Guess What?

I started college at BYU-Idaho in January 2008 (because they assign 2 out of 3 possible semesters to students to be able to admit more of them, so I sat out Fall Semester). So.

AFTER:

• 5 1/2 years of on and off, full-time/part-time classes
• 1 Academic Probation
• 1 Academic Suspension
• 1 hardcore heartbreak (and a chunky get-mentally-healthy-again stretch)
• 9 Jobs (Never been fired! That's what happens when you take two part-time jobs every time you move back and forth between Rexburg and Provo, rather than one full time.)
• 7 Sets of roommates, only living with one of them more than once. Shout out to Rachael Martin! 
• 9 Moves, while single (including moving next door, moving out after 5 days and moving in te middle-of-the-night)

AFTER:

• 1 AWESOME first-semester-back GPA, after suspension
• 1 Lovely fall-in-love story
• 1  Engagement
• 1 Wedding
• 2 Universities
• 1 Associate's Degree
• 1 and 8/9 completed pregnancies, including morning sickness during finals and full-time student status during 3rd trimester twice
• 1 Beautiful, healthy daughter's birth (yay!)
• 5 Months of colicky crying in poor daughter, while-mama-was-doing-evening-classes-while-daddy-also-went-to-school-and-worked-part-time. Blegh.
• 1 Utah State Hospital volunteer experience, playing with six 10-year-olds with some mental struggles during P.E. Fun!
• 1 Summer Internship, while husband completed his at the same time
• 8 moves while married (including four different homes in four months, in three states)

AFTER: 

• 1/3 college credits completed as a mama
• 1 newborn-grown-to-two-year-old
• 6 months living out of mainly suitcases with a one-year-old
• 2 times our bank account dropping to the single digits
• 3 1/2 years of marriage
• 1 4.0 GPA
• 1 winter-spent-in-a-beach house (random)
• Countless late-nights for homework, or awakenings with baby
• MULTIPLE, multiple blessings

After ALL of it:

I'm graduating from Brigham Young University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology. I finished my last class on Friday and will be walking in graduation, 37 weeks pregnant August 15 & 16. 

BOOO YAAAHHH!!!

Wee update

Well, I wrote this massive email to family yesterday and sent it...so if you're family you already got this. But I figured I'd just go ahead and copy and paste this baby on over, for the few people who read this who aren't family. Yup.

We moved in with Darren and Loalee at the very end of February, so we've been here...almost two months, now. I've had a harder time totally un-packing here more than anywhere else, funny enough. I think because I'm still unsure of how long we'll be here, and just like our last place we've moved in somewhere that is completely furnished (though there's much more room here than the last place). Shout out to Mike and Chantale for not seriously bugging us about a lot of our stuff being in their basement. It won't be there forever, I swear! 

Jori loves the space. For those who don't know, the Hatch's built this house with their bare hands about...17 years ago, doing almost all the labor themselves and only hiring out on a few jobs. Maybe I'm exaggerating but I'm always super impressed when hearing about that time. So because of that they have a fair sized house, perfect for visiting family and, in our case, an adventurous toddler. Jori loves the space to run around, and LOVES the pets they have here: two cats (one which I swear doesn't actually live here), three dogs, and four horses. There's also a neighbor dog that started coming over all the time when Millie, their miniature poodle, was in heat, but he--Teebo is his name--and Jori are total partners in crime. Makes me smile-they stick together like glue when he comes over. I just don't smile when they start running down the driveway for the road--booo. That's a constant struggle. Little stinkers. 

I made a school schedule for myself, since the lack of deadlines was a serious detriment to me making any progress toward graduation. If I'd stuck with it perfectly, I would be done on May 4th. Unfortunately, I fell off the wagon a bit this week when the amount I'd hoped to accomplish each day just wasn't happening. Since then, I've revised it so that it's more doable (hopefully), and am now hoping to be totally done with the last of my schoolwork by the end of May rather than the beginning, and then walk in graduation in August (8 months pregnant :) ). The first week I did great and finished my D&C class, so I now only have 7 credits left-3 in each of my two Psychology classes, and a 1 credit temple class that I totally underestimated. Ha.

Our taxes were a nightmare this year, since...long story. Basically I still think Sam's past employers are villians, now. But a friend of a friend who has a Master's in Accounting took pity on us and did them for us, and I was thrilled and surprised to find that we would still be getting a refund back. No idea how that happened but I'm delighted! We're still waiting on those employers to send us the last of what Sam is owed...in five days it will have been two months since Sam's last day. Yeah, they're lame. Another long story and I shouldn't get into it since really...this is a perfect opportunity for me to exercise forgiveness, and I've not been wanting to and just wanting to stay mad at these people. Whatever-the check should be on its way so hopefully we'll be done with it, then.

We sold our '96 Camry! I had mixed feelings. I hated that car in so many ways, but it still got us around the first three years of our marriage. We had thought it would have died long ago so honestly I'm glad we were even able to sell it. And, it went to a guy who knows tons about cars, so I feel happier about that because if it gives him trouble he'll be able to handle it. It was kind of a funny thing that brought all this about, though: Darren, Sam's dad, still had the Camry's title in his name. This was just laziness on our part: they'd paid the insurance on it for us, so we didn't see the need to officially receive the title. Well then their 2001 Chrysler 300M, the transmission went out and their first estimate they received for a repair was like, 2-3000 dollars, which they didn't want to pay. So, they got a 2009 (I think) beautiful blue Lincoln instead, and the Chrysler sat there. I think they'd planned to sell it. Then Darren and Sam got chatting, and got estimates from other places for the repair and it wouldn't cost nearly as much from some of these other places. So basically, the money from the sold Camry paid for the repair on the Chrysler and 6 month's car insurance, and we're now driving that. Eventually we'll buy the title from them, but for now it's our un-official car. Yay! Even being 12 years old it's a lot fancier than our last car, so that's kind of fun. And by fancier, I mean the radio works. :)

As probably all of you know by now, we found out we're having a boy a few weeks ago, too! That was crazy-I went in for my first appointment at my new OBGYN, and there was an ultrasound machine in the room. My doctor was super nice and she asked me if I wanted to take a peek, just since it was there, so I said of course. Then she asked if I wanted to know the gender which I was NOT expecting, but said of course and lo and behold! A boy! For the Hatch side, in case you forgot: in 2011 there were three boys and Jori born on that side, but on my Christensen side Jori was one of four girls born. Well in 2013, our son will be the fourth grandson that year! Crazy. What are the odds of that?! (Ike this is where you can chip in.) 

Jori cute moments: 

We've taught Jori "I'll be right back," to calm her when we have to leave the room but only momentarily. She trusts us now when we say it, so it's a valuable tool to keep her calm when this is necessary. Well a couple weeks back Jori really wanted Sam to go get her a treat, so she was 'ugnn'-ing and tugging at his finger, then she said 'Ahbarighback.' And had a satisfied look, like she'd solved the problem. She was telling him to be right back. With her treats. Chop chop. :) 

She does it herself, too, which is so cute I about die every time. I love when she gets a mission in mind and says that. 'Ahbarighback.' And dashes away. 

She also says "One more," in the same tone we do. Not correctly, of course--she always thinks there will be infinitely more 'one more's.

I guess these are all sayings...she has started saying "I carry you" when she wants you to carry her...which can be hard to resist. This girl is so spoiled. Not for much longer-the larger the belly grows the more difficult it is for me to give in! 

As I said earlier, Teebo and Jori are good pals. I appreciate him for that. I think in age he's equivalent to a teenager, for dogs, so he's very playful still. He's just pain to be around when he's horny. Jori also REALLY loves Twixie, the cat that we do see frequently (since the other I never see). She'll follow her all over, and to her credit she hasn't yet scratched Jori. Jori will also try to lay her head down on Twixie, then she moves, then Jori tries again...it's a sweet little cycle. Silly ladies. 

She's still a little mimic, trying to say just about anything you ask her (and some things you don't! She's said shoot and 'Oh gosh' a few times cause of me...I've gotta be careful with it). The other day at the table she discovered the word cute, but says it 'coot.' She was so pleased with herself and gave this cheesy grin, between saying it over and over. Maybe you had to be there...

Also at the dinner table, she was trying to say "Strawberries" a couple nights ago and instead said "Stabebebebeies? Stabebebeies?" several times. Not even trying to be silly, just decided that's how it was done. :) 

She can be SO sweet. We went to the store yesterday and she got a little treat since she was good, and when she was eating it in the car (unprovoked, mind you!) she said "Day-to, mama! Day-to, mama! Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" until he responded, then "Day-to, daddy!" (Which is thank you.) Melts my heart. 

Oh, other recent commands are "Come on, mama! Come on, daddy!" or "Let's go!" SO high. Young voices, I'm tellin' ya. They get up there. 

Sam has been diligent in basically the pursuit of our future, for lack of a better way to phrase. He shadowed a couple of different speech pathologists, and has contacted others but a lot of them require a connection to a school program, in order to let people shadow. So Sam will be starting pre-requisite courses for a Master's in Speech and Language Pathology through USU's online program early May, and we hope that will give him the connection needed so he can shadow more professionals and decide for final whether this is a good fit, or not. He's also looking for jobs, mainly in Cache Valley since cost of living is so much lower and we're hoping he'll get into USU's Master's Program, since they have accreditation the other two universities in the state with a program in this (BYU and U of U) don't have. So it'd be nice if we wouldn't have to move again once school started. We'll see how everything works out...basically, if you're curious, these are our only main requirements: he needs a job that would be conducive to him succeeding in school. So like, concrete laying for example, wouldn't work cause it's very hard on the body and he'd be too exhausted to do school too; or an alternating graveyards shift job probably would too. And then it needs to be enough for us to live on. Of course. So the search continues...

besides this, Sam has spent a lot of time in Darren's wood shop lately, which I'm totally pumped about. In case you forgot,

 this is what our dresser looks like now, after we painted it 8ish months ago. Recently, Sam also finished the framing on the doors that I'm turning into headboards (one for us, one for a bro and sis-in-law) so they're ready to be painted, I just need a kick in the fanny. Here's a poor-lighting picture of ours, with the other behind it:

 and the very most recent thing, I showed Sam (and Darren) this picture of a nightstand I found while cruising pinterest and better homes and gardens online: 

 and since then Sam has been cruisin' on their construction, and is almost done! Woot woot! Here's a pic of where they're at right now: 

 woot woot! I'm thrilled. All that's left are the drawers, and then I get to paint them and choose knobs. I've been WAY into all these home organization, renovation and decoration ideas, both for our own stuff and others lately since I'm ridiculously nosy and that's fun for me. Man I'd love to be professional organizer. I think I could really get into that. 

Well there you have it family, the past month for our lil fam. Only took an hour to read. :) Oh, and I cut my hair, about a foot off on my birthday. Forgot to mention that. Shorter suits me much better! I'm a happy camper in that department. 

Well cross your fingers on me finishing school and Sam finding a job. Especially the job--school is probably overrated, but Sam gets really down because of our current situation. I hate that--he shouldn't, he needn't. He's doing all he can and I hate not being able to boost his spirits. So yeah...that'd be great. Love and snuggles, -Ariel

Sometimes, I forget I created this to document our lives...

So, looking over the blog...I've only written about our lives in the past post, at the end of November since like...August! And it wasn't in the normal style I do, either! But knowing me, I'll go WAY overboard if I don't limit myself so I'll try to sum things up with as few words as possible. Here we go:

• September...I can't  really remember very well. ?
• October, we had a lot of fun doing a "Murder Mystery" night, playing one of the How to Host a Murder games. The first one we prepped for for like, 2 weeks, and did it the Friday before  Halloween with old mission friends of Sam's and their wives. The second one we only thought of it 3 days before, and did on actual Halloween night with some ward friends. Both were great. :) I wish we could do one with every different set of friends we could think of: old roommates, old high school friends, family, etc.
• Jori was a little Chinese lady for Halloween. That doesn't sound politically correct but not sure how else to say it. You know just beautiful, decorative Chinese dresses? She just wore one of those we have for her and some shoes that match. It's beautiful, and she was absolutely adorable. 
• I signed up for 9 credits this Fall Semester, which was the most I've taken at one time since Jori was born, with Sam gone most of the time. (Last Spring I was a full-time student, but Sam was home almost all the time.) It ended up being nuts because my religion class (Survey of World Religions) was interesting but (for me) WAY hard. Bah! 
• One of those 3 classes in the 9 credits was an Independent Study class, Writing in the Social Sciences, which means you set your own schedule...but because I had Pell Grants paying for it, I still had to get it done by this past Friday, December 14th. This ended up being a recipe for disaster: I put it off for far too long, and then we moved, so I did...something like 75% of the class, in a week and a half. Phew. Never again. Good thing I have an amazingly supportive husband! 

• Thanksgiving we spent with Sam's parents and his sister, Melanie and her family. It was great, I just didn't enjoy as much of it as I would have if I didn't have the Independent Study class hanging over my head. I was trying to work on it a lot of the time. At least I won't have that dilemma at Christmas.
• We drove down to St. George Nov. 30th, then the rest of the way to Dana Point, CA December 1st. We got to see one of my very favorite old roommates, Sydney Jackson, and spent the night with her; we also got to see one of Sam's very best friends from forever, James Hess, and his wife Jenna and their kids. I also love them a lot so I was thrilled to get to spend some time there. 
• Our place is on a really...well, hoity toity road, you have to have a lot of moolah to live here (unless you have a sweet deal worked out like us), but it's one of the smallest on this whole long road. Thank goodness-it's surreal enough to live in a beach house, but at least it's about the size we're used to (just 2 small bedrooms and a living room and kitchen). It'd be hard to call it home if it was super huge or something-we're just not used to that or ready for it just yet, I think. It's been so cool to be here-Jori loves the ocean. I'm just terrified she's going to drown every time we go down to it, because she runs right for the water and then it comes in and if I didn't grab her she could be swept away so easily. This reminds me of the other one I wanted to say...
• Our neighbors are wonderful. They'll only be here till the end of the month, which makes me sad, but they're this family from Oregon who comes down to California to sell Christmas trees every winter. It's actually an older generation and their two kids, and then their kids' families. So there's one girl that's only 2 months older than me, and she has two kids, the oldest of which is a month younger than Jori. The other woman is older and has six kids, and she's wonderful too. They aren't LDS but I swear they could be-they dress very conservatively, home school their kids, highly prioritize the Bible...it's great! I'm happy to have neighbors with such strong morals that I can relate to, and that there's someone Jori's age. Even though Jori thinks she's older than she is, I swear. She'll steal the older kids' bikes, particularly this one trike, but then cry cause she can't reach the pedals. Silly girl. 
• Our first weekend here, we spent with my uncle Kelly and his wife Marlayna, and their two boys (Seth and Ammon). Seth did something way funny, to me: he told me "You better watch your step, because there's mistletoe hanging in some places!" I told him "Watch out, I might jump out and smooch ya!" Then I left the room. Sam said something like "Careful Seth, she really might kiss ya!" And he smiled and said "That's what I was hoping for." Then I found him "nonchalantly" hanging out under the mistletoe, so I kissed his cheek and he did the 'cha-ching' with the arms sign, you know the one? And let out a huge "YEEEESSSSS!" silly boy.

That's about it for a catch-up. I do hate driving on the freeways down here, just as I suspected, but I have hope I'll get used to it eventually. Oh! And one of my finals? The one for my Independent Study course, actually. I had to have it proctored, so it was shipped to the closest place they had listed in their system...but I had to pay fifty bucks to take the test at this testing center! Fifty!! I thought a five dollar late fee that BYU charges was bad...never again, geeze. 

The day Sam said ta-ta, textbooks!

That's what he should have said, at least. I think "ta-ta" is an under-utilized farewell.

Sam graduated from BYU with a Bachelor's in Linguistics, Minor's in TESOL on August 10th!!! I'm so proud of him. :)

Videos and brief update

Obviously I haven't been blogging much lately. I'll give you a quick update, hopefully in chronological order:

Our last laptop died. Sadness. Especially because I hadn't saved all of the pictures and videos to another source yet. Fortunately, I did save some of the latest vids like the day before it really bit the bullet, so that's good. And I'm hoping my bro Mike can access what was on the hard drive and we can retrieve anything else that I didn't save to an external source.

On the bright side, I found and secured an internship for Summer Term. Yay! I'll be interning with the Division of Child and Family Services, basically just shadowing for the extent of it. It surprised me, honestly: I thought I'd be...more hands on, maybe? Actually contributing to whatever organization I interned with. But they said since I'll be there for such a short amount of time and am an undergraduate student, they can't really give me many duties so my time would best be used just observing as many different things as I can. But really I think that'll be interesting, and informative. Basically I'll get an idea of what Social Workers do.

The only downside to me finding an internship is how crazy busy we're going to be. Sam has to complete 150 hours for his internship, and mine will require 135 hours. So basically that's around 20 hours per week each. Plus I'm scheduled for a world religions class, which is equivalent  to half-time student work again. Why does any of this matter? Jori pori. We'll finally really have to rely on others to care for her for quite a bit of those 8 weeks. It's discouraging, but I'm trying not to be prideful and accept help gratefully. Just easier said than done. 

I'm real excited for Spring Term to get done, even though Summer Term is going to be even crazier. I just really don't like group work! Not that there's anything wrong with the people, really. I'm just evil.

Though our laptop died, a couple days later my friend Laura was EXTREMELY generous, and offered to give us the laptop she used throughout college because she wasn't really using it anymore. So after my bro Mike fixed it up (thanks again), it's running great and we have a computer at home again. Yay!

That's about all to report. I have a few more cute pics and vids from our camera, but it's in the trunk of my parent's car so they'll have to wait. Still, here's some videos that I haven't yet loaded:

Holy bit off more than I can chew...

IIII....feel stressed. Like, crazy stressed. I've started my two classes for the term, my first time being a 'full-time' student since Jori was born, and it's madness. It'd be hard enough just with like the classes I had last semester, but on top of that the classes I have this term are exceptionally difficult. They're a lot of writing, like technical writing, and both are a LOT of group work. Pain in my fanny, bah. I just discovered: I must be awful with girls, because I almost never like working with girls. In groups in school or in an actual work environment. Don't know what that's about.

Anyway if that weren't enough, I'm trying to find an internship for Summer Term now (since Spring term is too late now) but it has to work around Sam's. And I'm also supposed to take the internship class summer term, and possibly the Religions Around the World class. Which seems like it'll be a fun class, but may be more than I can handle all together. But if I don't, then Sam is limited in his job searching to Utah Valley. Oi.

We also have a family reunion at the end of June, a trek, to prepare for, that I may be a single parent at (since Sam's Korean students are arriving at the same time). And I have my calling, Relief Society teacher. I have a lesson to give this Sunday for that. And don't forget about my most important responsibility: Jori!!

I had no idea it'd be so hard to be away from her so much. It's funny, really. I guess I've just gotten used to the way things have been. Spring Term she gets to be with Sam lots, so she's fine, but I'm struggling with it. I feel bad.

Why am I saying all this? I guess I'm immature and like getting sympathy when I'm stressed out. So there you have it: I'm stressed out!

BOO yah!

Done with school!!! ....for the semester.

I decided to do something unusual for me, and I got all (2) of my finals done the first day finals were open, which was Saturday. So Jori and I have had a pretty fun week with me not worrying about homework hanging over my head. Yay!

Much more exciting, though, is the fact that Sam is as we speak taking his last final of his last full semester of college!!! I'd say last ever, but he has to take this internship class Spring term and they may have a final, I don't know. But after his internship he'll graduate this August!

In case y'all didn't know, you should be very proud of Sam. School's hard enough when you're going full time AND trying to work at the same time. But then throw in a family to support and it's even rougher. But THEN throw in your wife is still in school, so you have to babysit so she can do schoolwork/go to class, and there's virtually no time to just do something for yourself. That has been my Sam's life for the past two semesters, and I really couldn't be prouder of him for doing all that he has.

Speaking of summer...(we kind of were, right?) this summer is probably going to be nuts for our little family. At least Sam won't have as much schoolwork to deal with, thank goodness, but right now the plan is for me to go full time Spring Term, and do MY internship Summer Term while possibly also taking another class Summer Term, as well. But that has to somehow work around Sam's internship class Spring Term, him working part time landscaping, and then SAM'S internship Summer Term as well.

Wish us luck. :S I've been so adamant about Sam or I being the main ones caring for Jori: I feel like since we made the decision to start our family before either of us was done with school, we shouldn't depend on others to take care of our child. She's our responsibility. But I may not have the luxury to say that this summer. BOY do I hate swallowing my pride. Tastes nasty.

Hello, beautiful

I just realized I stopped taking pictures for like a month. Crap! All the "She's only this age once" stuff is going to be floating over my head now...

...to try to get rid of said floating cloud of guilt, I'll post the few I have taken over the past...I dunno. Month? Just while on the computer with her on my lap.

Love this picture. :D So cute.

Hahaha love this one too, cause she was smiling so weird.

I mean for her. She never smiles like that. Goofball. :)

This was just Sunday. See that shiny chin?

She drools so much now. I much prefer it to spit up I must say.

Try to think of something cuter than a yawning baby. You fail? Me too.

Oh, and also try to look at this without yawning. I failed. Twice.

I think faces like this one are why when she first popped out

the nurses said "Oh, look at those lips! Angelina Jolie lips!"

She's taken to sucking on her fingers a lot.

I love it, except when said fingers then make me all slobbery.

I love this little lady. See how she's holding my shirt? I love when she holds on to me like that. Makes me feel like a superhero or something, protecting this fair maiden.

In other news...

• I just finished my midterm. Huzzah! Time for bed-I hate going to bed late. But I also love blogs, and facebook. Snap...
• We may move again. Hahaha...Sam's not excited. Can you blame him? This would be our 5th place. I really like where we live currently actually, probably neighbor-wise better than any other place we've been, but living closer to campus and/or having a washer and dryer is calling out to me...we'll see.