this is crazy.

my birthday weekend consisted of this:

music video from 2009 here.

st geeeeeze part deux

we woke up bright and early on sunday to drive out to zion! as we were driving into the park we accidentally went through the zion-mount carmel tunnel. we'd never even seen it before and it was actually really pretty! 

our first hike was to emerald pools. it was an easy but beautiful hike. lynn was a sport to do the hikes since she was 4 months along at the time.

 our next destination was weeping rock. the water seeps out of the rocks after it has been in there for over 1200 years!! jon, jeno and i caught the drops in our water bottle lids and tasted the water. it was pretty slimy and after throwing up for a few days we obtained inhuman strength. i also don't think i can die now.

 we sat here for quite awhile just taking in the beauty. it was so awesome to be there with lynn and jeno their first time to zion national park. of course jon and i know that it is beautiful there, but it seems like the first time for all of us when lynn and jeno are so astonished by the beauty.

we drove back to st. george that night and ate at texas road house. they used to go to TRH in yuma when jeno was stationed there and we don't have one in san diego. it was so yummy...the butter and rolls are exquisite.
going on vacation with the j's was awesome! they are so much fun to be around and they are both hilarious. we always laugh so much together. 

st geeze.

let me tell you a little something about the j's. 

jeno deployed to afghanistan with jon. while they were there, they talked about how fun their wife's are. upon their arrival, we all got together and had a great time. ever since then, we've been laughing at bridesmaids quotes, discussing the fact that not only is burger lounge the best burger place in the world, but how it's ruined every other burger out there, and talking about vacationing together. obviously hawaii would be ideal, but we don't really have the time for that. lynn is expecting in september (no plane rides after a certain point in the pregnancy) and i am a full time student (year around school). about a month ago, we decided that st. george needed to be our vacation destination. they've never been to utah and haven't experienced the beauty and amazing...ness of it all. it took some persuading, but they finally agreed to it. when we got to my dad's condo last night, they realized that the drive was worth it. when they saw the mountains this morning, they realized that we are right about everything and that they will never doubt us again. they also told us that we are the dominant couple and so it's officially okay to call us as a group of four the "hager-J's."

(as I'm reading this to them, jeno says "that's a bold faced lie.")

it took us nine. hours. to get here. 

 we had a huge breakfast including pancakes, eggs, and bacon, and then spent the day at the pool and playing tennis. 

 then these two came home and just passed. out. 

 we climbed up to the top of the mountain and took in the view. it looked so beautiful. it's fun being here with people who have never been before. it's like seeing st. george through new eyes. 

for dinner, we had jeno's famous lasagna. it was excellent, as always. 

tomorrow, we plan to spend the day at zion and then treat ourselves to some Texas Roadhouse! Yeahh....

family time.

remember when i told you that my WHOLE family was coming into town?? after weeks of excitement, they finally came. and it was as fun as i'd imagined. 

we usually hate having a playground directly behind our house, but, for once, we loved having it there! the little ones could go out and play while we stayed inside playing cards or getting dinner ready. we just left our back door open so that we could still hear them. audrey loved the swings so much that she cried every time she got out of them. and on the last day, robbie and i took the hose out onto the playground and ran through the sprinklers, turned the slide into a water slide, and made rivers in the sand. 

katie, sam, robbie and audrey got here on friday. we all went down to coronado to walk along the beach and get dinner. robbie and i decided to roll up our jeans and put our feet in the water. well....that turned into robbie going further and further out! we took his shirt off before it got wet so he wouldn't splash on it. good thing we did, because after 45 minutes or so of running from the waves, robbie fell and a wave washed over him. it was so sad, the water was freezing and he was now covered in sand. katie had him take off his jeans, put his dry shirt and jacket on and sit in the stroller with a blanket (or sweater) over his legs. it was so funny. we went to panera bread for dinner, and just pushed the stroller up to the table so he could eat from there. he didn't seem to mind!

after panera bread, we went and got ice cream at moo time creamery. 

the next day, jon joined us for some fun at sea world. we saw the shamu show, star fish, sharks, and did lots of other things. my sister was 26 weeks pregnant at the time. she looks really great and her belly is still small, so i don't think i realized just how pregnant she was until she said that walking all day was starting to get painful. she didn't complain at all though, such a good mom!

the last thing we did was go on atlantis! robbie had never been on a big roller coaster like this before, and he didn't even get nervous for it waiting in line! no one else wanted to go with us, since its a wet ride. when we got to the very top (right before the drop), i expected robbie to get scared. instead, i heard this: "awwwwww YEAHH!!!!!" with his hands up in the air! jon said that he looked a little bit alarmed when they saw us passing here after the big drop, but after the ride he said that it was awesome! he is the cutest little boy. 

saturday was sam's birthday, so we got a babysitter and all went out for dinner. at this time, gary, mei, and amanda had joined us! we went to barrio star in bankers hill for some mexican food. it was such a cute restaurant and the food was delicious! we picked lizzie up from the airport late that night for a full on family reunion!

the next day, we celebrated easter (one week early) by having an egg hunt and finding baskets filled with goodies for the little ones! we had a ham and potato easter lunch and then ate cake and ice cream for robbie's birthday (and sam's birthday the day before). he got lots of legos! that night, they left for orange county for the week. they spent three days at disneyland and one day with amanda in huntington beach!

katie, sam, robbie, audrey, lizzie and amanda came back to our house late thursday night. on friday we just hung out at home. there are some huge airplanes on base that you can walk under and look at, so we all went on a walk over there. i think robbie thought they were pretty cool, and both robbie and audrey especially loved throwing rocks around. (hmm)

we had fajitas for dinner and then went to the bigger playground by our house to play tag and other run around games. it was such a work out! those kids can run forever without getting tired. except audrey kept imitating us saying "i'm so sick!" and "i'm so tired!" because we were all STUFFED from dinner, and then ran around on full bellies and kept saying we felt sick.  

when the sun went down, we watched robbie and jon give us a cool show with the light up light sabers robbie got from disneyland. after that, we played nighttime tag on the playground. it was so dangerous, i don't know how many times robbie hit his head on bars he couldn't see, and how many times each of us almost got clothes lined on a low hanging bar. 

robbie paid amanda and i the biggest compliment when he told us that he thought we were the same age. he thinks we are twins!

the rest of the night was spent watching anastasia and playing cards. they left the next day at about noon. i was so sad to see them go, and our house felt so small for just jon and i. i wish they could have stayed forever!!!

oh, and by the way, they LOVED the chalk board!