The Phantom of the Opera

(Jenn) An unexpected and rare bonus at Ben's work this month gave us a good excuse to do something we've been wanting to do -- attend Phantom on Broadway! I had seen the play in London and LOVED it, but Ben had never seen it! We both absolutely love the music and know it backwards and forwards, so it was something we really thought we needed to do while we were in New York.

Everything worked together for us. Brittany, our friend from BYU days, has been staying with us for a couple of weeks while waiting for an apartment in the city to work out for her (she's attending Columbia University right now). We have been fully taking advantage of her presence in our home by leaving and conveniently forgetting to take Henry along! She is now Nanny Brittany, and Henry is finally starting to really warm up to her. Brittany stayed with Henry while I went to meet Ben after work.

Anyway, it was great for me to get to go ALL BY MYSELF to the train station with no stroller, diaper bag, raisins, or dump trucks! At first I guess it felt a little strange, but I got used to it pretty fast. I met Ben at a place for dinner, and then we did a little shopping before heading to our show. Of course, Phantom was breathtaking. We had orchestra seats -- center section, about 15 rows back -- it was perfect! The voices of Christine and the Phantom were really amazing. We both came home singing with our heads in the stars. It was a magical night! Unfortunately, this is the only picture we took (these digital self-portraits are always a little scary. It took a few tries to get one without double chins). We meant to get one in front of the theater but forgot :(

Apple Picking

(Jenn) On Saturday, we went apple picking with Henry's friends, Evan and Aden, and their moms and dads (who happen to be our friends too!). We went to Riamede Farm in Chester, NJ -- about 45 minutes away from us. It was a beautiful day, and we had a great time. We tasted plenty of apples while we were picking them, and then we went home with $17 worth of apples! We probably got way more than we needed, but we just got carried away with the picking. Today Cindy, Jessica and I got together and made apple pies, but I still have LOTS of apples left and will have to come up with something to do with them! The apples are delicious and very flavorful. Definitley a Saturday well-spent!

Colors

(Jenn) I think it's funny how parents seem to embrace their child's "wrong" way of saying certain words. It's almost tragic when they start saying the word right, because it was so cute when they said it wrong! That's why my parents still call me "Dutchie" (Tanner's name for me) and use phrases like "So backwards!" and words like "Moosh!" (Brady's word for "move out of my way"). While we were in Utah, Ben's mom noticed that Henry started saying "orange" instead of "orngee," and we all lamented the loss of one of his funniest words. Well, I caught him starting to say "orngee" again and just had to catch it on camera before we lost it again. And if you want to hear it, you have to watch him recite the names of the rest of the colors in the Crayola box (which he is getting right about 95% of the time, up from 30% a few months ago)!

Friendly Strangers?

(Ben) So, Jenn's been telling you about an Indian man that she and Henry met in the park who gave Henry Oreos and Ritz crackers. Well, she ran into him again last Friday, and her conversation went something like this:

Man: What does your husband do?
Jenn: He works in the city blah blah....
Man: Oh, I think I saw him with you in the park one day.
Jenn: Really?
Man: Yeah, isn't he the chubby one?
Jenn: Uhhhh...
Man: I mean, not really chubby, but a little bit. He was jogging with you.
Jenn: Yeah, I guess that's him...

I guess chubby isn't the worst thing I've ever been called, but I'm not convinced he's such a friendly stranger! :) What is it with foreigners deciding that Jenn and I are fat?

Friendly Strangers

(Jenn) I love people! I think the cool fall weather has made everyone in our greater neighborhood in a good mood recently. Henry and I jog at a nearby park 3-4 times a week (okay, I jog, and Henry rides in the jogging stroller) in the mornings. The weather really has been amazing -- cool and crisp, with hints of the beautiful autumn that's coming. I can't help but be in a good mood, and I guess everyone else is the same way. I keep getting comments from all sorts of people as we pass them -- mostly things about the jogging stroller, since very few people seem to use them here. This week I've received the following comments:

"Wow, that's a very nice carriage!"

"Where do you get all that energy?"

"Pretty soon, he's going to be pushing you!"

"Looks like he gets the comfy ride."

"Show off! (ha ha ha)"

Maybe these seem like regular comments, but it really is pretty unusual for our area, especially coming from complete strangers. One of my favorite things in the world is when people open up to each other for no other reason than to share humanity together. Probably one of the best reactions we've received is from an Indian man we pass frequently at the park. He happens to be there almost every day at about the same time we go, and so he always says hello to me and Henry, and we share a few words as we pass each other. On Monday, in his broken English, he asked if Henry likes Oreos. This morning, he showed up with a package of Oreos and two boxes of crackers for Henry (he works at Nabisco). Who does things like that for random people they pass on a morning walk? I'm telling you, people can be amazing. I tend to like them.

Conversation between me and Latina woman at church yesterday

(Jenn)
Her: (reaching to rub my belly) Seester, you pregnant?
Me: Nope, not pregnant.
Her: What? No, not pregnant? You sure?
Me: Yeah, I'm pretty sure.
Her: (continuting to rub my belly in amazement) But your belly, so Round!
Me: Just fat, I guess.

I guess the major differences between how she handled the conversation and how I would have are: 1) I would have NEVER asked that question in the first place, and 2) If I had asked the question, I probably would have stopped when she said "Nope, not pregnant."
Ah, the beauties of cultural differences!

Caramel Candy Corn

(Jenn) Ben and I went to Target the other night specifically looking for candy, and I was excited to see that the Halloween candy was out on the shelves in full bloom. I immediately thought of candy corn, and when we finally found it amid the flood of chocolate, we were excited to see a new variety: Brach's Caramel Candy Corn. Anyone who loves candy corn (I know many people don't) will know that Brach's is by far the only brand worth buying. Brach's also makes excellent Milk Maid caramels, and so naturally, their Caramel Candy Corn is a winning combination. They kind of have the taste of buttery caramel popcorn. If you don't like candy corn, caramel, or those buttered popcorn jelly bellies, you might not like these. But for those of you who agree with my taste in candy, I just had to recommend them! Happy Autumn (okay, not officially until this Sunday, but we can still enjoy it, right?)!

Sunbeam Song

(Jenn) Henry got to practice playing the piano and singing at the same time while we were at my Mom's house. He doesn't sing very many songs, but "Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam" is one of his favorites. While we were all in another room, we suddenly heard Henry pounding on the keys and intermittently yelling out "beam!" and "him!" It was pretty funny. This clip shows him singing and playing both with and without help from Dad:



Sunbeam Song from Ben and Jenn on Vimeo.

Fancy Blue Car

(Jenn) Henry would highly recommend the book "Who is Driving?" by Leo Timmers. Each page shows a different kind of vehicle (wonderfully illustrated), and you get to guess which animal will be driving that particular car! It's pretty fun. One of the vehicles in the book is a "fancy blue car" -- basically a fancy blue Chevrolet from the 50's, similar to the car pictured on the left. Henry was thrilled when he discovered that my Grandpa Griffin actually OWNS a fancy-blue-car, and he is currently storing it in my dad's garage! You might have seen in the slide show below that Henry got to play in the fancy-blue-car while we were in Utah. He was in Heaven! The funniest thing about it is that he hasn't quite figured out that the "blue" in fancy-blue-car actually signifies the color of the car. I guess he thinks that any 1954 Chevy would be called a fancy-blue-car. Listen closely on this clip to find out what color the fancy-blue-car actually is:



Fancy Blue Car from Ben and Jenn on Vimeo.

September Utah Trip

(Jenn) We just got back from a fabulous 9-day trip to Utah! We got to do lots of fun things: The Timpanogos Storytelling Festival, hiking in Logan Canyon, Jon and Kristie's wedding, Hogle Zoo, storytime at the SLC library, eating at lots of places we have been missing lately, and visiting lots of friends and family!

Watch this slideshow to get a better idea of what we did on our trip. It has been hard to get back to normal life (especially after Ben had to return to work the morning after a red-eye flight). Still, we can't complain because we'll be back in Utah in November when Dan and Autumn get married!

Henry Says . . .

(In response to "Who's your best friend?")
"Evan!" (He thinks about it for a second . . . )
"Aden!" (He thinks about it for a second . . . )
"Jesus!" (Mom rejoices in utter surprise -- I don't think he's had the "Jesus is My Best Friend" lesson in nursery yet)

Staten Island

(Jenn) We had about half of the day free on Saturday and were DYING to get out of the house, so we hopped in the car in the afternoon and headed to Staten Island. It was about a 45 minute drive from our house to the east side of the island -- a pretty reasonable distance for a short trip. Staten Island is one of New York City's five boroughs (along with Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx), so I guess I was kind of expecting it to look a little like the other parts of New York City. At least I was expecting it to look like an East Coast town where lots of NYC commuters would live. Ben and I were both shocked with what we found when we drove onto the island: we felt like we had been magically transported to California, minus the palm trees. Seriously, it was a little bit eerie how "West Coast" it felt -- probably mostly due to the wide roads, strip malls, large parking lots for lots of chain stores, and the fact that nothing was older than 50 years old. Most of the houses and apartments looked like they were built in 1980 or later. Also, when we looked at the people around us, we didn't feel like they wanted to hurt us! I guess this is not too unusual, but it just wasn't what we were expecting when we entered the 5th borough of NYC.

We were happy we went though, and it was a pleasant place to spend a Saturday afternoon. We spent most of our time on the boardwalk and the beach. Henry got to play in the water and sand (in his diaper because we weren't actually planning on swimming, so we weren't prepared). He loved getting splashed by the "wabes" and throwing rocks into the water. We left in time to stop at Carrabba's, our favorite Italian restaurant, before heading back to New Jersey. Carrabba's is actually the reason we chose to try Staten Island for the day -- S.I. is our closest Carrabba's location, and we're willing to travel great distances for that food! It was well worth the journey, by the way (side note: I over-ate by a few bites and felt no gall-bladder pain, yet another reason to rejoice!). Henry was also really happy at the restaurant because our waiter brought him a ball of pizza dough to play with while we waited for our food (a genius idea).

One Year in Jersey

This week we celebrated our one year anniversary of moving to New Jersey! And believe it or not, our blog is almost one year old. We decided to celebrate by changing the appearance of our blog around a bit. Hope you enjoy the new look!

Coincidentally, during our year in Jersey, we fear that Henry's speech has been forever altered by the accent here. Watch him say "hot dog" and "water" in this clip! He knows how to say these words the "Utah" way, but this week he picked up on how our neighbors say them.



New Jersey Accent from Ben and Jenn and Vimeo.

Henryese - to - English Dictionary

nobby -- (1) library; (2) library books
woobie -- (1) liberty; (2) Statue of Liberty
focky-ways -- Frosted Flakes
target -- guitar
garjee -- garbage
orjee -- orange
ringy-ringy -- ring around the rosies
nnap -- (1) laugh; (2) nap (yes, there are two n's when Henry says it)
soup-soup -- backhoe (he's trying to say "scoop scoop")
zeen -- magazine
cheedos -- Cheerios
crenzins -- crayons
ah-see -- ice cream
keebee -- keyboard
dangerous -- (1) curling iron; (2) fan; (3) knife; (4) bathtub faucet
careful -- (1) "I just choked on some food"; (2) "I'm standing on the edge of the table"
thank you -- "Here, I have something in my hand that I want to give to you."
self -- "I want the spoon and bowl."
chain-joo -- "I need a diaper change."

Counting to 15

(Jenn) I know, I know, everybody's kid learns how to count. But I still think it's cute to hear those little numbers coming out of Henry's mouth. The past few weeks, he's actually been getting most of the numbers in order, which is a big improvement! Unfortunately, you don't get to hear him say his favorite number at the moment: zero.



Henry counts to 15 from Ben and Jenn and Vimeo.

Bread-Winning at the Grocery Store

(Jenn) One thing that excites me more than anything else in my current role as homemaker is SAVING MONEY! Ben's ear is probably numb by now from listening to me ramble on and on about what incredible deals I found at the grocery store. That's why I'm telling you! Maybe someone out there will care. Personally, I think what I'm about to tell you is pretty much the coolest thing ever.

In the last two weeks, I bought the following items (all of which were on sale at ShopRite, my current favorite grocery store):

4 boxes of Lucky Charms @ $2 each

3 boxes of Kix cereal @ $2 each

3 boxes of Oat Clusters Cheerios Crunch (yummy, by the way) @ $2 each

2 boxes of Frosted Flakes @ $2 each

1 box of Apple Jacks @ $2 each

1 box of Fruit Loops @ $2 each

4 boxes of Kellogg's/Disney fruit snacks @ $1.67 each

2 boxes of Wheatables crackers (much better than Wheat Thins, by the way) @ $2.50 each

I used the following coupons:

$2.00 off 5 GM cereals

$1.00 off 2 GM cereals

$.75 off Oat Clusters Cheerios Crunch x 3 for Triple Coupon Day

$.75 off Oat Clusters Cheerios Crunch x 3 for Triple Coupon Day

$.75 off Oat Clusters Cheerios Crunch x 3 for Triple Coupon Day

$1.00 off 2 Kellogg's cereals

$1.00 off 2 Kellogg's cereals

$1.00 off 2 Kellogg's fruit snacks

$1.00 off 2 Kellogg's fruit snacks

I also received the following promotions:

$10.00 coupon for buying 10 GM items (ShopRite promotion)

$10.00 coupon for buying 10 Kellogg's items (ShopRite promotion)

$10.00 mail-in rebate for buying 10 Kellogg's items (from the coupon section)

Total cost of items (on sale): $39.68

Total minus coupons: $27.62

Total minus promotions: -$2.38

Postage stamp for mail-in rebate: .41

Total cost for my "purchases:" -$1.97

In short, I received 20 boxes of cereal, crackers, and fruit snacks, and I ended up MAKING $1.97! Now, just try to tell me that a stay-at-home mom is not also the "Bread Winner" of the family. I think I definitely deserve some credit here! Shouldn't that $39.68 I could have spent go toward a new pair of shoes or something? If you think so, send your comments to Ben by clicking below (thanks!).

Henry Eats His Toes

(Jenn) It seems like it's been a while since we've posted a video clip of Henry. In case you forgot what he looks/sounds/acts like, here he is in all his glory, trying to eat his toes!



Henry eats his toes from Jenn and Ben and Vimeo.

Inmates perform "Thriller"

(Ben) Okay, I just read about this in Time and had to check it out. This was the most watched movie last month on YouTube, so some of you may have seen it. Apparently there is a prison in Cebu, Philippines where to keep the inmates, uh, under control they have them learn different dances, etc. Anyway, here is a movie of them practicing Michael Jackson's "Thriller" dance. I actually learned this dance in Laytones, and I think they do a pretty good job of it! Check out the balding inmate who is posing as MJ's girlfriend--I wonder how he got that job? Poor soul. Enjoy.

GrandCentral

(Ben) Jenn and I recently learned about the coolest website from a friend of ours in the branch out here, and we thought we'd share it with all of you. Google recently purchased a site called GrandCentral which is a free phone service company. Here's how it works: You pick anywhere in the US to have a local phone number. We got a Layton, Utah one so that our parents can call us locally. Then, you set up on GrandCentral what phones you want them to forward the call to, and they will do it for free. You can have all calls forwarded to multiple phones (e.g. when my mom calls our Utah number, it rings on both our home phone as well as the cell phone at the same time), or select where you want to take calls from certain people (e.g. always send calls from a certain person to your work number, or your cell, or whatever). The service has CallerId, voicemail, and a whole bunch of other stuff (funny ringtones, etc.). Best of all, it's free! Cool, eh? Anyway, the site is still in its Beta testing phase, so if you want to sign up you have to be invited, but we have invitations, so email us if you want one. Also, if any of you want our Utah number, let us know and we'll give it to you.

Every day I become a bigger and bigger fan of Google...

Secondhand Serenade

(Jenn) Was anyone else a little disappointed with Dashboard Confessional's latest album, Dusk and Summer? There were a few good songs, but the album seemed to me like a complete departure from a lot of the things I loved about Dashboard. So we've had a year to lament the fact that Chris Carrabba stopped doing what he does best -- make extraordinary, accessible, soul-wrenching albums.

And along comes Secondhand Serenade -- answering the call to make Dashboard-like music for those of us who have been seeking it so desperately. Hey, if Chris Carrabba isn't going to do it, someone else can . . . right? I have had the album for less than 24 hours so far, so it's hard to really judge it fairly, but so far I like it. But it's almost haunting how much he sounds like DC, and in that way it almost makes me a little bit resentful (Hey, that was the exact interval from Saints and Sailors!). I've decided I need to either pretend like Secondhand Serenade IS Dashboard (which is the slightest bit disappointing because he's just not QUITE as good, particularly the voice and the lyrics), or I can try to forget that it's even similar to Dashboard and just enjoy it for what it is (good, raw music with some amazing, although not quite extraordinary lyrics).

Anyway, I thought I'd pass on the news for any of you who might be seeking out some good music or who felt a loss with Dusk and Summer (I must give Jacob Priest credit for the recommendation). It doesn't quite measure up to DC's quality, but hey, does anything? I have to at least give this guy credit for doing what Chris Carrabba is no longer doing. And I believe this (Awake) is his debut album, so perhaps it can at least give us something to hope for with the next album. Listen to it on iTunes or Amazon and see what you think!