Introducing, Jenna Kate!

Jenna Kate Allen arrived at 11 o'clock pm on Tuesday night, August 25th. Melanie and I got to the hospital at 6:30 that morning, so it was a long day to say the least. Melanie did great and Jenna has been a great baby for us. She weighed 6lbs 13 oz and was 19 inches long. As you can see from the pictures, she has a lot of hair - Mel is pretty excited about that since she can already put bows in her hair; I will let her post some of those pictures another day. Melanie's Mom and Dad (Nana and Pappy) were both able to be here and they are both very excited about being Grandparents. Jenna is the first grandbaby on the Smith side and the first girl on the Allen side. She is looking forward to meeting everyone soon.

Pregnancy Photos...

Taaa Daaa.....here it is pregnancy pictures! The last one is from today and my belly has gotten bigger than I had thought. We went to the dr 2 weeks ago and everything is looking great. She is 4 lbs. 8 oz so far. We go back to the dr on Thursday. I can't wait to see what this week will reveal. Pregnancy has definately been quite an experience for me. The first 18 weeks I threw up everyday....but thank goodness after that I have been doing great. It has just now gotten uncomfortable but I think that is do to the 100 degree weather...Yuck! I hope you enjoy these... 23 weeks, May 13, 2009

Utah

27 weeks, May 31, 2009

Alabama

27 weeks, June 5, 2009
Alabama

34 weeks, July 19, 2009
Utah

Jenna's Room!

Here is our little girl's room! We still have a few minor touches to do on it. We have decided to name her Jenna Kate, unless she comes out and it doesn't fit her (I guess). It is getting very close and we are very excited to meet our new

little love button! These are a few pictures...

I am definitely not the writer in our house...but I am being FORCED. :) So bare with me as I try to figure out how to write.

Our lives have finally gotten back to normal, somewhat. I am now 17 weeks and 6 days pregnant. I am finally feeling more like myself and have my life back. I have my energy back and I am not puking anymore! Hallelujah! We went to the Dr on March 6th, and he said that he is 95% sure it is a boy. I guess we will see if he is right next time we go to the Dr on April 6th. We are really excited no matter what we have. Joe and I are trying to decide on a name. We have different thoughts on every name we come up with.

As for Joe...not much is going on. He just works, works, work. He is also excited about being done with his Master's Degree in October! WOOO HOOO!

A New Writer

Due to high demand for "the blog", I will start writting another day...not today. So stay tuned....it should be exciting!

A Utah Christmas

Melanie's family all came out for christmas this year. It was nice to have them all out at the same time. They drove all the way from Arkansas, dodging and diving winter storm after storm and even drove through Wyoming to complete the 19 hour drive without stopping! They arrived on Christmas eve and we all went to Christmas Eve service at our church which was pretty funny

with all the little kids signing and the middle school kids attempting the Carol of the Bells with hand bells. We spent Christmas Eve opening our presents and then playing rock band on Brian's Wii. I think we spent half the week playing rock band - I think I'm going to try out for the church band since they're looking for a guitarist now...my rock band skills should help me out with that! On Christmas day we relaxed around the house and then went to a movie in Ogden later that evening. On our way back from the movie it started snowing very hard and within about 5 minutes you couldn't tell where the road was or wasn't. I think we got about 9 or 10 inches of snow that

made it nice and cold and icy. Friday, we all went to Park City.
We ate lunch on main street and walked around to a few shops...it was too cold to stay long, so we went to the Olympic Park and went throught museum. There were a few ski jumpers from Norway who were practicing on the freestyle ramps, but other than that there wasn't a whole lot happening up there. On Saturday, we tool Laura to the airport to fly home for her GRE test and to see Spencer. The rest of the weekend was pretty eventless and pretty nice to just relax before going back to work. Mel's Parents and Brian started the drive back to Arkansas on Tuesday morning, making a pit-stop in Moab to check out the sites of Arches and Canyonlands and then headed back over the Rockies of Colorado. It was great to have the Smith's out for Christmas and are looking forward to everyone else visiting over the winter. We hope you all had as great a Christmas and New Year as we had!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Here's some pictures I took today after the big storm came through this morning. There was about a foot or more snow that feel in just about 6 hours. Roxie and I were the first two to be

on the trail - I had to keep knocking snow off the tree branches that were drapped over the trail to be able to make it through. Roxie was happy to be in the snow again. She just runs back and forth, up and down the trail in front of me until she can't breath. Hopefully the snow will continue and we'll have another good Winter season for snowshoeing and skiing. I got a pretty good picture looking across a valley at snowbasin while I was out there. We haven't been skiing yet this year since we decided not to get season passes, but hopefully we'll be up there soon.

Winter's Arrived

Winter has officially arrived...in the mountains anyway. 4 days ago there was absolutely no snow on the mountains, we got about 5 feet or more in some places on Wednesday. This is just West of Snowbird/Alta were they just opened up the ski runs yesterday. It was nice to get out this soon since it's still relatively warm. Zach and I went up towards Red Pine Lake which ended up being a little over 6 miles total. This picture is at around 9,500 feet elevation - I'm not sure where we started at but it was uphill the entire way! I'm hoping I'll be able to get out as much as last year with this new job I have.

Allen Update

Well, I've been back home for about 2 and a half weeks now and after the last week of sitting around the house by myself I'm ready to get back to work. I'll be starting a new job though, instead of working in the Munitions Squadron, I'm going to be heading over to the flightline and working Aircraft Maintenance in the 421st Aircraft Maintenance Unit within the 388th Fighter Wing. It will be a good experience for me and it's also good for career progression. I think the hours and work schedule will be a little more hectic, but I'm pretty excited about this new opportunity. We've probably got about 2 more years here in Utah before we PCS to (my guess) Eglin AFB in Destin, Florida, or Hanscom AFB in Boston, Massachussets.

Melanie is still working at the Ogden Family Support Center. We are also helping with our church since we just started a new campus this month and are trying to get everything up and running smoothly as much as possible. She's heading home in November to be in a friends wedding and will probably stay home for Thanksgiving since I will also be at a wedding that's in Charleston at the same time.

The winter snow will be here to stay before too long and we're ready for anyone who wants to make a trip up to go skiing or just visit. Hopefully we'll get to see everyone around the Thanksgiving timeframe; we're planning on having a white Christmas in Utah this year so we probably won't see anyone then.

Viva Las Vegas

I guess it isn't too hard to see who keeps up with the blog around here since the last time it was updated was before my deployment. I got back last Wednesday, October 1st, and we are all glad that I'm back home now. This week Mel and I went down to Las Vegas since neither of us had been there before. We had a lot of fun and saw some pretty interesting stuff too. It wasn't a bad
drive down (about 6 hours) but I think we'll be flying next time since we can get plane tickets for about $100 or so from SLC to Vegas.

We stayed at the Mirage which was right on the strip across from the Venetian and the Wynn and next to Treasure Island and Ceasars Palace. It was a very nice resort; we got upgraded since they didn't have our room that we wanted to get so that all worked out pretty well for us. We spent a lot of time walking the strip and I think we walked about 20 miles in 2 days, but it was pretty fun to see all the sights. The Bellagio is where they do a water show like the one in this picture a few times each night. It was pretty neat and free, so we really liked it. I have always heard about the cheap buffet's in Vegas, but I don't know where they are because everything we had and saw was very expensive. Buffet's were about $20 per person and restaurants were even more ridiculous; $18 for a salad and $25-$30 for you main course which wasn't anything spectacular. The food was good, but I think we need to learn where to go to get the deals!

All the resorts have a different theme so we spent a lot of time just walking through them and seeing what was in each of them. The Mirage had a Tropical them like being on an island in the South Pacific, the Venetian is all Italy. You can
get gellato's and go on gondola rides or go to the Lladro store. They had one Lladro there for $40,000, we were gonna get it but figured we'd wait until the next trip. Ceaser's Palace is a huge resort that takes up a few blocks and looks like all the building's and amphitheater's from the Romans time. At the Mirage we got to go look at Siegfried and Roy's Tigers and Dolphin Habitat. It was pretty fun, they had a 1 month old dolphin and a couple 2 or 3 month old white tigers we got to see. I don't think they do the Shows with the Tiger's like they used to, at least not that we know of, but they still have them at the hotel for you to go and watch.

We also went to a Cirque Du Soleil show at Treasure Island. They have a bunch of different shows but we went and saw Mystere which was interesting. It was pretty good for the most part but there were a few times it was a little weird to say the least. It was a fun trip but would
probably be more fun with some people who know the area a little better and know where to go for the deals. We played a couple slot machines and spent about $15 dollars (we weren't allowed into the high limit rooms). One my first machine, I put in 25 cents and won $10, so I cashed out immediately. When I came back to the machine after getting my $$ the lady who had been sitting next to me took it over since she thought it was on a roll, but I don't think she got anything. I won about $20 dollars total and Mel lost about $20 so I think we ended up even. Vegas is a fun place to visit for a day or two, but definitely would never want to live there. We were driving in the dessert for hours with absolutely nothing around and then we came over a little hill and there's the city just sitting out there in the middle of nowhere. I didn't win my millions like I had planned so I may have to brush up on my Texas Hold 'Em skills and go win a big tournament in the next couple years while we still out here.

Jackson Hole

Mel and I made a quick trip up to Jackson, Wyoming, on Monday; it's only about a 4 hour drive from SLC. The weather was perfect. It was about 70 degrees each day and there were no clouds in the sky to it was good for taking pictures of the Grand Teton's (behind us in this picture). The tallest peak is 13,770 ft high. In April of '05 Dustin and I came here for spring break but never got to see the Teton's w/out any cloud cover, so this was nice to finally see.

On the way back from the Teton's Nat'l Park, Mel said she was sad that she still had never seen a Moose...we literally looked up immediately after she said this and saw this young Moose on the side of the road. They aren't scared of people at all. Later that day we went to a local steak and game house for dinner and Melanie had another first for her and probable the entire Smith family...she tried some of my elk chops that were cooked medium-rare; I know here family would be shocked to have seen that - but, she said it was better than her steak.

Joe's Baptism and Roxie's new Friend, Polly!

Today was an exciting day in the Allen household! This morning Joe was baptized. He is a new man! He has never been baptized and he wanted to before he left for Iraq. Since our church is new we don't have a place to baptize yet. So the church got an inflatable pool to baptize in. Joe said it was FREEZING. There were about 20 people who got baptized today. It was really amazing! Yeah for Joe!!

Also, today we were blessed with a new family member. Her name is Polly! She is a two pounder that is full of energy. Our neighbor's weren't able to take care of her anymore and offered her to us. And of course I took her in a heartbeat, it was Joe I had to convince. After he thought about it and told me everything I had to do with her while he was gone; he said, "yes and Happy Anniversary!" I am glad now Joe has his big dog and I have my little bitty dog. Her and Roxie chase each other around the house. Roxie tries to pounce on her, so I am a little afraid for her life. A 2 pound Polly against 60 pound Roxie. For now they seem to really like each other, we will see what happens down the road.

Our Weekend in Arkansas

This past weekend Melanie and I went back to Arkansas to visit our family. We had a great time and can't wait to see everyone again soon. Jen and Drew were also able to fly out and see us. Mel was able to see a few of her high school friends...I just kept telling her that I didn't have any friends to see because I only had 3 friends in high school, including her, and the other 2 don't live in Arkansas anymore - it makes these trips that much easier for me I guess! But it was nice to see my Parent's and Jen and Drew who couldn't make it out to Utah for the ski trip this year; Liz, Justin and Jonah (who's gotten a lot bigger since the last time we saw him). I know Melanie was also pretty happy to see all of her family as well. Not too much happened for most of the weekend though. We flew in Thursday afternoon after flying through a snow storm in Denver and pretty much just relaxed the majority of the weekend...at least I did; I don't think Mel relaxed as much as I did.
My Dad and I got to get out and hit some golf balls at the driving range...I think the strong winds may have played a factor in our hitting...at least that's what we're blaming it on. Then on Saturday, we were all able to come over to the Smith's house for a b-b-q. As much fun as we had, I think we were both happy to get back home and back into our routine...plus the weather has been sunny and in the 70's, so o'course we're glad to be back. Hopefully, next time we can stay longer and see everyone we missed this trip.

Moab Adventures

We went to Moab this weekend with our friend Zach. It was nice to get away from the cold and snowy weather that we've had up here for the past 4 months or so. The first day we we're there,

we went hiking up Negro Bill Canyon. It's about a 2 mile trail that goes back up a canyon to the 6th longest natural bridge in the United States. It was a pretty nice hike alongside a creek, so Roxie got to play in the water for the majority of the day; she was surprised by how deep some of the water holes were - you can see she looks pretty surprised in the bottom picture. The second day I went Mtn Biking on the Slickrock trail and had a blast...and I will have a few scars to show that too. It was definitely a lot hotter than we expected it to be - we all came home on sunday with sunburns. Our next trip is to Arkansas this thursday, we're excited to see everyone for the quick trip out this week.

Wolf Creek Resort

Well it's been a while since we last updated our blog (thanks for the reminder Dustin and Gina), we've been busy at work and all the other stuff we've been doing that I can't remember, but we just got back from our AEF Retreat up at Wolf Creek Resort. It was a pretty good deal...we paid $50 and they put a bunch of us who are deploying in their lodges/condos/and homes for the weekend; we had breakfast, lunch and dinner each day and we were able to go snowmobiling, snowshoeing and skiing at no extra cost...

Melanie and I had never snowmobiled before, so that was what we were really looking forward too and it was a lot of fun. We drove out about 30 minutes further into the mountains where it opens up into rolling hills with hardly any trees around, so you can pretty much just take off in any direction...you just need to watch out for the barbed-wire fencing that was starting to show now that the snow is melting a little bit.

On Saturday, I took melanie snowshoeing...this was the first time she has ever been. I took her up to a place I've taken roxie a couple times (up Wheeler Creek trail in Ogden Canyon) and I think she had fun eventhough it wasn't as relaxing as the rest of the weekend had been. It was really nice weather though...a little snowy, but pretty warm and no wind so we had a good time. We only snowshoed for about an hour or so...I took here on a trail that's pretty much up-hill the whole way, so I think she got wore out a little faster than we planned on. But, we still had a great time and she say's that she likes snowshoeing.

I think next weekend, we may try to go down to Moab and do some hiking and I need to get my mountain bike out on the trails since it's finally built up...plus, as much as we've enjoyed the winter this year we are defintitely ready for the warm weather and hot sun. Other than that, we're just getting ready for our trip back to Arkansas in about a week and an half (April 10th) and are looking forward to seeing everyone there...especially Drew.

Melanie's Birthday Party

Here's a picture of Mel's wild and crazy birthday party. We did have a little get-together with some of our friends this past weekend but nothing on the 19th since she had to work a 12 hour day, but atleast Roxy showed up to wish her a happy birthday.

It Won't Stop!

Some pictures I took today after shoveling the driveway...again! You can see that the snow we've got piled up on the driveway and on the street is getting up to about 5 feet now. This is definitely a little different than last years winter. We'll probably still be able to ski into June and maybe even July this year if it keeps coming down the same. I think the storm today is number 4 or 5 in a line up of 6 storms. We're looking forward to having the fam come out in March - see you soon.

Snowshoeing with Roxie

On Saturday, I took Roxie snowshoeing up in Ogden Canyon. I think she likes this better than hiking. She spent about 2 hours running up and down the trail in front of me and ocassionally making her own trails in snow up to her back in some areas. We went about 3.5 miles on this trip and I think Mel wants to start going too, so we'll have to see if she likes it as much as I. About half-way into the trail we came around a corner and had a pretty good view of Mt. Ogden (in the bottom picture) which is the predominant Mountain at Snowbasin, were we go skiing. I had no idea we were that close to it until we came up on the view. In the picture, the tallest peak (in the center of the picture) is Mt. Ogden. If you follow the ridge to the right, there is another peak; this is Mt. Allen, there is a tiny shack that sits up there and that was the start of the Men's Downhill course in the '02 Winter Olympics. I think the mid-mountain snowpack up there is 90 inches right now (250" so far this year), the skiing and snowshoeing have been great this year. We'll keep you posted on what else is going on!

Busy in Utah.

Last week, I started my new job. I'm in the same Squadron but I am responsible for the accountability and storage sides of our mission now. This is a job I requested because it is exactly what I'll be doing in Iraq this summer and I don't know much about it right now. It's a bigger flight, so I will be managing a few more people and learning a completely different job. I'm excited about it b/c I was ready for a change in what I've been doing the past year or so.

Mel is still working at the Family Support Center of Ogden whenever she can make it out of our driveway and up the hill (the ice doesn't make it too easy for her driving). She still loves her job and the people she's working with also. She's a pretty good skier this year and it's much more fun for both of us now that I'm not trying to teach her.

I'm trying out a new sport this winter...snoeshoeing! I got some snoeshoe's for christmas and have been going out on the weekends whenever possible. It's a blast but a pretty tough workout...especially when you're up to your knees in powder! This is a picture of me last weekend on the green pond trail right outside of Snowbasin (looking east behind me). We had about 7 feet or so of snow at this point. I really like being able to go out and make my own trail and go literally wherever I want to...I'm gonna take Roxie out next weekend and see how she likes it. Laura came and stayed with us this past week also. It was great to have her again and we had fun showing her what life in Utah is like in the Winter. She went skiing for the first time ever and did pretty good. She feel on her first or second run (I can't remember which one it was) then didn't fall at all...until her last run or two. We learned from Daddy and decided to keep her on the bunny slopes though. We went up to the top (needles lodge) for lunch, but couldn't see anything because of clouds/snow, but it was still a great day to go skiing. Laura made a pretty good friend while she was out here too - I think Roxie is going into depression now that she doesn't have Laura to cuddle up to on the couch.

Snow! Snow! Snow!

Here's some pictures from the storm we got last week. I think we're supposed to get another storm or 2 this week to help keep the ground covered. Mel and I went skiing today and had a lot of fun. You pretty much get the gondola to yourself for the most part and there are no lines to wait in. Laura's coming out here the first week or so of January, so we'll see if she braves the mountain and goes skiing...I have a feeling we'll probably just be sledding though!