Year: 2017

Hey,

These updates are becoming easier to do. I think I like the whole “one month update” thing we have going. In the months when there are slim pickings we will combine a few.

February has always been a birthday month. First was my mom, then Arabella. You can see some of the photos below from their birthday. As is normal for Ara we went to a few places for her to celebrate. No, not as crazy as the year before when she was on a crazy concert spree, this time was tamer. A few places she wanted to eat we took her to, including Organ Stop Pizza (in Mesa). I also thought this was a good time to take a look at Arabella in her pretty outfit. If you look at the same photo you can see a picnic table. Fun story!

We got the picnic table at Home Depot or Lowes – one of those. When we did it wasn’t super nice, so we did some work to it, ended up staining it and I think it turned out incredibly well. This was the place where we had our Thanksgiving dinner (to give a better idea of what it was like). We also had porch lights hanging around to help the ambiance a little too.

Other fun photos?! Well, we take trips on the weekends, check out different areas in Arizona and see something new. On one of these trips, we came across the Jurassic Park Explorer. Now, for most people, this would be perfect. If you know the movies as I do, then it’s a 1992 Explorer, and the one above is sometime around 2008 or so. Anyway, the decal wrap looks great and I can’t blame them for doing so.

Updates on the baby? Smooth sailing. At the end of February, the baby boy was about the size of a Cauliflower and we were roughly 27 weeks in.

Finishing things off with the last two pictures. First is the pig… that’s because we went to a farm as part of Ara’s birthday week/weekend. She was able to pet Goats, Pigs and jump on farm equipment. And lastly, we have a picture of Geoffrey’s birthday balloon. At the time Toys R Us was still in business and if you registered on their website they would give you free stuff for your birthday. Obviously not something we would pass up. She still has the giraffe to this day and I believe even the book too!

just Pray

note: this post was published on 07/26/22 but moved the publish date back to the end of February 2017 to keep chronological order.

January! Spent the first few minutes of the day drinking some bubbly as we rang in the new year. Always spending it the same way, watching the ball drop in New York. I really do wish they had something cool like that for the West Coast. Why not do a ball drop in downtown LA? San Francisco? Seattle? Instead, we watch it pre-recorded as do so many other millions of Americans.

For the next couple of days, we enjoyed the cool weather. Since we were gone during Christmas we decided to light the candles that we got on our Christmas eve service and use them. Otherwise.. why even keep them? It’s a cute photo and as you can see we LOVE our wood-burning fireplace. There is really nothing that matches the real thing. Gas is nice – sure it can be easy to turn on and off, but there is something about having the real deal.

We decided to take a January trip to Flagstaff. Why? Well, we are big on weather systems and whatnot and saw that there was going to be a good chance for snow in the area. We booked it up and stayed a night during the storm. Yeah, it certainly did snow. We got over 22 inches of snow while visiting. It was great. Ara was up to her waist at some points with snow. Eventually, I had to carry her! She was dressed to the nines with snow-proof clothing but it was still a task for her little legs to hike through it.

We decided that we were going to find out the gender of the baby this time as the first time we (or mainly me) wanted it to be a surprise. It’s a BOY! You can see the toy that we got Arabella to let her know that she was getting a brother. She was ecstatic. I must say, the way you find out when learning the gender vs not finding out until birth is totally different.

We were also lucky enough to have our church host Bob Goff (we love his books: see Love Does, Everybody, Always) and he is a pretty entertaining individual to see in person. The way that God is working through his life is pretty awesome. We snapped a photo of him. Seriously- check him out if you haven’t.

There was news of someone else having a baby too!! Emily and Nam are going to have a baby! We ended up going to her baby shower as well. Still have the initial invite to the shower (below)

Okay, so I know this isn’t anything huge for most people. At this time Mcdonald’s also came out with the Mac Jr. and the GRAND MAC. The Grand Mac was pretty much what the Big Mac should have always been. I never tried the Mac Jr. so I can’t speak about that. They had these around for a few months, but sadly they are no more.

just Pray

note: this post was published on 07/26/22 but moved the publish date back to the end of January 2017 to keep chronological order.