EARTHQUAKE and Hanging out with Family

Probably most everyone heard about the earthquake that hit the Los Angeles area this week. It was measured at around 5.6 and that is considered a moderate size. Both Jackie and I were at work, the ground felt like it was rolling and it moved for quite some time, at least that is what it felt like. It was the first one we have felt in the over two years of living here. It was actually pretty scary, more of the thought that a big earthquake could hit and what if we aren't prepared.
On Saturday we went to Jackie's cousin Kallen's son Carson's baptism out in the Glendora/La Verne area. It is always fun to go to a baptism and feel of the spirit. It was also neat because Kallen has a new baby and they were able to do the baby blessing afterwards with all the family there. There was a nice luncheon afterwards and we had a great time talking. After the luncheon we went to "Aunt" Arlene's house to visit. She had just got back from England and we were able to see all the stuff she brought back. We just sat and talked and before we knew it, we had been there for 4 hours. We headed back to Kallen's house and hung out there for another few hours. Jackie was able to watch the Osmond concert that they had recorded from the conference center the other week. It was fun to be with family and just spend a day relaxing.

Jackie and I playing Rock Band for the first time. It was a lot of fun. We weren't very good at it though. The drums were hard to play and the guitar took a little time to get used to. It was a lot harder than I had imagined it to be. We always hear of everyone playing Guitar Hero and it was fun to actually try it. It could be the next game we get for the Wii.
Jackie and London
Jackie with baby Holland
Jackie, Kallen, Holland, and Aunt Cookie

Wet carpet and wet burp cloth to be!

We had a very exciting past weekend! Friday morning when C.J. grabbed the scriptures off the floor he noticed they were a little bit damp. So we moved them and didn't think twice about it. Saturday night when we were kneeling for prayers, we were on my side of the bed which we never are, and when I got up my knees were soaked. We starting feeling around and noticed that a corner in our bedroom was very wet. We started moving our stuff around and noticed that all my church books that I had up against my dresser were completely wet. I put them on the table to dry and sadly some of them are not usable anymore. I was and still am upset that my nice books are ruined. We went to church on Sunday and after church had one of the maintenance guys come look at our carpet. Come to find out our water heater was leaking and they would need to replace it, pull up our carpet to get out the wet padding and so the carpet could dry. We had our friends Spenny and Nellie come to help us move our bed over so it would be easier to pull up the corner that was wet. While we were moving it, Spenny was kneeling on the floor and got wet. The water had gone across our whole bedroom. We took down our bed and moved everything into the extra bedroom except for our dressers. When I came home from work on Monday, all the carpet in our bedroom was pulled up with three big blowers in there to dry it out. Did I mention that it stunk like wet dog in our bedroom all weekend? Anyway, today when I got home, the carpet was all put together again and our carpets were cleaned. It still has a faint smell, but it is way better then what it was.


Now for my exciting project! Tonight for an enrichment activity we had a sewing class. Now I took one in high school, but if you looked real closely at the things I made they were not so great, but from afar they looked wonderful! Tonight my friend Stacie was teaching the class, and we made burp cloths. It wasn't that hard, it just takes some getting used to. Mine of course is not as professional looking as Stacie's, but I have to say it turned out pretty darn good. I am very proud of myself in case you couldn't tell. I better not make too many though because my wonderful Mother-in-law has already made me lots for when we have kids! Thanks Connie!! And here is the finished product:

Movie Weekend

Two Movies came out this weekend that we were really excited to see. On Friday night we went and saw Mama Mia. Jackie and I had gone to the Broadway version when it was in Salt Lake three years ago and had so much fun, so we had been excited for it to come out on the big screen. It was a fun movie, not quite the same experience as seeing it live, but still a lot of fun. First time we have been to a movie theater in California on opening night that was actually sold out. We usually always go on opening night too. The theaters down in our area are never crowded. Anyway I thought Meryl Streep did a good job and you could tell she was having fun in the movie. On Saturday night we went and saw the new Batman movie The Dark Night. It was amazing. I think we liked Batman Begins better, but this one was still good. The Joker was extremely creepy and probably one of the best villains of all time. If you get a chance make sure to see it in the theaters. Be warned, it is very dark and there are some scary parts.
Saturday afternoon we had a barbecue with the three Skilled Nursing Facilities that are in Ventura County. We had an amazing barbecue and fun games for the kids. For the adults we had the egg toss as you can see below, relay race, tug o war, and pie eating contest. Jackie's facility took home the annual trophy. It was a fun time.
Me in the red with perfect egg tossing form, it's too bad my partner DID NOT have PERFECT egg catching skills. We made it to the final three teams and lost. Oh well........
Earlier in the week we had a "Couple Shower" for Tyler and his fiancee Jen. Some how I ended up being in charge of the whole event, don't know how that happened, but it turned out really well and we had a good time. We played some fun games, especially the ask them question game about their partner and if they answered it wrong they had to chew a piece of gum. Needless to say they both had at least ten pieces of gum in their mouths by the end. It was an eventful week. We are starting to pack as we will be moving to a different part of Ventura in August. It should be a hectic few weeks.

4th of July

What a nice and relaxing holiday weekend. We decided to stay in Ventura for the 4th. On Friday we went to a Festival in Downtown Ventura. There were hundreds of booths set up selling, pictures, paintings, crafts, vacations and lots of other things. We bought this photograph below. The picture below is the city of Ventura where we live. It is a beautiful place with perfect weather and very close to the ocean as you can see. We have really enjoyed living here.
We spent the day with the Morris' and had a barbecue at their apartment. The grill ran out of propane mid grilling and Spenny had to go get some more. Kind of funny, but we had great food and then went to the firework show at Ventura College. There were three firework shows in Ventura but we decided on the closest one to the apartment.
As you can see the firework show kept us entertained.
On Saturday we went out with Tyler and his fiancee Jen to the Hollywood Bowl. On the way we stopped at Porto's in Glendale/Burbank area. It is this Cuban bakery that has really good desserts and had some great sandwiches. The picture above is of Jackie eating fried plantains. This is a food I loved eating in the Dominican Republic on my mission and had never really found anything that compared to the fried plantains from the D.R. These were the closest things I have found and Jackie actually really enjoyed them. I was quite surprised. They sure tasted good to me and brought back many memories.

At the Hollywood Bowl we saw Bugs Bunny on Broadway. The Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra played the songs. While they played there were Looney Toon Cartoons being played on big screens. It was very entertaining and it was a nice relaxing evening. We arrived two hours before it began and had a picnic there and then watched the performance. It was nice to hang out with Tyler and Jen and catch up on everything that has been going on with them. They have been really busy with their wedding plans for next month.
We parked in this parking lot and once we got in there we realized that it was stacked parking, meaning you can't leave until the car in front of you leaves. I was a little nervous we were going to be stuck there for a while waiting for the cars around us to leave. Luckily for us the cars in front of us were gone when we got to the parking lot.
Hopefully everyone had as great of a Fourth of July as we did.

Trip to Utah

We have not been to Utah since Christmas and we decided to make a trip. Matt, Holly, and the kids just moved back, so we thought we would go see them along with everyone else. Jackie was so excited and counted down the days for the last month. The Rasband kids were so nice and made us a Welcome Home Banner along with balloons, as you can see there are no balloons in the picture, that is because......
After Camille was warned not to let go of the balloons, Jackie took them outside and by accident they decided to float away.
Bye Balloons, this is Jackie being sad about the balloons.....
Next we jumped on the trampoline with the sprinklers underneath, the kids showed me some good tricks. I also went swimming with Cory, July, and Cayman but did not bring the camera with me.

On Friday, I spent most the day with my brother which was a lot of fun just to hang out and talk. We went golfing with Ryan and Scott. Cory played great and well, the rest of us did not. I blame it on the clubs and the heat though. That night we had a fun barbecue at Cory's new house.
Grandma, Grandpa, Mom, Candice, Cohen, Ryan, Amber, Spencer, Criscell, Scott, and of course Cory, July and Cayman were there. It was a lot of fun to be able to see everyone. I had so much fun playing with Cayman and twirling her around and making her dizzy, and watching her play on her little car. She is fearless. I was so excited to hear her say my name.

On Saturday we went to Kung Fu Panda with the Johnson's. It was a good kid movie. We then went to a potluck with Jackie's high school friends. It was fun to meet people I had heard so much about. I do have to apologize to Natalie for spilling Root Beer on the table cloth, dumb me.
That night we had Cohen's 1 year birthday party. It was fun and I was glad we could be there for it.
This is how Sunday was spent, just hanging out with the Johnson family. It was a nice relaxing day. We sure do have great families and we love everyone so much and wish we could spend more time together. We love you all!!!

Griffith Observatory

Since we aren't planning on living here forever, we try to go see something new every weekend. This weekend we went to Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, it is located on the hills above Hollywood and offers a great view of the city. Inside it is a basically a space museum. It was pretty cool and fun to do something different.
Us in front of it. We went with our friends Spenny, Nellie, and baby Logan. It was nice to have someone else there to be able to take pictures of us.
One of the views of Los Angeles. Lots of pollution in the air, not quite a clear day.
That little white thing in the back left of the picture is the Hollywood sign. Despite what it looks like in the picture, we were actually really close to it.
That's Spenny in the picture, Spenny and I grew up together and one of our favorite things as kids was Transformers. Needless to say we loved the Transformers Movie. Part of the movie was filmed at the Griffith Observatory, the one scene with picture below is when the Autobots landed, some of them landed by the Observatory. The other scene is where we are standing was when Optimus Prime was looking through the glasses to try to locate the All Spark. This is where they had their meeting. Anyway it was pretty cool to be there. There have been lots of movies filmed at the Observatory, Rebel Without a Cause, Terminator, Jurassic Park, Bond's Golden Eye and here is a bigger list http://www.imdb.com/List?endings=on&&locations=Griffith%20Park%20Observatory,%20Griffith%20Park%20-%204730%20Crystal%20Springs%20Drive,%20Los%20Angeles,%20California,%20USA&&heading=18;with+locations+including;Griffith%20Park%20Observatory,%20Griffith%20Park%20-%204730%20Crystal%20Springs%20Drive,%20Los%20Angeles,%20California,%20USA

Jackie and I chilling with Albert, pretty nice guy, don't know what he was looking at though.

I must have put on some weight since we got married, thank goodness we don't live on Jupiter. There was another funny picture that I was told I was not allowed to post on the blog, so if anyone is interested, I will email it to you.
Our last stop was a Hamburger joint called Tommy's. It's one of those places that you can feel yourself getting fatter as you eat. Chili Cheese Fries with a Double Chili Burger. It was Yummy

My New Glasses

Everybody in my family has glasses except for my sister Jodi and me. My eyesight has been getting bad lately, I can't see far away things. I can't read street signs or the chalkboard in Primary. It was bound to happen sooner or later, so I decided it was time to get some glasses. CJ and I went to Lenscrafters yesterday and I got my eye exam and then we went through the store searching high and low for the perfect ones, but I am not so sure that we picked the perfect ones. CJ and the girl at the store who was helping us thought these were the cutest ones. I trusted them and went for it. We took a picture on CJ's phone and sent it to my sister Holly so my family could see, she showed my Daddy and he didn't even recognize me. So sad! I told myself I wasn't going to wear them all the time, just for driving or when absolutely needed. But after wearing them for a couple hours last night when we were walking around the mall, I couldn't believe how much sharper everything looked. I didn't realize how bad my eyes really were. Bummer! So needless to say, I feel like an idiot when I wear them. It will definitely take some time to get used to seeing me with them on.