Calhoun Cousins

Last Monday, July 14th, Madi and I drove up to my parents' house in Northern California. My niece Ani was already here, and Tisha and Adley flew in Tuesday evening. We've had a fun first week in Brentwood. Here's just a few pictures of the things we've been up to.

The first day we were here, mom and I took the girls out on the town.


The Dollar Store is always a LOT of fun!



The grocery store wasn't as exciting though.


Did I mention that these girls are only 2 months apart?!?! There is seriously a 10 pound weight difference as well as a few inches in height!


The girls have loved playing in the hot tub, baby pool, bathtub, and outside in the backyard! They are super cute together!







Ani has kept us all entertained with her hilarious facial expressions!



This is a typical morning scene- outside playing trains at 7am! Adley wakes up somewhere around 6am, putting my mom on duty while Tisha and I go running. We're usually home a little after 7am just as the girls wake up to join in on the fun! Having had 6 kids, my mom loves the craziness of entertaining all 3 kids at once!


This is a typical evening scene- Tisha reading scripture stories to all three kids at once. Scripture time is always followed by more stories and songs! I gotta say, it's quite the party over here at bed time!


Adley and Anneke are quite the little buddies. While Ani enjoys playing with her cousin Madi, Adley isn't very interested. If I come outside with Madi to play, his first response is, "Where's Anneke?" I had to include the following 2 pictures as a glimpse to what you get when you put Adley and Anneke together! They are super silly, wrestle with each, and laugh non-stop!



We had to remove Adley from the swing in order to get the two of them calmed down; which just left a bunch of boring girls!! :)


Not having a sibling to pal around with, Madi has found other things around the house to keep her entertained.



She finally gathered the courage to warm up to my mom's new horsie! Madi was introduced to the horse on our trip here last month, but wanted absolutely NOTHING to do with it! This was her first time actually riding the horse! What a milestone!!


Madi and I only have 3 days left in Brentwood before we head back to Camarillo. While we are having a great time here, we look forward to seeing Spencer on Thursday!

Memory Tag

I had fun leaving a memory on another friends blog, so I thought I'd join in and play the game! Read the directions if you're interested!

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember!

2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory about you. It's actually pretty funny to see the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you.

The memory can be about Anie, Spencer, and/or Madilyn!!

Camping at Leo Carillo

This weekend Spencer and I decided to take advantage of all the nice beaches around us (and living with parents who LOVE our daughter) and go camping! Our good friends, Adam and Lora, were also up for some fun, so Friday afternoon we gathered up our camping gear and took off for Leo Carillo. It's only about a 20 minute drive from Camarillo- so it didn't take long! This was my first night ever away from Madi! I was happy for the opportunity to get away with Spencer and have a day to relax! Thanks mom and dad, Madi's a lucky girl to have such great babysitters!!!

After arriving at camp and checking out our site, we took off for the beach. It was such a gorgeous evening!!! However, I was a dummy and forgot to charge my camera before leaving. I was only able to get a few good pictures before my battery died! What a bummer!! Luckily Lora had her camera-thanks Lora for some great shots!!

We spent a couple of hours down on the beach, hiking around on the rocks and through the caves! What a gorgeous night!




We were even able to witness a wedding going on! We walked right past the bride taking pictures with her bridesmaids! We were nice though and didn't take a picture until we had hiked away from the wedding party!



Once the tide started coming up, we headed back to camp to barbecue hot dogs and roast marshmellows. After eating smores and playing a few rounds of cards, we hit the sack!





We all woke up bright and early to another beautiful day! Good morning!!


What prepared campers we were- bringing along our BBQ to cook up some yummy pancakes and sausage on. As always, Spencer was the master chef!



Obviously we weren't prepared enough though because we forgot to pack plates to put our pancakes on! We made it work though!! The sausages wrapped nicely in the pancakes and with a little syrup, gave us some delicious "pigs in a blanket"! Yummmmm.....


After breakfast we quickly packed up and were off to the beach!


While Lora and I layed on the beach, soaking in the warm rays and reading magazines, Spencer and Adam were chillin in the ocean- waiting for the perfect wave (or should I say, any wave)!


Thanks Adam and Lora for the weekend FUN!!! We had a fabulous time and can't wait to do it again!

A few of our favorite things

Spencer, Madi, and I have been in California for 7 weeks now and only have 6 weeks left until we fly home! It's actually going by surprisingly fast. While Spencer goes off to work each morning, Madi and I have several favorite things that keep us busy during the day. Here's just a few of our favorite things.....

#1 The Camarillo Library

Camarillo built a brand new library a few years ago, and knowing that we'd be around all summer I had to check it out. Madi and I joined the summer reading program at our first visit and have enjoyed checking out BAGS of books each week. While Madi did bring her backpack of favorite books from home, it's always nice to read new stories. While the entire library is amazing with all the intricate detailed tiling and a technological advanced check-out system, I had to take a few pictures of Madi's favorite room in the library. This is the discovery room where the Pirate ship is.



Inside this ship the kids (and sometimes even adults) choose their books and quietly find a space to read. Madi loves reading in the pile of stuffed animals!


There are usually a few other kids playing in the animals as well, and Madi loves making new friends! Look closely and you'll be able to see one of the friends she made this particular day. He blends in very nicely with the animals! It's super cute to watch Madi crawl all over the animals and then stop to give each one a big hug!


#2 Parks

On our way home from the library we will usually stop to eat lunch at a nearby park. I'll usually lay out a nice beach towel for Madi and I to sit on, but Madi quickly crawls off to go explore. The other day she found a nice pile of dog poop (luckily old and dried up)! As I made her drop it out of her hand I noticed that she had been sitting on an even bigger pile!! YUCK!!



#3 Playing outside in the backyard.

Whenever we're inside playing, Madi always manages to make her way over to the screen door. She opens it, and heads outside to play! There is always something interesting to play with outside! She loves being pushed around in the car, truck, and on the bike. I've got cute videos of her getting in and out of the truck, but I STILL can NOT get the videos to upload. I do it exactly like I've done before, but then it says there was an error and can not upload the video. If anyone knows how to fix this problem, please HELP!!


#4 Picking Raspberries

Spencer's parents have a pretty big raspberry patch next to their house and now that Grandpa Al introduced Madi to raspberries, she just loves picking and eating them!



#5 Being together!

It's amazing how many other little things that I never cared about doing before, seem like the BEST thing ever now that I've got Madi to share it with! I know people say that it's hard taking kids places and I'm sure I'll feel the same way when I've got more than one. But for right now, I really do prefer to have Madi with me. Here's us in another one of our twin outfits!!

Happy 4th of July!!

The 4th of July is Spencer's favorite holiday! My first 4th spent with the Jenkins' family gave me a glimpse as to why Spencer loves it so much! It's always an elaborate celebration with delicious foods, hanging out with friends, and a LOT of fun! Spencer gets SUPER bummed out when we don't do something awesome to celebrate our country's birthday! Last year, Spencer and I had a very memorable 4th, bringing Madilyn home from the hospital! She had been in the NICU for 4 days, and had not yet been home with us. So, while we didn't get to participate in the traditional Jenkins' family 4th of July festivities, it was a VERY special day!


Since last year we spent the holiday at home, enjoying Madilyn, we wanted to make her real, first 4th of July a BIG day! And what a FUN day it was! We started off the day going over to the church for an early morning Patriotic program and pancake breakfast. What a GREAT way to begin the day- with singing and inspirational words reminding us of how lucky we are to live in such a great nation! Here's Madi and I in front of Grandpa Al's Scout.



Following the breakfast we went over to our friends, Adam and Lora's house for swimming and sun time! We put Madi down for her nap and had 2 hours of relaxing "grown-up" time (I can never fully enjoy laying out with kids around)! Around noon Madi woke up to join us in the pool! Unfortunately we payed for our hours in the sun later that evening. With Spencer's back and stomach not having seen the sun for a LONG time, he's been in TONS of pain!! And even with all the SPF 50 that I lathered on Madi, she still managed to get red shoulders. While it didn't seem to bother her at all, I felt SUPER bad!





After swimming, we headed back to Spencer's parents' house to eat lunch. Dad, mom, and Jocelyn had already headed over to the beach, so we quickly packed back up and left to join them. With already having had enough sun for the day, we put our clothes back on and added another layer of sunscreen!



We returned home about 5pm, giving us an hour to get ready for dinner. Madi happily went down for a late nap while Spencer got right to work brewing his famous homemade root beer!


While Spencer brewed, I joined mom and Jocelyn in making the the buttermilk onion rings! They are seriously HEAVENLY to eat and SUPER easy to make too! It's as simple as onion slices dipped in buttermilk, flour, buttermilk, saltine crackers (with a little seasoning), and then put into the deep fryer to cook for a few minutes! We made over triple the amount shown below!


Along with homemade root beer and onion rings, another traditional Jenkins' 4th of July food, is homemade ice cream (which unfortunately I didn't get a picture of)! With Spencer's dad on the grill barbecuing tri tip, the rest of our dinner included: several other salads, corn on the cob, french bread, and watermelon! What a scrumptious meal!!


Madi actually woke up just as we were about to eat (always prefect timing- she's good at making sure I eat a cold meal)! She was happy to join us for dinner though and watch all the other kids who had come over to play. The Lassen and Lovstedt families joined us for dinner, making our group somewhere around 20 adults and 6 kids!

A little after 8:00pm we headed out to watch the fireworks! We got a perfect spot! I was excited to see Madi's reaction to the fireworks. At first she just stared in complete AWE! Then she started to get nervous and would lay her head down on my shoulder away from the fireworks. She'd cuddle with me for a few seconds and then would want to watch again. Then she'd get nervous and want her daddy, so into Spencer's arms she went! She's cuddle with him, watch for a minute, and want to come back to me! It was hilarious! She went back and forth from Spencer to myself several different times. About half way through the show, she actually wanted to watch. She sat down in the chairs with me, pointing into the sky and joining me with my ooohhhs and awwwws!



Left to right: Mom and Dad with good friends: Mitch Tao, John, and Debi Lassen



Madi with mama and Aunt Joci


What a HAPPY 4th of July!!