Spring Break in Houston

A few months ago, we discovered that Pete and his brother, Brian (in medical school in Houston) had overlapping spring breaks! We were able to find some cheap flights and decided it would be super fun to go visit Brian and Ashley. It was sad that Ash wasn't on Spring Break too, but I was so glad she spent as much time with us as she could amidst the busy-ness of nursing school. It was so fun to be with family, and Brian and Ash were excellent hosts! They let us sleep in their bed, gave us cool Texas T-shirts, and had a never ending supply of fun activity ideas and yummy food plans. They also made arrangements to have a high chair and pack-n-play for Ems which made the visit go very smoothly. We had such a great time with them and I really hope we can see them again soon!

Our adventures included:

A trip to College Station to have dinner with Aunt Kath. Pete and I hadn't seen her since we got married, so it was great to visit her. She fed us Deee-licious food and gave us a tour of her little bakery. Anyone who knows Aunt Kath knows that she makes amazing food. She sent us home with leftover dinner and her famous cinnamon rolls.

Me, Aunt Kath, Ems, and Pete standing outside the bakery: "Mrs. T's Big Buns" :)

I love this face of Em's...her mom makes her eat squash...life's rough.

RODEO! We had so much fun watching mutton bustin', sharing delicious barbecue/Mexican/everything fried, and my favorite---the petting zoo. Emery was so excited to see and touch all the different animals

Between the 4 of us, we sampled a lot of fried goodness: fried red velvet cake, fried cookie dough, fried oreos, and fried snickers (the best!)

All of us, watching mutton bustin'

Pete's dream car ;)

Eating yummy barbecue with my cute husband :)

Can you see her "excited hands" in the upper left corner? She flexes her arms, clenches her fists, and shakes when she gets reeeeally giddy :)

Strawberry Picking. We went to a U-Pick Strawberry Farm and picked strawberries to make homemade jam with. We may or may not have also tried a fried pie made with fresh peaches. And it may or may not have made my life complete. Mmmm.

Emery especially loved strawberry picking. From the pictures, you can easily see her transformation: cautious, curious, ecstatic, and...a big mess :)

On our last night in Texas, we put Emery to sleep and hung out at home chatting and playing Jenga! We had so much fun and came home missing Brian and Ashley. Hope to see you guys again soon!

Christmas with the Hoyts

Hailey, Golda, and Gramps :)

 We loved spending time at the "Tree Farm" with Pete's family. Pete's siblings are getting pretty widespread as time goes on. However, for a couple precious days, all of the Hoyt kids were together. This was no small feat, considering there's 11 of them and they came from all across the country (Utah, Arizona, Vermont, Texas, Georgia, and Washington). It was a full and happy house! :)

Here's some highlights from our visit:

* Brother time. Pete got to spend good quality time with his brothers, who hadn’t all been together in the same place in a decade. The love and friendship all the Hoyt boys share is one of my favorite things about them.

Workin' time. Pete missed this picture because he was, well, workin' :)

A big congrats to Ush, for winning the "manliest photo" contest ;)

John and Eric shooting guns

Lauren, Eric, Tim, and Daivid opening presents

The football games were plentiful

*Sister time. I have so many wonderful sisters-in-law and spending time with them was sooo fun and good for the soul. Whether running together, baking, or reading, the sister bonding was abundant! It was also fun to see and play with my cute nieces...they're getting so grown up!

Hailey and Ashley

Heidi, Hannah, and Ash walking to the riv

Getting ready to eat yummy food.
Notice that Hannah had to forego wearing her red matching top in order to wear her styling' Wal-Mart turtleneck.

Lauren, Ems, and Hailey reading books

Hannah with the cute nieces: Ivy, Hannah Z, and Megan

Me and Hannah! Thanks, Toin, for giving me some camera pointers!

* Princess Diaries Marathon. Me and John B watched the Princess Diaries (1 and 2) movies together and I am happy to report that they are still as awesome as they were back when I first loved them (in middle school, or, mayyybeeee that was high school?) ;)

*Shopping and Mexican Food. I went baby clothes shopping with cute Golda and Sosh (Hailey) and it was so fun! We met up with the boys afterwards at a Mexican Restaurant in Ferndale. Good family + Good Mexican food = Good times :)

* Watching these crazies jump into the freezing cold Pacific Ocean:

Ashley, Heidi, Brian, Hannah

*Singing Christmas songs: Simple but sublime. We made quite a sizable choir and it was beautiful to hear all the different parts harmonizing together in song after song.

Paul, Brian, Todd, Asher, and Eli

Even Ems joined in! Actually, she just really liked the hymn book

Hailey, Ashley, me, and Hilary

We are so grateful we got to visit both our families for Christmas and are missing them lots these days! 

Christmas with the Jensens

Considering the fact that I am still reminiscing about our epic Christmas 2011, March really doesn't seem too late to get my Christmas posts in :)

Being farther away from family than we’ve ever been before, the long Christmas break was a huge blessing. I thought we might get sick of being on vacation for so long, but boy was I wrong! We spent two weeks with each of our families and it was so much fun. My ultimate favorite thing about our time spent with family was just that: the time spent with family. I really feel like I am related to some incredible individuals, and want to do better at keeping in touch with them!

Here’s some highlights from our time with the Jensen clan:

* Nate's cute grin and attention to Emery. Talk about a good uncle! Nate was always sneaking over to hold her and play with her. Emery got excited anytime Nate walked into the room and one evening he had her laughing hysterically by hopping all through the house. Once I finally got her settled down and ready for sleep that night, I had to stay away from Nate because the mere sight of him sent her into giggles. 

* Desert trip. So we spent 2 hours packed into the suburban on “roads” that were meant for ATV’s. But it was fun.

*Grandparents. It was wonderful to see both my Baxter and Jensen grandparents while we were in Nyssa! I wish I would've gotten more pictures of them with Ems.

* Ward Christmas Party. Watching the traditional Nativity performance by the kids in my home ward put me right at home and secured the Christmas spirit in my heart. The primary music, the familiar church building, the cute kiddos…it just really solidified the fact that I was home for Christmas.

* Friends. Got to spend some time with my Whit! Also got a much needed visit in with Kim and some time with other good friends from high school.

*Food. We ate some GOOD stuff. From green smoothies and tofu to outback steakhouse and homemade cookies, I'd say we covered the full spectrum. I wouldn't have it any other way.

*Crafts. My sister Mallory, my mom, and I did some fun crafts together, including sewing cute tote bags which I gave to my niece and sis-in-law for Christmas and forgot to take pictures of (Bahh! They were so cute). Emery joined in on the crafting fun and I can tell that she inherited my mess-making skills.

(Note to self: I can't seem locate more of my Jensen fam Christmas pics right now, so I'm going to put them in later. I just really need to get these Chrsitmas posts up, pics or not)

10 months

Dear Emery,

Happy 10 months + 2 days! I often think about all the fun things I should be recording about you and hope to do better at it this year. For the past month of your life, we’ve been traveling and visiting family members. You’ve been a gem through all of it---plane rides, lots of new faces, and even the bumpy, off-roading trip to the desert (in fact, you didn’t complain nearly as much as I did about that one).

Here’s just a few quick things I want to remember about you:

4 teeth at 8 months

Pushing yourself up to sitting position at 9 months

Crawling (finally!) at 9.5 months

Pulling yourself up on furniture and cruising at 9.5 months

Eating solids like cheerios and bread (without choking) at 9.5 months

Drinking water from a bottle at 9.5 months

10 month stats: 17 in head circumference,17.2 lbs, and 27 in. long

You have quite the array of little tricks these days. My favorite is probably waving. You started consciously waving to people around 8 months and have since been perfecting your wave. You used to just wave by folding at the wrist, then you started folding your fingers down with your palm facing you (it was so cute how you waved to yourself!), and now you’ve put it all together to fold your fingers down and face them toward the person you are waving at. Basically, anything moving gets a nice hand wave from you these days (including animals, the flames of a fire, trees, etc.) It’s so cute and fun to watch how social and aware you are of the people and things around you.

At about 9.5 months, you started doing a funny little bear crawl in addition to your normal crawling. While all this moving around makes more work for me, I honestly don’t mind, because it’s so neat to see you gaining more skills and more control over your tiny little body. Another trick is what we call “crazy face,” where you either smile or open your mouth wide and then shake your head all over the place. It evolved while we were on a long car ride. I think you wanted out of your car seat, so you started flopping your head around. Your dad copied you, you thought it was funny, and what could’ve been a meltdown turned into a game. Now you do crazy face just for fun, or to music.

You recently started doing the actions for your favorite “Popcorn Popping” song, and you love to clap your hands together. During our stay at the Hoyts, all the boys were up in the loft watching a football game and even though you couldn’t see them, you heard their occasional bursts of yelling and clapping and would face the direction all the racket was coming from and add your own clapping to it. So funny! You’re also really fascinated by books these days...you love looking at them, playing with them, and turning the pages.

Reading with Aunt Hailey.
She was your best friend while we were at the Hoyt's!

In other news, you’re still not sleeping through the night (vacation didn’t help that), but I’m not too worried about it at the moment. It’ll happen someday. Eating and everything else is going great. You recently decided that sneezing or watching people sneeze is pretty funny and you are constantly “ga-ga”-ing and “ma-ma”-ing and “da-da”-ing. You took a particular liking to the Hoyt’s dog at Chrismas time and I’m pretty sure you try to say the word “dog.” Most times it comes out like “gog,” but pretty exciting nonetheless. Since your dad and I hate dogs, I’m not counting it as your official first word yet. J Everytime you see a dog (they're quite prevalent in our apartment complex) your whole body goes rigid and you flap your arms around excitedly saying "gog, gog."

Just playing :)

You got spoiled with all kinds of attention over the break from family members, it was so neat to watch you get acquainted with all your extended family and so sad to have to leave them all behind. You seem to gather smiles from everyone: great-grandparents, grandparents, aunts, teenage uncles, young cousins, etc. I’m constantly amazed at how many smiles and how much laughter a sweet baby like you can bring to all and especially to me.

With the Hoyt fam

With the Jensen fam

Sometimes your dad and I jokingly debate about who loves you more, me or him. The funny thing is, each of us is pretty sure that we’re winning. Thanks for being such a sweet, happy baby. While I want you to be little forever, I can’t wait to watch you grow up!

Love,

Mom   

My kind of pretty

Often when I tell people that I'm from Oregon, I get comments such as, "Ohhh, it's beautiful over there," and "I love how green and pretty Oregon is." And then I proceed to tell them that I'm actually from the other part of Oregon. The desert part.  But you know what? I still think it's pretty, and while it's not green and rhododendron-scented, I think sage brush smells great too.

Over Christmas break, my dad convinced us to go for a drive out in the desert. 

It was long. 

It was cold.

And the dirt road had pot-holes the size of  the suburban we were piled into.

(well, that may be exaggerating just a wee bit) 

But...

Nate thought he was the coolest person ever because he got to stand on top of this rock.

And Wyatt got to shoot guns with his dad and Pete

And we trekked up a frozen river to find...

A frozen waterfall.

 Which was actually pretty cool.

So it turned out alright after all. It was great fun to be in the car complaining and getting lost together. Ahem, I mean, spending time together. 

Okay, all joking aside, thanks Dad! Even Emery had a good time---she doesn't give out her full, four-toothed smiles for just anything.

Vacation

{Pete working outside at the "Tree Farm" as his home is affectionately called.}

{All the Hoyt brothers}

{Me and one of my wonderful sis-in-laws, Ashley}

{Emery watching the football game with cousin Hannah Z and Aunt Hailey}

The holidays have been good to us. 

Verrrrry good to us.

2 weeks in Nyssa with my family, 2 weeks in Washington with Pete's family, and in 2 days it will all be over and we'll be home.

I wish I would have kept up with the blog posts, but, quite honestly, I was having waaaay too much fun. 

I'll try to catch up once I'm home :)

Garden Lights, Holiday Nights

There are few things more magical than bunches of twinkling Christmas lights. 

We witnessed our first lights of the season at the Atlanta Botanical Garden and, for the first time this fall, I actually missed cold, winter weather. It would have been fun to bundle up in scarves, coats, and hats and see the lights amid the snow. As it was, we were nearly overdressed in our single layer, long-sleeve shirts. Don't get me wrong...I'm not complaining. Every morning before running I check the weather outside and the weather at home and I'm grateful that where I'm at, it's usually warm enough to run in a T-shirt (and it's December! This truly boggles my mind!). I'm growing more and more nervous about going west in a few days to a 20 degree temperature drop and what that's going to do to the great running routine I've got going. On the other hand, it will be nice to truly enjoy this hot chocolate season and maybe even a white Christmas :)