The Bump....

Well some have asked so here it is...the Baby Bean #2 bump. Not a great picture...sorry my head is not in it, but it was not a pretty day for photos.

2007 Wrap Up...Welcome 2008

Ok so I am FINALLY getting around to updating this blog! Here is what happened in the past few weeks....

Christmas Eve

We spent the evening of Christmas Eve with our good friends Richard and Melanie Sala. It is an Italian traditon in Rich's family to make spaghetti on Christmas Eve so Richard made the sauce and we brought French Bread (homemade by me with Adam's recipe...it was hit!), Caprese Salad, and green salad. Needless to say it was a FEAST! Before dinner we took a little Metro ride into DC to see the National Christmas Tree at the White House. We were not the only ones with this idea...it was PACKED! The tree was not the Rockefeller Tree, but it was still neat to see.

Christmas Day

We spent the morning with out little family of 3 1/3 opening presents and eating a hearty breakfast of Eggs Huntington! YUMMY! Dan opened most of Jack's presents for him, but Jack certainly played with them all...that is after we managed to free them from the packaging!! For Christmas dinner we once again joined the Sala's for a tradtional meal. All in all a good Christmas...not white..but still fun.

Our sorta Christmas Tree....the real one is packed somewhere in the basement...

Trips to D.C.

We took two more trips to Washinton D.C. with the Salas and their 9 fmaily members. The first was on the 30th...we made it as far as the Lincoln Memorial before it began pouring rain! I have decided I would rather have snow! We took a quick side tour to the Korean Memorial and then headed back home to watch the sorry showing CU gave in the bowl game again Alabama.

The next trip was on New Years Day, again with the Salas and company. We went in the evening and were able to see the mall at night. It was a little frigid, but we managed to make it most of the way through the momuments. The most spectacular was the new World War II memorial! WHAT A SIGHT TO SEE AT NIGHT! I would love to go back during the day and read all of the inscriptions and take some picture. Only one of the ones I took at night turned out.

Over all, the holidays went well, of course we would have LOVED to have been with family, but had a good time with our Marine Corp family. Dan is headed back to school tomorrow for his last two weeks of TBS! It is hard to believe it is over. Then he will be headed to Camp Lejeune for Combat Engineer school on the 25th. Jackson and I will pack our things and head to Colorado in mid-march to stay and have baby bean #2. Then it is off to Sunny SoCal. Thanks for hanging with us this year...keep checking in with us...this next year will be another wild Marine Corp Adventure!

Beach Fun On A Cold Rainy Day

Last weekend we celebrated Jackson's 1st birthday with some of our friends. The day was cold, dreary, and wet but inside we were enjoying thoughts of the beach. We decided since we are moving back to CA and the beach scene we would give Jackson a little taste of the life to come. I did my best to decorate the kitchen in a warm beach scene.

We cooked hamburgers, hot dogs, and brats on the grill and enjoyed other food typical to a beach picnic. I did my best to make a surf board cake. It was my first time making the butter cream icing and it didn't stiffen up very well, but Jack didn't care.

Speaking of cake...Jack LOVED it! He wasn't too sure how he felt about us all singing happy birthday to him, but once the candle was blown out and the cake put in front of him he was a happy camper. At first he just picked at it. Just when we thought we would be there ALL DAY watching him pick at his cake he picked the whole piece up and began shoving it in his mouth. Here are just a few of the million pictures we took to capture his enjoyment.

He enjoyed all of his new presents too. He got the Little People Zoo, A musical phone, drums, a hammer that lights up and makes noise, a ride on Tonka truck, and crayons. What a day of fun!

Even after all of those toys he still thinks pulling all the diapers out is a blast. Some things just never get old.

Take Your Wildest Guess

As many of you moms out there know, when you are pregnant everyone has an opinion about whether you are having a boy or a girl. So, I thought it might be fun to get every one's opinion on the matter. I have added a poll to the right side of the blog just under our family picture. Just click on boy or girl and we will share the results after our ultrasound on Jan 16th. Happy Voting!

Guess Who Turned One???

It is hard to believe a year has gone by so quickly. It seems like just yesterday I was pregnant with Jackson and anxiously awaiting his arrival...being pregnant now may have something to do with it feeling like I was pregnant just yesterday :) As the weekend began, I began looking at the clock and remembering what we were doing the year previous. I looked at the clock at 10:00am on Sunday (12/9) which is 8:00am in CO and thought, a year ago today my water just broke. Another time I looked at the clock around 11:00am on Monday (12/10), again 9:00am Colorado time, and though about this time a year ago Jackson and I were taking our first ambulance ride. As I sit here today on Thursday (12/13) I think to myself, a year ago today I would have gotten to hold my baby boy for the very first time. Who would have known that a little life that started out so rough would become the happy healthy little one year old I hold today. Jackson is truly a blessing in our life.

Ok so let me clear away the tears from my eyes and tell you about our little guy's special day. When Dan got home from work that evening there were two boxes waiting for Jackson, one from Grammy (Diann, Dan's Mom) and one from Grandpa and Nana Jernigan (Jeff and Nancy, Dan's Dad and his wife)! YIPPY Jack's first birthday presents!

Grammy sent Jackson an AWESOME bath toy! It is a row boat with a little dude inside with crazy hair and board shorts. Funny...he looks a lot like Jackson. Along with the little rower was a great book about animals and how they camouflage and a cute outfit. Jack had so much fun with the wrapping paper and later in the bath with his new boat buddy.

Nana and Grandpa Jernigan sent Jackson a Lightening McQueen ride on car. For those of you who don't know, Lightening McQueen is the main character in the kids movie Cars. It is a must see. The present came wrapped from Target in a GIANT red bag that stood about as tall as Jackson. He was fascinated with all of the lights and sounds of the car. In fact it was difficult to get him to look up to take a picture of him.

We got him several gifts, but decided to give him just one of them and save the rest for his birthday party this Sunday. We wanted to get him a car he could zoom around. So what we found is a car with a little twist. The car is actually a bathtub on wheels with a pig inside. When you shake the car the pig starts snorting and then music plays and the car takes off on it's own. Jackson was no so sure about the car suddenly shooting across the room, but we sure enjoyed watching his chase it.

He is such a big boy now and we are so blessed by his fun, happy personality.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACKSON!

Turkey, Football, and Beach Dreams

Ok...here is other update of the happenings in the Jernigan household over the past several days.

We had the priviledge to spend Thanksgiving with good friends of ours the Sala's. Melanie and I split up the cooking and made a HUGE feast. We had two international officers join us to experience their first American Thanksgiving. One was an officer from Kuwait and the other from Panama. It was fun to watch them try all the traditional holiday foods. Melanie was the photographer for the event and she is out of town so I apologize for the lack of pictures.

Dan and I spent the next day at the Sala's lounging off our turkey dinner and consuming leftovers while we watched the CU-Nebraska game. What a game! For all of you who didn't catch it...CU WON!!! We loved all the pictures of the Boulder area and could not believe how much snow is on the ground. It was 50 degrees here that day. How quickly you forget what winter is really like. It is still hard for me to believe it is the end of November.

Our minds have had trouble focusing on winter because all we can think about is the So Cal weather we will soon be enjoying. Yep! That's right! We found out we will be stationed at Camp Pendleton!! Dan will be with 1st Combat Engineer Battalion for the next two or three years! We are truely excited to be returning to a place we hated to leave. I am still not sure when we will be arriving. As per usual I will be moving with Jackson and Dan will be joining us later. Dan begins his school in North Carolina on Jan 28th and will graduate about May 19th. Since that is cutting it a little close to my June 6th due date Jackson and I will probably head to CA no later than the last week in March. The housing situation is still up in the air. We have friends of ours who have been on the waiting list since the beginning of October and they are currently number 23 on the list...a whole two slots less than they were when they signed up a month ago. We are hoping to be able to get into housing but if not we will just rent somewhere for a short while. We will keep you updated on our next big moving adventure as the plan unfolds.

Jackson is coming up on his 1st birthday on 12/10 and is trying so hard to get his first tooth. So he is whining for me to get off the computer and put him down for his nap. Here's to hoping his teeth come in soon...I am not sure how many more sleepless nights I can put up with.

Pull Up A Chair...We Have A Lot Of Catching Up To Do

Ok so I have been terrible up updating this blog. Things have not been quiet around the Jernigan household as you will soon see. This pregnancy has brought with it many more symptoms of morning sickness and COMPLETE exhaustion...I guess that is what you get when you are chasing a very active 11 month old. SO let's see where to begin...




On Wednesday, Nov 7th my mom flew in from Colorado for a week. I actually made it safely to the airport (anyone who has driven in VA and the DC area knows what a feet that really is-by the end of the year VA will more than likely take the lead for the most highway fatalities). On Thursday I introduced my mom to pajama days. A pajama day is when Jackson and I spent the day in our PJs! Great relaxing fun...you should try it some time. Mom was so helpful and dove right into doing the MOUNDS of laundry and dishes that had piled up.





Saturday, November 10 was the 232rd Birthday of the Marine Corps. For those of you who do not know, the Marine Corps makes a really big deal out of their birthday and celebrate it with a huge ball. This year the ball was held in Richmond (A dirty nasty city about 75 miles south of Stafford) and since mom was in town Dan and I got a hotel room and stayed the night down there. No Marine Corps ball is complete without one really good story...we made it to the hotel safely, had gotten dressed, and headed down to the cocktail hour. As it got closer to the time of the ceremonies we decided it would be a good idea to check the seating chart and locate our table in the main ballroom. We quickly scanned the list of over 800 names and came up empty. After a much closer inspection of the list we still did not find our names on the list. HUMMMM...I know we paid in cash and signed up over a month in advance. After tracking down the officer in charge of the ball we discovered when they had made some last minute adjustments to the seating chart they had deleted about four tables from our company, including the table of the company commander. So long story short, we ended up standing in the back of the ballroom for the duration of the ceremonies and then were taken to the hotel restaurant to be served our meal. Although the situation was extremely frustrating we ended up enjoying our time with our friends. The next morning we headed out with the Sala's and the Elliott's for brunch at The Tobacco Company. The food was great and the atmosphere was enjoyable. Over all, we had a great weekend. Happy Birthday Marines!

The Girls - Trisha, Melanie, Me, and Tess

The guys - Dan, Abdula (International Officer from Kuwait), Rich, & Aaron

The Prego Girls - Me and Melanie

The Dads-to-be - Rich and Dan

Breakfast - Aaron and Trisha Elliott, Rich and Melanie Sala, Me and Dan

Dan had Veteran's Day off so we decided to take mom to Baltimore to the National Aquarium. It was so fun to watch Jackson look at all of the fish. He was mesmerized as we walked down the center of a five story coral reef full of fish. If you find yourself in the Baltimore area the National Aquarium is a must see.





On Wednesday we said goodbye to my mom. I wish she could have stayed another week or more. It truly was wonderful to have her around. Jackson really misses her!

Sunday Dan and I celebrated our sixth anniversary. My how time flies when you are having fun. Dan let me sleep in and he took Jackson to get me breakfast in bed and flowers. It was a memorable morning. I hope for many more fun adventurous years to come. Being in the Marine Corps I doubt we will lack adventure.

I had another doctors appointment on Monday and the baby looks great and is growing, growing, growing. After the ultrasound the OBNP decided not to change my due date and said I am growing a big baby! YIKES!! So all is well with the pregnancy and I am starting to feel a little more like myself as I head into my 12th week.





The biggest news is we just found out Dan will be a Combat Engineer for the Marine Corps for the remainder of his carrier. The selection of their military occupational specialty (MOS) is a complicated process...here is my understanding of how it works...all of the 2nd Lt in the company are ranked according to their performance in The Basic School. The class is them broken into thirds (A top 1/3, middle 1/3, and bottom 1/3). Each 2nd Lt ranks their preference of MOS from 1-15 and then all the information is shoved into a computer. In order to get a quality spread the top 1/3 of the top 1/3 is given their first choice based on the needs of the Marine Corps, then the top 1/3 of the middle 1/3 are given their choice of MOS, and then the top 1/3 of th bottom 1/3. It continues on selecting MOS by thirds and as the Marine's first choices are taken by Marines chosen before them MOS further down on their list are selected for them. SO needless to say depending on your class standing you may or may not get one of your top 5 choices. After the computer spits out what it feels is the appropriate MOS for the Marines the SPCs (not sure what this stands for, but it would be the equivalent to a drill instructor at boot camp with a lot less yelling) from all of the platoons get together and swap MOS for their Marines to get the best fit possible. After all was said and done Dan's class standing was the bottom 1/3 of the top 1/3 which is great when you look at it over all but not so great for MOS selection because he was not given a choice until the 7th pull. However, he did get his second choice of Combat Engineers. He is a little bummed about not getting his first choice of Infantry, but is glad he will be in an MOS where he can lead Marines.





SO...what does that mean for us? After Dan graduates from The Basic School on Jan 18th he will head down to Camp Lejeune for a two or three month engineer school. Because the school is shorter than six months the Marine Corps will not allow me to accompany him, so I will be staying here while he is in school. My friend's Melanie and Trisha will be staying behind too so I will have plenty of company. We still do not know what duty station we will head too after Dan completes his MOS school, but we are trying our hardest to get back to Camp Pendleton in southern CA.





I guess that is all from VA...sorry it was such a lengthy update. Now that I am feeling a little better I hope to update more often. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving.