A weekend with the Presidents

Last week we went to Washington D.C. and had a great time seeing friends and family as well as some of the top sites. Mark had a conference on Thursday and we decided to make a weekend of it. While he was at the conference I got to hang out with my old roommate Amber for the day. We had fun catching up and our babies are close in age so they enjoyed playing together. Adriana's favorite word is still baby. On Friday we went to Ford's theater which was really cool. I would highly recommend it. We also went to the Spy museum which was also very interesting. Now we are all certified spies! (Well I'm not anymore since I just told everyone. I probably need to go into hiding for a few years. Actually there was a spy we read about who did go in to hiding after WWII and didn't come out until 1984! Tough life.) We also went to China town and partook of the authentic food. The downside was that we forgot the camera, so no pics.

One of the things we did on Sat was the Air and Space museum. We learned all about ballistic missiles!

Our cutie!

A few of the gang. We stayed with Mark's brother Matt who moved out there a few months ago.

It was lots of fun, but we were all worn out by the end of the day... as displayed by Adriana. She slept for almost 12 hours straight our last night! It was a fun trip, and thanks Matt for being a great host!

Am I old enough to eat this? :)

Adriana's new acomplishments

Adriana seems to change every day. Here are a few glimpses in of her life these days. Her new favorite word is 'baby' and it refers to babies as well as most other humans.

Adriana's first corn on the cob.

A Birthday Surprise

Mark and I have birthdays only 4 days apart so it's always a party week! This year we both turned 25....

Okay, not really, but isn't this a cool cake? For Mark's birthday we kidnapped him from work and took him to a park for lunch.

Then we went Frisbee golfing that night. The course we went to had a ravine going through it so of course we had to rescue one of our Frisbees that got pulled in. We had fun making up our own rules for the course.

I had to throw this in... Adriana's hair is getting long so we try to put little clips or bands in it, but she likes to take them out. :)

For my birthday Mark surprised me by flying my sister Emily down for a few days! I'm sure my face would have been great on film when I answered the door to see her standing there! Mark really got me this year. Her daughter, Kathryn, is 6 months younger than Adriana so they always have fun too.

We enjoyed hanging out and also saw a few things in Dallas. 

We went to the Dallas Arboretum which was awesome and all in bloom. The girls fell asleep on the way there, but enjoyed all the flowers and water fountains once we got there.

This is pretty close to downtown Dallas as you can see in the distance. This is White Rock Lake.

The flowers were all so beautiful. I loved the colors of these ones.

Adriana had lots of fun giving hugs and kisses to Kathryn.

We sure miss them, but it was fun to have some time together! Thanks Mark for making it such a great birthday!!!! And thanks Emily for coming and hanging out with us for a little while, we loved it!



Here is a little video of the endless hugs Kathryn got while they were here.

THE TANNER ADVENTURES OF 2008+

Here's an overall update of what we've been up to. We emailed it out and decided to journal it up too.

Since our last letter (16 months ago, but who’s counting?) nothing has changed,
really . . . well . . . except for a few little things. Here's the rundown:

We had a baby (a very cute one, I might add) named Adriana Rachel. Adriana is a Mexican name. We thought that was very appropriate since she is Mexican. (She was born in Mexico and, therefore, has dual citizenship.) Our little Mexican was born on March 24 at 11:44 pm weighing 9 lbs. and 21 inches long. She is our pride and joy.

Sarah learned how to speak Spanish . . . mas o menos.

Mark got a new job in a totally different field. He was in HR with Cemex, but now he has returned to actuarial work with BlueCross BlueShield of Texas.

We moved to Dallas (in December) and had to say goodbye to our wonderful friends from Mexico, whom we love dearly.

Adriana went from no skills (except crying and sucking) to many skills: rolling over, shimmying, crawling, standing up, walking, running, climbing, blowing bubbles, smiling, laughing, melting everyone as she smiles and laughs, bouncing, picking things up and putting them in her mouth, other fine motor skills, bow hunting, and growling, as well as significant improvements in her crying and sucking skills.

We did some fun traveling. Over the summer we spent time with the Hansens in Vail, Colorado and then with the Tanners in Utah. Sarah’s parents also came to visit us in October and we did some traveling around Mexico!

Our main accomplishment in Dallas (other than Adriana’s speedy growth) was buying a house! We lived in a hotel room for three months while we looked, so we were very grateful when it finally worked out. We love our home!

We had a myriad of other excellent experiences, too numerous to mention. We will really miss the Mexican people. We hope the coming months bring many great things to you and your family.

With Love,

Mark, Sarah, and Adriana

Overlooking Guanajuato

The mummies in Guanajuato...ooooohhhhh

All about death and mummies there.

Grutas de Garcia (cool caves near Monterrey)

Some of Monterrey's awesome mountains!