Trip to Oregon!

At the beginning of September, Aubree and I flew up to Oregon to visit with my sister Joyell and her husband Michael! It is so beautiful up in Oregon. We had a lot of fun visiting with family up there and seeing all the sites!

This is a picture of Aubree and I on the plane up there! It was her very first flight ever and she did AMAZING! She slept on take off and landing. During the flight she was happy and charmed everyone around her. All the flight attendants and everyone around her LOVED her and wanted to play with her! She just smiled and had so much fun!

Aubree and daddy laying in the bed in the hotel! I love this picture!

Loading all of the luggage!

Here are some pictures of Aubree with her Aunt Joyell and Uncle Michael!

We went to Multnomah falls while we were up there as well! It is such an amazing view of the waterfall! It is a pretty hike as well!

Here are some pictures from the Dahlia farm. This was over 140 acres of BEAUTIFUL flowers that had super fun names! They had yummy food, and bouquets of flowers that you could buy! It was a beautiful day, beautiful scenery and we had a ton of fun!

We took a picture if Aubree next to the flower called 'Little Blessings' because that is what she is! She is such a sweet little spirit!

She was all tired out at the end of the day!

:)

We went on a really pretty hike in Washington. This was one of Joyell's friends from work. Her name was Dominique. I was soooo out of shape and Dominique helped me carry Aubree on the trail.

They have huge nasty slugs like this up there! I have never seen anything like it before!

We got the chance to go visit James' mission buddy Johnny Zobell while we were up there. He lived in Bremerton, WA and they had a ferry that goes over to Seattle. This is a picture from the ferry of the city!

Here is us on the ferry. In the background is the Naval base that Johnny works at!

We also drove out to the Oregon Coast one day and got to drive up and down! It was SO pretty. These were taken on the beach! It was such a cold, windy day, Aubree could barely breathe with all the wind! But it was so misty and foggy, it was like walking in a cloud!

This was in front of a lighthouse on the coast! I love Aubree's goofy grin!

This was the pretty road that we were driving on! Doesn't it look like something out of a movie?

We had a ton of fun on our vacation up there! We got to see so many beautiful sites and it was a lot of fun visiting Joyell and Michael!

Baby Blessing

We blessed Aubree on the same day that Amanda and Dave blessed their little Zach on the 4th of July! It was a very fun weekend! All of the family was together and we got to play games, visit, and hang out! Here are the pics from the weekend!

This is Aubree in her pretty dress that Nana made for her:)

She's all tired out from her photo shoot!
This is my family! Joyell and Michael were the only ones missing!

Here is a picture of all the family that was there!

These two pictures were really funny because when Zach was crying, Aubree was totally fine...
And when Aubree was crying, Zach was totally fine:)
She was so cute in her little outfit!
I love this picture because this was on of the first pictures I got of her smiling:)

Aubree Joy Hughes!!!

On June 10th 2010 at 10:53 pm, 6 lbs 15 oz and 18 inches of pure joy came into our world! Our little Aubree is such a blessing in our lives. She is so smiley all the time, and loves to play with everyone she meets! I cannot believe how blessed I am to have such a wonderful baby! I seriously could not have imagined a more perfect baby for me!

At first having her was a big adjustment. I don't know if anyone is ever really, truly prepared for a baby, but I definitely wasn't! But over time, Aubree and I have grown to know each other so intimately. I know her different cries, what a look on her face means, her sleeping and eating schedule, what makes her laugh. We love talking and playing together; she's my little buddy! And I can't imagine life without her!

Here are some pictures from when we were in the hospital.

She was so alert from the beginning.
Proud mama.
Proud daddy! I love this picture because it shows how happy James was. Also because Aubree was looking up at him:)
Happy new family!

Playing Catch-up!

So much has happened in my life these past few years, and I have not kept a record of any of it! I am starting this blog so that I will have a journal, scrap-book, and record keeper all in one! I'm excited to get started, and although this blog is mostly for my own benefit, if you get any sort of enjoyment out of it, thats great! So here we go!

James and I met in the fall of 2008. He was in my FHE group for our ward, and we met at his apartment for my first night at FHE. It was a Rockband party, and he was holding his HUGE snake named Spot. He was trying to get me to hold it the whole night and finally he said "If you hold the snake, I'll hold you!" And the rest was history! He proposed on April 25th 2010, and we were married two months later on June 26th 2010. It was such a special day that we will always remember!

The morning we had Aubree! Notice the Basketball I was stealing!
Our Wedding Day!

For our honeymoon, we went to Disneyland, Sea World, San Diego Wild Animal park and we had a mac and cheese picnic on the cliffs by the beach! It was a lot of fun and we were so lucky to be able to do that!
At Sea World on our Honeymoon!
At the Wild Animal Park on our Honeymoon!
At Disneyland on our honeymoon!

After the Honeymoon, we moved up to Morenci for the summer for James' internship at Freeport McMoRan mine. We moved into a smaller than studio apartment which was fine with us because it was only temporary and we were in honeymoon phase so we loved being close:) It was during this summer that I got to know about small town living. I learned that if you don't wave to everyone on the street as you are driving, someone will think you are mad at them (even if you don't know them, they know you!). We really enjoyed our time up in Morenci and the chance to be with family but we were excited to go back to Tucson!

Fall of 2009, James and I both went back to school. James was at the University of Arizona studying Mine Engineering, and I was at Pima Community College finishing up my associates. In October of that month, we found out that we were pregnant! We were so excited, but it made going to school not so much fun!

We continued going to school the next semester, I was getting more and more pregnant by that time and as my belly grew, my school attendance plummeted. But with a lot of effort and help from my hubby, I graduated from Pima, and he graduated from the U of A.

We were so grateful when he graduated, because he had a job in Morenci as a Mining Engineer. It was such a blessing, especially during these times.

So James left for work 3 weeks before I had Aubree, and I stayed in Tucson with my parents. Those were some tough three weeks, because I was feeling terrible and I only was able to see James on the weekends. But we made it through. And after what seemed like and eternity, the special day arrived!!!!