Christmas 2008

I can't believe Christmas is over! It went by too quick. Working the 23rd and 26th might be to blame. On top of work being the last place I wanted to be (first place would have been baking cookies, listening to carols, and sitting by the fire), it was the craziest week EVER. The county is on a mandatory furlough to save money, so there were only a few of us to do lots of work. Ugh...good thing this week I get some time off.

Anyway back to a recap of Christmas. This Christmas Eve everything felt a little different. We usually have a big dinner at my parent's house with lots of family and friends. This year my mom wanted to keep it low key and it was just our immediate family. I was a little bummed, but it just made me excited to plan Christmas Eve bash 2009 at our new home (or convince her that she really does pull off the best Tamale dinner!).

The other difference this year was after about 10 years of going to First Christian Church's Christmas Eve midnight service my family decided not to go. It hasn't been the same in the past years now that it is not either my parent's or our home church, but I'm big on tradition and had a tough time letting it go. Jose and I decided to go, but after it was over we concluded it is a tradition that we are ready to give up. Next year will be challenging--but exciting--coming up with a new tradition to take it's place.

Our Christmas Day was much more relaxed than last year when we drove back and forth between our families homes. Jose and I woke up early to open presents from each other and stockings. I give him a hard time because in the past he hasn't done so hot buying me gifts. This year HE ROCKED! He remembered just about every little home accent I had pointed out, the cutest slippers, pajama pants, and the GT Express!! I had no idea he would get me the infomercial wonder! I can't wait to try it out!

So far, our Christmas tradition has been to go to my parent's in the morning to open presents there. My little brother Jasen had said he was fine waiting to open gifts until 9 am, so Jose and I didn't have to wake up super early. Well as I predicted he called at 8 am asking for us to come over right away. Christmas morning was great! We were sooo blessed by awesome gifts!
The boys loved their X-box and guitar hero and played the rest of the day! At one point Jose walked out of the room, and came back wearing his Santa "shorts" (they are not boxers!) and made us all laugh.

After relaxing for a bit back at our house, we went to Jose's grandparents house to celebrate with all his family (my family came along too!). Small house + many people=chaos and fun! We played Apples to Apples and ate lots of food!

Since Christmas day is my dad's birthday, we went back to my parent's house to play more Guitar Hero and sing Happy Birthday! Every year I am in charge of ordering my dad's birthday pie. Since Marie Calendar's and Bakers Square went out of business, I took matters into my own hands and made my new specialty- Perfect Pumpkin Trifle (I just made that name up. PLEASE help me come up with a better name).

Where did 2008 go?

I can't believe we are two days away from Christmas! It happened so fast! It seems like yesterday I was waiting very impatiently for the chance to listen to Christmas music and decorate the tree. Now, way to soon for my liking, it is almost time to pack up the decorations and throw away the tree.

Along with our Christmas decorations, the rest of our belongings will soon be packed up for the big move! We don't have much, but packing and cleaning are still time consuming. Our close of escrow date got moved up to Friday, January 16th which is very exciting! That means only three more weekends of shopping for furniture and appliances! We may have found the couches we want, but we still need to pick out a fridge, washer, dining room table, ceiling fans, paint ( windsor blue is in the lead right now), toilet seats, curtain rods, bathroom accessories....the list goes on! I love it though, we've been waiting a long time and it is hard to believe that we will be moving very soon!

Amusement park fun!

Last weekend Jose and I had to do out of county group home visits. We timed the visits perfect with Knotts Berry farm's free admission for social workers! We only went for a few hours in the evening after we had seen all the kids. Because it was sooo crowded (with scary looking thugs mostly) and since we didn't pay to get in, we left after one ride. The ride was awesome though! One of the best roller coasters and they video tape you on the ride! We laughed so hard watching out expressions after the ride!

Don't bother watching the Knotts parade. LAME!


The following morning we headed to Magic Mountain. My mom gave me a free ticket, and it was Toys for Tots day. We brought a toy to donate and got in free (we know how to work the amusement parks free days). I love Magic Mountain! We went on the two newest and scariest rides first and had an hour wait and then a 30 minute wait. We assumed we would be waiting in lines all day, but were pleasantly surprised that the rest of the park was empty and we literally walked straight on every other ride! Jose decided he isn't the biggest fan of roller coasters so we left early in the day.

See, no lines!

Calling all our paint-loving friends!!!

We went to take another look at our house, and show Jose's mom and grandpa. Event though they just put in new carpet and fresh paint, I forgot how disgustingly dirty the cabinets were! We are going to have a huge cleaning and painting party when we move in!

The view from the family room/dining area into the entry way and the living room. Downstairs bathroom is on the right beneath the stairs

All you who like to paint, or just all you really good friends who want to help us out....we are going to need some help painting these huge walls! And I need some inspiration on what to do! I have some colors in mind, but don't know where to end and begin!


My favorite flowers in the whole world are cherry blossoms (they count right?). I was so happy to see a little cherry tree in the front yard! I can't wait until spring when hopefully our grass will be revived and our little tree will be in bloom!

Velazquez 2008 Christmas letter

This was the letter we sent out....

Dear Family and Friends,

Merry Christmas! I am very excited to write the first annual Velazquez Christmas letter. Jose and I love the Christmas season. We started listening to Christmas music in November, and our tree and decorations were up the day after Thanksgiving! From Christmas present shopping to baking cookies, we love it all. It would be so easy to get caught up in the “busyness” of Christmas and forget the true meaning, that Jesus was born to be our savior. It is because of that night 2000 years ago that we have a reason to celebrate!

Our first year of marriage was all we could have asked for—and more! We rang in the New Year in style with our friends in San Diego!
January turned into a month long birthday celebration for Jose. If I remember correctly we had a total of five birthday dinners for him! Because he loves sports we also went to a San Diego Chargers game,
a Clippers game,
and were blessed with free box seat tickets for the Lakers vs. Cavaliers game!



Every month it is guaranteed that Jose and I will get to travel. Part of our job with Child Welfare Services is to visit children who are placed in group homes around California. The county pays for the gas, food and lodging, and we make the most of it! It has been so nice being able to get away (even though part of the time we are working!). Most of the time we go to Southern California, but we’ve also been to Sacramento and San Francisco.


In June we took a couple of vacations to the lake with my parents and Jose’s mom. Our biennial trip to Bullard’s Bar Lake was a memory that we will never forget! Because of the Northern California fires we could barely see across the lake, we heard bears behind out tent, the boat broke down leaving us stranded in the middle of the lake until 10 pm, and a mysterious rash on Silvia’s hand forced us to make a trip to the ER! Nonetheless, it was a blast!


To celebrate our first anniversary we went back to our Honeymoon destination, the Dominican Republic. We had a blast revisiting Punta Cana. We took a great ATV excursion and saw more of the countryside. Jose even swam in a natural spring cave!


Other big achievements for us have been the completion of my Masters in Clinical Psychology degree, and the decision to begin house hunting. For the past 8 months we have been searching for the perfect house to purchase. We are so grateful to Jose’s sister Emma, because we think any other realtor would have fired us after looking at the 100th house! We are definitely learning a lesson in patience, but are hopeful that soon we will find “the one.” Hopefully next year’s Christmas letter will be mailed from a new address!

We have been so blessed to have had such an exciting first year of marriage. We are curious and expectant to see what the Lord has in store for us in 2009!

P.S

Our home is the middle right picture in the montage of pictures below.

New home, here we come!

Is it a coincidence that the day after I write the post about being content in this house searching, we get an offer accepted?! House number #9, the last one to reject us called back and said they changed their mind! They first tried to counter offer and ask for $15,000 more- which we said no to. But changed their mind and accepted to offer as is!

We signed the papers this morning, and on January 20th we should be happy home owners!

Starting to understand why...

As you know, we have been trying to buy a house for 8 months (but seems like FOREVER)!
We have had 9 offers rejected! Nine! The first few (ok the first 8) were really disappointing, and we couldn't understand why God didn't answer our prayers. We were so patient (i.e we had no choice) waiting 5 1/2 months for what we thought was our "dream" house. When we didn't get it we were pretty bummed out.

But here is the cool part. Last night after we looked at house offer #10, we were pretty giddy about the awesome neighborhood and great floorplan. We started talking about how long this process has been, but it hit us that every house we look at gets better than the last! When we first started looking in March, the nicest we could afford were houses with zero lot lines, in a "Truman Show-ish" style (that is what my mom compares it to). We were convinced we would be happy there with the huge new home. And we probably would have been. But now, in December home prices have dropped (and interest rates!!) and the same price range we had in March can buy so much more today! Our fave neighborhood in Santa Maria (new homes by Walmart) is now in our price range!

So all that wondering why God didn't let us get the house we HAD TO HAVE, makes sense when we have so many more options now!

We just faxed offer #10. If we get it AWESOME (even RADICAL- inside joke to my family), but if we don't no biggie. Because there are plenty of fish (houses) in the sea (Santa Maria). Right Silvia? ;-) God knows the desires of our heart (and my wish list: fancy fireplace, stairs, laundry room, big kitchen, formal dining room, living room AND family room...), and he is looking out for us. When the right house comes, I think we will get it.

Here is a sample of a few of the many offers we have submitted.



and offer #10


Oh, one more thing. Unfortunately this house is a short sale (aka LONG sale). We have tried to stay away from these after our forever long wait of 5 1/2 months, but couldn't resist this one. As luck would have it (I KNOW it is not God doing this ;-) the same horrible selling realtor from before is also selling this one!! Ugh... hopefully it goes smoother this time.

FINALLY time for Christmas

It is finally the "right" time to listen to Christmas music and decorate! First thing Friday morning I asked Jose if we could start decorating. He was more than happy to dig through our shed and pull out our Christmas decorations. We went and picked out our tree in record time (it was the first one we looked at!), and my mom and brother Jasen helped us decorate.

The boys were more intent on goofing off!



Even after the decorating was completed, Jose was still sad that something was missing!

A new TV!! We are so excited to not have our small ghetto screen!

Thanksgiving!

We made it back from Punta Cana at 3 am on Thanksgiving morning. We were pretty tired, but excited to spend time with our family. I even had time to make a pie! Pumpkin turtle pie!

Great Vacation!

We had a blast in Punta Cana! The weather was pretty rainy, but we still had fun. We also got stomach bugs, not fun, but it didn't ruin the trip. Here are a few pictures of our trip






to see more go to http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2057686&l=addfc&id=68600295

Off to Paradise!

Today is finally the day that we leave for our much anticipated trip! We fly out of LAX at 10:30 tonight, have a 5 hour layover in Miami and will arrive in Punta Cana at 3:00 tomorrow!
We are praying for safe travels and for everything to go smoothly. I am really really praying I don't come back with stomach problems/parasite. That was not fun last year, and will be even less fun because we return the night before Thanksgiving.
Can't wait to post pictures of the trip, and hopefully of my new tan!

This is Fall?

It does not feel like fall when there is no parking at 7-11, and the line for slurpees is to the back of the store! 85 degrees? Really?! Maybe the Punta Cana weather won't be such a change.

Dreaming of Paradise...

I know that we live in beatiful, warm California (this morning while we were singing along to Christmas songs it was almost 70 degrees on our way to work) but I am so excited to be in the extra warm, tropical Punta Cana! Every night for the past couple of weeks I have dreamt of the food, sand, and drinks!

Since there are only 6 days until vacation, I thought the blog needed to get excited with us.

(Only 5 days until Joey and Amy find out if they are having a boy or girl!)

Care Net Pregnancy Center

"While undergoing spina bifida surgery in utero, 21-week-old fetus Samuel Armas grips the finger of Dr. Joseph Bruner through the incision."


I'm not ashamed to admit that I am pro-life. 100%. Co-workers recently tried to get Jose and I to admit we would be in favor of abortion in situations of rape, incest, terminally ill fetus (if there is any question about how I feel about giving birth to a terminally ill baby, take a look at my link to the Stanfield Journey and the links to many of her friends who have done just that!) but it wasn't going to happen (well if in the .001% chance that the mother and child will BOTH die if the baby isn't aborted, I would choose to save the mother because that is preserving life).

I vote pro-life, I preach pro-life, and I support pro-life. One of my favorite agencies is Care Net Pregnancy Center (and for that matter Pregnancy support Center in Lompoc, Choices in SLO, and Life Line in AG). Last night was the annual Care Net fundraiser at the Santa Maria Country Club. My entire family went to hear awesome testimonies from two women about how the center has helped , and a pretty good message from a local pastor. Also part of the night was a silent auction. Jose shines when it comes to anything competitive. I learned Silent Auctions count as competitive! Our eyes were big with some of the items being raffled, and we immediately bid on many things. Of course we got excited and HAD to have them, no matter how high the bid went. Since all the money went to support Care Net we considered it a donation, but we were still a little shocked to see our total. Yikes! I'm convinced that my family was the biggest spenders of the night. My parents walked away with a night stay at San Antonio Lake cabin, Jesse got four Dodger tickets, and Jose and I got two massages, golfing green fees for Rancho Maria, In and Out dinner tickets + bowling, and two tickets for PCPA. Funny story about the tickets....oh goodness this is embarrassing... Jose and I both thought it was for two 2008-2009 season tickets, but it was for two tickets to use during the 2008-2009 season. We ended up getting the tickets for double their value! But of course it is for a cause that means a lot to us. It was a fun night and I'm so glad we went.

A few years ago the director of the Pregnancy Center offered me the position of event planner. I wasn't able to do it (it was only part time) and I had just accepted a job with CWS. But whenever I am at the dinners I start thinking about how much I enjoy planning parties, and wish I could have done it! I am still sure that somehow Jose and I will get involved with the Center in the future. My not so secret dream is to one day be the director...we'll see.

P.S Is this the choice "they" are fighting for?

Getting in the Holiday Spirit

I am so excited the Holidays are here! Last year I was eating super duper healthy to get fit for the wedding, but this year with no wedding dress to fit in, I am so excited to make new things for holidays. The cold weather has made me turn into a baking and cooking machine (at least on the weekends). Two weeks ago I made a pumpkin pie cake (yummy!), and this weekend I wanted to make cookies. I invite Silvia (mother in law), Savannah (niece), and Jenika (cousin) over to make a batch of cookies. I had in mind making one type of cookie, but I should have known better once I invited the queen of sweets over (Silvia). She brought with her mixes for magic bars, brownies, three types of cookies, ice cream, and cotton candy flavored quick (don't ask)! It was so fun making batch after batch of junk food!



The girls even humored me and let me start playing Christmas music! I am so glad Jose gets almost as excited as me about Christmas. He doesn't mind Christmas music the first week of November (in fact he uploaded a million Christmas songs to my ipod). He even joined in a bit and made fun shaped sugar cookies.



Savannah and Jenika are second cousins and six years apart, but they get along so well! Jenika is the twins' older sister, and you can tell she is good at being a big sister. They were so goofy and fun to have around.



They got a little tired by the end. Aren't they cute?



In the end we made Brownies, Snickerdoodles, chocolate chip cookies, and sugar cookies. Somehow we never made the kind I had planned on making (oatmeal toffee cookies) or the kind Jose requested (peanut butter), so I guess we have to have another cookie making day. Fine with me!

Update on houses

We are still looking at houses every week and making offers. If we had any other realtor, I think they would have fired us, but Emma is pretty patient with my pickyness.
We gave up on Arbor Walk homes, after our offer wasn't accepted after 5 1/2 months of waiting, and are looking in new neighborhoods. Our offers are more reasonable, and hopefully soon we will find the perfect one.

The funniest (maybe not that funny) thing is that the house we waited FOREVER for, just fell out of escrow, and the other realtor called and said the bank would accept our offer now. HA! No thanks, we've moved on.

Halloween

My family never used to be big fans of Halloween. We never put much thought in costumes, and my little brother even choose to not go trick or treating a couple of years in a row (even though I begged him to let me take him so we could get candy!). This year though he was allowed to go without parents, so he was really excited. Even more surprising was my mom dressing up for work! I think this is the last thing I could picture my mom ever being.

The Biker Chick and the Chick Magnet

Jasen insists that he could have walked around without the "costume" and it would still be obvious he was a chick magnet. Yes, I have a humble brother.

Jose liked Connor's costume the best (Go Chargers)

But I loved my parent's little neighbor the fireman the best. He was so cute! He was
walking around in a daze because he could not understand why he was getting free candy. He had chocolate dripping down his face!

The dorks on the block!

For all of you who have come to our house, you know how ridiculous our fence looks. Since I moved into our little house in March 2007, our landlord has said she would be replacing the broken down fence. But whenever I ask her about it, she gets mad and says when she gets money she will do it. A year ago, a section of it blew away, and her idea of fixing it was to nail a piece of plywood over it.

I thought our fence could not get any worse, until we drove home last night and saw this!


You have got to be kidding me! She attached a new section of fence, that she must have had left over from the front. Besides it being WAY taller than the rest, she didn't even bother taking off the old piece of plywood! I couldn't stop laughing when I saw it because it looked so ridiculous. But this morning it is just embarrassing!

Jose's grandpa offered to help us fix it this weekend, and we said no, it is the landlord's responsibility. Oops! I don't know why after all this time she decided to fix the fence (if you can call this "fixing").

Oh well, hopefully we won't have to deal with it much longer. I'm not going to get my hopes up by telling you about a certain something we may have put an offer in. Nope, I'm going to keep my mouth shut this time and not mention the big, beautiful home we may be the highest bidder on...

Jose's Facial Hair take 2

In January, I convinced Jose to grow out his goatee. In June (see blog post) he had to shave it off for an interview with Santa Maria P.D. He didn't get the job (but he was one of 5 who got an interview out of almost 100 who took the test), so he grew it back out. This past week he decided to shave it off again, and have some fun. Last time he shaved off the goatee part, and left the mustache. This time he did the opposite "Joey Duggan style".

Time has flown and he has grown!

I have long since faced the fact that I am done growing, well at least up. I knew at one point in his life my nephew, Eddie Jr., would out grow me. But at 14 he has already past me! And he gets bigger every time I see him! Not only is he physically growing, he has also grown into a very smart and respectful young man! I am so proud of him! When I was in high school my sister, Emma, would take him and my very beautiful niece Adriana (I am proud of you too) to every one of my football games and wrestling tournaments. I remember this little guy always looking up to me and being so proud of me after my games. He would feel so cool going out onto the field after our games. He and Adriana would always be painted up, wearing blue and gold cheering on their favorite uncle! (For a while all they had was six uncles!)

As the years past and Eddie Jr. was finally old enough to play something other than soccer, I was so anxious to see how he would do. I was so excited for him and a little nervous that he wouldn’t be good the first time I went and watched one of his games. Not that being good and winning is the most important thing, but it sure makes it a lot easier to watch. Did I have reason to be nervous? Of course not, he had watched his uncle play in lots of football games and definitely modeled his game after me! He was good! He was not always on the best team, but he was always a leader on the field.

Now this not so little kid is in high school! Wow how time flies! And things have not changed, I still get excited and nervous before his games. But he continues to impress me and I continue to be proud of him. Yes he is good at every sport he plays; football, baseball, basketball, and even volleyball. But what impresses me most about him is his awesome attitude and how well he does in school. He is a very motivated person and I know he will be great at whatever he does in life.

Emma and Eddie, you guys have done an awesome job raising both your kids. Adriana I am very proud of you too! I can’t believe you are graduating high school next year! I love you guys!

Bring on the rain

“I can count a million times
People asking me how I
Can praise You with all that I've gone through
The question just amazes me
Can circumstances possibly
Change who I forever am in You”

I’ve been thinking about these lyrics from a Mercy Me song a lot recently, and have tried writing this blog for a couple of weeks. As I was wasting time at work, I found a link to a blog (your not surprised are you?) of a family who lost their child shortly after birth. I was amazed, actually in awe, of the strength this family shared through their blog, and their unwavering faith in Christ. Connected to this blog was a series of other family’s blogs with similar stories of their children being born with Trisomy 18, a disease that is considered “incompatible with life.”

Jose was getting nervous with my obsession of reading the stories of T18 because they seemed depressing (and I don’t think he wants me dreading this when we decide to have children). But the truth is, even in these mother’s descriptions of their enormous grief, they are positive stories! The faith they have in Jesus, the trust they have in the Lord’s unfailing plan, and the hope they have in the promise of Heaven is challenging to me!

I am so blessed that I have not had to go through loss like they have. For whatever reason, so far God has given me a life free from huge trial. I am sure that won’t always be the case, but I pray and trust that when I am faced with a choice to give up or look up, I will be able to say “I am Yours regardless of The dark clouds that may loom above Because You are much greater than my pain,” (mercy me says it much better than I could).

In light of reflecting on this topic, we learned yesterday as my mom was waiting for my grandma to come out of surgery, that my grandpa’s kidneys have failed and he will need dialysis if he wants to live more than a year. My poor mom has two parents to worry about! But the weird thing is it didn’t surprise me. I had been praying that when grief hits my family that we would be examples of praising God through the rain. I’ll be more careful about what I pray for from now on!

“And I know there'll be days
When this life brings me pain
But if that's what it takes to praise You
Jesus, bring the rain”

#10 Best thing about working with my husband...

Not having to tell him about my day (because he already knows)!

I don't even know what #1-9 best things are, but I know they exist (like getting to see him all the time!).

Yesterday I was out on an immediate call all afternoon, trying to figure out who made a 1 year old's butt black, blue and green (turns out it may be a sort of birthmark), and didn't see Jose. We went home separately, and he went to his nephew Eddie's football game. We met at 7:30 at his grandparent's house for dinner. It wasn't until we were in bed that we had a chance to talk about the stressful afternoon I had. We were both so tired I think we fell asleep during my explanation. Normally we talk about it when I get back to the office, or on our way home. I didn't like waiting until the evening. And that is why I like working with Jose!

Chuck E Cheese

Jose and I love spending time with Jose’s little cousins Anastasia and Danica. They are the sweetest little girls, and I think they like us too! For months Anastasia has been talking about her birthday and party at Chuck E. Cheese. I kept feeling bad for her because the day was so far away and she had a long time to wait. I can’t believe how fast time flies (probably not for her) because now the day has come and gone.

She was very happy and excited, but I think the whole thing kind of overwhelmed her! So much attention!



Jose's niece and more second cousins doing the robot with Chuck E.