ROAD TRIP!!!

Hi. We haven't written for a while because we were on vacation for a whole month. Well maybe not a WHOLE month; we were actually gone for four calendar weeks but that's pretty close. Christina might delete that sentence later. (and that one).

"Where did you go on such an extended vacation?" you may ask. "Somewhere really cool and exotic I hope." If Idaho is exotic, then yes. More specifically, we took a tour through much of the Western United States to visit friends and family.

First we traveled south to California. Our first visit was with Christina's grandparents near San Jose.

Next we traveled down to Soledad to visit Adam's parents in their new house!

We had lots of fun adventures with Adam's parents, his sister Amber, and Lily's only cousin Amelia. 

We took a hike through Pinnacles National Monument.

 And visited the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium.

 Lily and Amelia (and the grown-ups) had a great time looking at all of the fish and other sea creatures.

 We also went out to breakfast; Lily thought the menu was superb. 

  And we took a trip down to the beach to have some fun in the sand and the waves.

Next we drove out to Utah, stopping to visit some of Adam's relatives in St. George and Enoch along the way.

We stayed with Christina's family in Salem but spent lots of time visiting old friends,

family members,

and former co-workers.

We also went to the zoo...

and the Air Force Museum.

We also saw some really cool cars. Lily wouldn't let us leave until we took a picture of this one.

Our next stop was Stanley Lake, ID where we went camping for a family reunion with Christina's mom's family. And yes, that really is how we dress when we go camping with the Lofgrans. (okay, not really)

One great thing about family reunions is that there is always someone willing to hold or watch the baby for you.

Lily had a fabulous time playing in the sand and the water while we went kayaking and tubing on the lake.

She sat in the freezing cold stream, playing happily with the rocks and the sand for over an hour! Good thing mommy has been feeding her so well.

We finally made it home safe and sound which is no small feat considering that there were massive wildfires burning just north and west of where we had been camping. Fortunately a timely rain storm suppressed the fires enough that the road was open when we needed to come home.

So that was our trip. Thanks to all of our friends and family who let us stay in their homes along the way. We had a wonderful time and miss all of our loved ones across the country already. So if you're ever in the Willamette Valley please give us a call and stop by!

I am an Olympic/Nature Photographer!

Okay, I'm not really that good at photography, but I did take some pretty cool pictures of Olympians and Nature which I have posted below. :)

My parents and my brother Daniel came to visit at the end of June. My mom and Daniel came to visit me and see Lily.

 
But I think my dad mostly came so he could go to the track & field Olympic Trials in Eugene (ok, he came to visit us too). He was very kind and took me with him to one day of the meet, and it was fantastic! From third-row seats, we got to watch Ashton Eaton run a lifetime best, gut-wrenching 1500 as the final, world record-breaking event in the decathlon. Everyone in the stands, which were packed, was screaming and cheering through the whole race, and jumping up and down when he finished in the time needed to break the record. It was breathtaking.

I like going to track meets, just became I'm that kind of geek, but this was REALLY fun. Partly because everyone else there was track-and-field-obsessed, and partly because it was amazing to watch some of the very best athletes in the world compete. I went to another day of the trials with Adam, and we got to watch Allyson Felix run the 4th fastest 200 in history! As in the history of the world, EVER! We were really impressed by the women high-jumpers, which included a 15-year-old high school sophomore and a 36-year-old. Here are a few pictures.

This is Chaunte Lowe with her daughter on her victory lap after winning the high-jump and qualifying for the Olympic team:

Here is Sonya Richards-Ross before the final heat of the women's 200, in which competed 7 of the 10 fastest women in the world.

Allyson Felix, preparing for a world-class 200 race.

Wow, they were good! But since most people are probably not as interested in reading about every element of a track meet as I am, I will spare you the minute details of each event. You can just watch the Olympics.

While my parents were here, we went camping at Cape Perpetua. I was a little nervous about camping with a baby, but my parents just got a pop-up camping trailer, which worked really well. It provided a dry sleeping space (not easy to come by when camping in Oregon), and a little more privacy for nursing Lily. We had a lot of fun, and the area was beautiful.

My dad's family decided to join us and make it into a family reunion, so they were staying in a beach house about 10 minutes from our campsite. We went on some really fun hikes, and spent time at the beach. This is my cousin Emily giving me a break from carrying Lily on a hike.

We saw some of the best tide pools I've ever been to, and hiked up a mountain for an incredible view.

 
We also visited the Sea Lion Caves, which is the largest sea cave in the world, and it's full of sea lions (as if you couldn't tell by the name). It was crazy to watch the males fight each other for the best sleeping spots. They are huge, and I really wouldn't want to meet one.

 
I really enjoyed spending time with my grandparents and some aunts and uncles I don't see very often. In fact, it was really hard when everyone left. I think I had forgotten how much I crave being around other people. It was difficult to go back to my very solitary life of taking care of Lily by myself most of the time. Adam has been really great at helping out, but of course he has school and work to do. I guess I realized that being around family is more important than I had thought. Hopefully when we go somewhere more permanent, we will be a little closer to family than we are now.

In the mean time, I will enjoy the time I have with Lily. She is growing up so fast! Lily is trying very hard to crawl, but has not been successful. I think this is because she is too heavy to support herself on her arms and legs. I don't mind though. She is easier to keep track of the way things are. She has two teeth, and loves eating new foods. Here is Lily devouring a plum during our camping trip:

And finally, we have some big news . . . Lily said her first word! She has been babbling for some time, so it may have been coincidence, but we think there is understanding behind it. We have been playing a game with her where I say "Da-da" and then Adam jumps up or appears from around the corner. And whenever she inadvertently says "da-da" Adam comes in and claps and cheers and repeats it. So after playing this for a while last week (officially it was July 1), he came in the room and Lily looked right at him, smiled and said clearly, "Da-da!" She has done it a number of times since each day since, so maybe that is significant. Maybe not, but hey, as her parents, it's our job to be over-excited about everything she does, right? :)

6-7 Months Pictures of Lily

This picture is to show that Lily isn't happy 100% of the time, in case anyone had mistakenly gotten that impression.

This was Lily's first day eating real food!

Scripture study with mommy.

This day was just full of funny expressions.

Lily's first experience swimming:

This is Lily's first experience with avocado:

Eulogy

The beginning of our summer fun has been interspersed with some tears.

The tears are due to the passing of our beloved kitty, Jack. He was hit by a car last week after a life of much loving, purring, jumping, running, chasing butterflies, playing with other kitties, patiently tolerating Lily's face-grabbing and fur-pulling antics, and snuggling up in our laps. He was the most patient and easy-going cat I have ever met. He was very popular among our neighbors, and everyone would tell us how sweet and friendly they thought he was. I think he had a very happy life here. He was also very afraid of cars and would never go into the road, so I am really not sure how he got hit. We actually didn't see him, but when he had been missing for several days, which had never happened before, we put up fliers around our neighborhood. The next day we received multiple calls from people saying they had seen him on the side of the road.

It has been a lot harder than I expected. He was Adam's first pet, and we got him the day after Lily was born so he could be her cat. It seems that in just 7 months, he already gave her a strong love for animals that will hopefully last a lifetime. But I still regret the time that she won't have with him, especially since she is too young to remember him at all.

I am grateful for the time I had with him, but it just doesn't seem like enough. I have been surprised at how much I miss him. I know what it's like to miss someone after breaking up or moving away. Everything reminds you of them, and you momentarily forget they are gone multiple times every day. I didn't expect it to be like that with Jack. My beloved horse passed away during my freshman year of college, and I was extremely sad about it. But I hadn't had daily interaction with her for a couple years. Jack was constantly part of our lives. In our small apartment, we were continually tripping over him, feeding him, petting him, letting Lily pet him (and trying to keep her from doing anything worse).

Since he's been gone, everything reminds me of him. Whenever I hear a cat meow outside, I think it's him for a moment before remembering he's gone. Sometimes I go into Lily's room and automatically glance under the crib to see if he's napping there. When Lily is fussy, I still think to myself periodically that maybe I will find Jack and let her pet him, since it makes her more happy than anything else. And then of course I remember that he's gone, and it makes me cry. And of course I keep thinking that I've gotten over it and I am done crying, but I'm not. And since I am crying while I'm writing this, I think I should probably be done. But first, here are a couple pictures of Jack, our beloved kitty. I am sure he is still chasing butterflies, wherever he is.

Strawberry Jam, Anyone?

So Adam and I got ambitious last week and decided to pick strawberries. We went with our friend Brianna and her baby girl to Twedt's Farms and labored strawberry picking for 2 1/2 hours on Thursday morning. Little did we know (Have you seen Stranger than Fiction? Well I have, and every time someone, including me, says "Little did he know," it makes me laugh. I hope you laugh too. If no, go see Stranger than Fiction because it's really funny.)

Anyway. Little did we know how effective our strawberry picking would be. We ended up with 18 pounds of strawberries! Yes, I said 18 pounds! And it only cost us 13 dollars! That's not including the opportunity cost of course, and I certainly know that if I had a good job, it would not be worth my while to pick strawberries at all when I could be earning much more than the money we saved by not buying these strawberries at the store. However, I am now a stay-at-home mom and I earn nothing, so it was definitely worth while. And in case you are wondering, yes, Lily did try desperately to eat the strawberries right out of the bucket almost the whole time. I mostly succeeded in preventing this.

With 18 pounds of super-ripe strawberries overflowing all over our kitchen, I had to make jam pronto in order to keep them from rotting. I used up every canning jar in the house and an entire bucket of sugar, even though I made low-sugar jam! I ended up with 5 quarts and 14 pints of jam, which comes out to 3 gallons! Here is the resulting state of my freezer:

I guess I will be making cooked jam when raspberry season rolls around.

After all this, I still had enough strawberries to make a large strawberry pie and cram two bags of whole strawberries into the door of the freezer.

If you come visit me, I will give you some strawberry jam . . .  :)