jc and i vlog for the first time!

i am alive!! i have made it through the worst of the moving process and we have internet!!! instead of blogging about all the moving updates, i just wanted to do something fun. so jc and i vlogged!

a couple weeks in iphone photos

why do i keep doing this to myself? i seriously just spent way too long going through all my iphone pictures. i need to do this every week, not every other week. if you follow me on instagram (my username is melissajenkins) you've already seen all these but hey, they are just as good the second time around. highlights include jc coming out of his teething/being sick all day everyday funk, a girl's night out with my mama, valentine's day, and jc's first sleepover with his bff damian. so much fun! and now i'm going to enjoy some more oscar's preshow before jc wakes up from his nap. have a good rest of your weekend!

linking up with a good life and life rearranged.

our love story, part two

photo by Stina Reffit Photography

so here we are for part two! you can catch part one here in case ya missed it. oh and you'll want to see the awesomesauce picture of charles and i before our FRESHMAN homecoming dance. it's all kinds of embarrassing.

again, this is from our wedding website so the tone is a little different than i normally like to keep it over here. hope you enjoy part two!

High school came and went. We moved into together the spring after we graduated, in March 2005. We lived in a tiny one bedroom duplex in a shady neighborhood. But it was amazing, because it was our place. Our first place together. We had always talked about how awesome it would be to be "grown ups" and live together. To go to sleep and wake up in the same place. And we finally had it.

We lived in that house for a couple years until we met one-third of the super friends, Garrett and Jessica. Within a couple months of knowing each other, we promptly decided that we needed to become roommates and move in together. And so it was. We moved into a four bedroom home with our new best friends. There were a lot of good times in that house. We like to refer to it as our "college years" even though only one of us was actively enrolled in school. But you get the idea.

um, yes i am lil jon. best halloween evar btw.

After living there for a couple more years, we decided it was once again time to move on our own. We moved into the house that Charles had lived in since he was three years old. This was the house that we would start to build our family. We just didn't know that part yet.

After a year of just hanging around, without much direction in our lives except working our nine to fives, the biggest change to our lives happened. On November 9th, 2009 we found out we were pregnant.

It wasn't part of our "plan" but sometimes life doesn't follow your plan. We knew this was supposed to happen ths way. This was for a reason. We were beyond excited to welcome a new member to our little family.

A couple months before we were expecting our new addition, we went on a babymoon, or one last trip before the baby comes. We traveled by car (Charles's '91 BMW, of course) north Interstate 5 through Northern California, Oregon, Washington and up to Vancouver, British Columbia and then back down the coast. One of our first stops was to Crater Lake. We had been told by many that it was worth the trip and they were right. It was breathtakingly beautiful. 

It was May 1st, 2010. There was several feet of snow atop this mountain with a lake in the middle of it. We were dressed for summer weather. After getting in a fight because Charles wanted to trek a little further in the snow and Melissa getting mad because "I'm 30 weeks pregnant! I'm not going to hike around in the snow!", Charles managed to talk Melissa into going a little further away from the rest of the tourists. That is where Charles got on one knee and proposed. In the snow with Crater Lake as the backdrop. The words he said are not remembered because of the anxiety going through Charles's brain and Melissa's absolute shock but they were special. And life changing.

On June 1st, 2010 a month to the date of our engagement, we welcomed John Charles the Third. He has made our lives whole. He fits so perfectly in our family and we are so thankful everyday that he is here.

our love story, part one

photo by Stina Reffitt Photography

being on the high of valentine's day over here, i decided now was as good a time as ever to share charles's and mine's love story. is that correct grammar? charles's and mine's? it doesn't sound like it. anyway, i needed to write it for our wedding website so i figured i might as well share it here too since i haven't divulged too much of that information yet. i'm pretty much just copying and pasting it over here so i apologize because the tone is a little different than i normally write. and it has a weird tense, i use "we" but also refer to myself as "Melissa". so yeah. it's kinda long so i'm going to break it up into two parts. check back tomorrow for part two!

Our story begins almost twelve years ago when two kids went to their first day of high school. Melissa had just moved to a new town, to a new school and was incredibly nervous. She didn't know anyone. Charles was going to a school where he would know the vast majority of the students because he had been going to school with them since he was in kindergarten. Our first class on the first day of high school was Computer Technology with Ms. Decoup-Lantay.

Melissa had arrived to class early and had been anxiously awaiting for the bell to ring. Charles wandered in, skateboard in hand, seconds before class had officially begun. Because of his late arrival, there was only a couple seats left. One was next to Melissa. And without hesitation, he swooped right in and sat down.

As prepared as Melissa was, mysteriously, she forgot to pack a pen with her for the first day of school. She asked Charles if he had a pen she could borrow. Lucky for Charles, he found the one pen in his backpack that he had swiped out of the telephone drawer that morning that hadn't been chewed on by his sisters. And the conversation began.

The next couple months were hard, as most young love can be. Of course, Charles had a girlfriend already. With his charismatic ways, who could resist? This kept our relationship platonic but it was only obvious to anyone within a five foot range that we were totally into each other. We talked on the phone everyday, exchanged emails, instant messaged, couldn't get enough of each other. But with respect to his relationship, we kept it at that. Charles even tried to set Melissa up with several of his friends. Later, he admitted to doing so to keep her close. But it was no use, the feelings were still there.

The fall was approaching and so was the fall homecoming dance. And the news came. Charles was now single. How convienient. With that, Charles asked Melissa to be his date to the dance. And before the dance even happened, we officially became a couple on October 19, 2000, the day before Melissa turned 15.

keep it real melissa has to cut in here because O.M.G. you guys. really. we are 14 in this picture. my hair is all sorts of awesome, i weigh like 100 pounds and i'm wearing an illusion necklace. i know you had one too.

We were children. We realize that now. But somehow, with our immature minds and lack of experience, we knew that we had something special. Enough that even through all the drama that can happen in high school, we managed to avoid it. We knew we had to hold onto each other. 

jc's first santa encounter

as weird as it may seem to many of you, i strongly considered not telling jc about santa claus. i didn't like the idea of lying to him or making him sit on a stranger's lap. eventually he would find out the truth and i worried that he would be angry with me for lying to him. i thought about doing the same with the easter bunny and the tooth fairy.

then i realized that it would be inevitable that he would find out about santa from somewhere else. and i didn't want to be the scrooge that stole his childhood magic away from him. i guess i will just deal with the resentment that will inevitably come my way when some mean kid tells him "SANTA ISN'T REAL!" part of being a kid is believing that magic is real. could he still feel this way without having santa claus in his life? probably. but i do love christmas and santa is a big part of the christmas magic.

that being said, we took jc to visit santa for the first time on wednesday! it was one of those things that i didn't get around to doing last year. he was only six months old last christmas so i didn't really think it was important. looking back, i do wish i had a santa picture for every year. oh well, whatcanyado?

i fully anticipated jc to have a meltdown when he saw santa. he's only eighteen months old and has no idea who santa is. i tried to show him pictures of santa and used his name frequently within the past couple weeks. but, it didn't really help.




i actually think these santa freak out pictures are kinda cute! it's only made all the more glorious by the awesome fancy title that they had to add to the bottom of the picture. the whole idea of making a toddler, well into his separation anxiety phase, sit on strange man's lap with a giant beard and a crazy outfit is just hilarious anyway. the lady who took our money told us that she straight up put a picture of santa up in her house all year round so that her kid wouldn't be scared. i'm not about to do all that but hopefully he'll understand the concept a little better next year? a two and half year old? ehhhh?

i'm happy we did it and i'm excited to take him again as he gets older. as we waited in line, i saw a couple older kids tell santa what they wanted for christmas and that's when i really "got" it. ooooooh that's why people tell their kids about santa. i'll definitely have fun baking cookies and leaving out a glass of milk for santa with jc as he gets older. i'm thinking about starting the "elf on the shelf" tradition with him now. i'm excited to hear him ask all the awesome questions that come along with santa magic. "how does he get to everyone's house in one night?" "how will he fit down our chimney?" "how does he know if i'm naughty or nice?" i don't know how i'll answer these questions yet but i'm looking forward to opportunity to do so.

wordless(ish) wednesday: baby meets candy apple

These are from our trip to Apple Hill that I wrote about last week.




"what is this?"



"ooo that looks good, bring it a little closer"



"this is going to be amazing. i wish i had more teeth."



"great success!"

{Linking up with The Paper Mama,a little king and i, and then, she snapped, Supermom, Live & Love Outloud, 5 Minutes for Mom, jenni from the blog and Baby Baby Lemon. Whew, that's a lot of linking up.}

apple hill

Wow I am so late with this post. I feel like I saw everyone else's pumpkin patch pictures three months ago and here I am, in November like "hey! we went to the pumpkin patch too!" But, in my defense, we did go on October 30th so it was kind of a last minute excursion.


Charles and JC

So a big group of us made our way up towards the foothills to visit the Central Valley tradition of going to Apple Hill for our taste of some autumn fun. There are a bunch of apple orchards, farms, vineyards, breweries, bake shops, pumpkin patches, Christmas tree farms all in one area. So much fun, most of it can be done for free or very little money. Beautiful scenery, all kinds of baked goods, crisp mountain air. What more can you ask for? I really want to try and go again before it gets too cold.


JC and his Grandma Stella


left to right: Charles, Brenda, me, JC, my mom, my brother, Jessica, Damian, and Garrett

The whole gang was myself, Charles, JC, my mom, my brother, our family friend Brenda, and our friends Garrett, Jessica and their son Damian. I was a little disappointed at the beginning because JC was kinda cranky, he was terrified of the cows in the petting zoo (they did smell pretty bad) and wanted us to hold him constantly, did not even want to walk at all. And of course, we forgot his stroller. He hates that thing anyway. After lunch (pulled pork sandwiches, hot chili, and cinnamon rolls) he was in a much better mood. We went to another farm, where there was a pumpkin patch and more room to run around. Then we couldn't keep him with us! All he wanted to do was run around, climb up dirt hills, try to eat apples off the ground, crawl under trees in the orchard. He was out of control. But it was a lot of fun chasing him around, I must say. I love my little toddler.







He LOVED the pumpkins. He had to go around and tap each and every one. He also had to carry a little bottle of lotion around with him constantly.


This "running-in-action" shot almost made me pee my pants







And of course, he had to try and get as dirty as possible in his little khaki cords. He's like "who wants to see those stinky cows? these leaves are awesome!"







I can't wait to go again next year and make this a family tradition. I'm a little surprised at how important the idea of traditions have become to me. My family never had a ton of traditions and Charles's family didn't either. But I feel like this is something really important to do for our family and our son. Plus it's super fun to go run around and eat cinnamon rolls that are the size of your head.

wordless(ish) wednesday: happy halloween!

I've been itching to get these photos up. This is my first time opening my laptop in the last couple days. Had to take care of a couple orders of business first, speaking of which check out some of my new sponsors as well as some continued sponsors right over there -------->
I'm so happy to have them!

So, onto the Halloween festivities! This year was extra hard in the costume deciding department for some reason. We just could not decide what we wanted to be. The biggest problem I guess was that Charles was really adamant about all three of us matching. I actually can't wait until next year because I'm sure JC will be able to pick out his own costume and I won't have to worry about it anymore!

So after throwing around ideas for the past month, we finally decided that JC would be a baby monkey, Charles would be the daddy monkey (or, to be exact, a daddy gorilla), and I would be a zookeeper. I think it worked out pretty well.




This was JC's second Halloween but it was really his first time actually being able to trick-or-treat himself. Oh, we took him trick-or-treating last year and we shamelessly ate all his candy. But this year, he was actually able to walk up to the doors and hold his little bucket. It was adorable. He really started to understand how it worked at the last few houses we visited. Since Halloween, if you just say the word "Halloween" he runs over and points at his pumpkin bucket with candy in it. Speaking of which, I really should eat all his candy hide that sucker.




We only visited a few houses; I'd blame JC but I didn't think very much about walking around in boots with heels while trying to hold squirmy little monkey. My dogs were achin'. It was ok though because I really like to see all the other kids come up and hand out candy. We have this big inflatable cemetery scene that we have on our front yard so we get ALL the trick-or-treaters. We seriously went through about 9 bags of candy. We ran out and had to turn kids away while my mom ran out for an emergency candy run. Thanks mom! Next year, I definitely need to just get like 5 Costco sized bags and call it a day. Charles and I cannot just hand out one piece per kid, we like to give handfuls.

I'm super excited for next year's Halloween! JC was pretty scared of certain elements of Halloween this year (my brother wore a Bill Clinton mask and I think he may have scared him into being a Republican), but hopefully I'll be able to better communicate to him next year that it's all pretend and just for fun.

And just because I didn't have a blog this time last year, here's our costumes from last Halloween.




Where's Waldo family! Last year was so easy. My costume and Charles's costume were store bought. I knit JC's sweater and hat. Surprisingly, they don't sell fake baby glasses? So we bought some sunglasses and just popped the lenses out.

I love the look on his face, like "Sigh, these are my parents." Sorry JC, you never stood a chance.




This is how we rolled trick-or-treating. No shame in our game.




And one last one from this year. I cannot get enough of that sweet baby face.

{Linking up with The Paper Mama,a little king and i, and then, she snapped, Supermom, Live & Love Outloud, 5 Minutes for Mom, jenni from the blog and Baby Baby Lemon. Whew, that's a lot of linking up.}

las vegas via instagram

I figured since today is my birthday, it would be a good day to post pictures of my birthday trip. Charles and I went to Las Vegas last Friday and came back on Sunday. It was the first time that we've been away overnight from JC and we were definitely ready. I really think that because JC was a preemie and we were away from him most of the day for the first seventeen days of this life, it made it so we NEVER wanted to leave him again. I could count on two hands how many dates we've been on since he was born. When he was really little, I couldn't bear to leave him with anyone else. It really wasn't healthy. Once he got older, he has just been so easy to take out with us. If we want to go out to eat, it really isn't that big of a deal to take JC along with us.

So needless to say, Charles and I could use a little "mommy & daddy" time to ourselves. My soon-to-be in-laws was nice enough to pay for our airfare to Vegas and my parents were nice enough to watch JC while we were gone. We really could have gone and stayed in a hotel down the street because it was nice to just relax and not be constantly worried about someone else. But Vegas is nice too. And JC did great! I almost kind of wish he would have missed us a LITTLE bit more than he seems to have. No problems at all. No late night phone calls begging us to come home.

We went to Vegas with two other couples that we know from work (I used to work with two of them and Charles currently works with them). We stayed at The Venetian which was AH-MAZING! So beautiful. Probably the nicest hotel room I've ever stayed in; and we were staying in their cheapest room! We flew Allegiant, and I can say that I would NOT recommend them! Super cheap airfare but the ordeal that we went through to get home was inexcusable. If you follow me on twitter then you know that I was really about to punch someone in the face. Kind of put a sour end to our trip. But all in all, the trip was a lot of fun and it was nice to have some grown up time. Plus, it doesn't hurt that public drinking isn't only legal, it's encouraged.




just a taste of how beautiful our hotel was



getting ready to go out the first night



the fountain at caesar's palace, i promise no one in my group jumped in



the faux eiffel tower lit up at night



refueling at margaritaville



statue of liberty at new york, new york



more loveliness inside the venetian



ummm our BATHROOM! bigger than my bedroom at home



going out the second night (it looks like charles has an awesome neck tattoo in this picture but he does not)



do NOT waste your time at the pirate show in front of treasure island



first time i drank a rockstar vodka in a loooooooooong time. they both taste so horrible, they kind of cancel each other out.

Charles's mom is already trying to get us to go to Vegas again next month! I think we will have to pass for now because our bank account is not very happy with us right now. But it was great to get away, even if it was just for the weekend.

wordless(ish) wednesday: cozy coupe

These pictures are actually from a couple weeks ago but I just got around to editing them tonight. JC received this cozy coupe for his birthday back in June but we just barely put it together last month. Although, I think he is just old enough to actually enjoy it. We still have the floorboard in it so he can't use his feet to Flintstone move it yet but we just push him around in it for now.

He loves it so much! When we are inside the house and he sees it in the backyard he points at it and says "THAT! THAT!" Since JC isn't really a fan of his stroller, I've considered using this as a means of transportation to get around the neighborhood or to the park. As soon as you put him inside of it, he starts rocking back and forth to try and move it. I don't understand how he understands how this works. But somehow, he does. When it's time to get out, I open the car door for him and he steps right out and closes the door behind him. This kid is definitely getting his driver's permit at exactly 15 years and 6 months.

I'm not quite sure of the origin of the feet driving skill.









{Linking up with The Paper Mama,a little king and i, and then, she snapped, Supermom, Live & Love Outloud, 5 Minutes for Mom, jenni from the blog and Baby Baby Lemon. Whew, that's a lot of linking up.}