Christmas with Family

This year, the holidays really flew! We were lucky to be able to have lots of family in town for Thanksgiving, then the Sorenson cousins got together to celebrate Katie's graduation. She got her bachelor's degree in nursing!

Then we headed to San Diego to spend Christmas with my dad, stepmom Kathy, and my three adorable little brothers. (I also have 2 older brothers, though I would no longer call them adorable... handsomely debonair maybe). My grandma Petersen also came down for the holidays. We always have so much fun together. Rocky had a blast playing with his little uncles. They were like the three amigos... or stooges maybe.

Jack followed little Dylan's every movement and even picked up on the word "ma ma" while we were there (a Dylan favorite). We also got to see 2 of my best buds Melissa and Jaime. It was fun seeing all of our kids play together and interact.

Kathy was an incredible hostess cooking a delicious multiple course French feast! It was TRES BIEN! We were impressed with the decorations and centerpieces too, along with the cute kid's table she had set up. Among many, many other items, the meal included cassis, coconut shrimp, lamb, caviar, foie gras, pate, and pumpkin pecan pie all prepared by Kathy with assistance by Grandma.


The kids were so fun to watch the next morning opening up their presents. This was the first year that they were really aware of it all and looked forward to it. Kathy and my dad spoiled us. We loved it. Kathy is such a fun, thoughtful person and really made the holidays special for us. I'm so glad that she is a part of our family. And we couldn't get enough of Brandon, Evan and Dylan. They are such sweet kids. We are blessed to have so many loving family members on all sides of our family. Now, we are looking forward to spending New Year's Eve tonight with Uncle Mort and Aunt Lacie's family, where we will be debuting our Guitar Hero World Tour game we got from Dad and Kathy and eating homemade Cafe Rio pork barbacoa burritos! Life is good!!
As an aside, do you notice how often I mention food? You see where my focus is...
Here are some more pictures of our holidays of 2008:


Rocky's Sorenson cousins at Thanksgiving


Cousin Gabe & Rocky


My awesome sister-in-laws Kari & Julia and I dressed up for Julia's B-day


Jodi & Cousin Jason at Katie's graduation party


Cute cousins Chloe & Chelsea... who is always great with the kids


Cousins Brad & Angie in town for Katie's graduation


Jack & his awesome uncle Rob


My little bro Evan all dressed up for the Christmas Eve dinner


Dylan & Jack bonding in their high chairs during the Christmas Eve dinner


Brandon excited about opening Santa's gifts Christmas morning


Crazy big sister Jodi reading stories to all the boys

Merry Christmas!!

This was Jack's gift to Dad... a little more than he was expecting! And yes, the spit-up went IN his mouth.

We hope you all had a Merry Christmas! Stay tuned this week for more holiday updates...

Rocky's Infectious Laugh

Happy 6 Months Jack!

He turned 6 months yesterday. It continues to amaze me that he is so different from his big brother. That's an understatement. In fact, I would go so far as to say that they are complete opposites. Let me give you some examples:

1. David was a docile baby content to lay there and smile. He didn't CRAWL until he was almost a year old. Jack is always in motion, flipping around, rocking, bouncing and is on the verge of crawling already! He scoots pretty well and many have witnessed him taking on the yoga "down-facing dog" position that even I find difficult.

2. David was a clean baby. I didn't understand how baby clothes could get stained or worn out. Jack, also known as geyser, spits up (or should I say gushes) his milk after all feedings, soaking all people, sheets and blankets present. I do AT LEAST 2 loads of laundry A DAY! Workers at the gym kids' center have started bringing extra clothes to work just because of him. If you visit us, I suggest you do the same.

3. David was a quiet baby, when he wasn't doing his squirrel giggle. You could barely hear his cry and it was rare. Jack's cry resembles a loud, piercing, unearthly siren call. Those who have heard it don't soon forget it. His cries go from 0 to 60 in 2.2 seconds. When he's mad, he's MAD. And he was pretty mad the first four months of life.

4. Jack is brave, while David is still very timid. We've never had to worry about David jumping into pools, falling off jungle gyms or tripping down stairs. Jack, on the other hand has flipped himself off the bed so many times that he doesn't even cry when it happens. It doesn't faze him. We're the slow parents who are still expecting the same leisures we enjoyed with David.

5. David has always and still does fear baths. He is so sure that water dripping into his eyes while his hair is being washed will mean certain death. Jack LOVES baths. He splashes, he kicks, he coos. Rich even dunked him in the pool once, and he didn't mind a bit.

6. As a baby, David hated rice cereal and consistently refused it until we gave up trying. Jack loves the stuff and can't get enough. The first time we hovered a spoonful near him, bracing ourselves for the battle, he surprised us by grabbing the spoon, shoving the cereal noisily into his mouth and swallowing with ease.

7. With David, new stages took training and patience such as nursing, using a bottle, swallowing food, rolling over. Jack handled it all like a champ. He's gotten everything the first try easily, as if he had done it all before. Except for smiling and sleeping. David dazzled us in his first few weeks of life with both, while those have taken Jack much, much longer.

There are many other examples, but you get the idea. We are learning how little control we have over these little personalities. I know you're not supposed to compare your children, but it will be fun to look back on this and see if their stark differences continue.
Most amazing of all... we love them both equally!

To celebrate Jack's 6 months of life, I made a little video I like to call
"60 Seconds with Baby Jack." Oh, and I didn't add any sound effects. What you are hearing are authentic Jack sounds.

Christmas Card

We hope you enjoyed it since we are not mailing out real cards this year. Too busy and way too lazy. Kate did this on her blog, and I thought it was awesome. So we did it too. You may have noticed that Jack is on it twice. We needed 5 elves, and since he has 2 distinct personalities: extremely happy Jack and extremely grumpy Jack... I thought he could represent 2 elves. We love you all and hope you have a merry Christmas!!

Christmas Card

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Best Thanksgiving Ever!

Our Thanksgiving was awesome. This is because we had 8 of our favorite people staying with us over the holiday weekend, and it was a non-stop party. We laughed more in a few days than probably several years combined, which was very healing considering the emotional funeral visit we had just returned from. There is nothing like the sound of 6 cute, little kids' laughter filling your house to fill your soul. Two of these cuties were ours; the other 4 were our extremely adorable nieces and nephews Jeffery, Aspen, Gabriel and Miriena. We have been close to these kids ever since the first few years of marriage that Rich and I spent in their basement, so it was great to spend some quality time with them again. Along with them, we had their parents Joe (Rich's brother) and Julia, and Kari (Rich's sister) and Nate. The first evening, Rick (Rich's dad) and Pam joined us for some intense Sing Star kareoke gaming. We laughed ourselves silly singing a number of 80's songs. Thanksgiving dinner was cooked by the men and very impressive! That should definitely be a tradition. There we were joined by brother Rob and Uncle Dennis and his family. The rest of the weekend involved playing at Caper Acres park, Guitar Hero and more SingStar, movies, meals, workouts at the gym, and much more laughter.

Nate & Kari are exercise pro's and got me on a new exercise schedule and diet that I'm pretty excited about. I'm two weeks in, and so far, I'm loving it! If you're interested let me know.


My personal trainer & sis Kari

Nate Dog... breaking the diet...

Rocky had the time of his life playing with his cousins, who were so helpful and sweet with him. Every night they all crashed together on a blow-up mattress in Rocky's room. The kids were so quiet that we ended up sleeping in all weekend. When we woke up, Jeffery had gotten Rocky dressed and ready for the day. He followed his cousins everywhere. When we were at Round Table pizza the first night, he followed his cousins into the bathroom. Rich and I were unaware until we heard the laughter. We looked up to find Rocky waddling across the restaurant behind his cousins with his pants AND underpants down at his ankles. Too bad he was in one of of his SHORT shirts that day and gave everyone a show. Then Jack surprised us by leaping out of his car seat. Good thing Pam has quick reflexes and caught him in mid-air. We also celebrated Julia's birthday. The girls went shopping, while the boys watched the kids. Julia and I benefitted from Kari's shopping expertise and showed up that night for her birthday dinner in new outfits. The whole weekend was a blast!
I'm so glad I married into Rich's family. I love them all so much. I couldn't ask for better sisters. I just wish Kayla had been there too! And I wish I'd taken more pictures. Here are a few from our day at the park.

Jenodi Trip in SF

I'm catching up on events. The weekend before my Grandpa Derrall passed away, I met up with one of my very best friends in San Francisco. Jen was my fellow Journalism Dept. adventurer and later became my roommate. We became instant best buds while working at the Sundance Film Festival together, then later the 2002 Olympics. We are so alike and when together become this super brave and fun-loving person we like to call Jenodi. If you haven't heard some of our crazy college tales yet, you should. Even though we've been living on opposite ends of the country for years now, we've continued to grow closer through correspondence. So you can imagine my excitement when I found out that her work was sending her to SF for the weekend! It was the first kid-free girl time I've had since well... ages, so we lived it up! It was seriously the most fun I'd had since my honeymoon. We, accompanied by her equally awesome coworker, Jane, hit the town, ate our weight in seafood, cruised and screamed our way down the steepest streets we could find, danced our hearts out and got an enthusiastic ovation from our kareoke number, which can only be explained by the magic that occurs when Jenodi comes together. They let me participate in their work stuff too, and it was great to briefly pretend to be an important businesswoman. Just like the old days with Jenodi. We stayed right on Fisherman's Wharf within walking distance of all the action and then slept in hotel beds more comfortable than I ever imagined possible. Each evening ended in hours of girl talk. It was the best weekend, and I floated the whole way home. Ok.. actually I gripped the wheel in fear and panic as I maneuvered the streets of SF and multiple freeways towards Chico, but you know what I mean. Thanks Jen for the most amazing, rejuvenating, fun-filled, full-filling weekend. Thanks Rich for watching the boys AND cleaning the house. Incredible. And thanks GPS for getting me safely home.

Jen & the amazing seafood platter from Scoma's... best seafood in SF


Posing in China Town


Jane, Jen and I in front of our hotel.


Rocky sporting the ninja sword and jammies from China Town.

My Grandpa Derrall Petersen

My Grandpa, also known as Dudley, passed away last Monday night. We just returned home from his funeral in Hyrum, UT last night. He had been fighting colon and later pancreatic cancer for over 6 years. Even though we knew he would be leaving us shortly, it was still so hard when he did. I've always been proud to be his granddaughter. He was respected and loved by everyone who knew him. Being the only granddaughter for many years, he made me feel like his little princess while still treating me as an equal to the boys, physically and intellectually. He was a man of honor, kindness, humor and quiet dignity. He was a hero to me. I miss his warm hugs, his endearing chuckle and those twinkling eyes that said everything he didn't say vocally. He wasn't one to express emotions, but his eyes always revealed how much he loved his grandkids. He was a man that other men looked up to and came to for advice. He had a wealth of knowledge on so many subjects, such as fossils, astronomy and modern technology. He was a hard worker, dedicated to his wheat farm, Monument Mt. Ranch. My brothers and I loved visiting him on the farm and riding his combine and four-wheeler.

As kids, my brothers and I would go arrowhead hunting with Grandpa on his farm, then he would fascinate us with his vast collection of fossils, gems and gold. Grandpa was the most interesting person to talk to and inspired us to learn more about the world around us. These last few years, he and I have been reading the Michael and Kathleen Gear books. These archaeologists have written a lengthy series about the various Native American tribes of North America. Grandpa loved these books and got me interested in them as well. Since Grandpa didn't often talk about himself, reading these books that he loved so much helped me know him better and bonded us together even more. I loved discussing them with him. This was our favorite:

I already miss my Grandpa so much but appreciate all the memories I have and his presence and example throughout my life. I appreciate the relationship he had with my Grandma. The way they loved and treated each other has been an inspiration to me. They were true companions. I admire my Grandpa and hope to learn from his example. Until the very end, my Grandpa fought for his life and remained optimistic about his recovery. Despite the terrible pain he suffered, he rarely complained and greeted all of his final visitors with his genuinely warm, loving smile. I love you forever Grandpa.

War and Peace

This was not a set-up! This is how I found him this afternoon after his nap. I guess Rocky was sharing his weapons with his little brother. One of those coincidental ironies...

This is how he looked when he realized I had caught him in his hypocrisy.

Quality Time with Dad

Since Mom has been "under-the-weather" pretty much since Jack was born, Dad spends every free moment he has helping out with the kids, so I can rest. Since we are rapidly approaching Thanksgiving, I thought I would mention this and express how grateful I am for his help and patience with my frequent illnesses. If I didn't have Rich, I probably would have died of exhaustion by now. Thanks Rich!! Here are some cute pictures of the last few weeks...



It was quite a downpour! Rocky hates baths but he decided that playing in the rain (with Dad) was pretty fun.



I couldn't find my family one day... then discovered them all napping in the crib! Rich was tired of always bringing Jack to our bed, so he decided to just sleep in his!

Halloween... A Few Tricks & Many Treats

The festivities began with a little trick-or-treating through downtown Chico. Hordes of little costumed kids marched up and down the shop-filled streets during the less scary daylight hours. A good little sport, Rocky, donned his last year's cow costume and petitioned every basket-toting adult for candy in his sweet little irresistible voice. Many of them found him so adorable that they didn't refuse when he came back and asked for more, bearing a heart-warming resemblance to Oliver Twist, though I was a bit embarrassed and attempted to restrain him from this.


Just like the year he was a chicken, random Japanese students took pictures of him as we mingled in the plaza. He joined cousin Eli (aka Batman), aunt Lacie, University of Utah football player Jack (outfit compliments of Grandpa Bill & Grandma Coralie who sent the boys each a Halloween package... which made our day!) and me. Lacie and I, though without costumes, enjoy dressing up and are considering it for next year.

Jack was entertaining. When he wasn't staring wide eyed at his fluorescent sticker or the yellow warning strip in his car seat, he was growling at people. They would poke their heads in his stroller, ogle over his chubby face, then he would frighten them with an unearthly, loud growl. I'm not sure if it was Rocky (impersonating a tiger) who taught him this or Grandma K, while she was here karate-chopping the punching bag. It remains a mystery but proved to be a good Halloween trick from our little Ute.


Sorry Aggie fans ... if we had Utah State gear, maybe we would dress him in that too.


Later, we met up with Rich in the downtown plaza. There were 2 girls dressed as street performers, living out their fantasy with a prepared routine. Naturally, Rich decided to join in.


Later, I tried to cram in all the Halloween activities we hadn't done yet. We made paper towel ghosts (thanks Jaime) and construction paper bats with clothespins in them to clip on things (thanks Martha Stewart... though mine turned out looking nothing like hers). Once the decorations were completed, we began making Halloween treats (I went a little overboard since last year I was sick with the pregnancy and missed everything).


On the menu were frozen banana ghosts, monster jello, bloody toes (lil' smokies wrapped in tortillas and smeared with ketchup), deviled eggs, and other more traditional snacks. Jared & Allyson joined us last night for these creepy treats, sugar cookie decorating, Alfred Hitchcock movies and a round of Killer Bunnies & the Quest for the Magic Carrot (most intense card game ever... Jared wiped out whole colonies of bunnies at a time... he's the master).

Rich and I had way too much cookie dough, so we shaped half of it into a giant pumpkin and decorated that too. We'll just give Rocky the credit for the decoration of that one. It became evident to us that our guests were the ones with all the artistic talent.