The Jackson Family

A Morning to Remember

2011-06-10T13:54:00.000-07:00

Ever have one of those days when you say to yourself, "Really? Is this really happening to me, today of all days, right now of all times??" Well we had one of those days today. Actually, looking back on it, it's quite funny to tell the truth.

Today we were all pumped and ready to get out of town and head to San Diego to taste the sweet Cali sun and celebrate at my brother Joe's wedding. I had a fairly normal night (as far as nights with nursing babies go) and only noticed a very minor oddity in how I felt as I went back to sleep around 2:30 am. I had to pee. I know you're going, "Why would that be odd? Hello!! Everybody has to pee in the middle of the night sometimes!" But you see I had just gone to the bathroom before having the feeling again. I didn't think too much of it except that it was a little weird.

I go back to sleep (sort of) for the next hour and my alarm goes off at 3:45 am. I get up and get ready to go to the airport and notice I still have that feeling. So I try and.....nothing. I think, "Huh, that's weird." I ask Nate what he thinks of it and he tells me it's a sign of an infection sometimes. My "oh-that's-not-it-because-we're-going-on-vacation" self completely denies that possibility so I continue to pack and get ready to go.

After getting in the back of the car with the kids and heading on our way (with Valerie - Nate's mom - so she can drive our car back home), I start getting an annoying pain in my lower left back. The onset was almost instantaneous and the pain wasn't going away no matter how I shifted. I said something about it out loud and Valerie says that dreaded word that Nate spoke earlier, "infection." No, no, no!! It can't be! I'm supposed to be going on vacation, not getting sick! I'm determined to get there come hell or high water. So we continue on as if nothing is happening.

As soon as we get to the airport, our next challenge presents itself. Emma starts gagging and throws up. I helped to wipe her up and gave her some food as I think she was just very hungry and it was early in the morning. So here's me with a stabbing pain in my back and Emma puking. We hadn't even gotten out of the car to get checked in and Nate goes, "Okay, I give up." But I wasn't about to give up! We get out, get bags and car seats checked and head towards the security line. By this point my pain had definitely escalated. Well we get through security fairly quickly but we notice Carter's wet diaper had leaked and he was wet, Emma was sopping wet from her diaper leaking and her throw up, she's covered in melted chocolate from the granola bar she only half-way ate, and I'm hurting so bad I'm sweating and pacing and cringing with pain. But did that stop us? Of course not!! We headed down the stairs to the train to get to the terminal. The crowd was huge. Needless to say we did not make it on that first train. This kills me because it really hot down there, I feel like throwing up and need to pee, and there were no restrooms in sight. I had to suck it up and wait. We waited for what seemed like forever and finally the next train came. We get in and others get on. The doors began to close and what happens? More people rush onto the train, stopping the doors from closely, and ultimately jamming the doors. Really??? I'm in pain here people!! Get the stupid train going!! After they hand-closed and checked all of the doors, we finally got going. Once we get to the terminal, I book it to the bathroom and puke. That eased my nausea but the pain was still as stabbing as ever. I then finally change Emma and Nate gets Carter changed. That was when I went up to talk to the gate people to see if there were paramedics or nurses they could call to help me. By this point I'm doubled over in pain, about to cry, and feeling worse than I've ever felt before. I hadn't been in that much pain since giving birth. The lady calls the paramedics and I wait for them to show up. People around me are definitely staring and one nice old lady offered to help saying I looked like I was in a lot of pain. I really thought I would faint from the pain.

When the medics got there they put in a wheelchair and sat me in full view of everyone and began to question me. Not sure why they did that, but they finally realized it wasn't very private (after the whole world knew about how I needed to pee but I couldn't...lol) and moved me. I'm now calling out in pain and knew I was making a scene. But I did not care. They did tests and got me on a gurney and put me in the ambulance. Unfortunately, Nate and the kids could not ride with me so I had to leave them. I felt so bad for Nate and especially for Carter since he only got a chance to eat for couple of minutes before they took me away. Talk about a worried mom!! Well after a very painful ride to the hospital, lots of questions, tests, and an IV, I finally got the good stuff....morphine. That stuff was heaven for me! I was finally able to relax. Then I got the cat scan and diagnosis....kidney stone. That baby was apparently 5.9 mm, as compared with an average size of 5 mm. The doctor said if it doesn't pass by Monday, I'll have to go in and get it broken up. We shall see! I certainly hope not! But ultimately I was feeling tons better and was completely shocked by the crazy morning I had!

Now you may be wondering, "Are you still going to go to San Diego?" The answer is yes, we are going!! We changed our flight time (which we almost had to pay an extra $400 to do, but got out it thankfully) and are about to head out again for our next try at leaving. Hopefully this try goes a ton better than the last one!

Parenting is to Parenting Books as Reality is to Dreamland

2011-03-31T13:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I got the notification that my parenting book I had put on hold at the library was ready for pick up. I'm pretty excited about this so I pack the kids in the car, head off to the library, and get my book. When I get home, it's lunch time so while we're eating I start to read. The book: On Becoming Toddlerwise by Gary Ezzo and Robert Bucknam. I started off in the chapter on Conflict, Training, and Correction since this is where I felt I needed the most help. Much of it was smart and intellectually stimulating. I actually found some things that I wanted to try including giving Emma instructions instead of asking her to do things. But overall the big looming, blinking sign hanging over my head as I read was PARENTAL FAILURE. I'm sitting there with my 2 month old in my arms, while trying to eat and read, and trying to keep Emma from standing up in her high chair and throwing her food on the ground. Immediately I sternly say NO and tell her to sit down. It doesn't happen so I tell her again with hand directions this time. Again she doesn't obey and even shakes her head no with a little smirk on her face. So then I grab her arm and bend her legs and force her to sit back down. She screams and throws a small fit, but stays sitting for a bit. I go back to reading and what do I read? Something about not forcing them to do things. BIG check for me. Then I read some more about not using threats or bribes. Uh-oh, check two! So many times I've said, “If you don't do this, you'll go to your room (or get a spanking)!” or “If you do this, Mommy will give you a chocolate (or a snack)!” Oh boy....having gotten mostly through the chapter I think to myself, “Do I really want to read this??” The rest of the day I try out some of the things in the chapter like saying “look at Mommy” first before giving her a direction or putting her in isolation when she disobeys. She obeyed me a little more I would say. In fact when she didn't pick up the kitchen utensils she threw on the ground when I asked her three times (I even looked her in the face and got her full attention on the items and she still ignored my directions), I put her in her room and wouldn't let her out until she stopped crying a bit. I opened the door and told her to say sorry to me then gave her a hug. But she seemed really anxious to get around me and go somewhere. I decided to let her go where she was going and immediately she went downstairs. I listened to drawers open and items clunking together. I then went down to see what she had done. I was surprised to see she had gone down to do exactly what I had wanted her to do just a few minutes before. She put the utensils away! She knew what I was asking of her and was deliberately disobeying at first. There was no misunderstanding there. But she discovered that when disobeying meant being locked in her room, she knew she had to hurry to complete the task so that she wasn't in there anymore. Smart girl! That encouraged me a bit, so I thought, “Hmmm, maybe I should keep reading that book." Day two. Today. I finally got both kids asleep and decided to eat lunch and read again. This time I begin on the chapter called Structuring Your Child's Day. Here's where things really began to make me feel awful. Practically everything I was doing in this area according to these authors was wrong. Now, I know that parenting books aren't all correct and that every situation is different. I know that doctoral authors are not know-it-alls even though they think they are. So this chapter I kind of want to say to them, “Are you kidding me???” They are saying my day should be structured to every 15 minutes or half hour. They say get your kids up at exactly the same time everyday and that a good time is 7 am. Well, buddies, I have a 2 month old baby that goes to sleep at 11 pm gets up at 5 am to eat and a husband that gets up at 6 am to go to work. I want to go back to sleep so that I can keep my sanity, so no I am not going to wake my toddler up if she's still sleeping and I can get some shut eye!! Also, they say there should be all these different kinds of play time, but no where in there did they account for mommy work out time, dishes, laundry, cleaning, phone calls, emails, errands, and other things that have to get done. They also don't know that my child just simply does not do quiet time, unless she's into something she shouldn't. She takes naps, but put Emma on a blanket for 30 minutes to play? Good luck!!! She'd be up and off that in 2 seconds. Don't let her switch toys every 5 minutes? She switches toys every 30 seconds! And how am I supposed to control that when I have a baby to nurse? The evening schedule they have is totally out as well. I teach piano so dinner is at a different time every day depending on when my lessons are. And those switch around so much that it changes week to week even. And apparently I put her to bed too late. That is actually a good thing for me to hear because now I have a good excuse to start putting her to bed earlier and getting some good nightly alone time with my husband. So overall, I am overwhelmed by this chapter. Maybe I'm too selfish and shouldn't be so focused on what I need to get done, but rather what I need to do for my children. But seriously this is too big a bite for me to chew. Maybe I just need to change one little thing at a time. I guess we'll see how this goes. For right now I am going to say to that parenting book, “You live in the parenting dreamland and I live in the parenting reality. Sorry, but I think reality overrules dreamland. Thanks anyways!” :)

A Month With Two Kids

2011-03-03T14:15:00.001-08:00

It has already been a month now that Nate and I have had two kids. Whew! We made it this far! Oh it's not over yet? You mean we still have the rest of their lives??? Shoot...this parenting thing is harder than I thought! Maybe I jumped on the second kid wagon a little too soon...lol. In all seriousness, though, it has been an interesting adjustment to having two kids so close together. I love them both very dearly and wouldn't trade them for anything in the world, but I must say there are times when I think to myself "What have I gotten myself into?!" Thankfully (and equally regretfully), they don't stay little forever.

Carter has done really well for his first month of life and we couldn't have asked for a sweeter, more mellow baby. He sleeps pretty well at night, going 3 or 4 hours at a time before waking up to eat. He also does really well getting his bubbles out, which has made him a very pleasant baby. He seems to be okay not being held 24/7, which helps out a lot with the attention I need to give to Emma. He is growing very quickly and is already out of all the newborn stuff and is into the 0-3 month clothes. According to our scale he is about 11 and half pounds already! He's a strong, growing boy and it makes me sad to see him grow so fast because before I know it he won't be a baby anymore! Carter has also quickly become a mama's boy. I am loving every minute with him and honestly feel so attached! Little boys are so sweet and I have to say you don't know how much joy comes from having a boy until you have one.

As for Emma, she was okay with Carter for the first week or two and then the realization that he's not going away finally hit her. She started purposely trying to push him away from me and doing other pokes and prods that weren't very nice. Her world has officially been turned upside-down. Poor thing!

She is still helpful though, which shows me how sweet she really is inside. She always alerts me when Carter crys with a "Whying!" and a concerned little face that melts your heart. She also loves to give him his blankies and his binkie (while getting a taste herself...lol). And she even helps me pat his back to burp him.

Beyond helping/hurting Carter, Emma has continued to learn and grow. She can repeat words she hears now, even if they sound completely different. She says prayers with Mom's help and can repeat all of the alphabet after me. She can even say BYU now! :) She's gotten really good at certain puzzles and loves to play games on my phone. She is such a smarty and I know it's going to be hard to keep up with her! She's also had her difficult times, throwing tantrums and really disobeying Mom and Dad. I am waiting on a couple parenting books I have on hold at the library because I am completely at a loss for how to deal with her and discipline her sometimes. It's a good thing there are people out there, including Nate and my wonderful mother-in-law, who can and do help out before I completely lose it. I'm also grateful for Sundays now since Emma is finally in nursery and I get a reprieve from her for a couple of hours! Emma transitioned to nursery really well and that has made us really happy. She goes with Meema (Nate's mom) since she is a nursery leader and doesn't even look back. She loves playing with the toys and other kids in there and has kept the nursery leaders on their toes (tee hee...I laugh!). I was told that she has created a new standard for child-proofing the nursery. :) That's my child!

A couple of weeks ago my sister Leah from St. Louis, Missouri flew here to come see us and help out with the kids. It was so nice to have her here! Since my parents are on their mission in Germany, my mom couldn't come out. So she arranged for my sister to come so that she could be her hands. We had so much fun while she was here! We took the kids out so Emma could go play at Kent Commons at Indoor Park. I also took her to Seattle and we saw the Space Needle and the Pike Place Market. Leah had never been so it was cool to show her! We went up to the top of the Space Needle, but unfortunately they don't allow strollers so we each had to carry a kid. Leah took Emma and she definitely had her hands full keeping track of her! Emma was a crack up though because she would just run in circles around the top and since it's a little slanted and puts your equilibrium off, she kept running diagonally into the walls...lol. Leah also bought some fresh fish and produce from the market and made us some awesome fish tacos that night! She is such a great cook and really treated us to some good cooking while she was here! After she left, Nate was like, "Where's Leah to cook us dinner and do the dishes???" ...lol. She is an amazingly sweet person and we were so grateful to have her come!

So it's been a full, fun, busy month with two kids, but I think we're surviving. I feel like if I can get through this, I can get through anything. Here's to many more months with two (and eventually more) kids!

Carter Joins Our Family

2011-02-06T21:51:00.001-08:00

Well I happened to come across this poor, neglected blog and found it hasn't been updated for some time now. I almost forgot we had a blog! I actually remembered when I was reading Elder and Sister Hoggan's blog about their mission adventures in Germany and saw the link to our blog. It might just be old age, but I'd like to blame it on rebuilding my computer and not saving any of my browser favorites. Anyway, the past few months sped by as they always seem to. Christmas was great and it was nice to be able to have our own tree and decorations on the house. Last year we didn't do any of that since we were going to be in Utah with Amy's parents and family. I really enjoyed the time off of work as well.

January was full of busy-ness. Amy had piano lessons as usual and I had work. On top of that, she was working on putting the finishing touches on the Kent Stake's Women's Conference program. She was released from her Personal Progress calling with the YW and called as the ward music chairperson. It was a good switch for her with the arrival of Carter.

On the morning of Jan 27th, Amy began having regular contractions and we began to monitor them. As they increased and became closer together, it became evident that we would be making a trip to the hospital. Shortly after noon, we decided to head in. We checked in at about 3 pm. This time, rather than going 'natural', Amy opted for an epidural. It was so much different than before. We were able to watch movies and relax. I even was able to get some work done that I needed to finish up. (I'm really grateful for a job that allows me to work virtually from home/other locations sometimes). The doctor came in and checked her probably about 6 pm and estimated that the baby would arrive by 9pm that night. I had my doubts about that. However, shortly before 9 pm, Amy was checked again and they said the baby was low enough to be delivered. The nurse called for some additional help to get everything prepped for the delivery and the doctor was alerted. He came in, Amy pushed twice, and Carter was here! I was amazed how easy it was -- last time with Emma was a nightmare that I look back fondly on (pretty weird I know). I was even more amazed that the doctor was almost right on with his prediction -- Carter was born at 9:09 pm. The doctor let me cut the cord, which I find a symbolic gesture and pretty neat.

He didn't cry much. Nurses were trying to clear the fluid out of his nose and mouth. They gently tried to get him to cry to expel that fluid. He finally got enough of a cry to force that fluid out. They cleaned him up a little bit and let Amy hold him. After a while they brought in the scale and got his measurements: 8 lbs 8.4oz and 20" long. He had a healthy color and a healthy bump on his head, caused most likely by the speedy delivery, which I will conveniently be able to tease him about later in life.... such as that he was dropped on his head when he was born.

Amy zonked out shortly thereafter. I was up until around 1:30 am while the nurses kept coming in and doing their checks and the all important first baby bath. After that, I don't remember much. Carter had a really good first night and slept for most of it. We stayed at the hospital the next day and night and came home on Saturday morning. Some of our family and church friends visited us at the hospital. Amy really wanted to go see the conference program which was going on and we debated as we drove down the road. We ended up going to my parents' house and showing Grammee her latest great-grandchild. It was such a relief when we finally made it home. We could sleep and relax and Carter made it very easy for us.

Carter all decked out in his "going home" clothes (above). Us leaving the hospital Sat morning (below).

Emma is adjusting well. The first few days she had the "what is this thing" look on her face but now she always wants to pat him and say hi to him. She had her moments where she wanted to be in mommy's lap while Carter occupied that position but I think she's coming to grips with the reality that Carter is here to stay and she'll have to wait her turn.

We've had a generous showing of support from many friends in the ward, family members, and neighbors for which we are very grateful and appreciative. To all those that helped us in any way, whether it was bringing meals or gifts or just simply saying "congratulations," we wholeheartedly say Thank You!!

I Haven't Blogged Forever!!

2010-09-03T12:01:00.000-07:00

It seems my blog suffers as much as my journal does. It's been neglected for way too long. Since there's too much to post about in detail. I think a short synopsis of pictures is in order.

May 2010

Emma figures out how to twist open my mascara:

Emma showing her posing personality:

Memorial Day at Tahoma National Cemetery and BBQ at our house:

Emma after getting into markers:

The beautiful gold finches in our backyard:

June 2010

We found out we were expecting again! Yay for surprises!

Emma used to get up on the stool and play the piano like she is in this picture. Now she can actually climb on top of the piano! Crazy girl!

Father's Day:

Casey's birthday at Point Defiance Zoo:

Our lovely garden that Nate worked so hard to get put it. This is pre-planting:

July 2010

The ultrasound of our new little baby due February 1st!

Fourth of July:

Family vacation at Lake Chelan, WA:

The lake was freezing and it was really windy, but we got to play in some really awesome waves!

Emma's First Birthday Party. I can't believe she's already one! She's growing up so fast!!

For August I will do a separate post since there's quite a bit to talk about and I only took pictures on my phone instead of our regular camera.

Life With Emma

2010-04-16T17:36:00.000-07:00

Need I say more?

Grandma and Grandpa's Visit

2010-04-16T11:44:00.000-07:00

It was so fun to have Grandma and Grandpa Hoggan here! Emma really loved the extra attention and Nate and I loved having a couple of live-in babysitters for a while. It really was nice that they were able to make the trip up here and spend that time with us. We definitely enjoyed it! This was a needed "vacation" of sorts because we were able to take a break from the daily schedule and truly spend time with family. It's so important to do that every once in a while so that we don't lose track of what's really important in life.

Some of the fun things we did were going to the Salt Water State Park, visiting my Aunt Anita and Uncle Galen, going to the Everett Boeing plant for the Future of Flight museum and tour, and the Museum of Flight in Tukwila. It's fun to be a tourist of the state you are living in!

The park turned out to be freezing, so our picnic at the park idea didn't work so well. My mom and I ended up walking along the beach front while my dad played with Emma in the car. It was too cold even for her who doesn't mind the cold that much. But I think Grandpa enjoyed the one on one time with her! After we went to the park and ate our food in the car, we went over to South Center Mall to walk around and look at things. Grandma and Grandpa wanted to get Emma a ball, but that wasn't really the place to get it. So after driving aimlessly for a while (I was a little lost), we ended up stopping at a Target on the way home.

The next day we got up bright and early and headed to Everett. My parents were tired but didn't want to close their eyes because the drive was so scenic. I, on the other hand, ended up sleeping part of the way. Guess I missed out on some of the scenes! Once we got to the plant in Everett, I was astounded by the size of it! It was HUGE! The doors that open to let the planes out once they're finished were the biggest doors I'd ever seen. Then right after we parked, we got to see a plane take off just on the other side of the fence. I felt that one in my chest, it was so powerful! At the museum Nate and I walked around the gallery and the stores while Grandma and Grandpa were on their tour. They got to see the Dream Lifter take off, which was built to carry the parts for the Dreamliner. It's a funky looking plane, but very cool to think that it works! Then when they came back they took Emma for us while we went on our tour. They don't allow anyone shorter than 4 feet on the tour for safety concerns. So Nate and I kind of got to go on a date, which was nice! The tour was incredible! I could not believe how much goes into making an airplane. So much engineering, so much man labor, so many parts, so much money. It's mind-boggling really. I felt so small the entire time, especially when we saw the 747 being made. That thing is humongous! The people working on it looked like ants and those wings were so long I couldn't even see the whole thing without moving my head. It was almost scary, that's how big it was. Anyways, I learned so much about Boeing and about airplanes that I now have a very great respect for them both. It also made me feel so excited that Nate is a part of it. How cool to be a part of that kind of technology! I think we take it for granted when we hop on a plane to go visit family or take a vacation. We don't realize what it has taken to get us there. It's truly inspired technology. Unfortunately, we didn't get any pictures at the Future of Flight Museum and they don't let you take pictures on the tour so all we have as our souvenirs from this experience are our memories, a CD from the tour, and our 787 wings. We got them for being willing to participate in a survey that we didn't end up participating in because there weren't enough people. :) So that day was a great day!

Then the next day we went off to the Museum of Flight in Tukwila. We were definitely getting our fill of aviation! It was a really fun museum. They had so many different planes to see and many of them were very large! Once again, I felt very small and started to get an inkling of what it's like to be an ant. We went through the gallery, the Amelia Earhart exhibit, and the space exhibit. Those were all very interesting. Then we got to go into the old air traffic control tower and watch planes as they landed and took off. It also had an amazing view of Mt. Rainier. Of the many computer screens around the tower, there was one screen that showed all of the current flights, both private and commercial, in the air at that moment. There were TONS! It's really astounding when you think about it. Of course there has to be someone to control the air traffic with that much traffic in the air! Other parts of the musuem we saw were the airpark, the barn, and the hall with all of the WWI and WWII planes. In the airpark we got to go inside a

Concorde and the Nixon Air Force One. So neat to think we were walking where past presidents had walked, talked, and discussed classified information! :) The barn was where Boeing first started building planes back in the 1920s and they were made of mostly wood, metal, and cloth. All very fascinating. One of the best parts of the museum was the flight simulator. Nate and I got in it and he piloted (except for the take off, which I did very badly) an F-22. Man he took me for a ride! We did barrel rolls and flips and dives. I was honestly very sick to my stomach by the time we got out. But it was so much fun! Totally worth it!

After the museum, we went home and ate and then headed over to the church to hear Nate play the organ. He did a great job! It's so much fun to hear him play, especially when he pulls out all of the stops and plays full blast. So the day went very well (except for Emma being extremely fussy at the museum) and we enjoyed the time we got to spend together. My parents stayed Sunday and then left on Monday. It was sad to see them leave, but at least we had a fun time while they were here!

What Happened to March?

2010-04-02T11:07:00.000-07:00

It feels like March just flew by this year! I can't believe I haven't posted anything since the first of February. Boy am I behind! Well, I guess that's just how life goes. Let's see here. New things this month, beginning with Emma:

She can crawl like the wind now, going so fast I can't even blink anymore without her hurrying off to get into something she's not supposed to. She can also walk pretty well behind her walker, until she runs into something, which happens because she's smiling so big at Mom or Dad to show how proud of her we should be that she doesn't watch where she's going...lol. She loves to get into the towel and utensil drawers in the kitchen and pull everything out. She also LOVES to try and find Mama when I hide around corners. She gets a real kick out of that. Her new skill this month is whistling! She had a habit (and still does) of getting really excited about things and breathing in and out really fast, kind of like a panting dog. Then about a couple weeks ago or so, she did the panting thing with her lips in an "oo" shape and it came out like a whistle! The day she discovered it she was doing it all day long. She hasn't done quite as often since, but she does it every once in a while and it's really cute! She has also learned to feed herself and is actually getting quite coordinated with it. She's smart too. She figured out on her own that if she has something in her hand and wants to pull herself up to standing on something, she'll put that thing in her mouth so she's got her hands free then pull herself right up! Then she uses the object to bang on whatever it was she stood up on...lol. That's my Emma! We had fun taking her to the neighborhood HOA Egg Hunt Activity and she had fun watching all the little kids run around. She's itching to be with them! That'll come before I know it, she's growing so fast! Love my little Missy Moo!

As far as things with Nate goes, he's been super busy at work and has been doing some on call stuff at home. He's been working really hard to show his managers that he deserves a promotion, so we're hoping they see that and give him one! Nate also started sell HomePro By Design this month. It is a line of EXCELLENT cleaning products that came from the supplier for Nate's dad's carpet cleaning products. They are of professional quality, are inexpensive, and are even green. I LOVE cleaning with them! And that's saying something since I never really liked cleaning growing up. We both think it would be a great Mother's Day gift to get the Cleaning Essentials kit and then tell your wife/mother that you'll clean the whole house for her for Mother's Day. They clean so well, you'll be done with it in no time! :) Here's the link to check it out! http://www.hpbyd.com/natejackson Nate doesn't have a whole lot of time to get out there and sell it, so we're relying a lot on word of mouth right now. Other than work and HomePro, Nate stays busy with the Young Men doing activities and things. He went on his first campout with the Teachers in February and really enjoyed it. It was also my first night being without him in a big empty house. But thankfully I got through it okay!

My new stuff this month includes getting my first pair of glasses ever, joining Scentsy http://www.scentsy.com/amybjackson, getting 6 new piano students, and subbing for the primary pianist (who is subbing for the primary chorister who just had a baby). So I stay pretty busy. My piano students are so much fun and they are all doing so well! I love watching them progress and master new songs. It's the best seeing the joy and pride on their faces when they do that! Other fun things we've done this month have been a game night with our neighbors, lunch with my co-worker, and going to the temple with the family for Gram's birthday then going out to dinner afterwards. It's been a really great month! I'm really looking forward to the rest of April as well. Conference has been awesome so far and I can't wait to hear the talks tomorrow! Plus it's Easter tomorrow and it's a wonderful time to celebrate the death and resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ. He truly lives and we are able to become perfected and rise again through Him. It's a great time of year! I'm also looking forward to my parents coming this Tuesday!!!!! I can't wait to see them! It'll be a blast!

2010-02-09T10:04:00.000-08:00

In the past few weeks, Emma has continued to impress us and make us laugh with her new skills. She now knows how to crawl and get around. She can also pull herself up to standing on things. Consequently, she has also had some hilarious moments in connection with her new found talents. Just some funny moments to share:

I decided to let Emma fall asleep on her own for nap time so I laid her in the crib on her back with her binky wrapped up in a blanket. She was definitely very tired at the time so I was hoping it wouldn't take long for her to conk out. I left the room to do some other things and could hear a little fussing and some movement. Then it was silent so I went to go check on her and found her like this.

I couldn't help but snicker imagining her squirming out of the blanket, rolling over onto her tummy, fussing and then just plopping her head down in complete exhaustion. I guess she wanted to go against the grain and sleep across her bed. Funny girl!

Then just yesterday I was doing laundry and set Emma down next to the basket to go grab something out of the bedroom. When I came back she pulled her self all the way up to her feet! I was absolutely amazed!

She was very pleased with herself as you can see.

She also had a fun time "surfing" the net for her first time last week. She is obsessed with the keyboard and mouse so Nate finally let her play with them and all kinds of windows started popping up...lol. We got a video of it, but somehow I'll have to figure out how to change the format so I can post it! She was going to different websites (ones that Nate already had up in different tabs) and then she made the computer go "beep beep beep beep" over and over again. It seriously sounded like it was going to blow up.

Oh and did I mention she has two teeth now? She chews on anything she can get into her mouth. She's like a puppy sometimes, carrying something in her mouth as she crawls around. Too cute! My Emma is growing up so fast I can't keep up with it! I love my silly girl!

Our Christmas Vacation

2010-01-08T22:54:00.001-08:00

Vacation is over now, but what a vacation it was. Actually we are probably getting more sleep now than we did while we were away, ironically. Emma wasn't too keen on having to sleep in a crib that wasn't her own so needless to say we had many restless nights as she tossed and turned in our bed every night. But other than the constant feeling of being tired, we had a great time in Utah and Idaho with my family. We got to see all of my siblings (including Bruce :D who is stationed in Germany right now) with the exception of Leah and Catherine who live far, far away in the midwest. Though our visits were short and it seemed like we had just greeted someone when we had to say goodbye, it was well worth our trip out there. It's nice to reconnect with family when we live so far away from them. I do wish we could have done more reconnecting. That's probably the biggest downside to big family get togethers. Everyone is there at the same time so one-on-one time is very rare. I swear I was only able to say like three personally directed words at some of my nieces and nephews. I do hope they know that I wasn't trying to neglect them! One thing I was very happy about was that Emma was able to meet so many family members that had not seen her yet. And what made me happier yet was the fact that they absolutely loved her! You know it's very interesting how my happiness now comes from knowing that my child and husband are loved by those who mean so much to me. I loved watching everyone hold and play with Emma! And surprisingly I wasn't even angry when I found out my 4 year old nephew Noah dropped her a short distance to the floor...lol. Emma and her cousin Kalea (who is 4 months younger) were so fawned after that I think they will have no problem feeling loved by the Hoggan/Campbell family.

As for other parts of the vacation, they included seeing Nate's great-aunt Rae (who is sweet and wonderful as can be), watching the BYU bowl game and its very happy results, Christmas shopping, watching movies, playing games, eating TONS of goodies, seeing the lights on temple square, and, the pinnacle of them all, seeing and hearing Nate play the Conference Center organ before getting a behind-the-scenes tour of the building with my family. It was literally awe-some! Nate was as giddy as a kid on Christmas about this amazing opportunity! We were really blessed to have this happen. It will be something we will cherish for a very long time. I have to say Nate made that instrument just vibrate through my bones while he was playing. Awe inspiring! The tour was pretty awesome too. We learned so much about what goes on backstage and how much time and effort is put in to bring about the amazing programs done at the Conference Center (such as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concerts and General Conference). It is truly mind-boggling. For instance, it took 3 hours to program about 1000 lights for one subtle light change on the stage. They also had rooms for all the different translators and a master control room sending those languages out all over the world. So cool! We also got to go up on the catwalk, which was very high and very scary. Heights are not my favorite. It really made me appreciate the people who actually work on things up there. Glad it's them and not me! All in all, the vacation was wonderful and very much needed.

Well, the holidays are over and life is moving on its merry little way. I'm keeping myself busy trying to decorate the house with the spare decorations I have to work with, cleaning a big new house, teaching piano and finding new students, doing Activity Days, cooking (I guess you could call it that), and of course taking care of our adorable Emma. Nate's days are filled with going to work, working, coming home from work, and doing Young Men's stuff. Some good news for him is that at work they are thinking about promoting him due to the fact that he "exceeded expectations" in his review. He's so awesome! We also find time to read together, shop together, play the piano and organ together, play Farmville on Facebook, and watch movies on the floor in front of our computer...maybe we should be trying to find furniture together...lol. As for Emma, she has been filling her days with learning and growing! She's a little over 5 months old now and in the past month has learned to roll, sit up by herself, get up on her hands and knees, get up on her hands and feet (like she's doing a pushup), and push herself backwards when she's on her tummy. In the past couple of days she has had her first tooth come in and her first meal of solids! At this rate I have a feeling she'll be crawling next week and then there'll be no limit to the places she'll go and the things she'll do. The rough nights we've had with her lately now make sense, what with the tooth and all. She was also VERY ready for solids because she devoured her rice cereal like it was the most wonderful feast she'd ever had. Guess it's time to get a high chair and get ready to dazzle her tastebuds with things like applesauce, banana mush, yams, and other such delectable baby foods.

I can't believe she is practically half way to being a year old. It's going by too fast! But at least we have lots to look forward to seeing Emma learn and do this year. It's going to be a year to remember for sure!

Catch Up Time!

2009-12-11T15:24:00.000-08:00

It's been a little over a month since we last posted so now we've got a LOT of catching up to do. So here it goes:

Nate's 28th Birthday

Nate turned 28 this year! Yay for Nate! For his birthday I got him a Chamberlain 3/4 HPS Belt Drive Garage Door Opener System. Actually he was going to get it anyways for our new house, but it was so much more fun as a birthday gift! We also had a family get together for his birthday and had pie and ice cream. It was lots of fun!

Emma's Adorable Toothless Smile

We randomly caught these pics of Emma one night. It's not often we catch a smile on camera so this was perfect!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was at Mom and Dad Jackson's house this year. It wasn't as large of a group as it usually is with Nate's family since many people had other plans, but there were still a lot of people. We had a great time with everyone and the food was awesome! Valerie did a really great job on the turkey and everything else was delicious! Heidi and Cirdan brought their Wii and the new Super Mario Bros game so we had a blast playing that. Emma had a great time with everyone too. It's too bad she wasn't old enough for the food yet! Here she is with Aunt Heidi:

Ella, Heidi's little girl, had a rough time when she first got there from being woken up from her nap. I just couldn't resist getting a picture of her sad little face. So cute!

Here's the group of us!

The missionaries came to eat with us too. I think we were their second house that day so it was round two for them!

Our cute little family. I'm so grateful for Nate and Emma and I'm grateful to have such a wonderful family!

We Moved!

Nate and I got the keys to our new house on November 24th. It was so exciting! We didn't get the keys until after 5 so needless to say it was a late night. We were just itching so bad to move that we wanted to go right away. Some friends from the ward helped us out so that was nice. The first night in our house we didn't have the crib set up yet so Emma slept with us, but the second night Emma slept in her own room all by herself and she slept soundly through the night. I think she really likes her new room!

I don't have any pictures to show of the house yet because we're still trying to get it organized. We'll get some up soon though!

Family Pictures

We finally all got together to take some family pictures over at Heidi's house. For some reason it's so hard to get everyone together at the same time to take pictures so it was almost a miracle that we got these...lol. These particular pictures were taken with our camera. The first couple were taken at the same time as another camera so that's why everyone's looking somewhere else.

Meema and Papa with all of the grandkids!

Emma's First Mohawk

Emma's hair is long enough now that I could put in a little mohawk after her bath. So cute!

The View from our Room

We are able to see the beautiful sunrise from our bedroom window every clear morning. It is just breathtaking! We love it!

Decorating Gingerbread Houses: A Jackson Family Tradition

It's been a busy Christmas season so far what with putting on the Ward Nativity Program and Nate accompanying our friend Jenni the violinist at a stake Creche Exhibit. We were so busy we missed the first round of gingerbread house decorating, but we made it for round two. Here are Daddy and Emma having fun decorating together:

Our gingerbread house. It wasn't really complete because Emma and I weren't feeling too well and my creative juices weren't flowing. At least it got all put together!

Everyone elses houses looked awesome! The one on the left is Craig's and Stacey's. The one in the middle is Kaylee's and Valerie's. And the one of the right is Heidi's and Cirdan's. Good job guys! They look awesome!

Emma Meets Santa

This is Emma's first time to meet Santa! He came to our Ward Christmas Party to take pictures with the kids. Emma was asleep when I handed her to him, but she woke and started freaking out. So we put the binky in and she went back to sleep. No awake pictures with Santa this year!

When I took her back she accidentally grabbed onto Santa's beard...haha! Let's just say he had some readjusting to do when she finally let go. She must already be testing to see if it was the real Santa. Either that or she really wants coal for Christmas this year!

Our House is Almost Done!!

2009-11-05T18:03:00.001-08:00

Just wanted to post this picture of our house. I swung by yesterday after work and snapped this with my work cell phone. They've poured the concrete for the porch and driveway and finished the painting too it looks like. We heard that they are hoping to be done by the 19th of this month!!! We are definitely hoping too!!

Halloween 2009

2009-11-03T11:25:00.001-08:00

For Halloween this year Emma was a flower and Nate and I were bees. Emma looked absolutely adorable in her little costume!

After getting all dressed up, we went to our Ward Halloween Party and Trunk or Treat. It was so much fun! There were tons of people there and everyone looked so great in their costumes. We didn't take Emma outside for the trunk or treat, though, because she's had a stuffy nose lately and we didn't want her getting sick.

They also had a chili cook-off for the guys and a dessert cook-off for the women. Nate decided to make a really hot chili and he ended up winning 1st Place! I was so proud of him! :) The chili actually had a really great sweet and spicy flavor so that when you first tasted it you thought "Oh yum! This is good!" Then the heat would hit you like a punch...lol. It was awesome!

Surprisingly I ended up getting 2nd place in the dessert cook-off! I thought that was kind of funny just because it was my first time making the dessert, which was a black forest cake with chocolate covered cherries on top. I really only made that because it just sounded so yummy that I really wanted to eat some! So the night turned out really great! The party was actually the night before Halloween so on the real Halloween night we went over to Nate's sister Heidi's house and played games with them. It was tons of fun eating goodies and hanging out! I love Halloween for that reason! :)

What Kind of Mother Am I?

2009-11-03T11:15:00.000-08:00

Emma has decided that she can wiggle her way out of her car seat if she's not strapped in. I was fixing dinner, talking on the phone to Nate, and had my back turned, when it all happened. I heard her fussing a bit and then realized it had stopped so I turned around and found her like this!:

She was just kind of looking around like "what just happened?" and then she saw her blanket and decided to start eating it:

I guess the stationary days are over now! I better keep a better eye on her from now on like a good mother...lol.

Happy Three Months!

2009-10-29T12:36:00.000-07:00

Emma is three months old today! She is getting bigger and cuter all of the time. This last month has been so fun with her because she is starting to interact so much more with Mom and Dad. She smiles to us a lot, especially when we put her in front of a mirror or we hold her up in the air. She has also shown us her little opinionated personality. She definitely wants what she wants when she wants it! But she's just so cute that she gets away with it. Emma is also starting to reach for her toys and loves to watch them and listen to the rattles. She does not like to be on her belly on the floor, but she has learned to hold her head up in this position nonetheless. Since she doesn't like being on her stomach, she has learned to roll back over onto her back if she's only part way on her belly or side. She can't roll all of the way yet, but she's working at it. Emma also talks...A LOT! She loves to make noises and tell us her baby joys and woes. It's so fun and cute to hear her! She's starting to get little laughs out every now and then, but we have yet to hear her truly laugh. One of her favorite activities is her bath. She loves to splash around and gets really mad at me when I take her out. Here she is enjoying her bathtime. She's kind of got the "deer in the headlights" look because of the camera flash, but she really was enjoying the bath!:

I also took some pictures of her in a couple of my favorite outfits. I couldn't really get her to smile big because she's been kind of grumpy today. Changing her and doing a photo shoot wasn't in her plans for the day apparently...lol. I got a few cute pictures, though, so it wasn't all a lost cause. :)

We love our cute little Emma! Happy three months sweet pea!

In other news, Nate and I have both received new callings in our ward. Nate is now 1st Counselor in the Young Men's and I am an Activity Days leader. We're both pretty excited about our callings and are happy to be working with the youth and primary. We're also both going to be busy. Nate will be working with the Teachers and they do a lot of camping and scouting. There's already a camping trip planned for November. I guess on those weekends I'll have to spend time with the in-laws or with girl friends! But girl time is totally fine with me! We've also been assigned to put together the Nativity program for our Ward Christmas Party this year. It will depict the Christmas story in both Judea and in the Americas. The youth and primary kids are playing the parts and singing the songs. It's going to be so great and we're pretty excited about it! Doing this project with Nate has been so fun and I've gotten to see his "artistic director" side. He has so many good ideas it's a wonder that he doesn't direct movies or something...lol.

As for our house, it's coming along very well. Inside it looks like all of the walls are done and the light fixtures are in. The finish date is coming up on the 23rd of November so just a few more weeks!! Then a week after that we close and move in! We're so excited about it! We've already bought our washer, dryer,
and refrigerator (they're being stored at the warehouse until we move in). It's loads of fun getting ready for a new home!

House Update

2009-10-12T13:38:00.000-07:00

Well, our house is continuing to progress! Yesterday we went over there to check it out and saw that they had put the siding and trim on and that they are halfway through with the sheetrock inside. Yay! It really looks like a house now.

This is picture of the sheetrock in Emma's room:

We also had to take this picture of some hot sauce a worker left there. Somebody likes it hot! ...lol.

2 Months Old and Oh So Cute!

2009-09-29T20:33:00.001-07:00

Emma is 2 months old today and as cute as ever! I can't believe how much she has changed in just a month. Babies grow so fast! Just to show the change, here are a few pictures of her at about a month old, courtesy of my wonderful friend Jocelyn.

Now here she is at 2 months:

Big change! At least I think so. :) She is smiling and cooing up a storm now and we just can't get enough of it. She had her 2 month appointment today and she weighed in at 11 pounds 5 ounces and measured at 23 and a quarter inches long. As far as length goes, she is in the 90th percentile, well above average. Nate and I think she better enjoy being tall while she can. It's not going to last long with us as parents! :) She also got her 3 vaccination shots today and has been a little fussy because of the tenderness in the shot areas. Poor baby! It's so sad to see her in pain!! At least she is healthy though and these shots will help her stay that way. For that I'm very grateful! I also wanted to share these last two pictures of her sleeping on our bed recently. Her sleeping position was so cute and we had to get it on the camera. I love her squished face and cute little hands! Such a little angel!

Comin' Right Along!

2009-09-28T15:43:00.000-07:00

Over the last couple weeks, there has been a fury of construction on our new house. My parents and I went over to see what the house looked like during the half-time break of the BYU - Florida State game. They had put on the 2nd story for the most part and had the trusses for the roof stacked and ready to go.

By the following Tuesday, this is how it looked:

It was a very good week in terms of weather -- it was sunny and warm every day -- and the workers put in long days. I stopped by at 6 pm and they were still there and had just finished up. One thing that I love about the lot/cul-de-sac is the view of Mt Rainier. We would have a pretty good view of the mountain from the house if the trees were 200 ft to the left :)

This past Saturday (the 26th), they put the shingles on... WAAAHOOO!! This is a really good thing because the weather is forecast to be rainy this week. At least I won't have to worry too much about all the framing and plywood inside getting wet!

So now, it appears that the plumbing, vents, heat ducts, and fireplace have all been installed. I think next up is the electrical work!

A Cake to Remember

2009-09-17T10:28:00.001-07:00

Nate and his mom made this lovely cake for me for my birthday and it truly is a cake to remember. Nate decorated it himself so it was a labor of love. I don't think I've ever had such a unique-looking cake. I loved it though because he made it just for me and it tasted great! The finishing touch, however, was the large emergency preparedness candle that was used in place of regular birthday candles because we didn't have any...lol. At least I got it easy this year when it came to blowing out the candle! I love my husband!

Nate also took me out to Applebee's for my birthday and it was so fun to get all dressed up and go out. We hadn't done that in a LONG time. After that, we came home and watched a movie together and relaxed. So it was a really great birthday!

Changes Overnight!

2009-09-16T09:24:00.000-07:00

Though this title may sound like it applies to Emma (which it probably does), it actually applies to our house, literally. On Sunday night Craig and Valerie went to our lot to see what it looked like and saw that it looked the same as the last picture we had of it's progress. Nothing had really changed in a couple of days. Then yesterday one of our friends in the ward who lives right by it saw that they were already working on the second floor that afternoon! She told Valerie about it yesterday so we went to look at it and sure enough it was already looking like our house! How awesome is that!

Here is our front door:

This is looking into the kitchen area from the back of the house. That short little wall there is the beginnings of the bar.

This is looking into our living room from the back of the house:

And this is the beginnings of our second floor!

We're so happy it's actually getting done!

Emma's Blessing Weekend

2009-09-11T18:09:00.001-07:00

This last weekend Emma was given her baby blessing. Grandma and Grandpa Hoggan and my sister Julia and her family all came out for it and we had a great time with them here! Saturday we did some shopping while Julia and the kids went to Forks and then that evening we headed over to the place James and Julia were renting for the weekend to watch the first BYU football game of the season. Such a great game! It was Emma's first game too and she was all decked out like a true blue Cougar in her BYU onesie. We had waited to put it on her until right before the game so she wouldn't dirty it with a blowout or something. Then of course less than an hour after we put it on she had a MASSIVE blowout...lol. Oh the irony of it all. But at least we got one picture of her in it.

Then of course Sunday was the blessing day and Emma looked so precious in her blessing outfit. Julia, the talented woman that she is, made this dress. She did an amazing job and it fit perfectly! Nate gave her a beautiful blessing and I cannot describe the emotions I felt as he gave it to her. Now I finally know how mothers feel and why they always tear up at things like this. I feel so blessed to be a mother and I love my baby girl so much!!! It's by far the most joyful feeling I've ever felt besides being married to the love of my life. Emma is an angel and so very special. She will be an amazing woman as we discovered in her blessing!

After church, we headed over to Grammy Jean's house to have a luncheon with the family. We were originally going to have it outside at a gazebo near Grandma Donna's house, but the rain put a damper on that idea. It all worked out though and it was great to have so many family members from both mine and Nate's sides there. After that, we went back home and played games with my parents and my sister and her family.

Then they all held Emma before leaving and we took lots of pictures. It was so sweet to see them all hold her!

James and Julia went home Monday but my parents stayed until Tuesday so we went to Snoqualmie Falls to do a little sight seeing. It was a great weekend!

Lastly, I just had to add this picture of Emma saying hi! :)

House Progress!!

2009-09-11T17:41:00.001-07:00

During the past few weeks, Nate and I have been following the progress of our new house. We are just getting so excited and antsy to have our own place! It's been really fun to see it getting built right before our eyes! This is what it looked like the end of August just before they put the foundation in:

Just this past week they put the foundation in. That made it feel very real:

Then this week they have been putting the framing in:

I can't believe it's really going to be our house! Can you tell I'm giddy? Our very own house! Woohoo!!

Three Weeks Old!

2009-08-19T14:23:00.000-07:00

Emma is three weeks old today! I can't believe how fast time is going. I feel so bad too because I haven't been keeping up the blog with things about her. It's been a hard but rewarding past 3 weeks. The first week we were just trying to get used to the whole lack of sleep thing...lol. Emma definitely had her days and nights mixed up. She would have cluster feedings at night, wanting to eat practically every hour and not really sleeping in between. Then she would sleep most of the day and I would have to wake her up to eat. By the second week she was a little bit better and had some good nights when she and I would get a good 3 hour stretch of sleep at a time. Those nights were very nice to have! But with the good comes the bad. She started to cry a lot the second week and is still having problems with that. We think she might be somewhat colicky because she just seems unhappy a LOT! Poor baby! It's so hard to hear them cry and not know what's wrong with them. Thankfully she does take a pacifier, but sometimes she won't even take that. She's also had some problems eating. Unless I get her on right away before she starts wailing, it takes forever to get her to calm down enough to latch on. She also gets so excited when she eats that she hyperventilates, swallows tons of bubbles, and sometimes gets the milk down the wrong pipe. I end up having to get her back on 3 or 4 times on each side because of those things. The second week I also got a breast infection. I had started feeling very achy and kept getting fevers. I was so worried I was sick with something that I was going to give to Emma and so I was relieved when I found out it was something I couldn't give to her. The doctor prescribed me some antibiotics and things got better after that. Although I must say that breastfeeding is very painful, even still. But we just keep going knowing that it is for the best and that it won't always be this way. Emma also had her first real photo shoot her second week of life! We had our friend Ashley from our ward take pictures of her for us. She did a fantastic job! We are really happy with the results. Emma did a great job too! She only cried a little and gave the camera some really cute poses and faces. I've posted a lot of those pictures on Facebook so I'll only post a few favorites here.

Then her third week she had another photo shoot by our friend Jocelyn, also from the ward. She offered to take a few pictures so she could get some practice and they turned out so cute as well! Jocelyn is definitely talented! Emma is also so photogenic. We love it! I'll post some of those when we get them back. Emma has also had a chance to go a few places and really likes car rides and stroller rides. Her first week we went to the doctor for her first check up and all was well with her. Then later in the week we had to go back to the hospital for her second hearing screening since her right ear had failed the first one after birth. Thankfully she passed this time! I'm glad she can hear because it seems like she's been enjoying listening to Mom and Dad play the piano and sing to her. Her second week we took her to another doctor's appointment and she checked out healthy again! We are so happy to have a healthy baby! So blessed! The next day we went to our options selection appointment for our new house that we are building! That's also some new news. The Friday before she was born we signed the papers to buy and build a new home! It was a great deal that we couldn't pass up so we did it. It's so much fun too to choose the things we want inside. It's going to be so nice to have our own home! It should be done by the end of November so we're looking forward to it! We can't wait!! After choosing our upgrades, we stopped by the bank where I used to work so my old co-workers could all see Emma. It was nice to see them again and they all loved her. Emma's also had a chance to go out for a stroll around the neighborhood, go to Costco, and go on an outing for lunch to Jocelyn's house. Slowly we're getting her used to going out and to life in general on this earth :). She's also growing a lot! Her newborn size clothes are starting to get pretty tight on her and she's looking more like an infant than a newborn. She's just such a cutie and I can't get enough of her! Here are some random pictures of her during the past 3 weeks.

After her first bath at home:

All snug in her big crib:

Chillin' on our bed:
Nate and Emma fell asleep like this after Nate finally got her to stop crying. I love it!!

Being cute during floor time:

Emma Beth Jackson

2009-08-02T17:08:00.000-07:00

Our beautiful baby girl was born July 29th, 2009 at 7:43am, sharing a birthday (and a name) with Grandma Hoggan. She weighed in at 8 lbs. 9 oz. and was 20 inches long. We are both so happy and can't believe the amount of love we have for her! She is our precious little angel and our cute little squeaker! She has a squeaky little voice that just melts your heart. Here she is just 7 minutes after birth:

Here she is with Grandma and Grandpa Hoggan:

Mommy and Emma:

Aunt Stacey and Grandma Jackson with her:

Emma being held by cousin Kaiya with cousin Ella and Aunt Heidi looking on:

Making a cute little face for the camera!

The labor and delivery went well, although it wasn't very fun...lol. The story actually starts back on Saturday the 25th. We had our big stake celebration for it's 25th anniversay that day. There were lots of fun family games and Nate and I decided to join in on some. We were just crossing the finish line for the 3 legged race when we noticed my parents standing right there cheering us on. We were completely shocked!! It took me a second to realize my parents were really here and I just thought "How the heck did you find us and why are you here??" They had driven up the day before and decided to surprise us. And they certainly did. At that point I was really excited and really worried all at the same time because I knew they were here hoping that Emma would come really soon and I hadn't felt any contractions and was sure labor was forever away (even though I was dilated to a 4 and a half). They came for the week and so we were all hoping she would come while they were here! We did a lot of walking, went to Seattle to sight see, and just did things to keep ourselves busy so that labor would possibly get started. I had my routine check up on Tuesday so we thought that if nothing had progressed by then we would possibly ask about induction so that my parents didn't come up here for nothing. Well it turned out that we didn't even have to ask. The doctor saw that I was dilated to a 7 and completely effaced and sent me straight to the hospital. I felt totally normal until I got dressed and laid down in the hospital bed. It was then that I felt my first real contraction...weird huh? I had a few more but they didn't get closer or more intense so they decided that later they would break my water. They had to put me on antibiotics for at least 4 hours before baby came out because I was GBS positive, but after that they finally broke my water. It was about 1:30 in the morning when this happened and the contractions came on really strong after that! I decided not to take any meds for the pain so Nate and I worked through the contractions until about 5:15 am. (Nate was an amazing coach, by the way. I couldn't have done it without him. He's the best husband in the whole world!!!!!!!) That's when I was finally at a 10 and started pushing. After 2 and half hours of pushing, getting a tear and then an episiotomy, and having the vacuum extractor used (poor baby!), Emma came into the world, eyes wide open and everything!! It was the most amazing feeling I've ever felt to hold that baby for the first time. Nate and I were both so emotional and happy about this miracle of ours. It was like we were in a dream world for those first few hours and even the first day or two. We were also very tired...lol. It is an amazing feeling being a parent. We absolutely love it!! This beautiful little girl is our baby and we are so incredibly happy to have her here!! We can already tell she'll be a quick developer too. She is already doing very well at moving her neck and head, she latches and eats just wonderfully, and she also loves to roll to her side when we lay her down to sleep. She is a very special spirit and we are so blessed to have been given this beautiful girl!

Farewell to Employment, Hello to Motherhood!

2009-07-17T12:37:00.000-07:00

This has been a fairly eventful past couple of weeks! Last week was my last week of employment at the bank and I think it was one of the longest weeks ever because of that...lol. I was so ready to be done with work and start preparing for the baby at home so you can believe how time just dragged on for that reason. But I have loved working with the people there and they have been so flexible and patient with me throughout my pregnancy. That job has been such a blessing for Nate and I so that we could save up money to buy a house. They've had great benefits and they were so family oriented and were glad for me that I was going to be able to stay home and raise my baby. It is a great bank and there are great people there! My last day (last Friday) they threw a surprise little party for me before we opened and it was the nicest thing any employer has ever done for me. Of course I was running a bit late that day (which always seems to happen when you're supposed to be somewhere on time) and so when I walked in everyone was standing around waiting for me with pink balloons and streamers and flowers and they were like "Surprise! Can we eat now??"...LOL. It was kind of embarrassing because it seemed like EVERYONE was staring at me and waiting for my "ok" to eat the food. So I told them to please start and then they had me open some gifts. They were so sweet for everything they did! They brought fruit, yogurt, donuts, bundt cakes, zucchini bread, and juice and for gifts they got Emma diapers, wipes, a Mickey Mouse piggy bank, a Pooh blanket, and a generous gift card to Target. I could not believe it!! I will always be so grateful to them for their kindness and generosity! Seriously I don't know how I get so blessed to have all of these amazing people in my life. It honestly humbles me because I know that it means the Lord loves me and loves our little baby. I learn so much from these people, like how to be giving and loving and how to care about those around me. What great examples they are to me. And it's not just the people from work. I also was given a baby shower last week by my visiting teachers in the ward and many women from the ward came to it. It was really so nice of all of them to come. I received several absolutely adorable outfits and blankets and things, some of which were homemade. I also received a nice group gift of an infant swing, a carrier and diaper wipes. I even had someone make an adorable cake made out of rolled up diapers with ribbons and flowers all over it. SO cute! Everything I received was just what we needed for Emma and I am so grateful to all of the girls who came! It was so much fun!! See what wonderful people are surrounding me?? It was a great week last week and all of those baby things got me SO excited about the baby coming soon. This week has been really nice being off of work because I've been able to get the room organized and get baby stuff washed and ready to go. Nate even painted the room yesterday (mostly so the room looked nice and to help out his parents who've been wanting that room painted for a while). So we're almost ready to put all of the stuff back in the room and have it all ready for the baby. We bought a crib online and it should get here this coming Monday!! We already got the mattress and bedding in the mail for it so we're just waiting for that crib! I also had a doctor's appointment this week and the doctor said I'm dilated to a 4 1/2 so he said the baby could come any time, whenever she decides to "push the button." It could be today or it could be 2 or 3 weeks from now. We're hoping it's sooner than later because waiting is just really difficult...lol. I was all worried about her coming before I finished my last day of work and now I'm begging for her to come. So I guess we'll see! We know it's gotta happen some time so the waiting won't go on forever, even though it feels like that sometimes. :) In the mean time, I'm going to have to come up with projects to keep myself busy because long days not being at work, with Nate being gone, and with no car to use tend to get boring kind of fast. Hopefully our baby girl with come soon!

Pictures!

2009-07-05T18:29:00.000-07:00

Here are the pictures I meant to post on the last post. We haven't taken many since these ones, but we've been having fun testing out our new video camera! We're so excited that we've got one to record our precious baby girl when she comes. The camera came with a USB cable so that's how I'm putting these ones on here.

Ken Griffey, Jr. - Cool, but no great hits came out of him this game.

The foul ball we caught.

Mariners win! Yay! These next ones were just some random ones we had Valerie take for us a couple of Sundays ago. Had to get some good family and belly shots!

Also, since the last post, we've had some 4th of July fun with the family. In the morning we got up and went to the flag ceremony at Gram's stake center. She was being honored by the mayor of the city for her help in establishing this flag ceremony 50 years ago. It was pretty neat!

She got a certificate signed by Sam Reed, the Washington Secretary of State, and a flag that flew over the state capitol! What a great honor for her! Then we went home and bought our crib and things online so we're really excited to get that this week! Then Nate made homemade ice cream, homemade root beer, and a couple of dutch oven desserts (I helped a little with the desserts...lol) and we had a BBQ with the neighbors out in the coldesac. It was lots of fun and the food was great! That night Nate and I went over to a lake nearby and watched the fireworks display there. It was actually pretty good considering it was only put on by the city. It was really fun to get out, ride the shuttle bus, be with the crowds and enjoy the summer night! Hope everyone had a happy 4th!!

The Busy Month of June

2009-06-28T19:01:00.000-07:00

This month has been a busy one and it has just flown by! We did a lot of things and took some pictures too, but now we can't find the USB cable to put the pics on our computer....grrr...bummer! So sorry but no pics for this post. We'll have to post them once we find the cable....I know it's here somewhere! Anyways, this month we went to a Mariners game, birth prep classes every Tuesday night, celebrated Mama Jackson's birthday, Kaylee's graduation, and Father's Day, and we bought some fun baby stuff including the car seat and stroller, cute clothes, and a camcorder. We don't actually have the camcorder yet, but we're supposed to get it tomorrow from UPS. Nate is especially excited to get it all figured out before the baby comes. This little girl is going to be so spoiled with attention...I love it! I can totally see it too...we'll probably back down on camera time when other babies come and our kids will grow up jealous that Emma got the most camera time as a baby...lol. I guess we'll see how it all goes. The Mariners game was lots of fun. We got some pretty good seats through my work for an awesome price. I swear I have one of the best employers ever as far as benefits go sometimes. We were down on the first level at the top of the section behind the Mariners' dugout. The game was a good one because we won, but we also got to catch a foul ball! Nate and I have never gotten one before so we were pretty syked when it came right to us. One of the Minnesota Twins players hit it and it came over to our section. It bounced off of a guy's hands quite a few rows in front of us and then hit the cement in front of some empty chairs and bounced in the opposite direction right to Nate. Totally random! We decided Emma was our good luck charm. So it was a great game! Nobody hit any home runs though, but I guess we can live without that. :) The only bad part was that we were going to ride the train up to Seattle, but we just barely missed it. So we had to drive and park at extravagant prices, but oh well...what do you do? Our birth prep classes have been so nice for me and it makes Nate excited for the baby every time. I learned so much about what to expect at the hospital and how they do things there. I've also had a lot of questions answered about newborn care, breastfeeding, how labor works, and what my options are with pain management and anesthesia. I was seriously so uninformed before taking this class and now I feel so much better having some preparation for what is to come. How come sex ed never covered the stages of labor and how birth really works?? ...lol. Anyways, we have our last class this Tuesday and this one is going to be a tour of the new birth center at the hospital and then we will be learning breathing and relaxation techniques to cope with pain. Should be fun! As far as all of the celebrations, they were nice and we enjoyed the occasions and ate some good food. So our busy month of June is coming to a close soon and now we're going to be starting the last month of this pregnancy...yay!! We feel like we really don't have everything we need yet for the baby so we're not ready for her to come yet, but we also can't wait to see her and hold her in our arms. We've also been waiting to hear back on our offer that we made on a short sale home here in Covington. Our real estate agent told us last week that we should hear more tomorrow so we are really hoping we do! The house is supposed to go to auction on July 6th and the mortgage company that holds the loan has to get back with us before then. So here's hoping!! We would love all of the prayers and faith we can get too!! Most likely we won't be in a house, even if we get this one, before Emma's born so it'll be fun to add her to our already crowded room until we are able to move. Yay for the joys of transitions! It'll all work out I am sure, but I find that I am a worry wort about such things. Anyways, I'm really excited for July and all of the fun things we'll be doing then. We've got the 4th to look forward to, a baby shower put on by our ward, me quitting my job on July 10th, Harry Potter 6 coming out, and the possibility of the baby being born. I'm so excited!! Life is wonderful!

Remembering our family veterans...

2009-05-31T21:48:00.000-07:00

Just to set the record straight, it was me that snipped the blanket for Emma. Sure Amy did the sewing but I had to do the painstaking effort of cutting up the edges. This was a pure act of selfless love for Amy and Emma and resulted in some temporary nerve damage in my finger and thumbs. I had numb-thumbs for a few days. Oh and I set a record by doing it within 45 minutes. :-)

On the day before Memorial day, we went to visit the graves of my two grandfathers at the Tahoma National Cemetery. The weekend prior, we attended a ward service project to clean the headstones in this area. Fortunately most of the stones were still clean but the birds did get a few. It was neat to be able to clean these for the families of those that did so much to preserve our freedoms and liberty.

Grampee's headstone. We were able to see many other family members at the cemetery as well including Gramee, Jeff and Shirley, and Brad and Andrea. The weather was just absolutely perfect, which apparently is very rare for Memorial day in Washington.

Me trying to get Casey to walk.... He still prefers to crawl though.
We also stopped by Grandpa Jackson's grave and saw that other family had already visited. They left flowers and a balloon.

It was cool to see all the US flags lining the streets and next to every grave, especially with Mt Rainier as the backdrop. It invokes a sense of patriotism and solemn gratitude for the sacrifices made for each US citizen.

And of course for those of you wondering, this is a random side-profile of Amy to show how big the baby is getting! She's gi-normous!!

A Blanket for Emma

2009-05-22T20:13:00.000-07:00

I've finally completed the rag blanket for our sweet baby girl! The embroidered E took me the longest but I'm really happy with how it all turned out. I used purple and green instead of pink because she just seems like a purple and green girl. Once we have a room for her, those are the colors I want to use.

Our First Anniversary - Day 2

2009-05-09T20:50:00.000-07:00

Our second day turned out to be a beautiful sunny day, which is a rarity there in Forks. We stayed the Dew Drop Inn (which was quite nice and Nate and I very much enjoyed it!) and I loved what they had on their sign:

Across the street from our hotel was the Outfitters store. It was where Bella worked in the book. It really is the biggest store they have in town.
The night before, we got the Twilight sub at this Subway. We also saw some high school kids all dressed up for prom there and they were apparently having it at the Quileute tribal center that night! Nate and I thought it would have been great to crash the party, but we decided not to...lol. It was just ironic that we were there prom weekend because prom was the event at the end of the first two books.We left Forks that morning and headed back. On our way we stopped at Lake Crescent again to get more pictures and to take a short hike to Marymere Falls. Here are some pictures of the view driving there:

This was a little view spot we stopped at and learned that this lake is a glacial lake. It is apparently 624 or so feet deep in the middle. Deep lake!

Here are the pictures of the hike and the waterfall:

This was the creepy tunnel we had to go through that went under the road to continue the trail.

The trees were SO tall and really big around. The pictures don't do them justice. It was absolutely beautiful!

After the hike we headed into Port Angeles to get some pictures at the dock. We then had a little picnic that we brought with us and ate it on the benches there. It was a really nice day so there were a lot of teenage kids out doing stuff on the dock. There were definitely some interesting ones there and a cop even drove out onto the pier to stop some of them from riding their bikes in places they shouldn't...lol. We also walked around the little free marine aquarium they have. It was neat to see and even touch some of the sea animals (sea cucumbers, starfish, etc.). I thought it was so crazy that in 20 minutes we went from mountains and lakes to ocean and ships. Washington is great!

Those mountains in the distance below are actually Canadian mountains. The border is somewhere over the water. There's a ferry that goes from Port Angeles to Victoria in Canada quite often without needing a passport. Starting June 1 this year they will be requiring passports though.

This was my attempt at getting the "Welcome to Port Angeles" sign. It didn't work very well:These were my souvenirs. Yes I am a dork!
Our anniversary was really fun and it was so nice to be alone together and get away from the hustle and bustle of work and extended family. I can't believe it has been one year since we got married. It has all gone by so fast. I have been so blessed to be married to Nate. I love him with all of my heart and he loves me more than I know. I can't imagine my life without him. He is my best friend, lover, confidante, protector, provider, and spiritual leader. He is everything I could ever want and everything I need. I love you Nate!! We've had a great and eventful year together and we're so excited to be growing our family by one this year!

Our First Anniversary - Day 1

2009-05-09T19:37:00.000-07:00

For our first anniversary we decided to take a weekend trip to Forks, WA, home of the Twilight story. I'd been wanting to take this "tourist" trip for a while and we finally did it! It was Nate's present to me. Most of the trip was driving around the Olympic Peninsula and seeing all of the beauty there was to see.

This was at a park by Hood Canal. It was rainy and cloudy but still very pretty.

We also stopped at a famous local burger joint called Fat Smitty's. It's a really unique little place that has been there since right after World War II. Inside the walls are covered in dollar bills (some with messages), business cards, pictures, etc. There were a lot of random things on it, including this pass-a-long card I happened to notice on the wall behind me! It was great!

The ceiling was also covered with hanging one dollar bills. It's really a sight to see!

We decided to split their famous Fat Smitty Burger because it's really big. It was delicious!! It's costs 9.50 for a burger there. Crazy!! But people love it and keep coming back.
The sculptures outside were fun and we thought I had a resemblance to the Fat Smitty guy...lol.
We also saw some beautiful views as we were driving. I tried to get some good pictures of it and was somewhat successful some of the time. Nate's definitely better at taking pictures so the good ones are probably his.
This is Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park. It was incredibly beautiful and peaceful and water looked like untouched glass.
The road around it was pretty windy and if you've read the Twilight books, Edward drove these roads at 100 plus mph going back and forth from Port Angeles to Forks. Driving those roads made me think how scared Bella really would have been riding in that car!
This was the view as we approached La Push's First Beach on the Quileute Reservation. Breathtaking!
Here are pictures of the beach itself. I was in love with the view. How gorgeous!
Nate saw some dog prints and bare foot prints in the sand and called them the werewolf and vampire prints...lol. We had to take a picture of it!
The heart may be odd but it was still fun to make! And we had to add Emma to it too!
We started taking a hike to Second Beach but thought it was too long so we turned back and headed into Forks. The trees out there were huge and Nate is hiding in this one. :)
This is what you read as you cross the line into the reservation:
Yay we made it to Forks!!
They had lots of stores selling Twilight stuff but this one was dedicated to it.When we got there we took a drive around town to find the sites in the book. It took us all of 5 minutes to go around the town and find them. That's how small it is.
Forks High School:
The City Hall where Bella's dad Charlie worked:
Their tiny jail:
The hospital:
The vistior's center. I love the sign in the window!:
Bella's truck!
In the hotel we stayed in they named their one and only suite "Bella's Suite." It was great. We didn't see what it looked like but I had a feeling it wasn't much different from the room we had. Small town hotel you know?
This was the view from our room:
After the short tour of town, we got out the top layer of our wedding cake that we froze for the year and ate it for our first anniversary. It was still just as good as it was on our wedding day! We definitely had a top notch cake maker!

Gram's B-Day!

2009-04-04T18:52:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we celebrated Grammy Nye's birthday. She is a temple worker at the Seattle temple and for her birthday some of her kids and grandkids came to do a session at the temple with her. Then more family, including us, met up afterwards to go out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant. It was really fun! She is such a great lady and is definitely an amazing example for her family. Everyone loves her and she deserves every bit of that love. She is always so kind and generous to everybody and loves to be of service. I hope someday we can be like her! Love you Gram!

Gram with Chris and Katrina. Sorry I caught you with your eyes closed Chris!

Nice Craig....lol!

Iraqi Painting

2009-04-04T18:37:00.000-07:00

My brother Bruce joined the Army a few years ago to help him get through dental school. After he graduated, he had to serve his time and has been in Iraq as an Army dentist since May 3, 2008 (he was deployed the same day as our wedding). His wife and kids are living on a U.S. Army base in Germany and they'll be there for the next couple of years. Bruce will be done with his Iraq deployment in August this year and will be back with his family in Germany for the rest of his service time (hopefully). A few months ago he had me send him my favorite wedding photo and I had no clue why. A couple of weeks ago we found out! He had a half-blind Iraqi native paint a large oil painting of the picture we had sent him! It is beautiful!! We absolutely love it. I guess it's kind of like a belated wedding present from him since he wasn't able to come to the wedding. He was so thoughtful to have it done and we are so excited to have it displayed in our home, wherever that may be. It'll be a cherished family heirloom for sure!

"It" Becomes a "She"

2009-03-21T20:47:00.000-07:00

Well the big day came (after a long night of dreaming about finding out the gender of our baby) and the results are in. It's a girl!! We were actually kind of surprised at first because we had been referring to her as a boy and deep down that was what we were hoping for. After the initial shock, the news settled in and now we are so excited for a precious little girl. Nate is already protective of her modesty as the ultrasound picture of her girl parts was not allowed to be posted on the blog. :) I am just as happy as can be and have already started looking at everything girl for babies - carseats, strollers, clothes, room decor, etc. I've also been feeling her kick a lot lately and am just waiting for Nate to be able to feel it too. Every time I try to get him to feel it, she always stops. Nate says it's because she knows it's Daddy and knows he'll kick her back...lol. ;) I'm also feeling so much better. I believe I am in the "golden" stage of the pregnancy now and that makes me really happy! Now all we have to do is wait for the next big day...the birth!

Pretty Flowers

2009-03-17T21:12:00.001-07:00

Nate bought me some tulip bulbs in vases for Valentine's Day from Costco and we've had fun watching them grow over the last few weeks. Now they have bloomed and they are beautiful! I absolutely love how much beauty and brightness they bring to the home. A little bit of sunshine in the rain if you will. Enjoy!

John's Wedding and Family Fun

2009-03-11T20:29:00.000-07:00

So Nate and I were driving back to Clearfield from Provo on Saturday night when I realized that I had forgotten to bring the camera and didn't take ANY pictures of our fun little Utah trip. Sad day! Thankfully Mom took a few pictures the day of the wedding and sent me some. I've got to get in the habit of taking more pictures so we can look back on fond memories without simply relying on our memories. :) That being said, Nate and I had a great time in Utah. We got into Salt Lake on Wednesday night and waited for Joe's flight to arrive before heading to my parents' house. The next day was John's wedding at the Salt Lake Temple so we had to get up and get going. My parents left earlier because they had to be there earlier so my aunt Maurvene picked us up (or rather she came to the house and Nate drove us in her car). Christy and Ben left at the same time in their own car, which I didn't really notice. We got to about Kaysville and Farmington when I suddenly remembered that I didn't have my recommend with me. I panicked because we didn't have time to go back to the house. I thought maybe Christy was still at the house (silly me) and called her to see if she could grab it, but of course they were right behind us in the car...lol. I was freaking out because we came all this way to go to the wedding and I wasn't even going to be able to be there! I was really quite sad. Nate tried to reassure me that they'd be able to look me up on the system and verify me so I was hoping he was right. When we got to the temple, I ashamedly had to tell them I forgot my recommend and they sent me to speak with someone. Nate ended up being right (as always)...yay! So they verified me and I was able to attend the sealing. I was so glad because it was so wonderful! Afterwards, we all went outside for pictures.

It was chilly and a little windy, but the sun did end up coming out and I think John and Tricia were able to get some good pictures (at least when their photographer finally showed up late...can we say discount??). Tricia looked absolutely beautiful and I think John was literally beaming. It was such a happy day! Their daughters, Damia and Mikayla, looked completely adorable in their purple and black dresses.

While John and Tricia were getting the rest of their pictures taken, Mom and Dad took Nate and I to the Church Office Building to give us a small tour of where they work. It was neat to see and the view from their floor was amazing! We also got to see our old bishop from BYU and his wife, Brother and Sister Taylor. They are in the same mission as my parents and it was great to catch up with them.

Then we had to hurry back to the Joseph Smith Memorial Building for the luncheon. It was beautiful! And the food was honestly delectable. Yum!! We were so full afterwards, but of course we had to have a piece of their chocolate wedding cake. They also had candy in the middle of all of the tables, which I thought was a cool idea. We ate a bunch of that and took a bunch home.

It was then time to say goodbye to the newlyweds and wish them the best on their honeymoon to Ireland. How fun for them!! After we left, we were talking in the car about where the new couple would live and I asked where Tricia lived. Maurvene then goes, "Who's Tricia?" We said, "John's new wife!" and burst into laughter. It was awesome! Good old Maurvene. :) Then that evening Mom, Dad, Joe, VJ, Nate and I went to Fat Cats in Ogden to go bowling. Before we started, we watched some people do that iFly thing where a big fan blows air so fast you can fly in it like you're skydiving. It was so cool and funny to watch! How awesome! Someday...when I'm not pregnant and have money to burn...lol. The bowling was tons of fun and we just had a blast. The next day Joe, VJ, Brady and Brooke went snowboarding and Mom, Dad, Nate and I spent the day in Salt Lake. First we went to the Organ Recital at the tabernacle, which showcased Richard Eliott this time. That is one cool organ and Richard definitely knew how to play. It was awesome! Julia came to see it with us and then she left. We then decided to go to the Church History Museum, which amazingly I've never been to. We spent half the time parousing the store...lol. The museum was pretty intriguing and I learned quite a bit. Then we headed to the Gateway to watch Paul Blart: Mall Cop. It turned out to be cute and funny, but not an A+. It's worth seeing, but probably not more than once. When the movie was over, we met up with the snowboarders to eat dinner at Red Robin. Gotta love it! Nate was all excited when he saw there was a Burnin' Love burger that was supposed to be really spicy so he ordered that. Unfortunately it wasn't spicy enough for him, crazy guy. At least he got some spice out of it....lol. That night we played games and just hung out.

The next day both Joe and VJ had to leave so we took VJ to the airport first. Then Nate and I rented a car so we could go to Provo that night and then the rest of us went to the temple. We had a really special time there doing some family names. It's always nice to go together as a family too. After that, Nate and I drove down to Provo. First we stopped at Arctic Circle for lunch/dinner (yummy!) and then we finally went to Provo. As we drove to the south end of campus near where we both used to live, we noticed a big empty space and realized the Knight Mangum building was totally gone! It was so weird!! Now it's just a grass field with a sidewalk up to campus. Things change so fast at BYU! Anyways, we had fun at the bookstore and then went over to Nate's friend Rob's apartment. It was so good to see him and also so weird to be back in student housing with the honor code. I had to remind myself that I was married now and it was okay to use the bathroom at a guys' apartment..lol. We just played games and watched a little of the basketball game on TV. It brought back lots of memories. :) We also went to the creamery for some good old creamery ice cream. DELICIOUS! Rob seemed like he was doing really well and the night was great. We then drove back to my parents' house and then left for home the next morning. It was a wonderful vacation!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

2009-02-19T20:02:00.000-08:00

Nate and I had a great Valentine's Day this year. He pretty much let me choose what I wanted to do that day and that's what we did. We slept in and then got up to make pink heart-shaped pancakes with the rest of the family.

Mama Jackson also made heart-shaped cupcakes with Kaiya and we got to eat the yummy treats later. Then Nate went and dropped me off at the nail salon while he went to the church to practice the organ. I got to be pampered and got a spa manicure and pedicure. It was SO nice! I definitely needed that! After I was done, Nate needed more time to practice the organ so I went and paroused Petco and Payless. At Petco they were having dog races down the aisle and it was really fun to watch. The dogs were all shapes, sizes, and ages. They were all very cute! Petco is actually a really neat place. I had no idea they had a doggy treat bar with treats even I wanted to try...lol! I also watched the mice and birds do funny things in their cages. I guess I found a new fun place for me. I could've spent all day there! Simple mind, simple pleasures. :) Once Nate was finished practicing he came and picked me up so I could go home, shower, and get pretty. We decided we were going to go to a movie and dinner so we ended up going to see Twilight (the 2nd time for me and the 1st time for Nate). It was on at the $3 theater. I guess that is the $1 theater of the Seattle area (everything here is a bit more expensive). Still, $3 a person is a great deal compared to $10 a person at the regular theater. Yikes! After the movie, we went to the Cheesecake Factory because we had a gift card for the place. We definitely went at exactly the wrong day and time because we ended up waiting for over 2 hours before we even got seated...lol. That was really hard for me because I didn't bring any food with me and I get really sick and have really bad headaches if I don't eat every hour or two. Thankfully Nate had a couple of granola bars in the car so I was able to have something to tide me over. When we first got there the place was packed more than any restaurant I'd ever seen. I got in line to talk to the hostess and finally got our name on the list. She said to come back in an hour and a half to get a buzzer so while we were waiting, we walked over to the mall and had fun looking at books and listening to music in Borders. We then went back to get the buzzer and waited for another 30 or 40 minutes when it finally buzzed and we got seated (In the meantime we played our electronic Yahtzee game...lol). It was crazy!!! There was still a TON of people there all willing to wait like we did. I bet that restaurant had people there past midnight easy. So we ordered and got our food around 8 or a little after. We were starving and the food was amazing! We also couldn't resist and got a slice of dutch apple struesel cheescake to go. It was well after 9 by the time we got home. So the dinner part took a really long time but I felt like it was worth it. YUM!

And then like the tired pregnant lady I am, I went to bed very soon after we got home and ate our cheesecake. It was a great day though. We also had to include our baby in the day's plans so I had Papa Jackson take our picture so you can all see how I am starting to show...or just how fat I'm getting...lol.

On a side note, we got to hear the baby's heartbeat again today. It's such a surreal feeling to hear that fast thumping and I'm getting more and more excited every day! We get to find out the gender of the baby in just 4 weeks on March 19!!! Yay!! I'm so excited to start making blankets and decorations and to start getting baby supplies for our baby. I'm especially excited to narrow down the name selection. Names are really hard to pick out. I mean, we're choosing the name it'll be known by it's whole life! That's a lot of pressure! We can't wait to find out and we'll be telling everyone when we do!

2009-01-25T19:13:00.000-08:00

Hi, this is Nate again. It has been a long time since I have posted anything to the blog and now that I'm making the effort, I've got writer's block, so this post will be short. There is some sad news this week but also happy news.

I guess I'll relay the sad news first. On Wednesday night, our Meg was put to sleep. Over the past few months, she developed a weird tumor thing that hung from her belly. My dad took her to the vet to see what could be done. They said that if they removed it, she could potentially die from the resulting bleeding. Meg has also had some other health issues affecting her. She was an old dog and according to the vet, she would was the equivalent of being over a hundred years old (dog years for a dog her size). It was decided to put her down so that she wouldn't suffer through the rest of her life. My dad was with her when she passed on. He buried her in a peaceful location with a toy from Heidi and Kaiya. There are many fond memories that we have of Meg and it was a difficult decision to make. We miss Meg and look forward to when we see her again!

The good news: We went to the doctor's office on Thursday and got to hear our baby's heartbeat! It was cool to hear the steady, but quick thumping of the baby's heart. Amy is starting to have problems fitting into her pants.... basically she is starting to show that she is pregnant. :) We are enjoying following the progess of the baby's growth and Amy's pregnancy. Today, she didn't suffer from morning sickness as much so we are hoping that the worst of it is over.

Thursday night we attended ward temple night. We had a decent turnout - 21 people altogether. We ate dinner in the cafeteria and got to sit with President Skeem and his wife (Amy's aunt and uncle). It is always fun to see them in the temple. Dinner was good and the session was wonderful. Both Amy and I came away with new insights. I'll admit that after a long day at work, it was really hard to stay awake for the whole thing. It was peaceful, warm, and the perfect atmosphere for a nap. I was fighting to keep my eyes open for the first part and for the most part succeeded. I was always awake though. It is always nice to be able to escape the cares of the world for a couple hours.

Today, or should I say last night, the snow returned to Washington. We woke up to the ground covered with a quarter inch of snow. Fortunately the roads were clear and we were able to go to church. Tonight we may get some more snow but it shouldn't be that much. I'm just ready for summer already! :)

Christmas and a New Year with New Experiences!

2009-01-08T19:40:00.000-08:00

Happy Holidays to all! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. Ours turned out pretty good this year because our big present was the fact that I'm pregnant! Yay!!! We actually knew about it before Thanksgiving but wanted to wait and tell everyone in Christmas cards. It's actually pretty funny because while we were in Utah with my family, I was asked if I was pregnant yet and I actually had to lie and say I wasn't. :-p (Ben and Christy I hope you're not offended). For those first few weeks of pregnancy I was doing great and felt normal except for mild random cramping, which my doctor later told me was normal. Then in the beginning of December, the morning sickness hit, big time. And I've been sick ever since. I didn't go to work for almost a week when it first started (lots of vomiting and misery). Then, thankfully, I had my first doctor's appointment and was able to get a perscription for anti-nausea medication. It helped a lot and without it I throw up like crazy (as I found out last week when I ran out and didn't get the refill on time). With them I usually only throw up once or not at all and can get to work okay. I'm pretty nauseous all day long and feel like throwing up but haven't yet at work (I refuse to throw up at work!!). I've missed a few days here and there of work since I got the pills and they're being really patient with me. They've changed my start time to 10 am instead of 8:30 so I am able to take it slow in the morning and eat so I can feel better. I usually have to eat/snack all day long or I get really sick. I've tried every trick in the book (including wearing my acupressure bands 24/7) and though some things help temporarily, I'm back to being sick again really quickly. My guess is that it might be this bad because I have always had a weak stomach and am prone to motion sickness. I read in a pregnancy book that people like that are more likely to have worse nausea during pregnancy. Who knows, though. As for Nate, he has been such a trooper dealing with all of this. Poor guy has to deal with my demands for certain foods I feel like I can eat, my complaining, my moaning during the night, my commands for him to hold me and make me feel better, me telling him he stinks or that kissing makes me nauseous, etc. Honestly, it's kind of gotten to him and it's been hard for us both. We're both really hoping I get to feeling better soon, him for his sanity and me, well, so I'm not sick anymore and can feel normal! Needless to say, this sickness thing has taken over our lives and sometimes I have to force myself to think about the reason we're going through this in the first place: our baby! Mom and Dad sent us our first baby gift this past week. It was a pair of newborn baby booties and really helped me put this all in perspective. We are going to have a new little baby! It was really neat to see the baby's heartbeat on our first ultrasound too. It was unbelievable! It's still really hard to imagine my own baby, but I get thrilled when I think about it. Our little blob! (That's our nickname for it now) I've put the booties and the ultrasound picture right next to my bed so I look at it everyday. We already love our little blob, despite the misery we're going through. :)

So besides the pregnancy, we've had fun dealing with the crazy weather here. For a while we had a big snowstorm that made it really tough to get around (in Seattle they have hardly any snowplows, so roads are really bad). Work even closed early so people could venture home through the mess. Christmas was a white one, which for here is very rare. It was beautiful on all of the trees here. Christmas was nice just spending it here with Nate's family. We all got some fun things, nothing big, but lots of little fun things (DVDs, gift cards, clothes, tools, etc.). For New Year's we were housesitting at Nate's aunt and uncle's place so we got to spend it alone together, which was really nice. It's definitely been a holiday season to remember and we're really looking forward to having our baby, which is due on August 1st. That makes me almost 11 weeks along (a little over 1/4 of the way!!). We send our love to everyone and hope that everyone is doing well!!

Thanksgiving in Salt Lake

2008-12-10T14:25:00.000-08:00

This year Nate and I spent Thanksgiving with my family in Utah. It was great to be able to go back and see them after being in Washington for a while. I really missed them and it was so great to be with them again! We didn't go for very long, just 2 days, so that was hard but at least we had a good time for the amount of time we were there. Thanksgiving Day was great and we ate lots of good food! We had it over at the church by Mom and Dad's place in the Young Women's room. Nate made rolls there at the church and I made a cherry pie. Our contributions were pretty small compared to Ben's delicious dutch oven food and all the salads and sides people brought, but it was all so yummy! We had a pretty big group, about 30 people (including children) so we had a lot of fun just talking and eating. We also got to meet my brother John's fiance Trisha. She is so cute and so nice and think they make a great couple! Her little girl was so adorable too. I'm so happy for him and it'll be fun to have a couple of additions to our family! Then after dinner we all went back to the house. Some people napped while others of us played games and still others just kept eating pie and goodies. The hit game of the day was Apples to Apples. I have to say that I've never played it quite like the way my family played it that day. Some people were new to the game and others weren't, but I couldn't believe how SLOW we played it! It was just so funny to see how long it took people to decide which card to choose. I've discovered that most people in my family take everything very literally, especially when it comes to definitions of words. Nate and I were used to playing it a lot faster and less literal with his family, so while other people took their time deciding, we went to the kitchen to eat goodies...lol. But it was still pretty fun. We are sad to say that we forgot to take ANY pictures on Thanksgiving so we have no visual reminders of how it was. :( At least we remembered the camera the next day at Temple Square. That day was kind of uneventful, but we got to see Tia and Deren and their family and went to the mall together. When we came back we had pizza for dinner and then headed to Salt Lake to see the lights on Temple Square. It was the first night for the lights to be on so it was a little crowded (and cold!), but SO beautiful! Nate got some good shots of the lights and temple. There's just something about being around the temple and all of those beautiful Christmas lights. The Spirit really is present there and depsite the cold, you feel all warm inside when you're there. It was fun to walk around with everyone and the little kids.

After perusing through the lights, we decided we wanted to get warm and eat a treat so we headed to the basement of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. I had no idea there were vending machines and tables down there. It was awesome! They even had BYU creamery milk so we HAD to get a chocolate milk. It was delicious!! I also got some donuts to have with it, but my hand got stuck in the flap...lol. The donuts and chocolate milk reminded me of my freshman year at BYU. That was my staple for breakfast almost every day that year. No wonder I gained the freshman 15...lol.

That wasn't the only problem we had with the machines either. My dad went to buy an ice cream treat and it got stuck. So he decided to buy another one and the first one came out but the second one got stuck too! We thought about calling the service people, but decided to try one more time. So six bucks later, he bought a third one and this time shook it as it was being vended and they both came out. Yay! Except then we were stuck with 3 ice cream treats and we couldn't take them in the car because they would melt. So even though we were full we got them all eaten. What really cracked me up was that after all of that, we went home and my dad had a bowl of ice cream...haha! I love it!

Payton had fun making faces for the camera and Nate and I had fun teasing her by kissing in front of her everytime she told us not to. She's so fun to tease. :) On our way home we stopped by Wal-Mart to get a Christmas movie, but their selection was so slim!! Of course, it was Black Friday so that's probably why so many movies were gone. Luckily I found Elf somewhere towards the checkout lines so my parents got it and we went home and watched it. The next day we flew back home. Lots of fun in Utah!

My 27th Birthday!

2008-11-16T21:02:00.000-08:00

Well, I admit that it hasn't really sunk in yet. I feel younger in my head than my body feels and than I actually am. So anyway here is the scoop on my birthday.

First thing in the morning, Amy woke me up a few times because she was having nightmares about the following not going according to plan. Then she brought me a delicious breakfast which started off everything.

Breakfast included eggs, bacon, pancakes, and the following note:

"Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! I've got someting fun instore to do. Are you ready for some clues? Today we are going on a treasure hunt for presents you won't want to punt. Hope you enjoy the fun without delay, For today is your 27th Birthday!"

Clue #1

"As soon as you are ready to go, Head for the place where we sit in the front row. A place of worship, a place of love, Where our faith & testimonies can grow."

So we went to the church where I got this present (organ music books). WHOO HOOOO! New music!!! I love new music!

and the next clue:

Clue #2

"Now that you've found some music to play, Perhaps you should see where we're going next today. Go to the place you first went to school, The place where you did a project as a scout so cool"

Being at my elementary school brought back a lot of memories. It was fun to see the changes since I'd last been there.

Clue #3

"Congrats! you've made it this far. Now it's time to go back to the car. Drive to your next place of learning, Where your tush & legs would get some burning."

We had to avoid the girls practicing soccer and find the clue taped to the building near the track at my Jr high school.

Clue #4

"After you take a couple of laps, Follow the included two maps. They lead to a place you'd go when mad, the best little hideout you ever had."

This hideout of course was in the backyard at home.

Clue #5

"Are you getting tired yet? I hope not because now we've got to jet. It's off to your best man's house we go. To get your next clue, an answer to a question you must know."

We went to the Waisath's house where I found the next clue.

Clue #6

"Q: What's big and blue and goes all over? [Ans: my car] Great job! You're a winner! The number of clues are getting thinner. If you look in your glove box, you'll find some music that rocks!"

The music was the CD from last year's MoTab concert with the King Singers. I highly recommend it. :) Oh and incidentally, fortunately I was on the phone with Amy's mom, who provided the answer to the clue. I never would have gotten the car because I was thinking really big... like the sky... ocean... etc.

Clue #7

"Jing jing jing jing jing jing jing. Now as we listen to MoTab sing, Let's get ourselves going to Federal Way. Best Buy awaits you there, OK?"

We spent some time just looking around in Best Buy to see what cool things they were selling.

Clue #8

"While you're looking for something you want, You'll be looking for letters in font, Follow the puzzle below, and the place we're going for dinner you'll know."

So I made Amy squirm when I figured out the puzzle in record time and it really bugged her that I figured out the answer without even knowing all the words in the puzzle. We were going to Panda Express...

Clue #9

"Chinese food is really good, Just as Panda said it would. Here he is to say 'Skadoosh!' Let's go home with a woosh!"

There was also a gift I got from Amy here--- the "Kung Fu Panda" DVD. The funny thing was that at Panda Express, I got a fortune in the fortune cookie that said "A pleasant surprise is in store for you." So we went home and then to my pleasant surprise, my family was there to sing happy birthday to me (except Kaylee who doesn't like to be around us). My cake was amazing and the smoke filled air didn't kill anyone, or set off the smoke detectors.

Thanks to everyone for all the birthday wishes! I had a wonderful birthday.

Fun Halloween Week!

2008-11-01T16:31:00.000-07:00

Guys' Hunting Trip

The fun week started with a hunting trip for the boys. Nate, his dad, and Landis left really early in the morning last Saturday with the dogs for Ellensburg, WA up in the mountains. While they were gone, Valerie and I went shopping (tee hee!). We checked out the grand opening of the new Costco here and did a bunch of other little errands. We walked around the Kent Station mall and had lunch at Panera Bread. It was a lot of fun! It was nice to get some girl time in while the boys were having their boy time. I will let Nate tell about the hunting trip:

It was a good long walk. The dogs were so excited they couldn't control themselves and couldn't be controlled. Kia scared up two pheasants and they were too far ahead of us to get a shot off. My dad shot once and missed. I went through another grassy area with the dogs and scared up two pheasants and they flew back towards my dad and Landis. I nicked one but couldn't find it. I think it hit the ground and ran. So we walked across the field trying to scare more up, but couldn't find any more. Meg got thirsty and decided to go down to the canal for a drink. She got down there and couldn't stop because it was steep and ran right into the water. It was too steep for her to come back up so I had to rescue her. She cried all the way back to the car because she was tired and sore. We got back to the car, ate some goodies, and came home tired and empty-handed. These are some of the pictures I took on the way, during the hunt, and back at the car afterwards.

Trunk or Treat

This year for Halloween we decided to reuse the costumes we spent so much money on last year (yay for thriftiness!). Nate was a pirate and I was Elizabeth Swan. We wore our costumes to the ward Trunk or Treat last Saturday and decorated our trunk with lots of fun pirate stuff, courtesy of Stacey and Landis (thanks guys!). We put the candy in a treasure chest and called it our treasure and we even put out a "plank" for the kids to walk in order to get their candy. Nate was a very mean and scary pirate (that smiled a lot...lol) and I tried to get my British accent on. It was fun!

Stacey, Landis, Heidi, and Cirdan and their kids came to visit us. They had such cute costumes! Check out Heidi's blog for more pics of that. The kids made bank on the activity because they continued to go around the row of cars over and over until all of the candy was gone. That's the way to trick or treat!

Casey's Baby Blessing

Last Sunday lots of family came over for Casey's baby blessing (Nate's sister Stacey's baby). The blessing was so precious and it was a happy time for everybody. There was a lot of goodies to eat and it was nice to visit with family members. Casey was so cute in his little white outfit!

Nathan in the kitchen, where he tends to be most of the time, making and serving hot cider for everyone. Yum!

Halloween at Work and Home

My work decided to let us have lots of fun for Halloween. They let us wear our costumes to work and had us bring in pumpkins that we carved for the pumpkin carving contest. This is the table of all the pumpkins that were entered. Can you guess which one's mine? Okay, okay I'll tell you. It's the weird one on the very left.

This is the full picture of my wormy pumpkin. I got the idea from the internet and decided last minute Thursday night that I would do it. I had to do it all really fast but after the customer and employee votes, I won scariest pumpkin!

I had to take a picture of the Wilson pumpkin because it just made me laugh. It was a lot of fun and everybody went all out with their costumes. Here are some other girls from work that had similar costumes to mine (princess/royalty type). I love playing dress up!

Then when I got home we had corn dogs and french fries (fried at home) for dinner and then made donuts and homemade root beer. YUMMY!

It was SO good! I think I can see the donuts piling up on my love handles...lol. There weren't a lot of trick-or-treaters so we were able to just chill and watch TV for the rest of the night. What a fun Halloween week!!

October Update

2008-10-21T13:46:00.000-07:00

I can't believe how time flies and that it's already been a month since we last posted! I'm kind of kicking myself for not doing this sooner because I think I've forgotten some of the things we've done. If I find I did forget something, I guess we'll post it later. We've been living in Washington now for 3 months. It's been wonderful to be here with Nate's family and we're really grateful for their kindness and hospitality. We're still not sure when we'll have a place of our own, but both of our jobs are stable and we're saving up money and for that we are very grateful. Okay so here are some of the things we've done in the past month:

*We went to Nate's cousin's wedding reception at the Woodland Park Zoo. It was really different but very cool. The reception was all set up in the exhibit for the grizzly bear and the river otters. Even though it was dark outside, the grizzly bear was still up and playing in the water that we could see through the glass. The bear literally came right up next to the glass! It was huge!! Kind of scary at night thinking it was just a window pane away from us. Anyways, the reception was nice and it was good to see some family.

*Nate and I were asked to speak on "leading by example" at church the week or two before Conference (can't remember which one). Two talks in one year is enough for me...lol. I guess that's what happens though when you keep moving into different wards. The talks went well, despite the fact that we each only had 5 minutes since there was a lot of ward business and the last speaker was a missionary leaving on his mission.

*Over General Conference weekend (which was amazing!!) we went to Nate's grandma's house with a bunch of the extended family to watch it. In between sessions on Saturday we went to Salmon Days, a fair in Issaquah. It's a huge flea market with food, vendors, and bands playing, all celebrating the salmon coming back up stream to mate and lay their eggs. They have a big facility that regulates the fish and you can see them through the glass around the bins going up the fish ladder. It was really cool to see! I've never seen that before so it was a neat experience.

*Nate and I were also finally given callings in our ward here. Nate is Ward Organist..surprise, surprise, and he's been doing wonderful at it! Honestly he is so very talented and it brings a great spirit to the meetings!! I was called as the Sunday School teacher for the 12-14 year olds. My first teaching calling! I am loving it so far, but have found that it's very hard to teach exactly the way I picture it in my head, especially with a bunch of chatty teens. It'll be a great learning experience for me for sure.

*Last Saturday we went to my cousin Kyan Skeem's wedding at the Seattle Temple. It was so beautiful! It was my first time attending a sealing at the temple other than my own. It was also so very great to see all of my cousins that I haven't seen for years! I couldn't remember anyone's names but I was so happy to be around family at the temple. I also was able to see Galen and Anita's offices at the temple. That was a great experience too.

*This Saturday is our wards Trunk or Treat and Nate and I are planning on dressing up like pirates and decorating our car that way. Nate's been trying to figure out how to build an air cannon that we can put dry ice in and have it blast out puffs of "smoke." It's going to be so good!

Anyways, that's about it so far. We've mostly just been working and doing family stuff or church stuff. I will try to be better at keeping up and hopefully I have pictures on the next post!

Birthday Fun!

2008-09-22T19:04:00.000-07:00

Nate is great!! Last weekend was my birthday and he made it so nice for me. On Saturday we went out to eat at Applebees and watched a movie at home.

Then Sunday he made me breakfast in the morning (waffles, eggs, bacon, the whole deal). YUM!! Nate's Mom also got me my favorite cereal because I had mentioned it one day...too cute! That evening he put together a family party for me and made a really nice dinner that I had wanted for a while. We had pork chops baked in apple pie filling and stuffing, curried butternut squash soup in bread bowls that Nate made, and boiled red potatoes. It was soooo good.

We then had a Wii tournament playing Mario Party 8 and Wii Sports. So much fun! We also had fun just kicking back with family and enjoying each other.

Nate also bought me a giant chocolate cake that was SOO rich and completely mouthwatering. He definitely knows what I like. :) AND he bought me a purse that I had wanted and took me to Phantom just a couple days before. Isn't Nate just the greatest?? I love him! Thanks to everyone who came too and for their really nice presents!! And to Heidi for letting us come to her house...and to everyone who helped out! I loved it!!

Phantom!!!

2008-09-14T14:40:00.000-07:00

This past Thursday Nate and I and a bunch of the family went to see Phantom of the Opera at the Paramount in Seattle. The show was amazing!! I was really impressed with all of the cast, but most especially the guy who played the Phantom. His voice was absolutely perfect. I couldn't get enough of it. Broadway is awesome! The set and stage tricks were so cool and really fun to watch! We all loved it and I'm so lucky to have a husband that likes to go to things like that and is willing to take me. :) Here are a few pics:

The Paramount theater as we drove by when we got there.

A picture of us inside the theater in our seats. I guess the building is copyrighted so we weren't supposed to take pictures anywhere inside..but we got out with this picture...lol.

Outside afterwards. Love the lights!!

Catching up....

2008-09-07T18:55:00.000-07:00

As some of you have noticed, we haven't really kept the blog up-to-date lately. Now, we get to play catch-up. :-)

Seafair

After a week of watching the Blue Angels during my lunch break, Amy and I went down to lake washington to watch the performance. It was a perspective that I had never seen before (I usually saw it from Boeing field) and lucky for me, my camera battery lasted long enough to get these shots. Before the Blue Angels performed, there was an a10 warthog and a Coast Guard helicopter among other planes.

Mt. Rainier

A few weekends ago, we went up to Mt. Rainier to go on a hike and so Amy could get a good close-up of the mountain. We started from Sunrise and did the hike to the Mt. Fremont lookout and it took a few hours. Here are some of the pictures:

This is Amy at the beginning of the trail at Sunrise. In the picture below, you can see the path we took out to the lookout point. This was after the intense steep part of the trail. The lookout is the little dot at the tip of the mountain.

Finally we made it!!! Lucky for us, there was a gazillion mosquitoes that made it too so we weren't able to stay long. Even with bug spray they were still annoying. Before leaving, we got this picture. Unfortunately the big chipmunk that was at the lookout didn't want to be in the picture. Lucky for us, Amy wanted to be in the picture? :)

Since we had to look at a car before going on the hike, we didn't start until around 12:30. By that time, it was 1,245 degrees. Ok so maybe only around 85 degrees but it was hot! The bag that I was carrying left a good sweat mark on my back:

Amy thought that it looked like a face. It was a fun trip and a good hike. Despite wearing SPF 50 sunblock, Amy got a sunburn which is still visible 3 weeks later.

2008-08-26T19:49:00.000-07:00

I liked Stacey's idea of putting this in her blog so I decided I wanted to do it too. This one is mine. I think it fits almost perfectly.

You Have A Type A- Personality

You are one of the most balanced people around

Motivated and focused, you are good at getting what you want

You rule at success, but success doesn't rule you.

When it's playtime, you really know how to kick back

Whether it's hanging out with friends or doing something you love!

You live life to the fullest - incorporating the best of both worlds

Do You Have a Type A Personality?

And this is Nate's.

You Have A Type A- Personality

Do You Have a Type A Personality?

I was so surprised that apparently it's exactly the same! I really don't think so because we're way different in a lot of ways. But I guess we're a lot alike too...lol.

The Neighborhood

2008-08-13T15:30:00.000-07:00

Just thought I would post a few pics of the surroundings here (they're beautiful!). The first three are of an old cemetery by the house we were housesitting over the weekend. We went for a run with their dog Daisy around the lake and I saw this and had to take pictures. So pretty! And for those Twilight fans, can't you just see Bella, Edward, and the Cullens standing there ready to best some bad vampires?

This is Wes and Deb's house where we stayed over the weekend. It's a really nice house with a log cabin feel.

Nate's neighborhood.

A view from the front of Nate's parents' house.

Nate's parents' house (our home for a little while).

Update from Washington

2008-08-07T11:15:00.000-07:00

Sorry that it's been a little while since our last post. I kept feeling like there was nothing to post about until the days added up and I found there was a lot to post about!...lol. Nate's been at his job now for about two weeks and so far I think he's liking it. He says they have him doing a lot of busy work for now, but I'm sure things will speed up soon enough. They've already assigned him to be the facilitator at one of their important meetings. So they aren't hesitating to use him. I think the only thing he doesn't like at this point is the commute, not that it's necessarily horribly far away, but the traffic gets really annoying and makes it long. Guess you've just got to pick and choose your battles. As for me, I've finally got a job! Yay! I was getting worried because I wasn't being contacted by anyone for an interview and I was really depressed about it. Then I randomly saw this job for a teller position at First Savings Bank Northwest in Renton and they contacted me like an hour after I emailed the resume in. I interviewed with them they decided they really wanted me. There were so many good things about the job that outweighed the bad that I couldn't turn it down. Bad parts were that I still don't have my own car and Renton is 30 min away in good traffic, 45 min. in bad traffic. But I guess that's really all that's bad about it. They are a one branch bank in Renton that's been there for 85 years. They don't have as much stress and strain as the bigger banks do so it'll be more stable and it's growing. It's a very nice looking bank and everyone there has been so nice to me. They said they actually have a carpool going from Covington (where we live right now!) to the branch so I could use that until we get another car. They're starting me at a pay that I was so happy to get. It was better than any other teller job out there, including the big banks (Bank of America called me for an interview but they were set at $10/hr...cheapos!). I'm really excited about the job. It's 9-5 M-Th and 9-6 on Fridays. No Saturdays or Sundays and off on federal holidays. Yay!! I start on the 15th. Okay I'm babbling on too much about this. I have a lot of time on my hands because right now I'm house-sitting for Nate's uncle and aunt (Wes and Deb). They are such nice people and their house is so nice. They have three dogs (two of them are very similar to two of Nate's dogs and so I keep messing up their names - they are the same kind of dogs and came from the same litter of puppies). So I'm taking care of them and watering the plants, getting the mail, etc. They've been good so far and it's kind of nice in this solitude. Nate gets home in the afternoon and it'll be nice to have a place to ourselves for a bit. I also got the book Breaking Dawn on Monday. I normally would have a book like that finished in like a day or two but I've been trying to savor it bit by bit since it's the last book of the series. It's SOOOO good! I love it!!! I think Stephenie Meyer has the coolest imagination ever and is a romantic at heart just like me. I've also been saving it so that I can read most of it while I'm here alone. I've been reading all morning so I'm just taking a break to update the blog...then I'll be right back to it...lol. Well things are going great, despite the ups and downs of regular life. I'm really loving Washington so far. It's so beautiful here! And it's SO cool to be reading the Twilight series in this atmosphere, if you know what I mean. It's like I'm so close to seeing the story open up right before my eyes. I am beginning to feel the small pull of being away from family and from where I was comfortable though. I don't feel home quite yet, but maybe once we get our own place I will start to feel that way. I'm glad Nate's sisters are all close by. It's fun playing with their kids and holding babies again. That helps me feel more at home in a weird way. Babies have that comforting effect I guess. We all got together this past Sunday for Stacey's birthday. It was so much fun! We went to Heidi's house and had a BBQ and had ice cream cake (her favorite) for dessert. It was nice to just relax with the family. We just hope it made Stacey happy! Other than those kinds of things I've been pretty domestic just doing laundry, ironing Nate's shirts for work, looking for a car, making breakfast and lunch for Nate. Just trying to stay busy. I think I may look for an opportunity to sing in choir somehow here...yeah there's ward choir, but I'm thinking something more professional than that. I don't know. I might also do a couple piano lessons on the side. We'll see. Anyways, first thing is to find a car so I can get to work...lol. Wish me luck!

Parties, Lakes, and Moving

2008-07-25T18:52:00.000-07:00

So these past two weeks have been crazily busy but oh so much fun. We've had some big changes happen and so far they've been good. Last Sunday my family threw us a party, along with celebrating some birthdays in the family, including my Dad's, at Cody and Jayla's house. We had a killer meal - Jayla you're awesome! - and played lots of fun games. First we played some rousing rounds of Washers (a game that Jayla's family came up with).

Then the kids started a water fight and obviously lost.

After that we played kick the can with everyone once it got dark. It was a blast!! Then on Tuesday, with the help of Mom, Dad, Joe, and Caleb, we got all packed up in our moving truck and headed to my parents' house. We got the rest of my stuff packed up there and the next day we took the long drive to Washington. Nate drove the moving truck (and spent about $300 in gas on that thing) and I drove his car - yes, Nate let me, although I guess he didn't really have a choice..lol. It was a really long drive but we made it. When we got here, his family had a little homecoming party with dinner and a cake and everything. There were even decorations! So cute! The next day we unpacked the truck, packed the car, and headed out to Lake Chelan with the family. Nate's aunt and uncle own a house in Chelan only a few blocks from the beach so that's where we stayed. It was sooo much fun! We played games, swam, rode on the jet ski that Landis brought, ate a ton of food, and slept out on the deck. Lots of fun in the sun! Here are a few pics:

The guys getting on the jet ski to take Cirdan out for a crazy ride on the tube:

Nate and Kaiya playing the Wii:

Nate and Kaiya swimming - the water was so clear!

Nate ruined about a shirt a day out there so here is shirt number four. I told him I get 4 new shirts for every shirt he ruined. :)

Lounging around

Holding Stacey and Landis' precious little boy Casey!

Jumping off the pole! It was so scary and took me forever to stand up but I did it! The jumping was the fun part.

The only time I can pick Nate up :)

Nate batting the bees away...crazy boy. Notice I stayed inside.

Nate also started his new job today at Boeing. It was just orientation so he still doesn't quite know what he'll be doing, but it should be fun for him to learn something new. We'll see how his first week goes next week! I'm still looking for a job so I'm just trying to organize our stuff for the time being. Lots of fun!

Finally!

2008-07-11T08:39:00.001-07:00

Yesterday and today were the day of "finally!" Finally it was Amy's last day at work. Finally we got the wedding pictures from our photographer last night. Finally today is my last day at Novell and finally we are using that card I have had for the last year to Cafe Rio that let's us get an entree free after just buying one more! I bet Amy is saying "Finally we are going out to eat!!!" I won't have to talk to annoying, whining, complaining customers finally. I won't have to answer the pager calls at inconvenient times finally. I'll be free for a week, finally! Finally, we are going to get out of Utah finally!

Fourth of July!!

2008-07-05T14:59:00.000-07:00

In the morning, we went to the Colonial Days festival in Provo. There were many actors and artisans dressed in the garb of the colonial era. They demonstrated how things were done back then such as basketweaving, blacksmith-ing, candle making, writing styles, speaking, etc... the best demostration was the firing of the muskets which made a few kids cry.

We also got to see many original documents dated from that period with the signatures of our founding fathers and other important men like Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, John Hancock, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Abraham Lincoln.

Then we wandered through the printing museum where they have the most complete and only working Gutenburg press in the world. They demonstrated how printing is done using the press. Amy and I got our name made in metal type for a donation of $2 to the museum.

After all this excitement, we went to watch the Stadium of Fire yesterday. We staked out a spot by the new Hinckley building and waited for her parents to come and meet us there. Her mom brought us dinner: a delicious taco salad which we ate across the street in the shade of some trees. I was amazed at the amount of construction that has happened since I was going to school. They have expanded the Cannon center, Tanner building, and built a parking garage as well! Anyway, we played some games and then got ready for the show. To start, they had some jumpers-- 6 of them-- parachute into the stadium.

(Those two specks are people)

Then we got to play the waiting game (and Phase 10) for the next two hours. Rob and one of his friends came to join us. And then came the best part of the night: The Fireworks!!!

I'm going to have to cut part of the other file with the finale in it. It's too big to post to the blog right now :-)

Fabulous banana splits

2008-06-29T20:10:00.000-07:00

This past weekend I told Nate to get stuff for banana splits because I had invited my friend Shari and her boyfriend over to hangout and play games. We had tons of fun with them playing wiffle ball in the park and playing our Pirates of the Caribbean DVD Treasure Hunt game. After we played, we had banana splits and then they headed home. Well now that we have stuff for banana splits, we've had one every day since. Not so good for our butts and bellies, but oh so good for our tastebuds! Nate went crazy on this one yesterday and we had to take a picture of it. Yum!

This is a picture of the baby bird that happened to be right outside our front door two nights ago. We were watching a movie on TV, kind of a suspenseful one, and I heard strange noises coming from outside. It was like a plop and a high pitched screech. I told Nate the mute the TV and we opened the door and found the little thing just sitting there, almost looking dead. We also saw a cat just about to pounce. Nate scared it away for while so we watched the bird just hop around (it couldn't fly yet). It was so sad! We had seen a nest of baby birds in the tree close by so we figured it was from that. I guess it got kicked out or something. Well anyways, we decided to let it be and went back to our movie, but I kept peeking out the window at it. We saw the cat come back again and I, yes I, decided to let nature take its course. We totally saw the whole thing and watched the cat carry the baby bird away in its mouth screeching for help. It was sad, but oh so cool to watch - yes I know it's bit morbid. Too bad we didn't get a picture of that.

The last things I'll share that we did this weekend was the Patriotic Service at the Marriott Center at BYU tonight. It's part of the events of the Freedom Festival in Provo. It was amazing! Glenn Beck was the keynote speaker and Michael Ballum sang. There was also a brass band that was awesome that was made up of mostly BYU faculty. Seriously, it made me realize that there is something we can do as a people to make America strong and to fix the problems we are seeing. Glenn Beck used the words of the hymn "Come, Come Ye Saints" to parallel our journey, and at times fight, to keep the wonderful freedoms and blessings we have. They were words of hope. America isn't a failure yet and there is so much we can do to make sure that doesn't happen. Right now my brother is part of that in a specific way. He's over in Kuwait or somewhere close serving as a dentist for the army. He'll be there for a while. His little contribution, when combined with the little contributions of others, makes one big, unbeatable contribution. That is why we must keep contributing. Vote for those things and people we know to be right and good. It is our right and blessing to do so. Help out, speak out in our communities. Be a part of celebrating freedom. I love it! We are so blessed! And we can keep it that way if we humble ourselves, remember that God is our Father and leader, and adhere to the gospel principles and family values that we know to be true. God bless America, my home sweet home!

Weekend of adventure

2008-06-22T14:45:00.000-07:00

Ok so it wasn't that adventuresome but I had a hard time trying to come up with a different title. Yesterday we had a father's day activity with Amy's parents in Salt Lake City at the Gateway mall. We were running a little late so we rushed to find a parking spot. Of course I had to hit every red light and then drove around in circles to try to find a spot in the parking garage. Eventually there was parking available on the bottom floor (3 stories under ground). Then the elevator was acting broken (it was just sitting there with the doors open making the 'warning' sound) so we opted to take the stairs. We made it into the theater several minutes after the movie was supposed to start and met Phil out front. We then had to find the right room. Fortunately for us, the show started right as we sat in our seats so no previews for us!! One thing that was cool with the theater was that they had assigned seating-- but you could choose your seats on a screen and get tickets for those seats. Kung-Fu Panda was just as good the second time around!

After the movie, we went to the California Pizza Kitchen to do some eating. And eat we did! Everybody got pizza, except for me... I got the BBQ chicken salad. Amy and I split the pizza and salad. It was all pretty good. We got some of the details of mom and dad's mission and they seemed to be loving it! After leaving the restaurant, we ran into Dennis, the caterer at our wedding reception! It was good to see him again too.

Everybody piled into my car and we had fun going around in circles again trying to find mom and dad's car. We searched the entire garage (literally) before finding it on an aisle that I had skipped before (they thought it was on a different floor). So that was pretty funny!!

Amy and I then came home so I could write my talk for today. Amy had already written hers and was bored so I kicked her out and told her to go to the mall so that I could write mine in peace. :-) Ok, so she wanted to go to the mall anyway but I got a lot done when she was gone. I put the finishing touches on it this morning and then printed out hers and mine.

Amy got really nervous and nearly pooped her pants before she gave her talk. (j/k -- Amy told me to write that) Its a good thing she didn't though because that would have been a really crappy talk. She did well and then I gave my talk. She says that I did amazing but that is only because I'm really turning her on right now (she told me to write that too). We're just glad that it is over and we don't have to worry about it anymore. We do have to worry about a musical number though coming up in July.

Still waiting....

2008-06-17T16:48:00.000-07:00

We still are waiting for our wedding pictures from our photographer. Amy has left numerous messages on his answering machine which have gone unanswered. Maybe we need to either pay him a visit or just get our money back...

Happy Father's Day!

2008-06-15T18:09:00.000-07:00

Here we post a tribute to our fathers. Our dads have been so wonderful to us throughout the years. They have fed us, clothed us, gotten mad at us, and taught us life long lessons. They slaved through our homework...oh I mean helped us with our homework. They have even willfully paid for us to do all the things we wanted to do (i.e. movies, theme parks, vacations, mini golf, etc.) Here's to you fathers!! Thanks for all you've done!!

Amy's favorite memories about her dad:

I loved the time we went on a road trip through Arizona and saw all the places my dad grew up. It was really cool to see the schools he went to and the house he lived in. It really helped me get to know my dad a little better. I absolutely loved road trips with my dad. He would always let us eat junk food in the car and we played a lot of fun games as well as read a lot of good books together as a family. Dad's a great dramatic reader and it was always fun to listen to him read. Dad was also always so great for doing most of the driving, even though it was miserable for him. I also loved the traditions we had for Christmas, doing the 12 Days of Christmas for other people and Dad making his fudge. I loved our family Christmas programs too! Another thing I remember about Dad is that he was the best cheerleader I ever had. Thanks for always being there!! Love you Dad!

Nate's favorite memories about his dad:

When I was younger, my dad and I would always go fishing on the first day of the fishing season. We would wake up (I would wake up at 4am like he told me to and he would get up at 6) and then load the boat up and go to one of the lakes in the area. It was always quiet, dark, and cold. We would usually stop to get some worms for fishing and some doughnuts/juice for breakfast. Then we would get the boat in the water and start fishing. I was always the one to catch the first fish (and the most fish). My dad would pretend he was happy, but I knew he was jealous.... so I rubbed it in as much as I could.

As a side note, today was Nate's first day to play the organ for the congregation as ward organist. He blew the place out of the water...lol. The closing hymn was "God of Our Fathers, Whose Almighty Hand" and by the last verse Nate had pulled all the stops and changed a few of the chords to more dramatic ones. It was intense and we all sang like it too. The Spirit was really strong. It was awesome! The bishopric turned around to him afterwards and were just showering him with compliments. A lot of the congregation did too. It was so much fun! Also, I got to be primary pianist today and they threw a bunch of new songs at me so I was practically sight reading the whole time. That was also a lot of fun...lol. Then we came home, ate pizza, and then had some apple pie with whipped topping that Nate wanted so badly. Good day!

Skadoooosh!

2008-06-09T08:12:00.001-07:00

Amy and I went to "Kung Fu Panda" on Saturday. It is a funny movie and very well done. Before the movie started, Amy and I were listening in on the conversations of the families around us. The theater was packed with kids! Some of the things we heard were:

"Dad! You ate your hotdog already!!??? You ate it already?"
"Dad don't eat all the popcorn!"
"Can I have some more candy?" "You already ate all your candy? No more candy, just eat your popcorn."
"Daddy why are you so bald?" "I used to shave my head. Do you want to be bald like Daddy?"

It was well worth the money. It is a movie I would consider buying and will likely get when it comes out on DVD. If you haven't seen it yet, I strongly recommend that you do!!

Our Ward Wastes No Time

2008-06-08T16:16:00.000-07:00

One thing we have learned this week is that when you're needed you are put to work...lol. That is what our new ward has done for us this week. They know we will only be here until mid-July, but that hasn't stopped them from using us. This past week both the Relief Society Presidency and the Bishopric came to meet us on different days. The ladies in the RS were so sweet and so cute! It seems we've already clicked as friends. It's actually kind of sad that we are leaving so soon because this ward has been so welcoming and I haven't felt this at home in a ward since I lived in Colorado. The Bishopric members were also very friendly and also funny. As we were telling them about us, I mentioned that if they needed a substitute organist they could use Nate. As soon as they heard that, they all looked at each other with big eyes and said to Nate "Would you like to be ward organist??" It was so funny. I guess they've been looking for another one so they're going to use Nate while he's here. He just got set apart today...lol. At least he'll be able to practice now, which is something he's been wanting to do. Then after that they asked us to speak in a couple weeks and then wanted us to do a musical number between now and when we move. Bishop also mentioned that my name was on a list the RS had for primary or something. So yesterday I got a call from the primary pres. and she asked me to substitute for the CTR 7 class today. We felt very much a part of the ward today! It's funny but it's nice to be busy...no matter how restless those kids got. I guess if you don't want to be put to work in a ward, don't make your presence as obvious as we did...lol.

Casey is Born!!

2008-06-05T21:04:00.000-07:00

So it's official! Stacey had her baby and thankfully they are both doing fine. The little bugger didn't want to come out so they had to perform a c-section, but at least it is over with. Amy and I are looking forward to actually getting to see them in person next month!! See the Imblers blog for more photos and information. I'm sure that Stacey will update her blog as soon as she can.

A new nephew is on the way!

2008-06-05T12:34:00.000-07:00

So this morning I took my car back into the dealership to have them replace a seat sensor in the passenger seat for the airbag system. For the past 8 months, I've had an annoying red light flashing at me saying something is wrong with my airbag system. The car has been to the dealership over 10 times and finally Nissan flew a "guru" out to look specifically at my car. Long story short, after a full day of inspecting my car, he came to the conclusion that the sensor in the passenger seat was defective. If this is the problem, it will be ironic since I suggested that they replace the sensors somewhere around the 3rd or 4th time I took it in. So now we play the waiting game to see if the light comes back to haunt me again.

Amy took me to work from the dealership and on the way, I got a call from my dad saying that Stacey is in the hospital since her water broke this morning. We are excited for her and Landis and hope that everything goes smoothly for them! This will be the first nephew for us on the Jackson side of the family!! Congrats Stacey and Landis!

FHE

2008-06-03T07:48:00.000-07:00

Last night, Amy and I had Family Home Evening. We pretty much have it every night since we are always are home together in the evenings. However, yesterday was especially cool since we built a fortress using blankets, a love-sac, chairs, and the futon in the front room.

We started a budget and so we'll see how that turns out. It is kind of hard to estimate our expenses since we don't know what we should expect. I hope it will get easier and more stable after the move to Seattle.

PCC Fire dancers

2008-06-02T13:29:00.000-07:00

Here is one of the cooler things we saw at the Polynesian Cultural Center in Hawaii. This guy is either amazing or absolutely crazy! You choose....

New Beginnings

2008-06-02T12:33:00.000-07:00

Well, Amy and I have been married for 1 month tomorrow. The time has blown by incredibly fast and it is still weird to think that we are married. Amy has her blog at http://strawbabe.blogspot.com/ and I figured that we should probably make a new blog for us. So this is a new adventure for me. I've always tried to keep my life personal and not out there on the web. I don't have a choice now since I'm on that blog. We'll try to keep this thing updated and I'm sure Amy will be doing the most blogging on this thing so you can thank her for that.