Another thing...

Crystal figured out how to work the T.V. in the kitchen, and was very proud of herself!

8 random things about Lisa

Thanks to Paula, I was given the assignment of writing 8 random things about myself on my blog, so here it goes:
First:If you are tagged you have to tell your blog readers 8 random facts about you. It can be habits, facts, or weird stuff that no one else knows. Be creative Second: Choose some bloggers that you would like to learn more random facts about and tag them and explain these rules.

1.When I graduated preschool as a 4 year old I won the award for "Most Caring." They even presented it to me in front of all the kids and parents at preschool graduation.

2.I've never panicked under pressure or during emergencies. (This is quite opposite of my husband by the way) I don't know why, but when something like an accident happens, I immediately start thinking of my options and solutions, and what to do next. Maybe it's cause I was the oldest in my family and had to bandage siblings who were bleeding profusely and accompany them to the hospital. Haha!

3.I love to read (sorry paula!). I like all kinds and genre of books however randomly and nerdily enough, my favorite books are actually psychology and self-improvement books. I love reading about personality types, color coding, birth order, overcoming perfectionisim, etc. I guess loving the scriptures got me into reading other books that provide clues and instructions on improving your life. Yes, I am a closet case nerd. I also like to write, but I never share my work with anyone.

4.I usually avoid scary movies because they remind me of scary things that happened in my mission...however I LOVE the movie 1408. The script was well written, and it still had a lot of similarities to the book, written by Stephen King (told you, I'm a nerd). I also like the plot, about a guy who was bitter about his daughters death, and because of it, didn't believe in anything...he goes around sleeping in "haunted" locations trying to prove to the world that ghosts, along with heaven and hell don't exist. By pursuing this notion and provoking things of this nature, he stumbles on a room where evil really does exist, and learns really quickly, that there is more to this life than he proclaimed. He changes his selfish way of thinking and acting by the end. I also like it cause it teaches not to seek out bad things, cause you'll find them.

5.My English 1010 professor at UVSC asked me out on a date on the last day of class. This freaked me out because he had children as old as I was (luckily he was not married when he did this...at the very least). When I handed in my final exam, he passed me a piece of paper, which was a note asking me out. I was afraid of getting a bad grade by never contacting him back, so I kept the note as evidence that I could show to a lawyer or the dean in case he was that kind of a slime ball. Actually I got an A+ in the class, even though I think I deserved an A-. I guess he was scared that I would prosecute anyway, if he didn't give me the best of the best. No harm done, I moved on with life with my A+. haha! After this experience, I've always wondered if I look old. hahahahaha! There are few people that I ever told until now. My husband knows, and my family does...which they laughed about and teased me about for a long time....and I told Natalie because she was in a class with me right after it happened and I was still freaked out.

6.I used to play guitar until my brothers decided they wanted to learn guitar too...then I quit it all together, because it wasn't an individual distinction for me anymore. They long surpassed the level I was at now. Looking back I wish I would have stuck with it so I could play as good as they do now, but oh well.

7. I got into an intese argument with my first zone leader when I was a greenie in my mission. (I won't say who it is). He was saying bad things about my companian to the whole mission and it was making me mad, so I comfronted him. After a while of serious disputing and anger...I made him cry. He was afraid of me for months. By the time he finished his mission we were at peace and actually on good terms. This was the beginning of a somewhat painful process I went through as a missionary learning self-control...whether he may have deserved it or not, it wasn't my place to correct him that harshly. Patience with my opponents is still a virtue I'm working on, but I've improved a lot.

8.I'm a natural blonde...just kidding. lol. Um, let me think. Okay...before my mission I refused to date anyone who was under 23 years of age. I thought anyone younger than that was just too immature. (Even though this phase started when I was only a whopping 18 years of age, and was myself, much less mature than I am now). I went out with a 24 year old when I was 18, and also a 28 year old when I was nineteen. I would kill my daughter if she tried that! haha! Looking back now, anyone 23 or older wanting to hang out with an 18 year old girl in my day and age, doesn't sound as mature as I once thought it to be...hahaha! I guess guys don't care how old you are, as long as they think you're hot. Ironically enough, even though I had a thing for older guys, I married one who was younger than me...who, by the way is much more mature than I am in a lot of ways.

Here are the people I Tag— Lisa F, Liz, Ramsey, Erin, and Natalie (when she gets back from vacation)

Todds Wedding

Scott's brother, Todd, got married yesterday and we had the opportunity to celebrate with all of the Itri family and meet the bride Megan's family as well.
Megan looked beautiful and it was a great day from start to finish.
It was a lot of fun too have everybody get together. In between the luncheon and the reception a bunch of us went bowling together to pass the time. (That's why you'll see some bowling photos in the sildeshow). Maybe it's an Italian thing, or maybe because it's male dominated, but it's always fun when the Itri's spend time together.



THE ITRI MAFIA

Playing in the sprinklers

Crystal's "boy friends"

Crystal had her 18 month shots today which was really upsetting for her, but luckily she had a lot of fun which helped her to forget about it. Today "Mommy" and Crystal went to two different fun places! First to Natalie's parents house to go to Nicholas' birthday party (he turned three). At first she wasn't very happy because she was still thinking about her shots, but after some fruit snacks and learning how to whack a piñata, she started to enjoy herself. After learning how to share some toy cars with Nicholas, the two of them held hands and walked around the backyard a little. Lisa's friend, Natalie, gave Crystal a pretty red balloon to tote around, and Nicholas had a black one. They looked really cute running around the backyard together!
After that we went to Liz's house (another friend of Lisa's) who's moving to California so we came to say goodbye. Soren, (Liz's oldest boy) was really sweet to Crystal. He read her stories, showed her how all his toys work, walked up and down the hall with her, and even fed her some orange sorbet! He was quite the nurturer! No wonder he gets along so well with his little brother, Anders! (:
It was really great for Lisa to hang out with her friends. She had a wonderful time with both of them and will miss them both when they go to their far away homes! (Liz to Cali, and Natalie to the East Coast).
Here are some adorable pictures of Crystal and the cute boys who played with her today:

This week Crystal had the opportunity to play with a lot of friends. Lisa took care of Elle, (her uncle David's daughter) for a little while and Crystal had a great time learing how to play "ring o'round the rosie's" with her; and just hanging out at home. Lisa's friend, Natalie has also been in town and they got together for a night out and then all went to a park together. Crystal loves interacting with other kids and has been really happy with all the running around she does with them. Other than that, not much new this week. Scott's brother, Todd, is getting married soon so we're looking forward to that. Here are some pictures of what we've been doing the past few days.

Ultimate Bed Head

After a long nap, my hair looked like this!

Blast from the past

After cleaning out the car we used to drive (that belonged to Lisa's parents,) we came across some old pictures from when we were both single. The funny thing about them is that both of us are on dates with other people in these pictures.
For those of you who didn't know, we were both friends long before we started dating, and would actually hang out in groups a lot and go on a lot of group dates together. As a matter of fact, Lisa had been on a date with just about every one of Scotts closest friends before the thought of even one date together even crossed either of their minds.
We ended up on our first date simply because Scott needed a date at the last second. He was getting together with some friends and they didn't tell him to bring a date untill a few hours before the activity. Anyway Scott called Lisa on the phone, but she already had plans. He explained the situation and as a friend, convinced her that he needed her help; and that she would have more fun with him anyway (instead of watching the pioneer day parade in Salt Lake with the other guy friends she was supposed to go with.) So long story short, she bailed on the other dudes and went out with Scott, and then we went out again the next day, and then a week later went out again, and then after that we just started liking eachother as more than friends and were engaged within two months. Three months after that we were married.
Next week will be the anniversary of our first date. It will have been 3 years...which makes finding these pictures even more enjoyable. In these pictures the thought of dating eachother wasn't even a concept that had crossed our minds at all. It probably should have though, since everybody in the group always thought we were good together, and also because we understood eachothers way of thinking so well. Everytime we got together in a group the two of us would end up goofing around together the most. We just considered eachother very good friends, and when other people would suggest we try being more than that, we would just kind of laugh it off cause we didn't have that kind of relationship at all. If only we knew.
The girl Scott is with is Allie, who was his girlfriend at the time (ironically, he broke up with her the night of this picture.) The guy Lisa is with is Ryan...one of Scotts close friends. (hahaha!) Even funnier, Scott and Lisa wouldn't have even met if David, (who happens to be the first guy on the far left in the top picture) hadn't asked her out a couple of times!
Both David and Ryan came to our temple sealing and our wedding. Its really funny to look back and laugh at how you had no clue what the future held, and also a good reminder that life is full of pleasant suprises.

A hat!

I usually let Crystal go through the kitchen cupboards within reach and play with the pots and pans. The other day she was so excited due to the fact that she found a mixing bowl that fit her head perfectly. She put it on her head and ran around the room, giggling and saying "A hat!" over and over. It's so great that she finds the small things in life so pleasing, and in the process, she spreads her joy by making us laugh too!

Crystal playing piano

Okay, so we're just going to tell you that as parents, we think our little girl is amazingly cute! Although the things she does may not be that different from other toddlers, it's unique and amazing to us as parents just to watch her do her thing with the funny personality she has. She usually likes to try and sing when she plays piano, but she was distracted a lot today and didn't do it on film, but here she is playing piano an being her cute self!

July 2007

June was a crazy month! Most of it was on vacation, and even though we were sad to come home, it's nice to have some familiar routine for Crystal. Like most toddlers, she depends a lot on her routine to stay in a good mood. Scott's parents do the long beach island thing every year, and because we had so much fun this year, we're already making plans to be out there next year too. Anyway there's not much to update reguarding June because of the many slideshow instalments provided in this blog. We celebrated the 4th of July at Lisa's grandparents cabin, where we ate burgers, steak and ribs, along with some fantastic salads and the usual barbecue chips. A lot of Aunts, uncles and cousins on Lisa's side of the family were there, and Crystal had a great time playing the children who were closer to her age. We made a point to sit on a blanket at the temple to watch the fireworks with Crystal to see how she would react. Crystal doesn't scare easily, so we didn't think there would be a problem. It wasn't. In fact she could care less about the fireworks, and all her attention was focused on her glowsticks that her uncle Matt provided. She ran around twirling them around in circles like a little she-ninja and completely ignored the fireworks. We left early to avoid the crazy traffic, and we were way ahead of everybody and thought we were home free untill we got rear-ended by a group of 18-21 year old boys and we had to pull over and exchange insurance info. Luckily nobody was hurt, and we didn't have much damage to our car at all. Crystal was asleep through the whole thing, clutching her glowsticks in each hand. The Officer on the scene said that we were not at fault and that was that. We felt bad for the kid driving though, he was nice and the traffic was pretty crazy, and his poor car had a lot more damage than ours did. Hopefully things work out for him. It was actually a pretty good day up untill the fender bender. We got home at midnight and crashed. So that was how we spent our independance day.
Crystal sleeping in the car with glowsticks in each hand

Just some fun photos...

Lisa was getting ready to go out, so she had to put Crystal in the playpen to keep her out of any trouble. The bigger crystal gets, the closer she is to Escaping. Soon the playpen won't be an option!
It's amazing how flexable toddlers can be!



All Dressed up to go to Grandma's house.


I'm not very ladylike though.

Winnie the Pooh

Thanks to Lisa's sister, Crystal is now a fan of Winnie the Pooh. We usually allow Crystal to watch some television as long as it's an educational program, however after Denise showed her Winnie the Pooh, she's hooked. We actually use it as a reward for her, or just to spoil her if she had a bad day. In this particular video clip she had fallen down earlier and hurt her face, so before bedtime we were going to let her watch a little of it, and she was so excited about it she couldn't contain herself.

New York

This was when we spent the day in New York. We took the ferry into Manhattan, then went by Subway into the Bronx to see Yankee Stadium since it was the furthest away. We traveled by Subway most of the time. After Yankee Stadium we went to visit ground Zero where the twin towers once stood. The atmosphere is still pretty gloomy at that spot, and it's just basically a construction site now, but we thought it would be good to go and pay our respects. After that we went to the shops on Seventh Avenue where the outdoor markets were open and Lisa was really happy shopping on the street just like life in Bolivia. Lisa lives for outdoor markets wherever they may be. We had tickets to Spamalot on Broadway and had to be there by 1:30, so we just walked from Seventh onto Broadway to find the Shubert Theatre. We were on the front row which isn't too bad for broadway...though like the movie theatres, the front row can be a little too close sometimes. It was a great show though, we laughed a lot, and it was really impressive. In Lisa's opinion, the play was ten times better than the movie, "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." After the show we did some more shopping and went to the Letterman Show to find Ruperts shop (frequently featured on the show) but for some dumb reason we couldn't find it. We shopped a little more and then went to hang out in Central Park on a quest to find "Strawberry Fields...the John Lennon memorial" which was lovingly decorated with flowers from fans which you will see in the slideshow below. All in all it was a pretty fun day. There was so much more we wanted to do there, but no time with only one day to do it. It was a fun experience and we're glad we went.

Just a few more Long Beach Island fotos.

This was basically our last couple of days on the beach, we bummed around on the beach and then went out to an expensive buffet for our last meal on the island. After this we took off to New York for a day and then went back to Philly. Being lazy on the beach was exactly what we needed this summer...we're already making plans to go back next year.