens. And notepads. And paper weights. And mini-hyperbaric-chamber keychains. I gave a ton of it away to my sisters as stocking stuffers last year for Christmas (so mad at myself for not taking pictures of the loot…let’s just say that a lapel pin in the shape of an IUD might have been involved.) Anyway, this particular occasion we were focused on the pens. They were everywhere. We rounded them all up into one huge pile, I allocated a notepad for each of us, and away we went. We separated them into three separate piles: Ones that don’t work, ones that “work but who cares?”, and ones that work that we wanted to keep. The “work but who cares?” pile went with Jon to his office (though not before he went sifting through to make sure I hadn’t snuck in any of his favorites). The ones we ended up keeping, I’m happy to report, all fit nicely into two (2) holders. No more no less. Here’s a before picture:





And there is no ‘after’ picture, because even I know that once you start taking lame pictures of pens just sitting in tin cups, you have a real problem.

Jon’s last trip was before Christmas so it’s been great to spend a couple of uninterrupted weeks with him. Our weekend was really nice – a trip to our favorite steakhouse, Pinnacle Peak (oh, you haven’t been there? That’s weird. You should come visit so that we can take you). The steak was the best I’ve ever had. I say that every time, but I really meant it this time. Literally the best steak I have ever had. And I don’t use the word “literally” very lightly. Doesn’t it bug you when someone’s all “I LITERALLY jumped out of my skin” or “I LITERALLY cried my eyes out” ? That really bothers me. Anyway, then on Saturday we went shooting up in the mountains. Jon got a new .22 with his Christmas money and has been itching to break it in. Minus him getting us temporarily stuck in loose dirt, then cutting his hand while clearing away rocks and branches in order to get us un-stuck (it’s southern Arizona, you can’t just go grabbing shrubbery), it was a really fun outing.

Here’s a picture of Jon shooting his new gun for the first time:



And the Pepsi can that I blasted with my first shot – kudos to Jon for the fantastic photo skills. Srsly. Blow the picture up and you’ll see what I mean:

Really impressive, considering that the old Powershot A520 can only take one picture every thirty seconds. You've only got one chance at a picture like this. I only wish that the photo I attempted to take of Jon receiving his diploma had turned out so well. I was under a lot of pressure, okay??

And a video of me throwing out a few rounds:




You may very well be wondering how I keep my eye shut while shooting, since I'm not capable of closing my left eye independent of my right, and let me tell you - it's about two-parts scotch tape, one part Jon's hand. Once I get sick of all the eyelashes I'm losing, Jon steps in.

And finally, a picture of the poor target that I created by drawing little animals on blue paper and taping it to a used Advent calendar (compliments of my mom. Thanks, mom!):

The gun hasn't been sighted properly yet, and it shoots high and to the right as you can clearly see. I don't want to talk about it. That's supposed to be a squirrel in the bottom left corner. I don't want to talk about that, either.

Once we finished shooting at that particular spot, we drove even further up the mountain and the scenery completely changed. All the saguaros disappeared and it really looked like African Serengeti – tall yellow grasses and gnarled trees. I should have taken a picture. But I didn’t.

After that we went to Target and bought a long-awaited popcorn popper and rice cooker. How have I gone so long without either of those things?? Growing up we had a tradition of making popcorn and drinking soda while watching America’s Funniest Home Videos every Sunday night. It was the only day of the week that we were allowed to drink pop. Once we got older, the tradition evolved into popcorn and soda while watching X-Files, instead. Anyway, I could not be more excited about my popcorn machine – it has already been used twice since I got it. Two days ago.

Could anything be more delicious than a brownie? How about a brownie with a rice crispy treat on top of it? I found the recipe here and to answer my question: No. Nothing could possibly be more delicious than a brownie with a rice crispy treat on top. Jon and I whipped up a batch right before sitting down to watch Pride and Prejudice on Saturday night. Love that movie.

Sunday we subbed the 4 year olds in Primary. It went well, minus the fact that I’d counted on having them draw pictures of ways they can choose the right and the church library was CLOSED. Closed! The library! On a Sunday! Closed! On a Sunday! So Plan B; we let the kids pretend to be cats for the last 15 minutes of class. As one little girl left with her parents when church was over, I overheard the mother ask "How did you like your new teachers?" and the little girl exclaimed "They were SUBstitutes!" Aw. Little kids can be so cute.

Anyway, there it is. That catches you all up to speed while demonstrating that I probably shouldn't really even have a blog to begin with. I'm sorry my life is so boring.

And that's when Jessie knew.....

My mom joined Facebook. I only know this because she sent my sister a friend request. An hour ago. I’m still waiting for mine…

A longer post is in the works, but this was urgent.

Christmas Recap

Get ready for lots of pictures. They might seem to be in kind of random order, but that's because they're all in the order I took them. Otherwise I'd go crazy trying to group them differently. Consider this post 100% chronological.

Little baby Pearl

Norah playing with kissy-faced Grandpa Jensen

Jon and Nolan. Jon looks wasted because he just got back from a harrowing trip to Toronto. The same night that we drove in to Lethbridge, he left for a few days in Ontario for work. It was a miracle that he made it back - and not only did he arrive the same day he was scheduled to, but he somehow managed to talk someone into letting him on to an earlier flight. So he was back in time for Pearl's blessing (see below) when most flights in and out of Toronto had been completely cancelled (including his original flight back to Alberta). Lucky guy!

Darcy, Lianna, and Pearl

Tatum and Pearl

Jon and Norah

Gingerbread houses!

Jon called mine "the Gingerbread Projects".

Christmas Eve jammies!

Jensen Annual Christmas Eve White Elephant Gift Exchange. Looks like some serious deliberation is going on.

Grandma J with great-grandbabies Norah and Pearl.

I secretly snapped this picture of Kelsey and Jake - cute huh??

Shauna (my mother-in-law) with Norah

Playing Rock Band! This picture pretty much sums up our trip. Glowing fire, lots of toys and babies, and just hanging out. It was too cold outside to consider doing much else.

And perhaps my favorite moment of the trip: Photographic evidence of 8 year old Mason singing along to "Roxanne". It was pretty much amazing.

Anyway, that's about it. Fun, relaxing trip to Canada. My photographer sister-in-law Caylee took some family pictures that all turned out really well - you can check them out at cayleesecretanphotography.blogspot.com. If you want. The end.

Walmart made me do it

I’m back from my Canadian journey, but I don’t have access to my camera at the moment to recap the trip, so I’m posting something else in the meantime.

My sister-in-law, Lianna, discovered Walmart Bingo over our Christmas vacation:

Anyway, we thought it was so funny that we decided to make one of our own. Introducing…


SACRAMENT MEETING BINGO!
It’s not in grid format, but get over it. Think of it more as a scavenger hunt. Ready, go.

• Member of the bishopric sleeping

• Someone writing a particularly large tithing check in full view

• Toddler making it all the way up the stairs and behind the pulpit before being caught by angry parent

• Someone texting

• Cheerios ground into the carpet/stuck in the pew-crack

• Dandruff on a black suit

• Child crying for over two minutes before parent removes them – BONUS if the parent doesn’t remove them at all.

• Off-key, warbling soprano outsinging everyone

• Severe combover

• Child playing with electronic toy

• Obscene coughing directly behind your head

• Someone saying “Bear with me” at the beginning of their talk – BONUS if they also begin an idea with “Merriam-Webster defines _____ as:”

• Child defacing a hymnbook

• Young Woman singing a solo from an EFY CD

• Baby girl wearing a headband with an enormous bow or flower attached to it – BONUS if she’s wearing at least two other accessories at the same time

• Little kid picking his nose and wiping it on the upholstery

• Knock-you-out Old Lady Perfume

• Cellphone ringing during the Sacrament: BONUS if it’s a highly inappropriate ring tone

• Person disclosing sensitive details of their latest malady/financial troubles over the pulpit

• Child kicking your pew

• Siblings (that aren’t twins) dressed identically: BONUS if it involves denim

• Old lady with enormous earrings stretching her earlobes beyond recognition

• Man with clean-shaven face, but sporting flagrant ‘neckbeard’

PS- Yes, we came up with this list during Sacrament meeting.
PSS- Lots more ideas could come from this post that I did a while back, but it wouldn’t be very original of me to post them all over again now would it?
PSS- A handful from the Wal-Mart bingo could go on this list, as well. Not sure if you noticed. I figured I'd point that out. Just in case.

Christmas Prep

I got called onto the Activities committee a few weeks ago. Of course I automatically assumed this was one of those made-up callings (“Sister Jensen doesn’t have a calling…throw her onto the bottom of the committee list”), and my hunch was strengthened when the activities leader left a message on my phone saying “Um, I guess you’re on the committee…we heard your name announced today in Sacrament, so we figured we’d get in touch with you…”. Looks like a strong case for made-up calling, right? WRONG. As it turns out, I am THE ONLY person on the committee! Except for Jon, and he doesn’t count because he’s never in town anyway. So yeah, I’m the only person on the committee. It’s me and the couple in charge, THAT’S IT. So we’re scrambling to get a Christmas party planned, since we were all called about three weeks away from the blessed event, and the woman asks me, “Would you mind making the fliers? Would you mind running the rehearsals with the children? Would you mind building the nativity?” BUILDING THE NATIVITY!! I am not even exaggerating; All of these things came out of her mouth. She may as well have said “Hi, thanks for joining the team, will you do everything?”. Well as it turns out, the Christmas party got postponed from last weekend to THIS weekend, and HOORAY – I’m not going to be here. And neither are the committee leaders! The bishopric ended up calling another two couples as “Christmas Party Specialists”. So I while I still helped with a lot of the details, I don’t have to set up or clean up or actually attend the event. Though the fact that we’re leaving tomorrow for our Christmas vacation in Canada didn’t prevent the original activities committee leader from asking me to make a breakfast casserole for the party, anyway. And when I told her that I didn’t think that was a good idea, seeing as it would sit in someone’s fridge for four days before making its debut at the event, she got kind of huffy and said “Well since we dumped this whole thing off onto these other people, I just think it would be the respectful thing to do.” WHOA WHOA WHOA, wait, what?? Dumped? They were called by the bishop to do this. What, was I supposed to change my flight so I could mop up spilled food off the Cultural Hall floor? Why don’t YOU just NOT go to your grandchild’s baptism in Flagstaff? And what? Respectful? “Thanks for helping, please keep this casserole in your fridge for four days, then feed it to people.” And besides, wasn’t it respectful of me to make the flier? And to find someone with a nativity already made? And to line up the musical numbers? And to help with the children’s rehearsal? She really confused me with that one. Anyway, that’s that.


I’ve been busy at work mailing out Christmas cards and organizing an Adopt-a-Family type of a thing for the employees to participate in. And I’m glad to report that it looks like this is NOT going to be a repeat of last year’s food drive. It was kind of embarrassing when the representative came back for their behemoth cardboard box only to discover that it contained two things of canned vegetables and a box of mac and cheese. With that memory fresh in my mind, it was kind of hard for me to commit our office to this new charitable effort, but I decided that if I guilted people enough that it just might have a happier ending than last year. And it seems to be working. Some people brought their presents in unwrapped, so I made a quick trip to Walgreens for some bags and boxes. This was where I encountered the Most Melancholy Bell-Ringer of All Time. I honestly didn’t even notice him until after I’d walked past. He gave his bell two or three sad peels before dropping it again to his side as he leaned against the wall. It’s quite a change from the guy last year at the same location. He was a Constant Ringer, and whenever anyone walked past he would hold it out and ring it double-time, double-loud for a few seconds before resuming his typical tempo. You wouldn’t think anything could be so annoying yet so hilarious all at the same time.


Like I mentioned before, we’re preparing to leave for our Christmas vacation (TOMORROW) and we have so much to do between now and then it’s UNREAL. I’ve got a to-do list with about fifteen things on it. We haven’t even begun packing. We have errands to run. Kitchens to clean, dogs to wash, blah blah blah blah. But I’m excited like crazy to leave work behind for a while and spend time with family, eat yummy food, and celebrate CHRISTMAS, hooray!

Sunrise

Pretty.

Unaltered, fresh from the lens. Just imagine how it looked in real life. You should have been here. It was great.

Vegas, Baby!

So this post is kind of late, but I’ve actually been crazy busy at work, and Jon has amazingly been home for the past several days, so I haven’t had a moment to write anything up about our WEEKEND IN VEGAS. Originally Jon was going for work and we were going to be staying at the Wynn for free, Jon’s flight would be free, he’d be getting paid each of the days he was there, etc. But then the workshop got cancelled. We’d already bought my flight and tickets to a show, so we decided this would be our anniversary gift instead. We stayed at our friends’ house and had fun eating good food, shopping, visiting, and watching Mamma Mia. Poor Jon lost a bet. A few months back when he was promised a raise at work, we placed bets on the percentage his salary would increase, and chose the stakes. I was the closest, so I got to pick the show. Plus, Mamma Mia leaves Las Vegas at the end of this year, so it was now or never. It was lots of fun. At least I thought so. Each time I ask Jon what he thought of it, though, he says something like, “the songs sure are catchy” or “there sure was lots of energy” or something like that. He’s a good sport though. Kind of. This is us before the show.

My first time ever playing the slots: I was a little anxious.




(That's our friend Addie. Not some random gambler sitting next to me. Don't even worry about it.)

I didn’t do too well. This is the highest payout I got the entire time.




That's ninety quarters, not ninety dollars.



Other random pictures…





On Saturday we met up with one of my good friends from Gardnerville, Brittany Keele. We went to lunch at Café Rio, then just spent some time at her cute apartment talking and reminiscing. I laughed until I almost peed.


Um. Yeah. That’s about it. OH. Except that on the flight home, we sat kind of near the back of the plane near a noisy group of people on their way home to Mexico. Anyway, it was hilarious, because there were two of them originally, but then they made friends with some other people in the vicinity, and about halfway back to Phoenix the entire group was singing songs together. Songs like “Paradise City” and “Achey Breaky Heart”. So we were cracking up, because seriously, who can get on an airplane, make friends with everyone around them, then get everyone to break out into random songs? Well anyway, it was a completely full flight, and some woman had been separated from her husband and ended up in the midst of it, and as we were disembarking, we overheard her freaking out to the flight attendents, “I WAS SCARED TO DEATH. SCARED TO DEATH!!!!” Whaaaaat?? What a psycho! People were singing around her, and it made her fear for her life. Some people’s kids. OH YEAH. And on our way through security in Vegas, some old guy got in a fight with TSA over his half-full Fiji water bottle that he was trying to take with him. Cussing, yelling..it was awesome. We put our shoes and belts on as slowly as we possibly could so that we could see the whole thing as it panned out. In the end, though, it wasn’t as exciting as I had hoped. If I’d have known you could abuse airport security to that point without being tazed, I’d have been doing it this entire time. They just explained the rules to him over and over while he shouted and swore and tried repeatedly to grab his water bottle. Then when Andre-the-Giant-Security-Guard wandered over and put his two cents in, the old man shut right up, albeit a few grumblings under his breath. Borrring.


And that was our trip. That’s all.

More Thanksgiving Pictures

Before the big meal, we took advantage of my grandma's beautiful backyard and the perfect light by snapping some pictures outside.

(They're laughing at the previous picture.) That's Kyle's new iPhone, btw. "My iPhone is ringing. Do you know where my iPhone is? Someone's calling my iPhone."

Jon was being silly so we didn't get any really good ones of the two of us. Not on my camera at least. My mom has some others that possibly worked better. This one is the best out of the ten or so we took with the old Powershot A520, though. Meh.




A couple of days later: The outfits below were completely unplanned. Somehow were were all wearing shades of purple?? Except Corinne, but she doesn't really count.



The end.

Turkey Day Recap

We’re back from Salt Lake! It went by way too fast, of course. We spent the days shopping, eating good food, and playing Uno and Trivial Pursuit. Let’s just jump right in.


The whole thing starts with a hurt foot. Two days before we left, Penny sprained her toe. Okay, so I sprained Penny’s toe, but it was an accident. Her toenail got stuck to the blanket I was using, and when I moved positions, it wrecked it. Poor thing. Before we knew what exactly was wrong with her, I did a little internet research to see what we should do for her and came across this exchange on Yahoo Answers.

QUESTION:
I think my dog has a sprained leg, what should I do?
We took her out to the park today and she was running around like crazy, when we left I noticed her right leg was shaking, and now she's limping when she walks. She won't bend her ankle (is that what they are on dogs?) and so I think it might be sprained. Should I take her to the vet now or wait until tomorrow to see if it gets better? Should I...I dunno, put an ice pack on it or something? I need some advice here.

ANSWER: dang woman.. well my dog got runned over last year and we didnt take him to the vet cos hes vicious.. so we just kept him here and within a week he was better.(his leg was f$#@ed up too) so its up to you if you want to take her.. if its just a sprained ankle then i dont think its such a big deal.. but you are extremely concerned about her then i say you take her to the vet


This person single-handedly convinced me to take Penny to the vet. So when we dropped her off at our bishop’s house Tuesday evening, we left also left them some doggie pain-killer/anti-inflammatory and strict instructions to keep her calm and off her foot as much as possible. Poor little thing. Anyway, no time to worry about her too much, because then it was OFF TO PHOENIX to spend the night before our 6:30 flight the next morning. We only got to visit with my cousins and aunt and uncle for about two hours since we had to wake up so early, but it was still fun to catch up.


On Wednesday, just a few hours after we landed, my mom, Annie, Jon and I met up with Darcy and Kelsey (Jon’s brother and sister), Lianna and Jake (their spouses), and Pearl and Norah (their baby girls). We’ve never met Pearl before so it was so much fun seeing her for the first time. And seeing everyone else again, of course. We had them meet us at Robintino’s – kind of a weird old place, but good food. My grandparents have been eating there at least four times a week ever since before they were born. We had a fun lunch catching up and taking pictures of babies.

^ (Pearl) ^

^ (Norah) ^

They grow up so fast. I always feel ninety when I say that. But it's true. One minute they're born, and the next thing you know, they're teething on lemons.

Apparently she loves them. This went on for two full minutes. Kels, I'm sorry but the red-eye removal didn't work on this picture. I tried. Really hard.

Thursday was THANKSGIVING (duh), the second best holiday of the year. I put in a good word for some crab drink and was not disappointed.

The chunks you see are crab (imitation crab, maybe?) and grapefruit. The liquid is some mixture involving Clamato juice. Don’t think about it, just eat it. Cold. DELICIOUS.

Here’s the turkey coming out of the oven…





And being carved. See the guy on the left? That’s my cousin, Brandon. Does he not look just like this guy on a billboard plastered all over Paris?


That's my mom's hand, whisking the gravy. It was delicious, for the record, as were the mashed potatoes. At least Kyle thought so.





He actually made them, and the apple pies, too. But he couldn't have done it without my excellent apple-slicing skills.





Jon was hunting while all this silly food preparation stuff was going on. He and the General squeezed a couple of trips out to the marsh to properly murder some ducks (pitiful quacking noise) :-(


No trip to SLC would be complete without a visit to Epic, our favorite restaurant. As a good rule of thumb, I’m a happier person when I’ve got lots of hummus and mascarpone in my stomach. It was amazing, as usual, but unfortunately Klutt was not our waiter this time around. KLUTT!! Someone named their kid KLUTT!!!!!

I can only hope that I'll look half as good when I'm a great-grandmother.

Holy longest post ever. And I’ve still got more. We took some really good pictures of the girls and the couples (well, everyone but me and Jon, more on than in a later post), and some REALLY hot pictures of me and Corinne. Corinne and me. Whatever.

Kyle pointed out that Corinne looks like a Fraggle in this picture.

Is that all? No. Our flight was scheduled to leave at ten on Sunday night, which would get us home around 2:30am (keep in mind that once we flew into Phoenix, we still had to drive two and a half hours to Tucson). Well when we got to the airport at 8:30, we discovered that our flight had been delayed until ONE O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING. This is why you call before you leave, kids. Ridiculous. This was me after we found out and were trying to figure out what to do.





So we called my mom and she turned around and got us. Thank goodness we had that option, otherwise we would have been stuck in the airport for FIVE HOURS before our plane took off. Ew. Instead, we went back to my grandma’s house for a couple of hours and slept. I managed to sleep in the terminal, too, once we got through security (it was a hassle, but not because there was a long line. It was the exact opposite. There was NO line, and everything was roped off. Nowhere to even form a line if we wanted to. We stood there, lost and confused for a few minutes, until we literally had to rouse a guard in order to get screened). I also got a few minute’s sleep on the plane once we finally left (not at one, as it turns out, but at one-thirty. Of course.) And I slept all the way home in the car. We pulled into our parking spot at 5:20, went inside and slept for forty minutes until the alarm went off at six, then jumped (jamp?) into the shower to get ready for work. Since I managed to get some sleep, I’m not too bad off. I can’t speak for Jon, though. Bless his heart for getting us home safe and sound.


This entire saga ends with a hurt foot. In the morning when I stumbled into the living room, I smashed my foot into the plastic paneling on Jon’s hockey bag. To say I “stubbed my toe” would be like saying Annie’s winking face is “sort of funny”.





Severe understatement. I RUINED my entire foot on it. Two of my toes now are completely swollen. I’m limping around like an idiot. If this had happened twelve years ago, I would have demanded that my mother wrap my entire leg in an ace bandage.


Anyway, that’s our trip, in a nutshell. If you read this whole thing instead of just skipping through to pictures, you have my respect.


-----------------------------

Explanation: Annie and I are the only two people on earth that can’t wink both eyes. I can at least wink one, and with years of practice Annie believed she had mastered her right eye. Not so.


Further reading: When Jon came in to see what all the commotion was after I destroyed my toes, he stubbed HIS foot on his hockey bag, too. But not as badly. At least, he hasn’t complained about it as much as I have.


PS- Do NOT go see Australia. SAVE YOURSELVES. I only hope I’m not too late.......

PSS- I can't for the life of me figure out how to salvage the second half of this post. It's acting like a link, but it's not a link.... thoughts?