Got a little catchin up to do....

October seemed to fly by without my permission. So many days just began and ended without even a blink..ok, I am exaggerating a little bit but not much...

We started out the month lovin on my new baby sister Miss Camri Abigail Whitaker. She is a doll and such a perfect little angel. We are so blessed to finally have her in our family. I still can't even believe she's here sometimes, but it feels good to have all of my direct siblings here with me. :) If you ask James, I was a little obsessive about her the first couple weeks, and then it was just obsessive the next couple weeks and now I have a calmed down to almost normal (I think...). Many people are askin if I am getting baby hungry and I am just puttin out there now: I want to be a mother really bad but I know that now is not the time for that. Right now I am livin and lovin every moment I get to spend with my sweet husband.


Speaking of that dear man. The weekend after we got home from Utah, he decides to take my dad up on the offer to go to San Diego for a BYU game. He would leave Thursday night after class and drive to Yuma. Friday they would get up early to drive the rest of the way to San Diego and go to Lego Land. Friday night would be the time to play at the beach. Saturday, get up, get all BYU Blued out and go to the game. After the game, drive all the way home. Quick trip and ALL BOYS. That's right, I stayed home. **My frist night alone since being married ** sniff, sniff...
But I was really glad that James got to go. It was all the boys: Dad, Braden , Candler, Mason, Bennett, and James. Alot of the cousins went too and Grandpa. It was a good break for all of them and they all had a blast.

I did get to spend some time with Becky, my mom, Kait, and Camri. Oh and I dyed my hair all brown. Well medium copper to be exact- but it looked really brown and dark. I was kind of scared what James would say...
It's lightened up, so he was ok with it :) It's been a fun change.

The next week was crazy with mid terms and work and cleaning the office every night and mutual to go to...the list can seriously go on lol.

But we made it through and ended it with a way good trip to the temple and then out to eat with my aunt Cari and our friend Brett. We got home pretty late but we had an awesome time at the temple and being with good friends.
Saturday was another road trip and party.

First was my mom's baby shower. She got tons of way cute clothes and things for Camri. It was good to see family and friends and kind of relax from a long week. Then later we got to go our friends wedding reception in Douglas. We had a great time and it was so good to see Johnny and Kisa so happy. :)


The last week of October was a rush of a ton of things going on. The semester is fast ending so teachers are piling everything on that they can. James and I are doing all we can to stay caught up and alert in class...Dang, real life is hard! But again we ended the week way fun. Since it was Halloween there were a lot of festive things going on.
Friday night we went to the institute dance with our friends Loni and JB. They had this way cool "Vortex of Doom" thing there that was extremely trippy to go through. We didn't stay at the dance for too long though. After, we went to Loni and JB's house and watched a movie. Although I think it only ended up being James and JB who watched, Loni and I kinda fell asleep after a little while...

Saturday was a very special day. Mason, my brother was baptized. James and I both have brothers who turned 8 this year and both were in October. But David, James' little brother isn't going to be baptized til Christmas time when James and I can be there.

Anyway- Mason's special day was on Halloween. What a cool day to get baptized! And he'll never forget the date, well I hope not at least lol.
Family and friends came and Mason was even a great missionary and invited two of his awesome friends from school to be there. Way to go Mas!
It was so fun to remember my baptism and how great that experience was and to watch Mason have that wonderful day of his own. How blessed we are to be apart of the true church and have these amazing experiences with the ones we love.
After the baptism was a luncheon with some very yummy food and some fantastic pumpkin bread that I made :) Jk, well kind of hehe.


For Halloween night James and I went to Loni and JB's house again to have dinner with a few other couple friends. We had dinner in a pumpkin which was so so good and ghost potatoes and pumpkin squash. It was way good and we had a lot of fun. After dinner we played a funny egg game and then Catch Phrase. It was a pretty intense game! After a while it's hard to come up with creative ways to describe things lol.
(Sadly I don't have any pictures from that night. But it was really fun :) )

Finally, it's November. I can't believe how fast this year has gone and how many things have happened. We are excited for the holidays and the family that we are going to get to see and the friends we will see on their special days :)

That's all for now :) ~Enjoy

Did I really just say that?

So there have been a few times that I have been really out of it and said something that has given James a pretty good laugh. James wanted to make them into a comic strip and call it "Sleeping with Jenessa". I am not sure if that will ever happen but I thought I would share some of them with you...

Somewhere around 1:00 AM

Ness: (suddenly sits straight up in bed) James! I know why your back hurts!

James: (noises that indicate he is waking up) What?

Ness: I know why your back hurts. We need to flip the mattress!

James: What?

Ness: (lying back down slowly) We um need to um flip the mattress....

James: Ness? Ness?

Ness: (breathing/ snoring soundly)

James didn't really like that one, it was funny but he said it took him forever to fall back to sleep.

8:00 PM--Doing homework

(Both James and Ness working on homework on the computer)

Ness: (Error screen pops up on computer that says "Connection Interrupted) James, you connected my interruption!

James: Haha, what? (smiling like he has a secret)

Ness: Oh wait, did I just say that backwards?

James: Ya....but I will connect your interruption anytime honey.

Same day but earlier

Ness: (talking to friends) You should text her and see if she has a brothered name David!

Ness: Oh my, did I really just say that? I meant, a brother named David....

I think I have dyslexia of the mouth.....

Ok last one for now....

3:00 AM

Ness: (awakened suddenly) James! Do you smell that?

James: (again noises that indicate he has been woken up) Smell what?

Ness: There is something cooking in the oven.

James: (Thinking, who would be cooking at this hour?!) Nothing is cooking Ness.

Ness: No James, really there is something in the oven. It smells familiar....

James: (noises that he heard me but he's not really wanting to stay awake)

Ness: It smells like chicken! Like chicken nuggets!

James: Are you serious?..... Ness?....

Ness: (Snoring/breathing steadily)

James: seriously?...

I hope this doesn't happen too often! ......Enjoy <3

Hey James, wanna go to Utah?

Thursday October 1, 2009. Apt 910, 10:30 pm

I am looking at my house with suitcases packed and cooler out wondering oh my goodness what have I gotten myself into.
The plan was this: Wake up in the morning, James would take off work to get the car ready and I would go to class to take a quiz. James would get the car serviced while I got some of my lecture notes from class. James would come pick me up, we would go pick up my brother and then head off to Utah. We would then drive pretty much all night to get to Utah.
I was excited yet somewhat nervous about leaving on such short notice when we had so much homework to do and other things to get done. But for some reason, none of that seemed to matter.....so we finished packing, got into bed later than I wanted to and tried to get some sleep even though both of us were really excited to be going to Utah.

Why would we do this crazy thing on such a spur of the moment? Well pretty much, it's because we can. And because I think we were meant to go....
My uncle called by some miracle and said that we could stay in his home, which meant that we didn't have to pay for a hotel. Such a blessing! My dad let us borrow his car we didn't have to worry about whether my car would make it or not. Another huge blessing! My brother Braden and James were able to go to the preisthood session in the conference center even thought neither of them had tickets when we went up there. That was an amazing thing for both of them and I am so glad they were able to go. I think the biggest blessing of it all was that we were able to see some of James' family.
James' sister Becky was traveling up to Utah with some friends and James' mom with 2 sisters and David were driving over from Colorado. Sadly we didn't get to see the entire family but being with the ones who were there was so wonderful.

Driving wasn't too terrible but I still hate sitting in cars for such long hours. Braden kept us company until he fell asleep...and for the rest of the drive we just talked. Even James and I had some great talks it was still such an amazing feeling to finally get to my uncles house and go to sleep.

Saturday we watched conference at the house and then got ready for the afternoon session (got all dressed up in church clothes) and went to Temple Square. We sat on the lawn by the visitor's center and listened to the 2nd session of conference. It was fun to just be surrounded by family and hear the wonderful words of the apostles and prophet.

After the session was over, we went into the visitor's center to look around a little, then over to the church history museum-- it's amazing what they have been able to preserve for so many years! I have always found it so fun to hear the church's history and all of the amazing people who were apart of it.

After the museums Braden and James went to the priesthood session and all of us girls and David went back home to change and make dinner.

I had so much sitting and talking with James' mom and sisters. We had an awesome time and I think that this trip will be something we will remember for a long time.

Another part of the trip was letting Braden see some of his friends from EFY. I took him over to one of the girl's house Saturday night while James and I went to the store to buy food for breakfast the next morning. He had a really good time :) If you want details....I'll tell you later ;)

Sunday morning, my friend Cortney, her roommates and her boy :) came over for breakfast before the first session. To keep up with tradition, I made biscuits and chocolate gravy. I also made regular sausage gravy and eggs and muffins for anyone who didn't want to eat the yummy chocolate. For my first year, I would say they turned out pretty good but mental note for next year: make the biscuits from scratch, not the ones that come in a tube that you keep in the fridge....

Braden's friend also came over that morning, to watch the first session with us. It was kind of sad that our trip was coming to an end really quickly but it was so awesome to be with James' family and feel of the spirit.

After a rushed effort to get everything packed and the house back in order we were all loaded up into the car and ready to go...Sadly....but we needed to get home, it was already getting to point where we would be arriving home pretty late. After hugs and kisses and last minute bathroom stops we were on our way. We had to drop Braden's friend off first, and bless her mom's heart, she made us a plate of goodies for the road. Then we stopped at my friend Marah's apartment to say a quick hello and have her finally meet James. We got back in the car and the second session was just starting so at least I had something fun to listen to on the way home :)


Aside from wind and a meeting with a handicap sign we had a pretty uneventful ride home. Wind slowed us down quite a bit sadly but we still made it in less than about 12 hours. The meeting with the handicap sign was not exactly the best thing but to make a long story short, a car rolled through a parking lot knocking over a handicap sign and wedged it under my car. Damage was minimal and the man who did it stuck around so we were able to get insurance things worked out.


Now finally home and back in the swing of things we are grateful for the opportunity we had to go and see conference and be with people we love. We had a great time and it helped to get us back on track in remembering what things are the most important in life.

Apt 910

So I have finally gotten pictures of my apartment. Sorry it's not the cleanest but you get the idea :)

























































Enjoy ~<3

Happy 23rd Birthday James!

August 29, 2009
James is officially 23 years old.
James and I have officially know each other for exactly one year.
I am officially not good at making cheesecake.
Our friends are officially awesome and thank you for sharing this special day with James and me.
Becky is officially a great pianist.
Fruit is officially amazing.
James and I are officially blessed :)







I think this post is officially over ;)

~<3

Barefoot Slushies

Well it has been a while since I have updated and some pretty exciting things have happened :) School has officially started and life has been SO BUSY!!! But James and I still thankfully find time to do random things....
Like our Friday night date night a couple weeks ago (August 28 actually). We were watching Indiana Jones and I had the sudden urge to go to Sonic. So we grabbed a whole freak load of quarters and got in the car. We decided finding shoes would be a waste of time, so we went barefoot :) For people who know me, I hate wearing shoes anyway, so this is really not out of the ordinary.
We then came back and played Settlers of Catan card game which turns out to be pretty fun. And I feel pretty proud cuz it was my first time and James actually felt pretty threatened that he was going to be beat. What can I say, I guess I'm just good ;)

Here are some fun pictures :)
He looks so excited huh ? lol

Yay! SONIC!

They asked us to wait............it was pretty difficult.......

Yay for slushies! :)

My bare feet. James says I have stubby toes.

Playing Catan :)

We had a really fun night. I have really come to love our Friday night date nights. It's been an awesome time to just relax and just have fun. Anybody have any fun, creative, cheap ideas for us?

~Enjoy <3

Would you Rather??

So here are some funny videos of both me and James. I think I got the rotten end of the deal, but either way we both have fun :)











Other summer adventures before we have to say goodbye to our sweet summertime and begin the awesome life of "in school" mode.
My dear friend Cortney played with me a lot this summer...I was sad to see her leave. But good luck Cort and have tons of fun at BYU this semester. I'll be happy when you come home again though :) (ps- so not an attractive picture of me...)



I went to Willcox with James and Becky to see the place where they grew up and also to meet their grandpa. It was a very fun trip and I had some amazing root beer!

Megan and Paige also came to visit this summer. Two girls that I love and I am so glad that I got to see them and they were able to be apart of my wedding this summer.

Hopefully the next post will have pictures of our apartment. It's been fun to get it all organized and all prettied up.. but I'm not going to lie, this whole being and adult thing takes a whole lotta energy!

Well that's it for tonight :)
-til next time...

Inspiration on a hard day

So yesturday wasn't exactly the greatest day of my life. It wasn't the worst either, but there are just some days where I think, Dang, I should have stayed in bed.
The details of the day don't really matter, but what does matter is the light and inspiration I felt at the end of the day.

Most of the time when things are hard, I will sit down and write or I will lose myself in a book. With writing things down, I am able to get the mess out of my mind. With a book, I become lost in another world and my own feelings don't matter, I live with the characters in my book.

Well last night as I was lying in bed pretty much feeling sorry for myself, I chose to enter the world of Emma Smith in Anita Stansfield's Emma: Woman of Faith.
First of all, here I am throwing myself a pitty party when I have the comforts of nice home and the support of family and great friends and the love of a wonderful husband (who isn't perscuted wherever he goes).
Ok so strike against me- I am way too good at being sorry for myself. That has def gotta go.
So I start reading. The part of the book I am in, Emma is given her own revelation through Joseph Smith. Well for some reason I couldn't keep reading without the nagging feeling that I needed to go get out my lovely Quad and read this section in the D&C. I got up and went to living room and started to look for the section- it took me a while to remember which one it was.
Finally I found it, D&C section 25. I started reading the section heading and found out the the previous chapter (ch. 24), this chapter ( 25) and the following chapter (26) were all given for the reason of encouragement and loving guidance while the early church was going through some difficult times.
Well I decided, I think I need some encouragement, I could use come guidance out of this selfish rut. So I started reading with Ch 24. I found some great versus in both 24 and 25 and I still need to read 26 to find what more great words await.
I thought I would share some of these versus with anyone who wants to read. :)

D&C 24:8
Be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many; but endure them, for, lo, I am with thee, even unto the end of thy days.

D&C 25:3
Behold thy sins are forgiven thee, and thou art an elect lady whom I have called.

D&C 25:9
And thou needest not fear, for thy husband shall support thee...

D&C 25:13-14
13. Wherefore, lift up thy heart and rejoice, and cleave unit the covenants which thou has nade.
14. Continue in the spirit of meakness, and beware of pride. Let thy soul delight in thy husband, and the glory which shall come upon him.

So after reading these things, I felt a whole lot better. I felt like I have a whole to improve on, but I felt better. I am so grateful for prayer and for scriptures, to know that my Heavenly Father's love is real and that He really does know me.

Well that's my bit for today. Maybe this will help someone else who may be havin it rough today.

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