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Me: Ryan, I’m still losing weight from when I was sick.

Ryan: Maybe the scale is broken.

The infamous sludge has returned. Probably. Nobody knows what it was in the first place, so it’s rather difficult to know for sure if it’s returned. WebMd thinks it’s either a panic attack or tuberculosis. My mother/in-laws/random strangers insisted it was morning sickness. Ryan’s diagnosis was rheumatoid arthritis of the stomach. My doctor’s guess was either a spasming esophagus or feverblisters in my throat. (Yeah—I want that diagnosis sheet.)

But I still think it’s the sludge. And since no one else knows what it was, I’m right.

Because the sludge is evil. Only the sludge is capable of producing the situations I went through, like:

• going to the doctor because I couldn’t breathe, panting through a million medical tests, and winding up flat on my back surrounded by six nervous nurses after I failed at getting my blood drawn;
• listening to the Big Boss tell everyone at work that I’m “on the nest” because I’d forgotten to remove my band-aid after getting said blood drawn;
• having Ryan leave work mid-day to rescue a very feverish me from my nauseous hell-hole in my car in the work garage; and
• worst of all, going in for a simple strep test and getting awkwardly questioned by my doctor about my sex life…in front of my father (who had accompanied me to the doctor since I’d left my ability to drive in my work garage).

Ryan’s been super nice throughout the whole thing—he didn’t laugh at me when I couldn’t breathe properly, even though I sounded like a whiny Darth Vader; he went to the grocery store early in the morning and bought practically everything in the store I had a chance at keeping down; and he quite generously let me sleep, ignoring the fact that I was clearly on his side of the bed. He’s truly Husband of the Year.

At this point, I’m feeling better—I guess it was a quick-acting sludge this time. Regardless, I’m rooting that next time will be a regular, more run-of-the-mill sort of sickness.

So after a really late night and a busy morning getting Primary things together, I go to church and learn…they’re dissolving our ward next Sunday, splitting us up among three other wards. And worse, we’re not supposed to know about that until next Sunday. Which means that everyone’s going three different ways and we don’t have a real chance to say goodbye.

It makes me so sad.

Being in Primary has been my favorite calling in the history of church. We have some kids who are a challenge, but they’re all pretty good kids. I love that we talk about the basics of the gospel, that the kids get excited about learning, and that I can feel the spirit pretty much every week. The girls give me hugs all the time, and all the kids wave to me in sacrament meetings and smile when they see me. This is 100 times worse than being released, because I won’t even get to see at least two-thirds of them, let alone hear their awesome stories.

Plus, Primary is the only place in the church where it’s perfectly normal to discuss Jesus, ninjas, and transformers in the same sentence. (Defeating evil ninjas makes Jesus really happy, by the way.)

And, holy smokes, I am really going to miss it.

So this past weekend was our annual Hales Family Campout. Grandpa Hales and Uncle Robert came down from Alaska, Karen came from Washington, and nearly every one of my cousins made an appearance. It’ll probably be a while before we’ll all be together again, and we had some great adventures—the gasoline fires, the rattlesnake, the lost toenail, the broken arm—and some great hangout-and-chat time as well.

It was as completely awesome as I could hope for.

It’s funny to see these campouts grow up—when we were younger, my grandpa would drag us up to some far-off area 50 miles away from the nearest flushing toilet. Now, however, my grandpa stays in a trailer and my grandma stays in a near-by hotel. When I was younger, I spent most of the campout playing with my cousins—now I spend it playing with their kids. It’s awesome(ly weird).

My cousin, Amanda, who is a year younger than me, has a two-and-a-half-year-old daughter (my first cousin once removed?) who is pure entertainment. She’d come up to me and say, “Jenn, what’s your name?” I’d tell her and she’d say, “Jenn, would you like to take me on a hike?”

Absolutely I would.

We went on several “hikes” over the two days I was there—looking in the windows of every tent in our camp and visiting the older kids’ “clubhouse.”

After one of our hikes, she jumped up on my lap and we had the following conversation, which was probably my favorite moment of the campout:

Liesel: “Jenn, where is your little boy and little girl?”

Me: “Um…I don’t have any kids right now. Maybe someday.”

Liesel: “What is your little girl’s name?”

Me: “I don’t have any little girls right now. But I like the name Lily.”

Liesel (after a long pause, taking in this information): “Will Lily take all my toys? Tell her to not take my toys.”

Apparently our unborn children are totally awesome bullies. Watch out world!

Lately I’ve been having lots of bad dreams and I simply can’t figure out why.

I’ve had pretty vivid dreams for about as long as I can remember—I usually have several dreams a night and can remember most of them the next morning. (Believe me, this is Ryan’s *favorite* thing ever. I quickly learned that a tired husband does. not. care. what happened in my dreams. He just wants me to get out of bed and shower so he can go back to sleep as quickly as possible.)

But even though I can remember so many of them, they’re not usually that great. If I had to guess, I’d bet this is how they’d divide up:

• 10% wake-up-several-times-a-night nightmares,
• 50% ominous, unsettling dreams,
• 30% random dreams,
• 9% interesting dreams, and
• less than 1% are awesome (fighting evil along side Wolverine and Harry Potter was a particular favorite of mine).

Do you even realize how hard that math was?

Anyway, that’s what’s normal. When things aren’t normal—i.e. major life changes or emotional upheavals—that’s when the heavy-duty nightmares kick in. For instance, graduating college and a disappointing breakup led to several months of nightly nightmares where someone died and it was my fault… Or, when things at work would go bad, it’s dreams of people screaming awful things at me all night long.

I’d wake up in tears several times a night and would delay sleep for hours, just to avoid the dreams.

So why I’m having bad dreams now is pretty bewildering to me. Things are pretty good right now (knock on wood, right?). So WHY AM I BEING EATEN BY LIONS EVERY NIGHT??? Seriously, it doesn’t matter if the dream starts out in a swimming pool or my own home, eventually a lion enters the picture and it’s game over.

Since no online dream interpreters can give me a reasonable answer, I thought I’d turn the question over to you: Can someone please tell me what these dreams are supposed to mean so I can start sleeping in peace again? Also, any tips for taking on a lion with your bare hands would also be appreciated.

Thanks, everyone, for being more awesome than Google.

Okay, just for clarification, that last post was definitely NOT an announcement.

But since I’m on the subject, while I’m not quite ready for kids yet, I am 100% ready to talk about baby names. While Ryan thinks it’s pointless to talk about baby names before we actually need one, I think it’s pretty normal since I’ve been picking out favorite names since my first Barbie. I have a number of girl names I love, but boy names…really haven’t considered those so much. (This means that I’ll end up with all boys, right? Um…)

Anyway, lately I find myself playing name games with Ryan, when I can get him to play. (For instance, we’ll go through the alphabet—Ryan’s favorites are always Bertha and Hilda—or try out names from books, movies, or people watching, etc.) This Sunday, as sacrament meeting entertainment, we went through the hymn book to see if there were any worthwhile names in there. After pages and pages of Parleys and Orsons and Ebenezers, we came across a name which led to the most brilliant idea of my life. Picture:

• Clark Kent McDaniel,
• Bruce Wayne McDaniel,
• Peter Parker McDaniel, or
• Charles Xavier McDaniel

I’m always looking for boy names that are strong and smart and reliable and have been around forever. These names totally fit those qualifications! This totally counts as personal revelation, right?

I asked Ryan what he thought…and he said I’m completely ridiculous.

AND THEN.

His very next statement, the very next words to come out of his mouth were as follows: “Oh, I’ve got it! Let’s say we have twins—a boy and a girl. We’ll name them Cain and Mabel!”

Who’s really ridiculous here, huh?!

It’s the question that plagues every newlywed couple. The first time we heard it was at the Salt Lake Temple—we’d been married for all of 15 minutes.

“When are you two going to have kids?”

“Two years, you guys.”

Before Ryan and I were married, we discussed having kids, and it felt right to wait at least two years before adding another person to the mix. Well, at this point there’s just June, July, and August looming between me and that two-year deadline. And we all know how fast the summers pass by. It’s unreal. The closer it gets, the more I find myself thinking about it—names we like, the clothes we’ll buy, how we’ll rearrange the house, etc. But what looms largest in my mind is how completely our lives will change.

It’s both exciting and terrifying.

Don’t get me wrong—I love kids. I adore my calling in Primary, and I have so much fun with my nieces. My friends’ kids are some of my favorite people on the planet. I can see how having kids has enriched the lives of both family and friends.

And yet…

Having a baby encompasses so many huge lifestyle changes. The current plan is for me to be a stay-at-home mom, a goal Ryan and I believe in strongly and are willing to sacrifice to attain. However, this change will represent a seismic shift in how we have to budget, in what we can do for entertainment, and in the pace at which we live our lives. For me, going from a 9-to-5 life to a 24/7 life seems particularly daunting. Especially when it requires me to do something I’ve never really done (mom-stuff) with someone I hardly know (the baby).

And then there’s what the kids do when they stop being babies—recently family and family friends have been dealing with kids who are sneaking friends over and doing significant drunken damage to the house or stealing from grandma to pay for drug habits. What?! I mean, even with all the good teaching and good examples, these kids still get to choose who they want to be and what they want to do. Am I ready to sign up for this? I know, I know… I realize that there’s a literal lifetime between now and when I’ll have to worry about those things. Does that mean I don’t worry about it? Of course not—you all know me and my distinguished worrying capabilities. Thinking about everything that could go wrong means I’ll be ready when something does. Right? Of course right. I have to be prepared in my worrying and the future ahead of us holds some real “meat and potatoes” living.

But I think that’s exactly what’s compelling me forward. Despite all the future frustrations, craziness, and disappointments (which I know are inevitable), the future seems to hold the promise of so many tiny joys—first laughs, funny sayings, and quiet moments. Somehow, when I hold on to that promise, the excitement of the future helps to calm my many, many nerves. These changes are what we want and they will be a good thing. And so somehow we’ll be able to both adapt and thrive.

But still, for the moment I’m glad that everything is still at least few months away. My time with Ryan has been the happiest part of my life, and I relish in the fact that I get to keep this status quo for a little longer.