Random thoughts

Hello Friends!

Can you believe it's going to be October tomorrow? I am so excited for fall to come. Even though it's still 100 degrees here, I know that the temperatures will be dropping soon. I ordered some holiday smelling candles the other day and can't wait for them to arrive. Also, my mind is swirling with ideas for Christmas.

Sorry I haven't posted more pictures recently. I am having some technical difficulties with our lap top which will hopefully resolve soon. Speaking of pictures, I discovered something really awesome on google blogger. Did you know that whenever you post pictures, Google automatically placed in a Picasa album for you? It's awesome. I went on there last week and printed off all my pics on snapfish and had them mailed to my door. No extra downloading needed, cause I had already done it. My 2008 Family scrapbook is going to be so easy to do! The best way how I can tell you to access the album is by clicking on the image picture when you are creating a post and then finding the orange question mark. From there, you will go to a google page that has a link to your picasa album. Very awesome. Reason number 542 why I love blogging.

So today, my new friend Laura brought her 3 kids to play because she had to go to the Nellis' pregnant mom class (it was really annoying that she had to go since this is her 4th pregnancy... she could probably teach the class....but it's the Air Force). Anyways, so I had fun with 6 kids under 6!! This gave me extra appreciation for my friends that have lots of children. Especially my friend Terri who has 10 adopted children! We love their family so much and were so happy to get to visit them when we were in Spokane. The kids had a blast at their house and are still talking about them. The other day, Miss M was playing with her little people stuff in her doll house and she said to me, "Mom, look, it's the Bade family!" I snapped a picture with my cell phone because I thought it was so cute.

Ya gotta love the spoon hangin out of Miss O's mouth...

So I thought it would fun today to check out how Mr. J's TSP (the military version of a 401k, kinda) and see how it was doing after the huge drop in the stock market yesterday. Not such a good idea because it had dropped by more than a thousand dollars..in one day... I keep telling myself there is no need to worry because we are young, etc. I am just so happy that about 3 years ago Mr. J and I took Financial Peace University. There we learned about how having a lot of debt is not a smart idea, and the importance of saving... which seems to be what all the "experts" on tv are telling us now. To find out more about this way of thinking and to find an FPU class in your area, click here . Another good blog to check out is The Charmed Frugal Life by my friend Sam (her kids and mine were in the biker gang....), they recently became debt free and we are so excited for them!

Well I better get going and finish making dinner, but one more think before I go, an online store I have bought some baby stuff at before is going out of business. It's called Angelina's Unique Baby Things and my favorite things they sell are the WubbaNub Infant Soothie Pacifier's (a cute animal attached to the binkie so they won't get lost and it helps them stay in) as well as the Dex Dura Bib.. pretty much the best bib ever! The prices have all been reduced. They also have some other really cute stuff that you can't find at normal stores. If you spend more than 50 dollars, you can get an additional 10% off by using the coupon code extra10 . Happy shopping (I am thinking about baby showers and Christmas gifts.)

California part 1

We stopped in San Francisco on our trip up to Battle Ground. We had a great time. We stayed at the lodging facilities at Travis Air Force Base. Military bases are great places to stay with a family, because we had something like an apartment with 2 bedrooms, a full kitchen, living room and even a washer and dryer... all for $34 a night! You can't beat that. Travis is near the town of Vallejo, so instead of driving into San Fran in the morning, we took the ferry.

The kids loved riding on the boat.
This is Mr. J, Miss M and Mr. T on a trolley! It kind of felt like we were going to fall off, with our 3 kids and a stroller, but it was fun... After the trolley ride, we stopped at China town to walk around a bit and then went to the next trolley stop. However, the wait for that trolley was like 2 hours, so we decided to get on the bus. Getting on an almost-full bus with 3 kids and a stroller helped us to understand why not a lot of people with big families live in the city....
I think this one may have been near Fisherman's wharf.
Ghiradelli chocolate factory... delicious chocolate sundae! The girls really enjoyed it, but I think Miss M was getting kind of full.

Mr. T liked it there too! There were lots of statue things out in front of stores and the girls loved getting their pictures taken with them. It was so funny.

At around 4pm, we decided to take the ferry back to our car in Vallejo and drive into the city. We wanted to drive the golden gate bridge and some other things.
We thought it would be fun to drive down Lombard St.... but so did all the other tourists in town, so it took us like 1 1/2 hours to get to the top, and like 2 minutes to drive down it. It was pretty cool. Thankfully, the 1 1/2 hours spent in the car was used for napping and making sub sandwiches out of our cooler.

Stay tuned for more pics of San Fran...

P.S. These are smaller pics than I usually post, but I think if you click on them, it will make them big.

Highlights of our summer

Hello Friends!

I apologize for not posting in so long. Life has been a bit busy in the Jones house the past couple of months. So, to start off, I thought I would give you some highlights.

• We found out July 24th we are expecting Baby Jones #4... due the end of March 2009. We are very excited that God has blessed us with another baby. We have an ultrasound scheduled for the end of October to hopefully find out if it's a boy or girl.
• We put in for an assignment to Yokota Air Force Base in Japan on July 21st with a report date of April 2009. We waited until the end of August to find out someone else got the assignment. What happened is the man in charge of picking was not able to get a hold of Mr. J on his cell phone while we were in Washington and so he talked to a coworker of Mr. J who gave him some misinformation about Mr. J's qualification. This caused him to choose someone else (whereas if he had known the correct info, Mr. J would have been chosen). We are confident that this is all a part of God's plan for us. It is nice not to have to figure out all the details of moving a newborn half way across the world.
• We had a great time in San Francisco and the Redwoods on our way up to Washington.
• Jones Family Fun Day was so much fun at Mr J's grandparent's home in Battle Ground. The cousins have a great time together.
• Clark County Fair! We spend a day there with my dad, his wife and stepsister and had a blast. I got my fill of fair food and the kids loved all the rides and the rodeo. Miss M and Mr T enjoyed the animals but Miss O was pretty much afraid of everything.. including the bunnies.
• A quick trip to Spokane ! We got to see the Martins before their big move to Germany, Manito Park, the Stordahls, the Weavers and Ashmoores, the Bades and go to Faith Bible Church. We miss you all so much there!
• Mr. T's 1st Birthday. This was a great time to see friends and family at Lewisville Park. Thank you everyone that came out for that. We loved seeing you all.
• Hanging out with a great friend from college and her kids. The kids were part of a Biker Gang while we were there.
• Wedding festivites for Deanna: a great shower thown by Jamie and Jenny, a Bridal Par-Tea, Bachelorette fun in Portland, decorating memories at moms.
• A Beautiful Wedding! You can see more pics on her website or facebook.
• A 1000+ mile drive from 3am - 8pm on August 19th to get home to our...
• Ant infested house!!!! Yuck. The kitchen was so bad, I thought my sister had spilled coffee grounds everywhere on the floor and counters... but no, it was just dead ants. It took 2 days before the ant spray guy could come and spray and even after he came they were still hanging around. It sure made the kitchen easy to pack up because I just threw all food stuff that had been previously opend away because there were ants in it. They especially liked the powdered sugar. The only thing that made this ant thing bearable is that we were moving in to our brand new base house 4 days later.
• On Aug. 22 we moved in to our large, beautiful base house. I promise to get pictures posted soon! Thanks to Zack and Jason for helping us move. It is so spacious and there are lots that we love about it including storage space, garage, filtered water, a big sink, real floors (our old house had school cafeteria-like flooring), an ice maker in the fridge, lots of ceiling fans, etc! It is great. The best thing, according to the kids, is that our back yard backs up to a park with a play structure and swings. In the evening, all the little neighbor kids come out to play and they have so much fun.
• I turned 27!
• Working 2 days a week at the clinic on base. The people I work with our so nice. Also, I am learning a lot about strep throat, upper respiratory infections and urinary tract infections. I see as many as 8 patients a day with these ailments. So if you have any questions, you can ask me.
• Mr. J and I enjoy following politics and are excited about the Sarah Palin pick.
• Mr. T walks now!! Like a pro. I am sure it won't be long before he starts running.
• Miss O is quite the talker now. Can you all believe she is now older than Miss M was when we moved to Vegas?
• Miss M started preschool again on base. She likes playing with all her new friends. They went on a field trip to the commissary, so when we were there the next day shopping, she showed me that they sell octopus in the fish case.
• MOPS started! This is my 5th year and I love it! If any of you all our mothers of preschoolers and would like to find a group in your area, click on the link. I am a discussion group leader and the registration gal.. and that job is always a bit busy at the beginning of the year.
• We went on a fun hike to Mt. Charleston to see a water fall.
• Our roommates (Deanna and Tom) got a cute little base house that they moved in. The girls like to play hide and seek there.
• My friend Amber and Jason welcomed baby Julia last week.
• We had lots of dr's appts last week. The baby seemed to be doing great.. I even got to hear the heart beat. Tuff weighs in now at 27 lbs! Miss M is growing great as well.
• For some reason all my google stuff has turned German into my main language. I have changed it back a couple of times but it keeps going back to German. If any one knows how to permanently fix this, please let me know.
• Oh yeah, and our house is Spokane is for sale and for rent. It's a great house and we are praying for a family to move in soon! I have been working a lot with our property manager to arrange house cleaning, carpet cleaning, carpet replacing, staging, and setting back up all the utilities. If anyone knows some one that might be interested, please let me know and I will give you our realtor/property managers information.

Well there you have it. Highlights from the last couple of months. I have lots of pictures to post and will try to get them downloaded for you all to see.