First Baby Quilt

A few weeks ago I dragged Nate to the fabric store to pick out some fabric so I could make a raggedy quilt for our new little one. After browsing up and down the isles for way too long -thanks for being patient Nate -I finally settled on some fabric I thought was "just okay". The pattern called for nine fabrics and trying to find that many that looked good together was really hard.

Last week I finally finished the quilt and still thought it was just okay - but then after we washed it and the edges started to fray and get the raggedy look I decided it may not be so bad - in fact, I kind of like it!

Labor Day Weekend

Each year over Labor Day Weekend Millbrae celebrates the annual "Millbrae Art and Wine Festival". (I swear, just about every weekend in the bay area there is some sort of festival going on.) The great thing about this festival is that it was literally right outside our front door; although for two days it caused quite the parking issue for us. Overall, the constant serenade we received from the street performer outside our window made it fun.

We even spent some time walking around and trying some of the food. We were overly impressed with two spray paint artists who in a matter of minutes could change a canvas into a beautiful masterpiece. It was impressive to see how much blending and control they could have over simple cans of spray paint. They always had a large crowd enamored by their work.

Planes, trains, and automobiles made out of used pop cans - pretty cool!

Spray painter at work

Artwork done by spray paint

The Giants piece was a huge hit

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ICE CREAM!

This past weekend Oakland celebrated the "Eat Real" festival at Jack London Square. The festival is centered around delicious and sustainable "street food" where you can go talk directly with the farmer or producer and sample their goods for a small price. Friday night they featured local ice cream vendors - so we couldn't pass it up. We had ice cream made from goat milk, organic gelato, and the best part was that some of the flavors were not the most common: basil, salted almond, orange chocolate chip, yogurt, etc.

What a perfect date night!

Lake Powell 2009

Growing up it was a yearly tradition of the DeFries family to go to Lake Powell during the summer. After a two year hiatus, they made plans once again to go. Nate was so excited to be back on the water after almost two whole years of not being able to wakeboard - getting married and starting a full time job have really hampered his extracurricular activities.

Having never done the house boat thing before, I didn't quite know what to expect. But I loved every minute of it, despite being held back a little due to my growing belly and the bats that kept me up at night. I did learn one thing - it's helpful to have more than one swimming suit.

Since I was restricted with what I could do, I often ended up being the camera girl, which was a lot of fun.

Poparrazzi

Little Bunny-Hop

Ready for another run

Jumpin'

Just floating

4 boarders behind 1 boat! Are we crazy or what?

Beautiful morning in the marina on day 1

The whole DeFries family beating the heat (minus Doug)

Just enjoying the ride

We hiked up to some Indian hieroglyphics

Snapping some photos during an evening run

Eric surfing

Maren catching big air

Nate enjoying his first run in two years

Backflip

Sunset

Snips and Snails, and Puppy Dog Tails

That's what little BOYS are made of!

Jaime went in for her 20 week appointment and we got the good news that we will be having a baby boy. According to the nurse, everything looks normal and the baby appears to be healthy and strong. We are really excited to start seriously planning for our new addition now that we know whether to buy pink or blue.

Here are a few clips from the ultrasound.

The proud parents after baby's first photo session

Baby's face, he looks a little like Skelator

Baby's legs, the nurse kept commenting on how long his legs are

Profile view

Baby giving us a thumbs up, letting us know that everything is okay

4th of July

We decided to take an extra day off from work and drive out to Utah to celebrate Independence Day. Jaime's folks were going to be in Provo for the Stadium of Fire and they offered their tickets to us so we could take Jenn and her friend, Sage. When we heard the Jonas Brothers were the headliners we couldn't say no!

It was a short trip, but we did manage to hike to the Timpanogos Cave and spend some quality time with family while we were there.

In honor of our trip we've changed all the music on our blog to Jonas Brothers hits.

Cruisin' in the Caribbean

Finally, after months of anticipation, the day arrived that we got on a plane to Miami to board the Carnival Destiny. We loved every minute of our cruise from the warm weather, to the fun ports we stopped at, to seeing Christian and Steph, to learning the behind the scenes shenanigans of the cruise ship, and to the little surprises Christian and Steph would have our steward leave in our room.

The two ports we stopped at were Ocho Rios, Jamaica and Grand Caymen, Caymen Islands. We felt very lucky to enjoy great weather throughout our entire cruise. We heard the few weeks before us it had rained quite a bit. Lucky for us we saw nothing but sunny days.



Jamaica. What a place! You couldn't walk even 5 minutes without being harassed by locals offering to give you taxis rides, to braiding your hair, smokes or even women. You would finally get one person off your back after they followed you for a block or two only to be followed by another local.



Nate and I had one goal in Jamaica -to find a souvenir. We ended up making friends with Radcliffe, who is a wood carver. After spending some time watching him make a turtle out of wood using only a machete, we bought one of his fish. We had our eye on a larger one but settled for a mid sized one. When we got the fish home to our small apartment, we realized just how big the fish really is and are grateful we didn't get the larger one.

Christian and Steph took a break from their jobs in Grand Caymen to snap a quick photo.

In Grand Caymen we went to a turtle farm. We couldn't believe how many sea turtles they had enclosed in tanks there. It was pretty cool. Nate's holding one of the babies in this photo.

Christian and Steph hooked us up with a shore excursion in Grand Caymen. We went swimming with the dolphins. Unfortunately the underwater camera we had took terrible photos and most pictures came out very unfocused. Above the dolphin is pushing me on the boogie board by my foot using only its nose.

The last full day of our cruise Christian and Steph were able to spend most of the day with us. We had fun playing mini golf, playing shuffle board, and just laying out.

All in all - we had a great time and would definitely do another cruise.