Christmas Letter

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all our friends and family! Here’s a recap of the Hawkes family, 2009.

Cassie made a lot of progress this year. We set some goals for Cassie at the beginning of the year, and she reached all of them! She learned to crawl, walk, run, talk, and understand what we’re saying to her. Cassie loves to talk. She labels everything she recognizes (“Daddy’s chair!” “Santa!”), often gives us commands (“Mommy sit”), and asks to do things by herself (“Cassie help” or “self”). Her first week in nursery was earlier this month, and she already loves it. We love being able to pay attention in our classes!

Trevor started his Masters degree in structural engineering in January and will be finishing this coming summer. He took a class during the summer called China Megastructures, and he got to travel throughout China for two weeks as part of the class. He recently was hired by Acute Engineering, a local firm that engineers residential and commercial buildings. He really enjoys his job and the people he works with. He is making progress on his Masters thesis and is excited to only have one class left before he graduates!

I’ve really enjoyed staying at home with Cassie this year and finding ways to fill my time as Cassie grows more independent. I spent some time this year decorating Cassie’s room and some other areas in our apartment, and I read a lot of good books. I also started singing with a choir called Deseret Chamber Singers. I love singing in good choirs, so it has been a very fun and rewarding experience.

Thank you for your love and support! We feel very blessed to have wonderful friends and family. We are thankful for the Christmas season to focus our thoughts on our Savior, and we know that our Heavenly Father is watching over our family and yours. Merry Christmas!

Love,

Trevor, Emily, and Cassidy Hawkes

Cockadoodledoo

Our little helper

I'm so smart. At least, that's what I decided the other day after I discovered a way to keep Cassie occupied while I made dinner. I asked her to be my "helper." I stood her on a chair, gave her a measuring spoon, filled the sink with a few inches of water, and asked her to stir. Brilliant. It kept her occupied for nearly an hour (!) while I worked. Definitely an improvement over having her under my feet, tugging on my pants while I cook. The only con was that she splashed a little, leaving herself and the floor quite wet. Oh, and the other con, that now all she wants to do is be my "hapah!" She's constantly dragging chairs over to the sink and reaching for whatever dishes she can grab, dipping her hands in dirty water and declaring "dah!" (stir). Maybe I'm not so smart after all.

Here's our little helper at work.

On the bright side, I'm much better at staying on top of the dishes these days. :)

Our Tree

Well, I wish it was ours, but for now we're just renting the shady spot next to it. I love watching the progression of the tree outside our giant picture-window through the seasons.

Winter

Spring
I took a picture of the same bud every day. It really did change this fast.
This year the buds survived a spring snowstorm

Summer

We just enjoy the shade and privacy all summer long- no need to close the blinds.

Stay tuned for fall! (At least as exciting as spring.)

What we've been doing...

Emily:

• Being a terrible blogger. Sorry.
• Singing! In a choir! A good choir! Called Deseret Chamber Singers. I'm a little excited about it. (I'm a total choir nerd.) Our first concert is October 27th at 7:30 pm at The Waterford School, which is at 1480 E 9400 S in Salt Lake. (hint, hint)
• Joining Facebook. I know, I'm totally behind the times.

Trevor:

• Giving Emily flowers because "I thought you deserved them." Aw.

• Being super busy with school, work, and research, while still being a great husband and father, and therefore being the real person who deserves flowers. (or at least the male equivalent of flowers...oreos?)

Cassie

• Eating bananas ("manas"). At about 39 seconds you'll see how she usually eats them. "Mah" means more. We hope you enjoy the clandestine camera work:

• Having a cold (Trev too). It sure didn't take any energy out of her, though.
• Making changes: going off the pacifier and taking only one nap a day instead of two.
• Really getting into General Conference: saying "Amah" after each talk and prayer.
  

The Whole Fam:

• Finding deer right outside our apartment yesterday morning!

• Watching BYU football from our comfortable couch. Go Cougars!

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

We all love you around here, especially little Cassie.

funny baby, smart husband (aren't I lucky?)

We were leaving town for the Labor Day weekend, Trevor driving, me in the passenger seat, Cassie in her car seat. While we waited at a stop light, Trevor asked me, "Do you know the people behind us?" I looked in the mirror to see a young couple in a minivan, smiling and waving at us. I smiled, thinking they must be friends or family...but I didn't recognize either of them. Weird. I contemplated waving back. They obviously thought they knew us. Then I heard an "Eye!" (Hi!) and glanced back at Cassie. She had a perfect view of the couple from her rear-facing car seat, and she was grinning and waving at them. We just laughed while Cassie kept them entertained for the next few stop lights.

In other news, I have an amazing husband. I have so many reasons to be glad that we're married, and I could write a post about how much I appreciate him and how well-suited to each other we are. But I just want to say that I'm proud of him for his recent accomplishments. He just got hired by a structural engineering company doing real (!) engineering for 20 hours a week. This is potentially a full-time job when he finishes his Masters next year, but even if that doesn't work out, it's great real-world experience. On top of that, after holding our breath for several months, unsure of whether there would be any money available for graduate scholarships, Trevor received a full-tuition scholarship for this semester! *sigh of relief* He's awesome.