Part One

Man oh man. So I guess my computer and Photobucket don't get along too well? Oh well, let's get started!

To start off - before viewing these pictures, please keep in mind that:

1) looking my prettiest wasn't a priority, and there are some unflattering pictures that I'm just going to put up anyway, and

2) many of the pictures of me and Kristofor were taken by one of us, so they're the really cool "here's my face 12 inches from the camera" type shots.

Our cruise left from Long Beach, CA and stopped at Catalina Island, then Ensenada, Mexico, then we spent a day at sea and came back to Long Beach.

I've only flown once before in my life, so I was pretty excited to get on the airplane, get my window seat and order my drink! Actually, Kristofor and I spent almost the whole flight watching Spongebob.. which I quite like.. anyway, moving on!

The weather was gorgeous, by the way. In case you couldn't tell from the pictures.

Pictures of us with the palm trees! They actually got me wondering.. what grows on palm trees? Anything?

We took a shuttle bus from LB airport to the cruise terminal (the driver drove like a crazy man and when we arrived he ordered me "get out," but at least we got there safe, right?). We got our bags taken to be loaded on the ship and waited in line for forever. But I was so excited/nervous that it passed by pretty fast.

Actually we waited in one line, then another and then another before we finally got to head toward the ship- so exciting! Once there we went straight to our room:

Our room had two porthole windows - and they totally made the room. It was so nice to sit by them and watch as the ship moved, and when we ported (made port? I don't know ship-y terms) we could see the island/port/land/people/sights right from our room. We loved it.

We had people come clean our room multiple times a day. They even put my toothbrush in it's container, wrapped my cord around my straightener, and organized our flip flops. Seriously. And left an itinerary, towel animals, and chocolates on our bed.

It was awesome.

The ship was so fun to explore - and there were so many areas we didn't even get to see!

They often had the fancy white piano being played by "Thom York Jr.," as Kristofor called him -the music filled the atrium and was so pretty. There were so many places to just stop and sit and watch the water and talk..

Ok, I know this is an abrupt end, but this has taken way longer than anticipated. I'll post way more tomorrow - ni-night!

teaser

Kristofor and I have been back from our cruise for a couple weeks now, and I'm just getting around to uploading the pictures onto the computer and going through them.. it was such a perfect vacation for us.

More to come.

After

When Kristofor and I got married, my grandma and grandpa Jensen gave us a little brown side table. I wasn't crazy about the faux-wood finish, and I've recently been inspired by before and after pictures of old looking furniture that's been re-painted in fun, cheerful colors. And considering we'll be living in some boring beige apartment soon, I figured I could get in on the painting-furniture fun and add some color to a piece I know I'll use.

Ta-Da!

Please excuse the poor quality pics, they're from my phone.

I had such a hard time picking a paint color. I wanted either a taxi-cab yellow, a bright blue, or a chartreuse-y green. Halfway through the painting process I was really regretting my choice of blue, but now that it's done I'm pretty happy with it. And if, after a while, I get tired of it, I can just sand, prime, and paint it again. Right?

church is hard..

I kind of hate to admit it, but I have the hardest time paying attention during Sacrament meeting of church - well, scratch that, I'm good for the actual Sacrament, but once those talks start... I'm a goner. I'm always fidgeting or doodling. I've developed the habit of sitting in the very back, behind these adorable redhead identical twin boys, who are probably not even 2 yet, but they sure give their mama a run for her money. Gosh they're entertaining, and they keep me awake. ;)

But a few weeks ago we sat behind the family of a little 5 year old girl who used to be in my primary class. She was sitting on the ground with her notebook and crayons on the chair in front of her - coloring - but kept looking up and me and giving me shy smiles. Just as the talks were starting she ripped a piece of paper out of her notebook, brought it back to me, walked quickly back to where she was sitting, and hid behind her chair. She would occasionally peek around at me to see what my reaction was.

A few minutes later she was back to coloring in her notebook. When she was done with this new creation, she did the same thing: ripped it out of her notebook, brought it back to me, hurried back to her chair and hid behind it.

This is what she gave me...



Portraits of: ME! She drew me exactly as I was, down to the stripes on my shirt, my earrings, and my braid. When I got home from church I had Kristofor take a picture of me to document how well she had drawn me.

Seriously, one of my favorite sacrament meetings ever.

spring break party animals

During Spring Break my sister Bre asked me to babysit her 2 kids - it's Spring Break, do you think I had anything going on anyway? No! ;) So of course I was excited to babysit, it's been a while since I've been able to and let's face it - my nieces and nephews like me. (okay, I like them too!)

So Jameson and London and I had a sleepover at their house. We made a sweet banner, painted some masterpieces, blew up some balloons . . .

And had a dance party, of course! I don't even know what the music was, I just turned the stereo on and the volume up! (Before this Jameson told me that they were all Doug's CDs in there and that we couldn't dance to it because it was rap... It was some good old 70s stuff - certainly not rap?!)

The next day we made some play-dough.. (and drank Jone's green apple sodas in honor of St. Patrick's Day)

We had some time to kill, so we had an impromptu picnic at the park! We ate and played 'bandits' on the playground until we got bored and went home.

I had so much fun with those little stinkers!

twinny too

My birthday fell on a Wednesday this year, so Kristofor and I decided to celebrate early. On Monday (our day off), we went out to eat at my restaurant of choice: Bangkok Gardens. Their yellow chicken curry is divine. After that we went to Farr's Fresh, one of my favorite places - it makes me feel like a little kid because I get all excited at all the flavors and topping choices. Then we went shopping for hours.. it was lovely. We went to the mall and Target (so exotic ;)) and I gotta say, Kristofor had more luck than I did. I found some awesome pants though - I thought they were going to be $20 but when we checked out, the price came up as $5 - !!! I love when stuff like that happens.

That was the jist of all my planned birthday celebrations - just a day hanging out with the Mister. But he had a few plans up his sleeve....

The morning of my actual birthday, I woke up at 5:30 to go do my clinical hours. When I opened the bedroom door to leave, I found this:

Kristofor spent a chunk of his late night (he got home past 11:30) decorating the hallway outside our room. There were streamers hanging from the ceiling, balloons and confetti on the ground, and happy birthday signs all over. It made me so happy. I kept thinking about it all day at the hospital.. ^_^

He also made me this awesome cake - it's Funfetti (my fave), decorated with cowboy and Indian figurines, and horses. He put exactly 22 candles on the cake, with one Indian dancing inside all of them. According to Kristofor, the cowboys and Indians were "fighting over the cake." It was serious business - one of the cowboys was pointing his gun at the Indian chiefs head, and another Indian had his gun pointed at that cowboys back. It's a good thing we lit the candles and ate the cake before any real violence could begin..

It was such a lovely birthday. My husband knows exactly how to make me feel loved. On a sad note, he's grown out the mustache. Apparently it's too much work to shave a chin??

p.s. Am I the only one who's having issues with font sizes on Blogger? I select different sizes when I'm writing, but when I post, it all goes back to normal size. Any ideas of what's going on?

fo ril

It was my birthday this week. Kristofor did some really cute things for it - I love that guy. I'll post some pictures soon, promise. Until then, here's us crazy kids.

Did I mention that I love him?

p.s. Kristofor is now a mustachioed man - I love it. I'll try to post some pictures of that, too.