A birthday to Remember!

OH MY GOSH I HAD SUCH A GOOD BIRTHDAY!

Y'all don't even know.

It began with an amazing Saturday night with friends.

My beautiful Portland friends surprised me at one of my favorite vegan spots for dinner and then we all went to Karaoke!

You guys, I really love Karaoke. A lot.

We had our own private room and I sang Lady Gaga's "you & i" like my life depended on it. All our friends are fabulous at Karaoke so the night was a blast and I wish it could've gone on forever!

 

The next day was a relaxing one. Jeremy played soccer and I worked on grad school stuff. 

Monday morning I woke up to a wonderful breakfast. My husband is the greatest.

 I took my sweet time getting ready and was greeted by our wonderful housemates and a bouquet of fruit from my parents. Very cute.

Next Jer took me shopping!! My wonderful in laws and sister in law treated me to a new pair of TOMS and a fabulous lunch at Native Foods Cafe.

 After a fun day of shopping we went home for a little R&R with our son.

 Then came dinner at Blossoming Lotus. I was so excited because this place is SOOO good! I wore the new tights I got in my Christmas stocking.

We had live nachos which are my favorite, a Thai BBQ salad which was amazing and a raw lemon coconut cheezcake for dessert. 

It was a beautiful evening. And the cherry on top of my beautiful day??

We are going here for our anniversary:

BOOM!!! SO EXCITED!!

Thank you to all of you who wished me a happy birthday.

It was very very happy.

Holidays and Thoughts on Family

Happy New Year!

It's been a while since we updated you all on our life.

We are enjoying a mild winter in Portland and just got back from 10 days in California with family.

It was so wonderful to celebrate Christmas in Dublin and Sonora, and New Years in Bakersfield.

As usual we were spoiled rotten with gifts and delicious meals while we were home. This year, however, my sister, Jeremy and I did a little spoiling of our own.

For Christmas we had our old home movies put on DVDs for my mom.

On Christmas morning (and throughout the week) we all sat around and watched home movies. Honestly, it was hard to pull ourselves away. It was amazing to see my sister and myself as little girls, to see my parents when they were 28 years old, and to see my nana who passed away when I was only 4 years old.

Needless to say, it was a very emotional Christmas.

It made me think about the future a lot and how fast time goes by.

How simple moments with a loved one captured on a video tape someday might be all you have left of them.

This trip to California was a reminder of how important family is.

Jeremy and I get so frustrated with our jobs and I will worry so much about money and the future, but when I remember our family- I am comforted.

We have such a wonderful and loving family.

I think I'm growing up because for the first time I am feeling like it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to have children. Now I'm not saying we are wanting that now or even thinking about it, but when I look at my family and the memories we've shared...I want more.

 

For now though, we are making some beautiful memories in our little apartment in Portland. Jeremy, Tony and myself are pretty content with our life here and I am so thankful for what we have.

I have no idea what 2012 will bring but I am certain it will be filled with wonderful moments that I will cherish for a lifetime.

Happy 2012.

Our Second Thanksgiving

We haven't posted anything in a bit so sorry if you thought we were dead. 

Well we're alive and well and getting pumped for the Holidays!

This Thanksgiving we flew down to the bay and enjoyed some time with both the Ho's and Agenjo's.

We decorated the tree and tortured the dog.

 

We hung out with old friends and new babies.

 

Took some glam shots.

 

And killed it in karaoke with some of the coolest people you'll ever meet.

The was wonderful and we are looking forward to Christmas!

Where does the time go?

I just stumbled upon this video we made when we were engaged.

So crazy.

How has it been 2 years since we got engaged?

A lot has changed...but we're still good looking ;)

A year in Blueberry Pancakes.

A little over a year ago, I was making blueberry pancakes in Bar Harbor, Maine. We were on vacation right before we were moving to Portland, Oregon. That week I was consumed with the anticipation of the unknown. We were supposed to be relaxing and exploring a new place but I couldn't relax knowing that in a few days we would be leaving the place I had called home all my life and moving to a place where I only knew 2 other people. Who would I be there? How would our marriage succeed without the foundation we were leaving? Would I find music in Portland? Would we find jobs? I tried not to think about all of my swirling questions.

I remembered these feelings this morning while I was making blueberry pancakes in our little kitchen. It's been a year since we packed up our things and our cat and drove 11 hours to our new home. It has been a year of new friends and missing our old ones. A year of learning to drive stick shift and stalling in unfamiliar places. A year of growing in marriage and making adult decisions.

This time last year I was so nervous about the road before us. But as we now embark on our second year in Portland, I feel a new found confidence. We may endure disappointments and discouragements or we may enjoy all the fruit of our labor and see prayers answered. Either way, it will be another year of doing life together. We will wake up each morning and be thankful that we have breath in our lungs, a roof over our heads and vegan pizza on our plates.

Thanks to all of you who have been supporting us this last year. We love you big time.

love.love.love.

E&J

Butter to my bread, breath to my life.

These past few weeks have been pretty busy.

We went to Seattle and hung out with Jeremy's parents which was awesome.

Then we came back to Portland with some wonderful friends.

The week was filled with eating out, laughter, and a lot of me trying to keep Jeremy in the dark about his upcoming birthday dinner!

On his actual birthday we went to karaoke with friends.

We brought doughnuts :)

 

Then The weekend rolled around and Jeremy's fam flew into town including Haley and Stacey!

We had a blast and ended the visit with a surprise dinner for Jeremy.

 

 

It was a great night.

One of the presents Jeremy received was our wedding video made by Haley!

After everyone left we watched it.

I totally cried watching it and it wasn't for the reasons I would've guessed.

I watched my dad walk me down the aisle and I remembered what I was thinking and how little I knew then.

How little we both knew.

I feel like I'm far more intimidated by the magnitude of marriage now than I was back then.

It's so huge and definite and sometimes you don't even know if you'll make it through that day together let alone the next year or 60 years.

But tonight we laughed with friends in a city that we've lived in for almost a year and I reflected on all that we have done in our partnership.

We have yet to see the fruit of our labor but we know that we're better for it all.

We're still growing a lot and becoming better spouses and it is really tough.

But I'm proud of where we've come from and the road we've taken ownership of.

This is our story together and as individuals and we are ready for whatever comes next.

love.love.love.

e&j

Still movin..

Sorry...I'm slow at this thing.

We've been super busy with lots of company.

 We've enjoyed visitors from Santa Cruz and the bay and a couple weeks ago I got to see my fam in VEGAS!

 It was SO good to see my cousins. Two of them, Maria & Nina, had both been living in Spain. I hadn't seen either of them in almost a year! We had a blast together.

 I am totally asleep in the picture but it's still a great shot of everyone.

 You're probably familiar with this girl.

 Uncle Allan was very excited about this.

It was amazing to see everyone though unfortunately, Jeremy couldn't make the trip.

But we toasted him at dinner and celebrated.

These past few weeks have been filled with company.

This weekend we go to Seattle to meet up with Maj & Faj Ho and then we get to celebrate Jeremy's birthday in a week!

What a month!

love.love.love.

The Ho's

What's New With The Ho's

It's been far too long since we've updated those of you interested (which may only be our mothers) on our recent happenings. Last month we ventured back to the bay for some much needed time with family and friends. We danced at a wedding, ate bread at Tartine and enjoyed a barbecue with the best people. 

It was crazy to see all my friends pregnant or carrying babies. We had a blast!

We then returned to Portland for some beautiful summer weather. We went berry picking with friends have had lots of snuggles with Tony.

Next week Erin heads to Vegas to meet up with some family. 

More updates and pictures to come!

The Hohengartens invade Canada

Where can you find delicious food, beautiful hikes and tons of attractive people?

Why, Vancouver of course!

Vancouver, British Columbia that is.

We made the 5 hour drive up to Vancouver last weekend and had a blast!

After checking into our hotel, we road our bikes to Stanley Park.

The path around the park was so beautiful.

 

The next day we went to a vegan bakery for breakfast and then to Granville Island.

We really enjoyed walking around the market and the beautiful island. 

 

After the island, we visited "the drive". Here we had a delicious lunch and walked around cool little shops. My sweet friend Dalene recommended that we visit the Sweet Cheribim Bakery so we stopped by. It was so delicious! I had a nanaimo bar which is a very Canadian treat- so good!

 

We walked around downtown and saw the damage done by the rioters. There were tons of love notes written to Vancouver all over the damage. A lot of the people we met were deeply saddened by the rioting and the damage, this seemed to be a wide spread sentiment...

 

We walked around Gastown which I guess is kinda like old town? 

 

It was there that I encountered my first Mountie.

We had a blast!

On our way home we stopped in Seattle for some lunch at our favorite place: Wayward Vegan Cafe.

After that we got some treats at Pikes Place including Turkish Delight which I very much enjoyed!

 

It was a fabulous weekend- we can't wait for more adventures!