First Birthday and First Steps!

A first Birthday plus some first steps made for an exciting day! I can't believe it has been an entire year since we were in the hospital with our new baby boy. I had no idea how hard and how rewarding being a parent would be. We really love Camden.

For the Birthday, we had a party with some presents, some cake, and some ice cream. Camden absolutely loves ice cream, but he wasn't quite sure what to think of the huge slice of cake in front of him.

The day ended with Camden finally deciding to take some steps on his own. We had a lot of fun sending him back and forth between Mom and Dad taking more and more steps each time. What a great day!

Our Big Adventure!

Wow! So much has been happening in the last couple of weeks! We treked across the country and after four days and three nights, we made it to North Carolina! Once we arrived, our work was not through. We had to go rent a storage unit and unload all of the boxes of things we didn't need until we moved into our own place. Then we had to return the trailer, and then come to our townhouse to unload all the things we needed here. It was definitely a lot of work!

After we got all of that done, it was time to figure several things out. We decided that we liked the place we were living, so we applied to get into a townhouse here at the end of the summer. Luckily, they had one that we could move into on the first of August. We really like the unit we got! It has a nice view of the pond, complete with fountain. We'll take some more pictures soon.

We also bought a new car! It is a brand new Toyota Camry-Blue Devil Blue! We really like the new car, and really like the gas mileage it gets compared to the truck!

Besides that, we've just spent lots of time exploring the area. We've been walking/Calvin has been running on the Duke Forest trail, we drove out to a beautiful area called Falls Lake, and yesterday Calvin took us on a surprise trip to the Outer Banks! We got to see this little town called Rodanthe (anyone seen the recent movie?). It was so neat! As you're driving there, you hit the ocean, then you go across bridges to this strip of land that runs along the coast, so there is ocean on both sides. It is really awesome. Now take a look at some of the pictures and videos!

Camden at the Southpoint Mall in Durham

On the beach in Rodanthe

Camden loved the waves!

The wildflowers were beautiful!

We Made It!

Our journey began last Sunday as we left Farmington, Utah and headed east.  The journey finally came to an end on Wednesday afternoon as we pulled into Durham, North Carolina.  While the journey was quite long, it was an amazing adventure.  We were able to drive across the United States and see the different landscapes and some different people.  Ashton summed up the cultural unity of the United States by stating that you could always expect a McDonalds to be at the next exit.  Anyway, as I am not the typical blog author (in fact, I am only testing some software) I will end for now. 

From Sea To Shining Sea

In the next few weeks, our family will have driven from coast to coast! We've been visiting Calvin's family here in Nevada for the past week, and we took a couple of days out to go on our own little trip. We headed out early Thursday morning and drove to San Francisco! The drive through the Sierra mountains was beautiful.

In San Francisco, we explored Pier 39. Our hotel was only a block from the Pier, which was perfect. We saw the sea lions who have made a home there at the pier since the earthquake in 1989. We also went on a boat tour of the bay. The boat sailed out and under the Golden Gate bridge. Then it turned and went around Alcatraz. They told us all about the prision that used to be there. It was pretty spooky. We even saw some dolphins swimming out in the bay!

After the boat tour, we went to the aquarium. Camden loved going through the tunnels under the aquariums and looking at all the fish, sting rays, and sharks. In one of the tanks, they had some of the biggest fish I have ever seen. I am definitely going to think twice before I go swimming in the ocean again. In this shallow pool, we got to touch the sharks and the rays. They also had some pools where we got to touch some star fish.

Our next stop was China town. We walked all 14 blocks there and 14 blocks back. It was so much fun to watch Calvin speaking Chinese to all the people there. They would get so surprised when he started speaking to them! We got some really good treats from a couple of Chinese bakeries.

On our way back to the pier, we stopped at Ghirardelli square. We couldn't resist some of the famous chocolate and and some really good ice cream.

On the second and last day of our trip, we got up and drove across the Golden Gate bridge. We then made our way up to Napa Valley. The vineyards and rolling hills were beautiful. After our sight-seeing, we went to Six Flags, Discovery Kingdom. The roller coasters were awesome! They also had some pretty cool animal exhibits and a neat killer whale show. Camden even got to go on a little ride! Overall, we had a very fun trip!

Graduation

Here is the proud graduate! We had a great time last weekend for graduation. Calvin is officially done! It was so nice to have his parents there too. We're grateful to both of our families for being there. We started the day bright and early at Amy's husband Danny's graduation. We then went to Calvin's graduation, followed by lunch at Magleby's. It was a great day! Calvin graduated Magna Cum Laude, we are so proud of him!

Springtime is Here

We are so excited for the sunny, warm weather! Today, Camden and I helped weed and plant flowers. Camden had a lot of fun playing in the dirt and pulling on the plants.

We are also so excited for Calvin to graduate!! He finished his last final yesterday. Now he just has to finish up his TA grading work and then walk across that stage! I really can't believe this part of our lives is over. We will be leaving BYU. How lucky we are to have had this great school play a part in our lives. So many little things came together allowing us to meet and be married; it really is amazing how many things you could name that had they been just a little bit different, we never would be where we are today. I am so grateful for those little things that made all the difference in my life.

So in just a few short weeks, we will be heading out to North Carolina. I am going to cherish every last minute I have here with my family. I am so glad we've had this time to spend with them and I'm grateful for thier hospitality. We are going to miss them!

Camden is becoming more and more vocal. Here's a little video.

Easter Egg Hunting and More

We had a really fun Easter weekend! There was a neighborhood easter egg hunt that we took Camden to. He had a lot of fun crawling around on the grass picking up the eggs. They had them all in zip lock bags in case it rained or snowed, haha. The way it was organized was really great. The night before the hunt, you had to drop off 12 eggs for each kid you were going to bring. You just dropped them off at the lady's house who organized it and wrote down on the sign up sheet what age group your kid would be in (0-4, 5-9, 10-12). Then the next morning, the eggs were put in different neighbor's yards along the same street for each age group. They announced which yards you should hunt in for each age group and said that once your kid had found 12 eggs, they were done. If they couldn't find 12, then they said to come talk to them because they had some extras. It worked out really well! Everyone seemed to find plenty of eggs. After the easter egg hunt, everyone brough breakfast treats to share!


We also spent some time doing some hunting of our own! On Saturday, Calvin, my Dad, Camden, and I went up to the Bountiful shooting range. Camden slept in the car while we shot some clay pigeons with our shot guns. We borrowed a spring-loaded thrower, which was actually a lot of fun. Then we went up to the range and shot some targets. I am much better at target shooting. Then on Sunday, my Dad, Calvin, and Danny shot the bow. It was kind of funny watching Calvin and Danny try to pull back the bow that was a little too long for thier arms. They did pretty good though! They even hit the target!


Here are just a couple other pictures of what we've been doing lately. Calvin brought me these beautiful roses just because he loves me! (And maybe because I've been hinting that I would really like some :)
Calvin proved what an awesome mechanic he is by diagnosing and fixing the broken water pump on my car. In case you didn't know, he went to the National Ford auto competition when he was in High School. What a catch!