Port Townsend

If anyone knows Jake or I very well, you'll know that we spend lots of time with our family.  (Well, considering we live 2+ hours away from most of them).  We really love our families and are so blessed to have been given such supportive, loving, and fun people to be related to!  However, with as much time as we've spent with Jake's family, we've never really had quality time with just his sister Cory and her family.  Last week we were able to spend 4 days in Port Townsend (Hadlock actually) with Brandon, Cory, and their awesome 4 kids.

What an amazing life they lead!  Cory and Brandon make such a great team, I love watching them parent. 4 kids. With their oldest being 6 years old.  Wow.  It makes me feel lazy to just have one!    

Although the kids are full of energy and a day in their lives will always be "busy," (for a few more years for sure...) it has been so amazing to watch each of our nieces and nephews grow into the people they are and will be in the future!  

I am so thankful to have a lifetime together to be friends with Brandon and Cory, and Hunter is so lucky to have cousins as special as these 4 to look forward to playing with in the future!

Making Ice Cream with Zac

Zac's baby photo:  Although not obvious in this photo, they look very similar!

Blueberries!

Austin & Cory being silly at home

Waiting to greet GG and Pappy at the airport. They are home from Africa!

Martina gave us a slide show presentation of their Malawi trip.  Awesome photos!

Capture the Moment

Although I am no photographer, the photos I take are generally taken because I see something cute, want to capture a memory, or a combination of both.  I'm not sure what Jake's motivations are, but here are the pictures I found on the camera when he was with Hunter alone for a while....  We are definitely different people!

Life to the Max

Sometimes I go through life thinking "I couldn't possibly add one more thing to my plate." But then, something comes up, and I rise to the occasion.  Even if nothing big presents itself, I usually find something to do to put myself in the "busy" category.  Good or bad, right or not, I've always been one to fill up the calendar, or even if my happenings aren't calendar-worthy, I generally fill and sometimes over-fill my time.  

Ever since Hunter has arrived life has been full in such a new, unique, and unusual way.  I say unusual because I'm not used to falling asleep with questions such as these:  

~How many times will I wake up during the night? (new thought)  

~What time will I first be needed in the morning? (No more "9:00" set office hours?) 

~If someone calls to get together, am I "busy" or not? (I don't always know until Hunter lets me know...) 

~What will I make for dinner? (Will I have any clean dishes to even get started?) 

~When did I last shower? (I honestly haven't kept very good track of this one.  Please let me know if it is an issue)

~Didn't I wear these clothes yesterday? (and will most likely wear them tomorrow too)

~How does anyone have more than 1 child? (frequent thought, especially in Hunter's first 6 weeks of life...) 

~What did I really "accomplish" today? 

Although I am busy and life seems full, I also feel so free as well!  Without a daily routine, and a job to run off to, I am so much more free to love on my little baby, learn new things about patience and sacrifice, and experience a new element of life that not everyone gets to, or desires to experience.  I have only been home for 4 months, but I feel as though I have learned so much already.  I am so excited to experience each season with my son and walk with him through the tears, the giggles, the teething, the sicknesses, and so on.   

If I have ever had a woe-is-me moment in the past months, I am kindly reminded by my conscience that I am SO lucky and blessed that I not only CAN stay home, but that Jake gets to stay home with us for 3 months out of the year!  Although I have tried hard not to, I recognize that I have taken this all for granted to some degree.  Every day I am trying to thank God for this unique, unusual, wonderful time of my life.  

Although I fall asleep with new questions in my head, I also wake up with new energy and resolve to love the place I'm in and enjoy it to the max.  

Thoughts Revisited: 

~I have learned to almost enjoy waking up in the middle of the night. I'm the only one that Hunter wants at these odd hours.  No one else can replace me!

~I have appreciated the fact that friends would even call to ask if I still wanted to get together.

~ I love that some days I can still pull together a meal that tastes, and even looks good! (I sometimes even get to the homemade ice cream that we are addicted too...) 

~I have learned that showering is definitely overrated, and if you wear the same clothes every day, you save money on your energy bill! (The saved $$ will go towards washing the millions of cloth diapers for the little guy)

~I realize that having more than one child will change life dramatically but I am already looking forward to adding to our family (not yet!) and learning how to rise to the occasion of more demands and a tighter schedule.  

~And what did I really "accomplish" today?  Well, if nothing else, I am helping to keep my baby healthy and happy, and attempting to learn how to love God and people more and more.  

So could I possibly add one more thing to my plate?  Absolutely.   In fact someday we'll hopefully add another son or daughter or both! to the mix.  I may add a new job or new responsibilities.  Jake may end up working during some summers, or even getting a new job altogether.  But, for now, I love this special one-child time of life that will really only come once-in-a-lifetime.

Latest & Greatest

After giving ourselves about 2 days of rest, we were off again!  We were able to pack this trip pretty full as well.  We headed down south & enjoyed a day of "wedding"of one of my first friends ever.  It was such a beautiful day for a wedding, and we had some great time with my parents beforehand and then spent time with the bridal party beforehand.  Kjirstin did an amazing job on Becky's hair!  

Beautiful Bride & Long-Time Friends

From there, we headed to Everett & spent the night at my Aunt & Uncle's house, to be closer to our 2nd destination.  Leavenworth!  We pulled in to Leavenworth at 10:30 on Sunday morning, just in time to spend about 2 hours confusing ourselves with the logistics of figuring out how to shuffle the cars, people, and boats from the drop-off to the end of the river ride @ the pick-up site.  Our next door neighbor in Bellingham and his son were SO generous and offered to take 4 of us down the river on their raft before they braved it in their kayaks.  It sounded like they had a blast!  Me?  I was fine with holding my little baby close this time & not adventuring with the rest of them.  Rachel & I enjoyed our relax-time with Hunter, he was entertaining enough for us!.

When the rafters finished, we decided to eat at our Favorite place in Leavenworth:  Munchen Haus!  I'm sure their brauts are good, but secretly I love their condiments and could probably leave out everything but the sourkraut, 15 types of mustard, onions, relish, ketchup, and "Bavarian" Ketchup.  I'm pretty much full after a few bites because the "entree" portion of my meal is the 3 inches of condiments!

Hmm.... Where do I start?

We love Leavenworth - The tasting shop is the best!

 We took Hunter camping for the second time, this time without a "Plan B"!  There was no house 13 minutes away like our last camping trip, but we were willing to risk it after having such a successful trip last time.  We found a beautiful camp site on Icicle Creek and I'm already excited to go back!  It was the perfect spot for the 6 of us.

Hunter gave Rachel the biggest giggles ever!

Peek-A-Boo Baby

The second day the three guys took the knowledge of the river from the previous day and ventured down the river in their own kayaks.  Drew took quite the tumble in the first rapid, but they all 3 returned safely....  but only 2 boats survived!  The boats are definitely getting a little old... but we didn't think one could pop like it did.  Sorry it had to be your boat, Drew!

Woah River Models

Drew getting mentally prepared to conquer the river

 All in all it was a great trip, with lots of adventure time for the guys, Hunter-time for Rachel & I, and enjoying the outdoors with friends.

Family Shot!

Hunter loves Brandon!  I think they have some similarities but I can't quite tell what it is...

We enjoyed another very busy day in Bellingham today, and we're off to Port Townsend tomorrow!  We are excited to spend some time with our nieces & nephews, and Jake's sister & brother-in-law.  

We are loving summer and we wish it would last forever!

Gettin' Bigger

One Month

Two Months

Three Months

I can't even believe how quickly our Little Man is growing up!  14 weeks today.  We love you Hunter!

Congratulations!

Kjirstin and Jeremy, over the past year you two have grown so much together, and have made it through a very trying time. After all the interviews and waiting, and more interviews and more waiting, and more potential jobs and more waiting..... it has all paid off! Congratulations, Jeremy, on your NEW JOB! We are SO happy for you, and so excited for both of you as you can now say that Bellingham will be your continued home for as far into the future as you can see. You can now relax when you have some down time, instead of constantly looking for the next "lead" in your job searches. You can now enjoy the rest of your summer together, with the peacefulness that comes with job stability! Jeremy, we know you will be such an asset to this company- they don't yet realize how lucky they are to have you!

We love you guys and are so thankful that we can share life with you!

Camping!

We spent this past weekend at Fort Flagler State Park with Jake's sister and her family, and many of their friends from their church. We joked that we were never invited before because we didn't have kids... but seriously, we would never have understood the "camping" life with kids unless we had one ourselves! We seriously just relaxed the whole time! There was no decision-making about what hike to go on, or where we should go next, we just hung out together and enjoyed the "camping" environment! There were too many schedules of different ages of kiddos to work with to plan anything except our meals. Which, was definitely the perfect way to go :)

I was so nervous to take our little man camping, he's just so... Little! Since it was going to get down to the low 40's, I knew that I would have to take some drastic measures in order to keep him warm. I put him in one onesie, three fullsies, two hats, two blankets underneath, and three blankets on top. Even still, I think he was a little cold the first night because he awoke in the middle of the night with some "more than just hungry" cries, but I was able to put him in my sleeping bag and rub him down and get him pretty warm before I put him back to sleep in the middle of the night.

It was during this camping trip that Hunter became a Sleeping STAR! It was the first time he has slept 11-12 hours during the night, with only waking up once to eat (all 3 nights!). It was seriously incredible. We were thinking that we might just set up a tent in our back yard once we got home to continue the fantastic sleeping frenzy. I felt SO rested during the weekend I was most concerned about!

Jake and I enjoyed meeting new people, and discussing "parent-type" things, which we don't do much in Bellingham since most of our friends don't have kids yet. It was such a great time with Jake's sister & their whole family, my parents who joined us for most of the time, and other young couples who made us feel very welcome & at home during their annual camping trip. Thank you Cory for inviting us, we hope to join you again next year!