Showcasing Skills

I figure since this video clip gives an idea of just how talented my son is, I might as well show everyone what I've been talking about. Here you can see Josh walk, say "dada", and sit up. Simply amazing!



Parenthood is pretty darn cool.

Real Men Drive Buicks

So for those of you who didn't know me in High School, and don't believe that I was the Mac-Daddy of all, here you go. Let's just say, the proof is in the Buick.

It was a car known far and wide for is luxurious interior, a full bench in the front seat, power EVERYTHING, a horn like a train, and my fathers favorite aspect: a hood and trunk stretched so far away from the interior of the car that it would take the proverbial two trains headed in opposite directions, one going 60 miles an hour, the other going 50 miles an hour - slamming into it from both ends for us to ever be in danger of being maimed during an accident.

However, as is the case with all good things, it had to come to an end. Here were our final moments with the Buick (before my dad sold it to an 80 year old woman, who I'm sure was unable to appreciate it like Erika & I did).

Party Like It's 1998

So here is a little flashback to the year 1998. What a great year it was. My family often enjoys a game called "airplane". If you haven't played it with us, trust me, it's funny. This video shows it all. This is about the funniest kid in the world - the one and only Blake Johnson.

Tag, I'm it!

Okay, so I've been waiting for someone to want to tag me, and finally my turn has arrived. (Didn't you hate waiting to be picked in kickball, thinking you're not as cool as those picked before you? Maybe I'm the only one with this issue, but I think not.)
The six things about me you might not, but maybe do, know:

1. I absolutely love to play the piano and sing. When I was in college, we girlies had an old piano in our house, and I would always call together little singing sessions. It actually became quite well known, and if I ever went out on a date with a guy, it usually included a musical moment, just ask Ryan. (He sang the Rainbow Connection in a Kermie voice on our first date....)

2. I've always wanted to be a blonde. When I was little, all my dolls were blonde; I made a little spool doll that had blonde hair, and I always wanted Sleeping Beauty's hair. And I tried that sun-in stuff, my mom wouldn't go for tint or highlighting, which basically made me an orange-head for a few months. I've gotten over this issue, and now want dark dark hair. Hmmm.

3. To go along with number 2, I was very much a princessy girl when I was little. I was all into barbies, princesses, make up, fashion, cheerleading, etc. I think I changed my mind once I hit puberty and didn't look very cute in the cheerleading skirts. Or maybe it was when I got glasses... Now I'm more on middle ground; maybe that's because Josh claims whatever I'm wearing for his spit-up territory.

4. I have never had a cavity. I've always been very proud of this; however, Ryan thinks he may have spotted one. So now I'm really really upset.

5. I love spray butter and gum. The spray butter tastes like the real thing to me, but with out the fat, so I feel as it I stuck it to some random man. I use it on everything and buy it in bulk. Talking about bulk, I've been known to put down a good amount of gum in a short amount of time. Before my pregnancy I would say I was ill; anyone who knew me knew that I was addicted to gum (at least a pack a day). During pregnancy I lost interest, and now I'm slowly (okay, rather quickly) gaining it back.

6. I love how smart my husband is. I never knew I really cared about it until Ry and I broke up and I dated some other guys who weren't as quick on the up take. It was hard to say something and not have the guy get what you were doing. A lot of funny jokes went unlaughed at during that time, and when Ryan and I got back together, I knew I would never take his wittyness and intelligence for granted again.

I tag: Shannon, Julee, Kristin, Rustin, Aubri, and Christy, once she gets a blog going. By the way, if you've already done this, don't worry about doing it again....Unless you have more you want to say!

Cruel and Unusual

Someone said that we needed to post things on our blog other than Josh. Well, there isn't too much to say, Katie and I lead an uneventful life (other than Josh). Here is my weak attempt at a post that is not Josh oriented.

My cousin Chad is visiting us here in New York as he is interviewing at 2 podiatry schools in the area. One is in Manhattan (NY School of Podiatric Medicine) and one in Philadelphia (Temple). Obviously Katie and I are trying to sell NY, but I don't know how successful we are being.

That being said, I just gotta share this video of Josh. You can see how cruel his mother can be towards him...



So much for not focusing on Josh.

Holy Spit!

The other day we were having dinner with some friends in the ward, and I made some spitting noises at Josh. Being the genius that he is, he picked up on it. Lately he has been doing it non-stop all day long. Of course, when the camera is on he gets a little shy... The latest, however, is he likes to fake cough. I will have to save that for a later post.



Note: I had to cut the video down from its original size so that it would play on here. Just imagine him doing this over and over all day long!

Some of my favorite things

My dad and two brothers, along with Ryan ( and my brother-in-law Jason, and Ryan's family), make up the best guys in the world.

This is when Josh and I pretend to play while actually posing for pictures.

Katie's joining the blogging ranks

So Ryan invited me to take part in our family blog and, as usual, I decide he's probably got a good idea in mind, so here I am! Hopefully I will be able to add a genteel feminine point of view for the Allen gang, right? Right.

Last week I went out to Utah to spend some time with my family before Tom (my little bro) heads out on his LDS mission to Switzerland. It was well worth the trip to spend some last moments with Tom. However, he's not dead, so I'm sure there will be more moments in the future

This picture of Josh was taken by my dad while my mom ran around around with baby toys, trying to keep Josh picture-friendly. This is my favorite picture EVER of my baby. I think they should go professional, don't you?

Can you say disappointment??

Last night I wasted 5 hours of prime studying time in order to attend New York's famous Village Halloween Parade. Basically, over 50,000 people dress up in costumes and march down 6th Avenue from Spring Street to 21st street (something like that). Word is that over 2,000,000 people show up annually to watch the people walking down the street in their various get-ups. Seeing as how Katie and Josh have been in Utah for about a week, I figured I might as well hang out in the city for the night. Let me just say something to all of you that have been planning trips centered around this parade: don't bother.

I, along with my classmates that were with me, decided that it wasn't really worth our time. First of all, the streets were lined about 10 rows deep of people trying to see the show. Being on the 7th row of people made it a little difficult to see anything. The first 2 minutes of the parade were pretty cool. There were large skeletons and things of that nature that were impressive. I've posted a picture of them (I took some with my phone but they didn't really turn out to well, so I snagged these ones off the internet. I did, however, actually see these things.).

I came to the conclusion that the parade was mostly a chance for some of New York's amazing citizens to cross-dress. I would guess that 40% of the guys in the parade were actually in women's clothing. Even the guys who didn't dress in women's clothes found ways to express themselves in a similar fashion. For example, there was a guy dressed as a bumblebee. He ran around prancing, and saying in a high pitched voice "Buzzz, Buzzz!" It actually was pretty funny. Then I looked and saw that he was in high heels, and I just had to roll my eyes.

There were some pretty funny costumes though. Let's see what I can remember: Jim Halpert as a 3-hole punch, Mario & Princess, The lady from The Ring coming out of a TV screen, the Little Green Giant, Anna Nicole Smith, Strong Bad, Michael Jackson, BeetleJuice, The Burger-King King, Catwoman, a drinking cup, a giant leaf, plenty of beer bottles, KISS, Clifford the great big dog, and plenty of superheroes, nurses, maids, police & any other inappropriate and shameful costume you can imagine.

Probably won't be attending next year though...

Exterminator....My Foot...

Whenever I would go to my grandparents house as a kid, I would always look forward to playing a certain game: Mouse Trap. I'm not sure that I ever played it right though. But that didn't matter, the funnest part of it all was just setting off the chain reaction of traps. It was very seldom though, that everything worked out and you would catch the mouse. The beauty of the game, however, was that it was just that - a game. The pieces were plastic, as were the mice. If you didn't catch the mouse, that was fine, it wasn't going to run all over the house eating your food and pooping everywhere.
Fast forward 20 years.
When I found this apartment in New York I was extremely excited. We would be the first to live here. Brand new appliances: a dish washer, washer & dryer, fridge, stove, central air, etc. These are things that you just can't find here in New York without selling your soul, or your first child, to the landlord. You can imagine my surprise when I found that I wouldn't have to do either of these things to live in this place. While this has been a great place, and we love it here, it does have one drawback: mice.
Now we have a really good landlord, so we gave him a ring, and he promised to have an exterminator come and check it out. What a waste of time that turned out to be. The exterminator came, placed some poison (that ATTRACTS all mice within its range), and said that that would do the trick. Now I ask myself, what kind of exterminator is that? I hope my landlord isn't paying him much. I could've done that myself...
Katie and I noticed that the "exterminator's" visit only worsened the problem. The mice ate ALL of the poison that had been set out. What a frustrating experience this has been. I feel like the mice are taunting us. I was so frustrated that I called the landlord again & got the "exterminator" out here. Guess what he did? Put out more poison.... Since the second visit, I've gone around the apartment on my hands and knees trying to find and fill any holes where the mice could be coming into our place.
Anyone have any ideas? HELP!!!

Baseball in NYC - September 24, 2007

Who would've thunk that the New York Mets would have a "Mormon Night" at Shea Stadeum? I was surprised myself when I found out about it. It was pretty neat. The missionaries were all there, and they even sang the national anthem. Our bishop had announced over the pulpit that the church was going to be having this event, and I knew that we had to go. Like many out there, I have been confused because of the great many sports teams in the area. Some say "cheer for the Yankees" while others say "root for the Mets". Because of all this confusion I resolved to find out for myself who to commit to.

This is how it went down: Mets 1-0 after 3 innings. After that point, it began to unravel, much like the past month of Mets baseball. After the 3rd inning, these are the runs scored by Washington, beginning with the 4th inning: 2, 3, 2, 0, 3, 3. End result: Washington 13 - Mets 4. This, in contrast to the Yankees game that I went to on September 18, where the Yanks beat Baltimore 12-0.

I'm pretty sure that Josh feels that the Mets just aren't the team for us. Just look at him in the picture. It was a beautiful night at Shea Stadium, however he cried quite a bit, something he never does...

I guess I should also note, as is obvious in the picture, that the sweet seats that the church scored us were on the very top row!!! I was amazed at how high we were. I actually felt short of breath due to the lack of oxygen at such a high altitude.

Something else that I cannot figure out for the life of me... When we paid for the tickets, we were asked to put it in with a tithing slip. The bishop said it was $6 per ticket, and to put it in the "other" category on the slip. It seemed strange, but that's what I did. However, when looking at the Mets website to see where we were sitting, it clearly showed that the section we would be in were $5 tickets!! Sure enough, when I got the actual tickets is showed that they were $5! Now I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist, but something fishy was going on that night. Did the Mets do this to exploit the Mormons, or is this how my bishop was able to afford taking his family? I need to get to the bottom of this...

Miracle Child

**Disclaimer: To those of you who have children under the age of 1, the content of this post may be upsetting to you, read at your own risk!!

When people talk of miracles, it can include a plethera of things. Some think that seeing a picture of the Virgin Mary on a grilled cheese sandwich is a miracle. To others, Moses parting the Red Sea is a miracle. Ok, the second one really is a miracle, the first one is just...well...cheesy. Let me tell you about another miracle: my son Josh.
I know that parents typically like to brag about their children. But this is not bragging, this is fact-telling.
FACT: He rolled from his stomach onto his back when he was 2 3/4 weeks old (I have it on video)!
FACT: He only cries when he is hungry, poopy, or tired!
FACT: He has the prettiest blue eyes of any baby on the planet!
FACT: At the tender age of 2.67 months he began standing up while holding onto my fingers for minutes on end!
FACT: The other day he stood up to the coffee table, by himself, for 13 seconds!
FACT: He is 4 months old now, and can practically sit up by himself (well, within a month or two he will be anyway...)!
FACT: The third time we tried feeding him baby food, he ate everything we threw at him (and it was peas nonetheless)!
FACT: It appears that he will be able to curl his toes under his feet and stand on his knuckles like his father!
FACT: He now has the perceptual ability to put his binky back into his mouth (at least 10% of the time)!
FACT: I could go on and on about him!

The picture above is of us playing one night after I got home from school. Typically we will play Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, or Hungry-Hungry Hippos, but this evening we decided to go with the classic "Stand up and laugh" game. It was a smashing success!

Asbury Park - Sept 1, 2007

So we figured that it was about time that we all take a little trip to the beach. So seeing as how we had a nice long vacation because of Labor Day, all of LDS guys from NYU got together with our wives (those of us who have them) and went to Asbury Park, NJ. It was Josh's first time at the beach, and he loved it! Well, I guess that's not true. He loved it up until the point where I put his feet into the cold water. After that point he lost control of his emotions (like children often do). After that he was extremely mad at his dad, and had to be passed of to mom to be calmed down.

The beach was beautiful though. We were also able to play some sand volleyball and frisbee. If anyone every wants to go, the beach was only about an hour from us. We do have beaches here on Staten Island, but I don't know what to think of them. I've actually never been to them, but just thinking that it is near to where the Hudson River empties just makes me wary about getting in the water here. From the sounds of it they are always pulling up bodies there, and there is lots of sewage (to name a couple things).