What Happened to March?

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!

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

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!

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!!

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

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?

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.