I hope you all had a merry Christmas--we sure did! This is our family after church on Christmas day. I should mention that Evelyn's dress was given to her by a secret Santa as well as some other very kind gifts. But I'm getting ahead of myself... Christmas eve first:
As you can see, we honored the Jensen tradition of making a Merry Christmas pizza on Christmas eve (just in case you can't read the bell pepper message on the pizza, it says Merry X-mas).
We enjoyed our pizza as well as popping Christmas crackers. Evelyn was willing to keep a crown on long enough for one picture.
Here Evelyn is on Christmas morning digging into her stocking! She is at the age now to get excited about gifts and seems to like surprises.
Here she is with a child-friendly nativity set....
This was my home-made gift for Clarisse. Forgive me for showing off. No drawing could ever be as cute as the real Evelyn. Clarisse's artistic side was manifested in Christmas dinner. It was a masterpiece! We wish we could have seen our families, but it was good talking to some of you on the phone. Love you all!

Evelyn is growing fast and seems more like a little girl every day. Here she is looking pretty in her Sunday dress. Her hair has gotten much thicker in the past few weeks.

Evelyn is starting to develop an active imagination and seems to give her stuffed animals some personality when playing with them. Her favorite is a stuffed rabbit (Thumper from Bambi).
Thanksgiving is old news by now, and Bekah has already posted photos on Facebook. I'll give you a quick synopsis, though. Bekah came down for a few days, and it was really fun spending time with her. It was also really nice kicking back a bit and letting Bekah entertain Evelyn (Thanks, Bekah! I hope we didn't take too much advantage of you!).

We took a little tour of sites in downtown Salt Lake, and our first stop was the Cathedral of the Madeline. We saw the inside for the first time, and it was AMAZING! I didn't take pictures because I thought it would be irreverent.

We enjoyed seeing the lights at temple square! It was worth braving the bitter cold. Below is the Christmas tree in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building.

Last Saturday was the first snow of the season and Evelyn's birthday party. Evelyn didn't play in the snow for very long on Saturday morning before her parents got too cold and took her in.
Here is Evelyn's birthday cake made by Clarisse. The stars were cut out of fruit roll-up. Way to go Clarisse!
A lunch of meat loaf, cheez-its, and canned peaches was served at the party. This might sound like an odd combination, but the theme was Evelyn's favorite foods.
Here she is with some of her presents. I think that she's running for the nearest parent in this picture. She loves to have us read to her.
Evelyn's new doll goes very well with her shopping cart. Evelyn's favorite toy, however, was the doll's bottle. She likes to suck on it and sometimes offers it to the doll too.

Happy Halloween! We went to a ward trunk-or-treat yesterday, and Evelyn was a little monkey. Clarisse and I were lazy and didn't wear costumes. There was no trick-or-treating for Evelyn though; she's too young for candy. Instead, she had a good time showing off her walking.
Oh, I have a confession to make that will make my mom and sisters very upset: I buzzed my head last week! I was sick of dealing with my unruly hair and did it on a whim. There are some great advantages to buzzing, though. It cost $0 (if you borrow clippers, that is), and I never have to comb! I don't have to worry about the wind messing it up, and I can take my hat off without any fear of hat hair.

I also started a beard growing, so by the end of the month, I should be unrecognizable. The University of Utah is having a No Shave November competition, and I think I have a shot at winning. I had to enter the contest clean shaven and have my picture taken, and the judging will take place on November 30th.

For those who haven't seen it yet, this is a video of Evelyn walking. She is being lured by a teddy bear held by Clarisse.

Hi everyone! I just wanted to share some news as well as some pictures of the happy little baby. As you can see, her hair is getting longer. The most recent thing she has learned to do is walk. She can take about four steps before sitting down and reverting to crawling. She also walks on her knees. It's not very fast, but she seems to like having her hands free.
Now that Evelyn can carry objects around with her, she likes to bring us books to read. She never gets tired of being read to, and she doesn't mind the same book over and over and over again. Clarisse and I change it up a bit for our own sanity.
I thought I'd show you all a few more pictures of the house now that it is unpacked and looks a little neater.
Above is the dining room where Clarisse is feeding Evelyn in her high chair, and the picture below is the kitchen.
Bekah came down and visited during conference and was very good at entertaining Evelyn. Bekah, we wish you could come more often! It was good to see you!
Oh, and the picture below is just to show off. I did the French braid myself. And my wife has beautiful hair. I'm showing off on two accounts.
And one last one of Evelyn... She's investigating the fall crocuses.
I guess I'll give you an update on my marathon too. I ran the Sojo (for South Jordan?) Marathon on the 15th and had a good experience. The weather was nice, and I enjoyed talking to the other runners (it was a more social event than I expected, and I ran along side several conversational athletes). Everyone was very supportive when they found out that it was my first time, and I got a lot of comments about my funky shoes. I finished in 4 hours and 18 minutes, but I didn't pace myself well. I actually finished the race walking, but I am just glad to have finished at all. I think that I'll try it again next year.

Evelyn enjoys having a yard to play in. She is always happier outside than inside. Perhaps she is an outdoorsey person by nature. She also likes natural toys more than man-made ones. If we give her a leaf or a flower, she's entertained for hours (Well...I don't think anything could literally entertain her for HOURS). Sometimes I take her out in the front yard and hold her up so she can see and touch the roses. She never seems to get tired of it.

We went to the fair yesterday and had a good time showing Evelyn the animals. She thought they were funny, but she was wisely cautious about getting too close! I think that she enjoyed looking at the people just as much as the animals.

Here we are looking at kangaroos in a tent featuring Australian wild life. There are actually two darker colored wallaby things just to the left of the kangaroo Ev is looking at, and there is an albino kangaroo in the background on the right.

I thought I'd just take a minute to show you the house that we are renting. Here's a happy Evelyn in her new bedroom. We took down the wallpaper and painted the walls and the trim. It was way too much work--I don't recommend it!
The carpet in Evelyn's room is very retro: it's shaggy with alternating patches of green, orange, and yellow.
This is the living room. The house was already furnished, so some of the furniture here wasn't ours originally. We still haven't tried to use the big TV.
This is the exterior of the house, and as you can see, there is an Evelyn crawling on the lawn.

This will be a short post.... Evelyn is getting more grown up every day. She likes to sit at the table with us now and eat the same food that we are eating. She does pretty well for only having four teeth.
She's an OK self-feeder too. She can put a piece of food in her mouth as long as it's big enough to not get lost in her little fist.
Here's a rare shot showing her teeth. Glimpses of them are rather fleeting. The other difficulty is that Evelyn likes to move so much that pictures of her are usually blurred. Perhaps I could find an action shot feature on my camera....

Hi everyone! Evelyn has come a long way in her development recently. She finally figured out how to crawl forward, and now she's a speedy little crawler. She likes to follow Clarisse and I and to chase the cats. She also has one little tooth now on the bottom. It looks like other teeth are soon to follow.

Evelyn also went for her first swim this week. She likes her baths so much that we figured she would like the pool. She had a little nervous moment when she first got in, but after that she had a great time splashing.

We had a nice evening at the park yesterday, and Evelyn enjoyed watching the ducks. They weren't shy when coaxed with a bit of bread.

Clarisse, Evelyn, and I spent the week at a Jensen family reunion at Yellowstone, and had a great time! It was fun spending time with family, and we appreciate all of the efforts of the planners and organizers, especially Grandma J who rented the cabins.

The first site that we visited in Yellowstone was the most famous attraction: Old Faithful. It puts on a nice show about every hour if you are willing to wait for it!

Old Faithful is the most commercialized part of Yellowstone and is surrounded by some interesting buildings. This picture is of the interior of the historic Old Faithful Inn.

I liked some of the other geothermal features even better than Old Faithful. There were several hot springs that gave off sulfuric-smelling steam and had perfectly clear, sky-blue water.

Sapphire Pool was one of my favorites despite its small size.... It's so otherworldly.

This is the Grand Prismatic Spring. The center of the spring is blue, but the banks are bright orange due to thermophilic bacteria that thrive there.

There was plenty of natural beauty besides the thermal features. This is Yellowstone Lake where we stopped for lunch. The water was too cold for swimming!

This picture of the canyon was taken from the very appropriately named Artist's Point. We saw a few impressive waterfalls during our stay.

Evelyn had a good time whenever she wasn't in a car seat. She enjoyed the new sights and textures and had no trouble finding things to play with.

Here we are wearing our shirts that were signed by everyone at the reunion. All of the signatures managed to fit on Evelyn's little onesie.

Oh, and I'd better not forget to mention the wildlife! There were buffalo everywhere, often stopping traffic. You can hardly blame people for wanting to stop and look though. We saw a couple elk too, and I didn't mind not having any bear or wolf encounters.