Things I've done

I found this and thought it was fun- it reminds me of all the fun and memorable things I have done in my life and the many more that I want to do:
The ones in bold are the things I have done

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland
8. Climbed a mountain- small ones count right
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea- from shore but not on a boat
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked- just in Provo
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run- I kicked a homerun in kickball-does that count?
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie-Does homemade count?
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby- SOON!
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Seen Mount Rushmore in person
101. Learned to play an instrument

Happy Holidays!

So time for another update. Good news- I am finally feeling better. I went to disneyland last weekend with my friend sheree and her two kids and I felt so good! I was so happy to have my apetite back and enjoyed food with a gusto- I had a corndog, pretzel, ice cream, chimichanga etc. It is so nice to feel like myself again- sort of. I read in my pregnancy book about the different symptoms/ailments that can happen while pregnant and I sure seem to have a lot of them. But the nausea was the worst.
So as I said, I went to disneyland with my friend sheree for the weekend. I always love it there at christmas time. There were big crowds but we were still about to see most everything. And it was fun to see the kids experience the rides and remember my first time as a kid at Disneyland. I was able to see my friend Heather briefly which was a nice bonus. I was exhausted by the time we got home though. Three days at disneyland is so much work! Then it was back to my job that makes all that fun possible. Having a mellow day at work is a rarity. So I am taking it easy today to recover from my week.
I also went to Nebraska with my family for thanskgiving to visit my brother Tom and his family. It was fun to play with my nephew Christian and get to know him better. For some reason, he liked to throw toys at my head. We had a good time spending time as a family- although it was a rough week for my nausea and vomiting and it grossed Amanda out as she loudly let us all know. Someday I hope to repay the favor when she is sick and pregnant. My mom took me to the store and bought me my first maternity clothes so now I don't have to just wear my pants unbuttoned.
Ross has finals this week so he is studying hard. I am looking forward to his weeks off because I have missed spending time with him. Plus, I am already working on his to do list. I can't even imagine now how we are going to make room for a baby. We have a whole room of stuff that will have to be cleared out- and go where? Although I know that we are very blessed and could get by on much less than what we have.
That is pretty much it here. We find out in 3 weeks if we are having a boy or girl- hopefully if baby cooperates. I haven't even started getting ready for Christmas- I remember growing up and hitting Walmart and the Dollar store the day before Christmas. Someday I'll plan ahead better.
I hope all of you are happy and enjoying the holidays!

Ybanito

So it has been a while since I last updated our blog but I do have a good reason. I have not been feeling well for the past couple of months and below you can see pictures of the reason why. Ross and I found out during our anniversary weekend in September that I am pregnant. The first couple weeks were great and then the morning sickness hit. Although it has been more like 24/7 sickness. And sometimes at night. So I haven't been able to do too much- just try to make it through work and rest when I can. We are excited about our little Ybanito (as my friend Sheree calls him/her). I am due May 23rd so we still have a ways to go. But I am still waiting for that magical day when the nausea goes away and I finally have an apetite. I thought pregnant women got to eat ice cream and milkshakes. But none of that sounds good to me right now. So that is our major news. Ross has been working hard at school and is almost done with his first semester. I am going to Nebraska with my family next week for Thanksgiving to visit my brother and his family. And then i am looking forward to the Christmas holidays when I will have Ross to myself- no school! So sorry I haven't been in touch much. I didn't realize how rough the first couple of months were going to be. But we finally felt ready to share our news.

Our 12th week ultrasound. You can see baby's profile and baby stretching its legs. They can't tell much yet on the ultrasound but I was excited to see legs and arms and a mouth, nose and eyes.

Baby's alien face. Staring right at the ultrasound probe. The tech had a difficult time getting the right image because the baby didn't want to cooperate. So Daddy gave the baby a peptalk after the tech left the room to get the doctor to do the ultrasound herself. Doesn't the baby look like Daddy:-) ?

BYU Freshman Memories

I was recently reminiscing a little about my college days- now several years ago which is hard to believe- as I was thinking about my friend Heather. So i pulled out some of my old pictures and had my sister scan them for me so I could post a few. We sure had a fun time our freshman year at BYU. I've enjoyed getting in contact again with a few of my freshman friends. Someday I'll have to pull out some more pictures. These are mostly of Heather and I. We lived in the Helaman Halls dorms together and were practically attached at the hip. So to Heather- thanks for all the fun memories. I remember when i was in college and people would say "I wish i was in college again" and I thought they were a little crazy because college was hard! But now I understand what they meant. The friends, fun, challenges and successes were once in a lifetime experiences.

Before Preference

I guess Heather was not allowing me to leave her room

Before a football game

Halloween Homegirlz!

Before Homecoming

Proud of very 1st snowman

Karaoke night at our apartment

Heather and I

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

My Grandpa Hawkes turned 87 yesterday and I just wanted to post a few pictures just to brag about how wonderful my grandpa is. He told me he was going to ride 87 miles on his bike this week although I have to find out still how many miles he did ride. He is a great patriarch and example to our family.
Here he is with Liz, picking corn in some random field in Nebraska so we could try it Grandma and grandpa kept up with our tireless travel schedule while visiting Nebraska and South Dakota. A huge buffalo somewhere in Nebraska
Grandma and grandpa, our wild west ancestors
We always spend Christmas with grandma and grandpa. They have always been there for me for all my major events growing up and I still can count on them to support me. And they spoil us every christmas

Grandpa perfomed our sealing at the Oakland Temple. That meant a lot to me

Grandpa at our family reunion in Utah- searching for wood to make whistles
Carving whistles. He seems to know something about everything. I love to sit and talk to him because he always teaches me so much

Playing the Wii. He is pretty good at it
Sitting through Ross' long graduation. I appreciate their willingness to come and support him. I think it is funny because they are all going through each name just waiting for Ross' turn.

Wow, it looks like grandpa was really hungry. This picture just reminds me how he and grandma and always there to celebrate every birthday. All growing up, that is the routine- sunday dinner and then cake with grandma and grandpa to celebrate our birthdays.

Happy birthday Grandpa! I love you!

Happy Anniversary!

Ross and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary over the weekend. It has been adjustment to have a husband in school because or schedule is much less free than it used to be. So my big plans to get away for the weekend didn't happen. Instead, we spent the day in San Francisco doing some of the tourist things we have never done. Might as well take advantage of the beautiful surroundings in which we live. So our first SF experience was paying an hours wages in parking fees. Then we took a "duck" tour which is a sea and land tour. Our tour was called the Bay Quackers. And they provided us with duck beak whistles to scare all the people we drove by. It was silly, but that is part of being a tourist. Our "duck" drove us through the main highlights of San Francisco such as Chinatown, Little, Italy, the piers, Union Square, the Financial district and the ball park. Then we drove into the water and we very slowly- those ducks are so slow, hard to believe they used them in World War II- (which they did for the invasion of Normandy) Anyways, back on track. So we slowly cruised in the bay near the Giants ballpark and the Bay bridge. We had a beautiful view of the city and also saw a California seal and some harbor seals. Then back to the land tour. I actually learned several things that I didn't know about SF- and I have been there many times.

Our "duck"- they were originally built in World War II (by women according to our guide)

Ready for the tour.

View of downtown San Francisco from the Bay. We had a really nice day in the city. No fog!

Our guide- a military officer from Sweden. I guess the military isn't paying well enough. He is sailing us toward the ramp. The entering/exiting the water was the coolest part







Ross took his turn driving the "duck".

Bay Bridge and Treasure Island/Yerba Buena Island. Typical bay day- lots of sailboats

We also hung out around Fisherman's Wharf. I love all the activity there. We ate at Scoma's which is a famous seafood restaurant in SF. More for Ross since he loves seafood. I actually tried scallops, crab, lobster and prawns.

That night, we went on a Ghost Walk with a local paranormal expert. I have been on ghost tours in Savannah and Charleston so I figure that San Fran must be haunted too. Here is our guide. He took us around the Pacific Heights area- which was not burned down by the 1906 earthquake so the ghosts are still there. It wasn't too spooky or anything but he did tell some interesting stories

Haunted House- made even more so by the full moon. It seems that the ghosts were all women- wonder why? We tend to become more attached maybe

This hotel is supposedly haunted and Ross walked around taking lots of pictures to see if he could capture an "orb" or supernatural presence in his picture. I say this is just a glare but Ross thinks it is an orb or as our guide calls it a "energy ball." This orb showed up in a lot of the pictures.

So we had a fun day together to celebrate a year of marriage. We ate our wedding cake with my parents the next day. I was happy that the part saved was chocolate and it didn't taste too bad after a year in the freezer. We have been very blessed this past year and everything has worked out better than we had hoped for.

My other news is that I am starting day shift tomorrow. I got tired of living in a haze and sleeping most days. Now I am trying to adjust to sleeping at night which has been harder than I thought. But I am looking forward to being awake when everyone else is and hopefully catching up with friends. I hope my body can handle the long 12 hour days.

Oh, and Ross did add more Philippine pictures- he just mixed them in with his previous pictures on the blog from August. So check out those pictures for new ones.

PS

I mean to comment on everyone's blogs but I am a little behind in reading them all. I will though. But I just wanted to say that I think you are all awesome- cute kids, wonderful parents, strong church members, intelligent, creative, funny. I get inspired reading about all that you do. I wish I could see you all more often- I have been blessed to have had you in my life at one time or another. So I just wanted to tell you that you are all my examples!

I love vacations....

For those dying to see more pictures, Ross took about 1000 of them so it is taking time to sort through them all. Plus, he started his first week of nursing school on Monday which has been very time consuming. He goes to school Monday through Friday from 8-4 in what they are calling "boot camp". I am glad that he is taking school very seriously but it leaves me with time on my hands since he doesn't have much time to lounge around with me. But the Olympics have kept me occupied this week. And also trying to figure out some sort of a sleep schedule.

So my impression of the Philippines- I enjoyed meeting Ross' mom and family. They all treated me well and were very kind. They were trying to feed me all the time which sounds like a good thing except I wasn't always sure what it was they were trying to feed me. It was a little stressful to make sure I didn't offend them but to discreetly avoid eating certain things. I don't have an iron stomach. Ross is from Cebu City so we spent part of our time there. Ross said it has changed in 14 years- I think he and Cebu have changed. He said that it used to be greener and less crowded. That was my first impression- so many people, cars, jeepneys, taxis and tricycles on too small roads. People work very hard there for what we would consider barely any money. But they seem happy to just be working and make do with what they have. That is one of the reasons why I love to travel- it always teaches me about gratitude and perspective. It is easy to feel ungrateful sometimes and wish I had more. But then i see the situations that other people live in and how happy they are regardless. I have too many luxuries to count. I did miss some of those while I was in the Philippines- like warm showers and comfortable mattresses. I will admit that I would not want to trade my life in America for a life there. But I enjoyed seeing a new place and meeting new people.

Ross and I went to the resort of El Nido in the Palawan islands for our last five days. This was one of the most beautiful places that I have been. We flew there on a small plane and landed on a lush barely inhabited island where they greeted us with singing and snacks. Then we took a 45 minute boat ride to reach the resort. We stayed in a water cottage which was on stilts above the water and had beautiful views of the resort and the surrounding islands. The employees were there to meet our every need. They had a long list of available activities and we just told them what we wanted to do and they arranged it all. We did a 15 minute introductory scuba dive- my first time. It hurt my ears as I expected but it was cool. We spent a lot of time snorkeling because the reefs were amazing. The reef around our resort had hundreds of fish and even some huge fish- like half my size. And then we had access to the surrounding islands and beaches. There were times when we were surrounded by hundreds of fish. The coral was beautiful as was the other underwater life. So that was my favorite part. I could have stayed in the water for hours just discovering all there was to see. But watch out for those territorial fish because I got attacked a couple of times- these tiny fish came right at my face. Pretty brave I thought.

The resort was all inclusive so we ate so much. I think i was on Michael Phelp's diet. But I wanted to try everything. We kayaked, explored hidden lagoons, relaxed on the beach, went sailing and fishing, and had lunch with just the two of us on an isolated beach. A five course lunch. This place was fantastic. The scenery was stunning and they treated us so well. So we would recommend it to anyone. We definetly want to go back. Our time there went by way too fast.

Philippines Trip

"The bigger the summer vacation, the harder the fall."

After 14 years

Ha! Ha! Oh no! We dont care if you get hit by a crazy taxi driver as long as you dont "text message" while you cross the street. Did you know that the Philippines is Rank# 1 in the world as the Top Prolific Sender of Text Messages? We don't care about Olympic Gold Medals because we are number#1 in text messaging.

Lapu-Lapu- The First Filipino Hero

We spent 3 relaxing days at my Uncle Boy's beach house in San Remigio

Nice and green. Grass so smooth you can sleep on it!

Jean posing in front of a non-motorized "banka"

Just Beautiful!!!

A family looking to gather some shells and fish for dinner. I am so grateful for where I am.

Their catch- mostly pufferfish( I guess the ones that are still puffed up are still alive)

At the Magellan's Cross in Cebu near the 100 yr. old Santo Nino Catholic Church

Dang! I need to remember to change my shirt;-)

Peace!!! Kids outside the Church selling P1.oo candles($0.20). I bought 6 candles and gave them P30.00 for being so cute. It makes me sad how life has to be for a young child to be forced to sell candles. They should be in school

Posing my new friends. This one is for you 'Manda!

Bohol Countryside

The Filipino Harry Potter (Chocolate Hills, Bohol)

Elevation Sensation!!!

My Little Brother John-John. Common dude! You can do better

Tarsier (Smallest Monkey in the World-smaller than my fist)

Jean meet a new friend in Bohol(Sorry flash wasn't allowed)

Jean attempting to cross the Loboc River by walking on ,"The Hanging Bridge." The bridge is mostly made of Kawayan (bamboo) and two steel cables.

We had lunch on the Loboc Floating River Restaurant . The boat took us around the river. I'll post a video sometime next week

Wow! A lakeside house

Our El Nido Resort Private Plane

A rainbow. We must be headed to Paradise. What can go wrong?

Umm Pilot! Can you just drop us off here?

Oh no! Is that smoke? The plane is on fire!

It's not looking good

Aahhh!!! I forgot what the Stewardess said about the Emergency door

Jean about to ride the Jeepney for the 1st time

Storm in Paradise at Pangulasian Beach

Life is good

Entelola beach

Another beautiful beach that is part of the El Nido Resorts

At The (Cebu) Mactan International Airport
" Don't worry Ma! I'm coming back."

Man! its a pain posting pictures on this website. Videos and more pix coming soon