Did you know my good friend Hannah is living with me this summer? The day I found out that T.J. would be gone four whole months, I prayed to know whether or not I should go with him. I felt that I should stay in Provo for several specific reasons and then the thought came to me to have Hannah move in.
I asked her what she thought, she said it was an answer to her prayers as well.
She moved in the weekend T.J. left and it’s been a slumber party ever since!
This weekend was busy but so fun! Saturday I had a baby shower to go to for my friend Ashley (who is in labor right this very minute… 6 weeks early… so pray for her and her baby!) and a wedding reception for a friend from Sophomore year. They were both up in Alpine/Highland area, so in between the events I hung out with my in-laws.
I really need to start pulling out my camera more often because my iPhone pics aren’t as high quality. But, here are snapshots of my life lately, according to Instagram. Sorry there are so many!
Saying goodbye to T.J.
Eva is trying lots of new foods. Bananas are not her favorite.
Hannah had these beautiful flowers and delicious candy for me after I dropped T.J. off at the airport.
First snow cone of the season!
We saw The Pirates! before T.J. left. One of my favorites! It was so funny!
Just “hanging” out.
Almost every night we walk to the elementary school a couple blocks away and swing.
Why buy toys when spoons work just as well? We went through about five of those because she kept dropping them on the ground!
Saw these cute little boys feeding a horse on my Sunday walk. They were so excited they would just laugh uncontrollably.
I went to T.J.’s grandma’s house last night for a Family Home Evening. More than thirty people showed up… it was so fun! We heard about her and her granddaughter’s Mediterranean Cruise, which sounded amazing!
I’m trying to eat a little healthier… so instead of eating goldfish last night as my snack (as usual), I ate asparagus and mushrooms with balsamic vinegar. Mom, you’d be proud.
T.J. started work today at Johnson & Johnson! What a cutie!
I’ve known my bestie Blair Murphy since 4th grade. That’s a long time, folks. We tell each other just about everything because that’s just what you do with your closest girlfriends. But there was this one time, about three months ago when I realized Blair was pronouncing Eva’s name incorrectly and I wasn’t sure how to tell her.
Let me back up first and say I know Eve is usually the shorter version of Evelyn, which is Eva’s full name. But I just liked Eva more PLUS I really like the idea of having a full formal name, just like my full name is Kathryn but I go by Katie. I also liked the “Evelyn” spelling more than “Evalyn” which my brother has bugged me about a lot. Most importantly, I knew it was going to be a name that people would probably pronounce wrong because there are so many popular names that are so similar to Eva such as Ava, Evie, and Eva-pronounced like Eh-va. It could go on and on.
But we pronounce her name with a long-E: EE-va
Anyway, back to Blair. I noticed that she was calling her Ava. With a long-A sound. But I didn’t correct her on it the first time, which was mistake because with each phone call, it made it harder and harder to tell her. It’s kind of an awkward thing to correct, ya know? I wasn’t offended at all, I just thought she should probably know what her real name is. Ha.
So, two months later (yeah, it went on for two whole months), we were talking about Blair’s boyfriend who has an unusual name. Then the thought came to me… this is the perfect segue to telling her!
I said something along the lines of this:
Uhm, Blair. I need to tell you something that might be kind of awkward at first. But once I tell you, we’re going to laugh a lot about it.
Okay?
Soooo… you know how you call my daughter Ava?
Yeah?
She actually goes by Eva.
Blair and I immediately started laughing and then Blair said she wondered why we spelled it that way if it was pronounced Ava. Blair also made fun of me for not telling her for two months…
Like I said, I know I had it coming when naming her Eva and I’m never offended when someone pronounces it incorrectly. But I thought this story was pretty funny and my mom thought I should share it.
And just in case you still don’t know how to pronounce it, just copy how Wall-E says Eve’s name (Skip to 1:12). EEEE-VA!
https://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.png00Katiehttps://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.pngKatie2012-03-20 00:05:142012-03-20 00:08:58Awkward Situation: How to Correct Someone Nicely
Last weekend was quite busy with lots of socializing and partying! Saturday we headed up to T.J.’s aunt’s house for a baby shower. T.J.’s cousin Annie is having a baby boy in April so we got to visit with a lot of T.J.’s family and eat out with some of them on Saturday night.
Eva tried out Annie’s baby gift. She told us that she loved it and wants one for herself.
We tried a new Thai place in American Fork. I wish I could eat peanut curry every night!
After dinner, we visited with some of T.J.’s old high school friends. I love this group so much and wish we could get together with them more often.
Sunday we spent the gorgeous day up in American Fork. Look at our little gnome with those chunky thighs getting ready for a walk around the block!
https://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.png00Katiehttps://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.pngKatie2012-03-16 23:52:132012-03-16 23:52:13Playing Catch Up
Wednesday. I’m on some new medicine and it made me ridiculously tired on Wednesday. Like I couldn’t even open my eyes. So Eva and I napped a lot that day. We went on a little walk around the neighborhood because the weather was absolutely incredible (that’s why we put Eva in her little snowsuit so she’d be super warm… it reminds me of the boy in The Christmas Story). Oh, and my old roommate Dana came over and met Eva for the first time. We talked forever and reminisced about the golden days living together at Heritage and at Chatham Towne.
Every Monday night, Eva and I head on over to my friend Sarah’s house with a bunch of other girls and watch The Bachelor. I’ve never watched the show until the finale of The Bachelorette last season, nor did I ever have any desire to watch the show. But watching it with a bunch of girls each week where we make fun of almost every line (they compare every date to relationships… “If we can climb this mountain, we will be able to climb the mountains we face in marriage.”) Anyway, it’s a fun girls’ night each week that I really look forward to.
This week, most girls dressed up because it was Valentine’s day on Tuesday. I was up in AF for the majority of the day so I didn’t get to dress up, but check out some of these girls! Mostly Erin who wore her prom dress from High School. She’s awesome. They’re all awesome!
The group. Believe it or not, there were even more but they left before we took the photo.
The start of the “Prom-ish” photos
I guess I was Kathleen’s date, so we decided for our pose, I would touch her tiny baby bump.
Then I realized it was really creepy/weird/bizarre that we were doing this and said, “What will our husbands think when they see these photos?!”
But that didn’t stop Sarah and Erin from taking some reenactment photos of when Ben proposed to the Bachelorette last season.
Hannah put Eva on a plate. Don’t know why it was so cute, but it just was.
And to top it all off, gotta love how Ben looks like Francine from Arthur.
https://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.png00Katiehttps://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.pngKatie2012-02-16 09:37:382012-02-16 09:37:38Bachelor {Watching} Party
Leslie Knope, from Parks and Rec, said, “What’s Galentine’s Day? Oh it’s only the best day of the year. Every February 13th my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home and we just kick it breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies. It’s like Lilith Fair, minus the angst. Plus, frittatas!”
So, I decided to throw my own Galentine’s party. It was awesome. It was just us girls, we ate LOTS of waffles, and played some intense rounds of Catch Phrase.
https://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.png00Katiehttps://katiederrick.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/logo.pngKatie2012-02-15 12:13:002012-02-15 12:13:01Galentine's Day
Friday night was our Halloween party and boy, it was awesome. You know how you always have people you want and need to meet up with but there just simply isn’t enough time to visit everyone? Well, I got caught up with like thirty people in one night because so many people showed up.
I baked pretty much all day and thought we would have way too much food (cake balls, chocolate covered pretzels, caramel apples, and sugar cookies) but everything was eaten by the end of the night. We carved pumpkins, played Catch Phrase, and roasted hot dogs on the fire pit out back.
I put up quite a fight with the costume because I knew that skeletons were really “in” this year. I saw them online, on pinterest, and at a bunch of Halloween shops. And heck, there were three in The Office dressed up as skeletons. I like being original, but I’m glad I was a skeleton, they turned out great and the baby skeleton was a huge hit.
Pretty creepy face painting, don’t you think? Plus, it was hard to read his facial emotions all night.
My old coworkers from the library.
Doc from Back to the Future roasting a mallow.
Baby Evette… cutest baby ever and wearing the Halloween outfit I bought her, by the way.
An iPad Jack-o-Lantern. Awesome.
I carved the “D”, the haunted house in the back and that stripey one (which looked cool when lit).
Our door at the Ward Halloween Party.
Oh, and since I mentioned the Ward Halloween Party… if I wasn’t baby hungry before, I would have been by the end of that party because there were tons of babies and toddlers dressed up in the cutest outfits you’ve ever seen. Seriously, it was ridiculous. They had a little parade where each of them walked across the stage and I got tears in my eyes (I know I say that a lot, but what do you expect out of hormonal prego?). Anyway, that party was also fantastic and it was so fun to have the little kids come around to each door and Trick-or-Treat.
