Jensen Family Top Ten 2011

Happy

Happy

Panic

Here is our Top Ten favorite things about 2011!

1. Colby and I celebrated our TENTH anniversary!  Wahoo.  I insisted that we take a trip somewhere awesome to celebrate and we did.  We vacationed on Oahu, Hawaii for over a week.  Luck for us my mom flew out here to "vacation" with our children.

2. Colby got a new job working in the Emergency Room at UVRMC.  He is loving his new job but the schedule is brutal.  He now has his own "bat cave" where he tries to sleep during the day while our children run around the house screaming and bang on the piano. Hopefully for his sake and our family's 2012 will bring him a better schedule.


3.We took a trip to Lake Tahoe for a family reunion.  Yes people, I traveled in the car for 11 hours with my children, pregnant and sick.  Oh and did I mention that I get car sick anyway?  I made it all the way there just to puke in the driveway as we pulled up.  Not fun.  What was fun is meeting lots of Colby's family and hanging out with my husband for 4 days in a row!  We went four wheeling, shooting, bike riding, and fishing just to name a few.  The kids loved it so much they asked if we could move there.

4. C.J. learned this year how to ride a bike with training wheels, WITHOUT training wheels, and has lost his first tooth!  We are convinced that he is the sweetest boy on the planet.  If we ever take him to McDonalds while his sister is in school he will ask if we can buy her a toy so she doesn't feel left out.  He even offered to give some of his Christmas money to Madison just in case her card didn't have anything in it. It did. :)

5. We sold our house! Yay!  Oh my gosh, it is such a relief.   Packing, moving, fixing the house, trying to sell the house....it is so stressful.  Now we can just relax and take our time figuring out where we would like to be.


6. Celebrated Colby turning 35 and myself 30!  We are officially grown ups now.

7. Myself (Casey), checked an item off the bucket list.  I ran in a 5k race.  I know it's not much to a lot of people but I'm the girl who pukes at the end of mile one.  I entered the Freedom Run in Provo, which is on the 4th of July.   I made it to the 2nd mile post before walking and never threw up so yay me! I actually loved it and am planning to run it again next July.

8. Little Finn.  Our dare devil child.  He can pretty much scale walls and repel from buildings.  Our house is a little crazy looking from all of our child proofing.  Luckily he is really coordinated and only has had one major incident where we thought he needed stitches.  Luckily my super talented husband and mother-in-law gathered up some medical supplies and dermabonded (it's like superglue for skin) his eyebrow closed.  It's healing quite nice and hopefully won't have a scar.  Also our little Finnster will be turning 2 years old on December 28th!

3. Madison turned 8 years old this year! How did this happen??? Seriously we can't believe that we are the parents of and 8 year old.  She has been patiently and anxiously awaiting her baptism coming up here on December 31st, 2011.

10.We found out that we are expecting another baby and it's a GIRL!  Hawaii has the best souvenirs! (We have always wanted 4.)

We hope all of our family and friends have a Merry Christmas this year!

Boo!

Halloween this year Madison said she wanted to be a vampire and C.J. wanted to be a pirate. Since Finn refused to wear footed pajamas I had to go out and buy him all new pajamas instead of using C.J.'s perfectly good footed ones from when he was that age. Lucky for him I found some cute little pirate pj's that I thought would be perfect for serving a dual purpose Halloween/sleep wear! Plus C.J. want Finn as his pirate buddy. Well you know how kids are, C.J. ended up being Batman and Madison changed her vampire costume into a witch. C.J. then asked if I would go out and buy Finn the Robin costume? I said no.

Isn't this the best family photo ever?! I had been feeling so sick right before these picture were taken. By the way we are pregnant with baby #4!

Can you tell he really wanted his picture taken?

All the little kids at Lynette's for Halloween Chili.

Still not wanting his picture taken and is trying to get down.

Coolest Batman ever!

Lynette has these plasma cars that Finn LOVES to ride.  He is crazy fast on anything that has wheels!

I love the look on Finn's face as C.J. is chasing him.

Happy 10 Year to us!

Talk about a long over due vacation! Colby and I were planning to take a trip together after he graduated nursing school but we had Finn 2 months before he graduate. (Smile) So we figured the next best time for us to go some place was for our ten year anniversary. Our anniversary is June 30th but we waited until August to go so that my mom could be here to watch my kids. I AM SO THANKFUL FOR HER!!! We decided to go to Hawaii! It was totally worth the money we spent. It is so beautiful and serene. We stayed at the Turtle Bay Resort on the North Shore.  The North Shore is where it's at!  It's true what they say "Everything in Hawaii is overpriced!" The speed limit is so slow it almost kills you at times.  But we loved it there. Places we visited while on Oahu included The Polynesian Cultural Center, Aloha Stadium, Dole Plantation, Waimea Valley Botanical Garden, Waikiki,  Snorkled some coves, drove the whole island one day,  shopped Haleiwa (my favorite town), Laie Temple, and visited lots of different beaches. I am still dreaming about going to Macky's Shrimp truck. It was that good!  By the way, every where you go there are signs up saying "High Theft  Area!" Don't even leave things in your car locked.  I was scared to take my nice camera anywhere. :( 

Thought about going Kayaking but then saw where they start and end and thought it was lame.  They just circle the cove.

Waimea Fall.

Real picture I took!  Sea Turtle would swim up right on the shore.

Laie Temple

Colby looking on Zillow to see if we could afford to live in Hawaii. The answer is no.

Dole pineapple ice cream. It was really yummy.

Us at the PCC.

Camera phone picture from our balcony on morning.

Beach at out resort.

Yeah I went running through there.  I was scared.

Pioneer Day Bike Parade

This year to celebrate the 24th of July we went to our neighborhood bike parade and pancake dinner. They encourage the kids to dress up like pioneers if they want and guess who really really wanted to? Yep. Madison wanted to be a pioneer. After searching through our house she found one of her baby dresses (size 18 months) and told me she thought it looked like a dress a pioneer would wear and then found a baby bonnet to go with it. I have to give her props for being original and I though she looked too cute.