Jai Guru Deva Om

The title of our blog is "Jai Guru Deva Om" and I think it appropriate to title this individual post the same. It is written in Sanskrit and the phrase actually appears in the Beatle's song "Across the Universe", which is probably irrelevant. But it means: Praise to the Heavenly Teacher ("om" is actually just the meditation chant.) Being Christmas, I thought I'd put up a few significant photos taken on our experience in Israel this summer, to show where the most imperative events in all of history took place.

The first photo is of the sea of Galilee, Galilee being the place where the Savior was raised, Nazareth being his home town. The Second is a tree in the Garden of Gethsemane, where the eternal and all encompassing atonement took place. And Third is of course the Garden tomb, where Christ broke the bonds of death and was resurrected; later He appeared to Mary of Magdala at this site. Ultimately, the purpose of this post is to redirect my thoughts (and hopefully yours) to this Heavenly Teacher during the Christmas Season.

Big Frosty

We thought we should take advantage of our once in a lifetime, large mass of land and frolic in the snow.

Eric and the Little Man

Halloween & Emmett turns 1

I (Carly) wore this bear costume when I was Emmett's age. Priceless. (no but seriously, we didn't have to spend any money on an outfit.) At Anne Marie's annual Halloween soup party.
An entire chocolate mousse birthday cake was put in front of Emmett to devour: he absolutely hated the mess. We may have a neat freak on our hands.
We went to the Hogle Zoo on Emmett's Birthday with Aunt Berkley and Uncle Pater.

No place like a new home

Apparently, our lives must be quite uninteresting, (we have not updated our blog for about 3 months now.) But we finally have something to say. So this weekend, that never-ending schooling abyss finally saw light as we traveled to Portland, Oregon, to find a new home. Emmett was left with Granny Tam, and Eric and I, confused with our aloneness, departed to the green state (green literally and figuratively: they are obsessed with an eco-friendly environment.) The trip exceeded all expectations. Our purpose was to find a new home, which we did, in a town called Wilsonville, right outside of Portland. Mission accomplished. We spent the remainder of the weekend exploring our new, future habitat...alone. Beauty and Class. Yup, that's Portland. Overall, the trip led way for a reachable future beyond over-cooked BYU students, including the characters of Eric the Sales Analyst and Carly the Mom.

images: view of Wilsonville and us in front of our new neighborhood

Lake Tahoe, North Shore

Lake Tahoe, Northstar. Wood Family Reunion.

Blog?

for months i have heard of blogs and indecently admitted to understanding what they were. many friends told me their blogs were up and that i should take a look. i also admit that I had to ask my single friends about what facebook and my space were all about. after receiving the basics, and after long thought, we have decided to join the bloggers.

p.s. i cannot commit to keep this blog thing updated, particularly because we lead mundane lives. but if anything of interest to the void comes up, we'll be sure to send it out.