Out of town again!

It seems like Jose and I are always out of town! Whether it is vacation or work, we are always on the road. We don't mind though, it keeps life fun. At least one weekend a month we go out of town to do a monthly check-up on kids in out of town group homes. We always feel bad that we don't spend more time with the kids and always vow that one visit we will. We tend to always be the social workers who visit one particular group home, and the kids recognize us. This time we took a little bit longer to talk to them, and even went to check out their cottages. They were pretty excited.

And of course it is never all work and no play! Jose asked his supervisor to let us get a hotel in San Diego instead of San Bernardino. She said yes (I mean who can deny Jose anything?), so we were able to spend some time with Joey and Amy, and Matt and Amanda. We didn't take any pictures, but we ate an awesome dinner that Amy made and played a competitive game of Cranium. Of course we talked about the baby on the way, and out excitement for our upcoming vacation!

The hotel we stayed at was surprisingly one of the nicest hotels we have stayed in (second only to The Excellence Resort). We were in a suite that was not only bigger than our house, it had a dishwasher and two plasma TVs!

As soon as we pulled back into town, we went to Jose's uncle Rudy's birthday party at the park. His family knows how to have parties! Great food, awesome bounce house, and Rita the bumpin' clown. Jose ended up getting my name "tattooed" on his neck gangsta' style, and I had his name on my arm (Ugh! I wish we had pictures!). We got to the party late since we were driving from San Diego, and it was really cool to see my family already there and comfortable with Jose's family. We are so lucky our families get along so well!

Twins Baptism

In just a few days, the twins turn four months old! We don't see them that often so everytime we see them they look so much bigger! This past weekend was their Catholic baptism. They looked so cute in their little white dresses and hats, and didn't really even cry.
To celebrate the event, Maria and Tavo (twins' parents)threw one heck of a party. It was at Los Alamos Vineyard (one of the vineyards Tavo runs) with AWESOME catered food, mariachis, and of course two of Silvia's (my mother in law) famous cakes. I didn't take pictures at the church, but here are a few faves from the party.

Don't you just want to squeeze their cheeks?! Kathryn is on the left, and Jaclyn on the right.





They are great eaters!


I can't tell you how many times our family members commented on Jose and I needing to have kids, and how good we looked holding the babies. It made Jose and I start talking future children, then planning our kids parties (the only thing that is settled is having a bounce house for Jose), and then it got me thinking about baptism vs. dedication. I was still thinking about it Monday morning and started discussing it with a co-worker who is a former Catholic now Christian. She commented that a Catholic baptism is just a formal Christian baby dedication. I disagree.
From my understanding, a Baptism is considered to be a child's acceptance into the faith. Based on the faith of the parents, the child is "saved", and will forever be Catholic. In the Christian faith, no one can make a decision to follow Christ on behalf of another. And that is what a baby dedication is all about. The parents stand up before their church and family and commit to raising their children in the Lord, promising to teach them the truth of the Word, and do everything they can to model a Christian life, so their child will one day choose for themself to follow God. A dedication is also the parents making a statement that they can't raise this child on their own, and are depending on God to help them.
Coincidentally, on Sunday we learned about Hannah at church. Hannah is one of my favorite Bible characters (and one of Jose and my favorite girl names). She demonstrated complete dependence on the Lord to give her the child she longed for and promised to give him back to the Lord. 1 Samuel 1:11 "And she made a vow, saying, "O LORD Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the LORD for all the days of his life." The Lord answered Hannah and gave her a son, and true to her word she took him to be raised in the temple. Now I'm not about to give my child to a church to raise, but I do want to be able to say like she did, " I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the LORD. For his whole life he will be given over to the LORD." I think that kind of faith will be such an example to a child that they will make their own decision to trust in the Lord.
I wonder why Christians don't celebrate dedications like Catholics celebrate baptisms. I think Jose and I will change that. So in a couple of years when we dedicate baby Hannah, you're all invited to a huge party afterwards, complete with a bounce house for Jose!

Pregnant?!

We could not believe it either! They said less than a year ago that they didn't know if they wanted kids, then said they had the same time frame as us (no I'm not telling you when that is!), then they say they are having a baby! Good friends of ours are having a baby (you thought it was my pregnancy test for a minute didn't you?). Last night the father to be sends Jose a text message to check his email. I hear Jose a minute later from the computer, "Ummm...Marlene...come here." And there it was, this beautiful picture of a stick that the mother to be peed on. I'm going to be honest here, our first reaction was, "Oh no!" because they are going with us to Punta Cana in November and we both assumed this whole pregnancy thing would change our plans (kind of selfish I know). But anyways, we called to congratulate and waited just long enough to ask "The Question"-- are you still going to Punta Cana. Once we heard yes, then we were really happy about the baby. That lucky little baby is going to be a world traveler before birth. Can't wait to meet the Baby! That means when we plan to have a baby she will be {still not gonna tell you how long} apart from the thier baby.

We hit a deer!

We really did hit a deer, but that's not the deer we hit. That's just a picture I found on the internet. Pretty gross, isn't it? The deer we hit lived. We were on our way to our "day camping" trip to Lopez and a deer ran out about 20 yards in front of us. We didn't even come close to hitting it. But I thought, "I better speed up just in case there are more deer behind this one. I don't want to hit any of them." So i sped up. Marlene was looking back to see if that deer came back out in the road. Then all of a sudden two more deer run out towards us! I swerved a little and stepped on the gas to try to avoid hitting them. One of them was smart and also slowed down and swerved but the other one, not so smart! He ran right into the passenger rear door. BAM! Marlene let out a little yelp and turned the other way. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw the deer do a perfect double back flip mctwist, land on its side and pop right up and keep running. He wasn't the smartest deer, but sure was was pretty tough! Luckily there was only a silver dolar size dent on the door and some deer hair stuck in the window. I could not stop laughing! I don't think it was that funny, I was just nervous. It was even funnier that this was the second time in a year that Marlene has been hit by a deer!

I love day camping!

I absolutely love going camping. I don't mind being dirty, sleeping not so comfortably, and smelling like camp fire. But this weekend I preferred "day camping." My parents invited Jose and I (this is Marlene writing :-) to go camping at Lopez lake. Camping at Lopez didn't have much appeal (it is only 20 minutes from our house) and we didn't feel like spending the whole weekend there. So instead we joined them in the evenings for bbq and bon fire, then drove home to the comforts of our shower and soft bed. We got all the benifits of camping- the good food, catch phrase around camp fire, and bug bites (you should see the HUGE bit on Jose's elbow!) but didn't have to take our camping gear. Perfect!

(Sorry no pictures to post, we didn't take the camera!)