This was a bad idea

what's up cyberworld? there's nothing new or notable in the life of nancy but I guess that really doesn't ever stop me from blogging. It seemed like last week I had something to do every single night of the week except Friday. It's funny how it seems that I am the most popular girl Monday-Thursday but once the weekend rolls around, I can hear crickets chirping. Anyway, Saturday was nice--I started out with a pedicure and then met Les and Matt and Em for lunch at the Rio and then headed up to see Grandpa in Evanston. Em flew in town for the weekend to come visit him. He's still on the road to recovery but definitely doing better than the last two times I've been up there. He's in a nursing/rehab facility and hopefully if he continues to improve can go home soon. Honestly, I think being home would be the best medicine. He was in somewhat good spirits and joking a little. When Lesley pointed out her pregnant stomach, all he could say was "Well it's your own fault!" This is exactly why we love Grandpa J. I saw Miss Pettigrew with the girls that evening and then met them again the next morning for a nice crepe breakfast before the morning session of conference. I met up with the fam again and we visited Uncle Steve in the hospital. I tell you the Johnson boys are all falling apart! We spend the rest of the day being a little bit lazy. It was really nice. This week is pretty quiet at the office. All my guys are out until Friday so I've been able to get a lot done and no one notices if I'm gone for two hours at lunch :) Idol is on tonight which makes me happy and i'm definitely looking forward to the return of NBC shows on Thursday--new episodes of 30 Rock and The Office--hello. I ended up taking third to last in the office pool for the NCAA finals. I was holding on to last place for a while but was fine to give up the title. That last second 3-pointer from Chalmers was pretty impressive. Go Jayhawks! One last little tidbit: Em decided she wanted to go down to Provo last night for dinner at Brick Oven--a family favorite for 20+ years. So we do the 30 minute drive in the snow to get there and find one million families waiting in the lobby. Apparently, Monday is free root beer night and the number of cheap families in Utah County is not in short supply. The ratio of kids to adults was easily 3:1. When our name was called--Emily, party of two, we were immediately taken to the coveted "date booth" in the middle of the restaurant. It's a U-shaped booth made from silver sparkly vinyl. awesome. We heard the special brick oven birthday song no less than 5 times and the line to see the balloon animal guy was ten deep. The night was not complete without the infamous Johnson line of "This was a bad idea"

it's only tuesday

well it's been a couple weeks since I last posted and unfortunately, there is not a lot to report. Here are the highlights:

1. dog-watched Harris while Les and Matt were out in Michigan (Matt's dad is the president at Western Michigan University and there was a big to-do for him)
2. ate pancakes for Easter dinner
3. had a spontaneous hair appointment (got bored at work & decided to go get my hair done)
4. watched the Bachelor with some girlfriends
5. went to the Jazz game with the office (we rented out a suite)
6. went to a cabin and four wheeling with a group of friends last weekend
7. started my hip-hop dance class with melinda and jen
8. got a little swiss army knife directly from switzerland (thanks jenny & holly)

Night Moves

I went night skiing for the first time last night at Brighton with some friends and it was awesome. I LOVED it. I'm not a a great skier but for the most part was able to hang with these other kids. All of the runs that are open at night are greens and blues. There was one pretty steep hill that took me a while to get down but oh well. The other kids were all pretty good. Andy would oftentimes do a 180 and ski backwards and it totally looked like rollerskating backwards. Nate & Andy had some pretty awesome jumps and Jen is amazing on a snowboard and Jocelyn & Ash have inspired me to get better. Now, all I need is a pair of goggles and I'll fit right in. I didn't break anything and I didn't lose anything-I'd say it was a pretty good night.

This is taco-freakin-bell. WTH? (Thanks Joc for a good laugh)

Arkansas

So two weekends ago, I headed down to Bentonville to visit Amy & Chris and the kiddos. I hadn't seen them since July so I was excited to be there. I got in pretty late on Thurs night and Amy came and picked me up. Delta cancelled their direct flight so I had to stop in Minneapolis. My connection was really tight so it really was no surprise that my bag did not make it. The kiddos woke me up early the next morning and we jumped in the suburban to take the older two, Jackson & Melanie, to school. There was a definite system to the elementary school drop-off. It made me think of the scene in Mr. Mom where he doesn't know how to do the drop-off system and all the other parents get mad. Anyway, Amy, Allison and I enjoyed a pretty easy morning and afternoon running errands and shopping and lunching. We even saw a real red-hat society group at lunch-pretty entertaining. We picked up the kiddos after school and we played for a little while until dinner. Amy & Chris wanted to check out the new Ruths Chris so they went out for the night and I was the babysitter. Saturday, Phil and Marilyn came and the kids were soooo excited to see Grandma and Grandpa--it's probably because Grandma always has presents. We made bracelets and "sewed" some paper animals. Jackson put together his Star Wars lego set. It was a kid heaven. The rest of the weekend went by pretty quick and before I knew it, the whole gang was dropping me off at the airport Monday afternoon. Here are my top 7 highlights: 1. Amy's orange cookies 2. Allison calling me Emily all weekend 3. making bracelets with Mom, Melanie & Allison 4. the 3 trips to Walmart 5. watching multiple animated movies. 6. Melanie & Allison's swim class. 7. Jackson reaching the wall (He threw a football from end of the gym and hit the wall at the other end) Anway, it was a fabulous weekend away and the kiddos are just the cutest.

in tha mix

it's a little random but i've completed my new mix and here is the final list:

1. Say-John Mayer
2. With You-Chris Brown (also my current ringtone)
3. If I Could-Blue Merle
4. In Love With a Girl-Gavin DeGraw
5. No Air-Jordin Sparks and Chris Brown
6. Between the Lines-Sara Bareilles
7. Superstar-Lupe Fiasco (I'm a big fan of his--check out Kick, Push & Daydreamin' off his old album)
8. Is it You-Cassie (From Step Up 2: The Streets)
9. Cirlce-Edie Brickell
10. Bleeding Love-Leona Lewis
11. Imagine-David Archuleta (American Idol week 2)
12. Dance Like There's no Tomorrow-Paula Abdul (I'm prepared to take grief for this one)
13. Outta My Head-Ashlee Simpson
14. I'll be Waiting-Lenny Kravitz
15. Hot Stuff-Craig David
16. If I Had Eyes-Jack Johnson
17. Hey Baby-Omarion & Bow-Wow
18. Only Fooling Myself-Kate Voegle
19. Hollywood's Not America-Ferras
20. LUV-Janet Jackson

Alternates:
Shawty-Lil' Mama
Pocket full of Sunshine-Natasha Bedingfield
Your Love is a Lie-Simple Plan
Long Road to Ruin-Foo Fighters
Bad Girl-Danity Kane
Always Be-Jimmy Eat World

you're about a 6

i didn't realize it's almost been two weeks since I last posted. Where has the time gone? I had a great little vacation in Arkansas (I'll post with pics later this week) with the fam but it's nice to be back. Work is going fine and we even had ski day on Friday at Deer Valley. I love skiing at Deer Valley. It was beautiful weather and the skier's buffet at Stein Eriksen Lodge is definitely worth the trip. However, I am sad to report that Deer Valley has claimed yet another one of my phones. This is the 2nd blackberry I've lost at Deer Valley in the last 4 months. UGH. Oh well. I ordered a new one today. My dad thinks I should buy the insurance ($5 a month) to safeguard against losing another but I'm determined to not lose this one. I never really lose anything. I'm very good about keeping track of things. And I live on the edge--I don't need phone insurance :)

We've had a bit of a scare with Grandpa J. He went in for emergency surgery for his stomach but he's had a hard time with the recovery. His stomach is okay but he's had a rough time breathing on his own. I don't think his heart and lungs could handle coming off the anesthesia. Les and I scooted up to Evanston Thursday afternoon and before we walked in, Les turns to me and says--we need to be rocks--Grandma needs strong kids right now. It was pretty upsetting and I didn't do very well. It was hard to see Grandpa in his state of unravel and it was also hard to see Grandma so upset. I'm not sure I've ever seen my grandma cry--she's usually one tough lady. I tried to keep it together but I wouldn't exactly say I was a rock. On the ride home, Les informed me, "you were about a 6". She gave herself a 9. I'd probably agree. He's doing better and we were able to spend some time with him yesterday. Hopefully Grandma will be able to take him home soon. The more he becomes aware of what is happening, the more he wants to go home. He's still pretty strong and he's tried to escape a few times. Yesterday, after I refused to help him out of his chair, he quietly mumbled for Matt. I think he was hoping he could count on Matt to bust 'em out. Dad flew into town as well and it was nice to have him out for the weekend. I think dads have this innate need to help their daughters with car stuff so it was nice of him to slip me a $20 to help pay for my oil change and tire rotation. Thanks Dad!

This week should be pretty uneventful but it is our annual investor meeting at work. All our investors fly in and we give them an update about how our portfolio companies are doing. We feed them a meal or two, hand out some sort of logo-ed item and give them a pass to Deer Valley to go skiing if they want. standard operating procedure. oh yeah, and I do have tickets to the Jazz game tonight. Oh great-gotta find a date. awesome.

It's a BOY!

So Lesley and Matt just came from the doctor and are proud to announce it's a boy! We're all very excited, especially since now we can do some shopping :) This is grandkid # 4 for Phil and Marilyn and grandkid #1 for John and Linda (Matt's parents). Congratulations to Matt & Les! I'm so excited to be an aunt again...

And speaking of being an aunt, I am headed to Arkansas this weekend to visit my nephew and two nieces, who i haven't seen since July. It also happens that Phil and Marilyn will be there this weekend as well so we should have a pretty good time. I've already been tagged to be the babysitter on Friday night so Chris and Amy can go out. I'm very much looking forward to getting away and to spending some time with the fam.

The weekend was pretty fun. I took Friday off and spent the day with Emily and Lesley running around town. After we had dinner, they headed home and I met up with some friends for Brad's 30th birthday. Happy Birthday Brad! We went to FastTrack and raced go-carts and then ended up bowling. Saturday morning, Les, Matt, Em & I headed up to Evanston, Wyoming to visit Grandma and Grandpa Johnson. They're getting up there in years but they were in good spirits and glad to see us. We had a little lunch and visited for a while. I also learned that the very first JC Penney was in Kemmer, Wyoming and that my grandpa and his parents were friends with the actual JC. Who knew? That's one of my favorite things about going to visit G & G Johnson. I always learn something new about them or pick up some treasure from Grandma's closet. She was quite the fashionista in her day and I love taking home a dress or a coat. After we got back to town, we headed down to a favorite stop in Provo-Magelby's Fresh-for dinner. We attempted to walk around the RiverWoods (an outside mall) for a while but it was quite chilly and we lasted about 2 minutes. I headed home and ended up at another birthay party. I stayed for a little bit but had to head home to work on a lesson for church the next day. The rest of the weekend was nice and quiet and Monday morning came too early. It's so cliche but Mondays are hard. I definitely had a case of the Mondays.