Our First Married Valentines Day!

Ben's gift this year was a giant candy card. It read... "All SNICKERS aside, I know we are a couple of NERDS but HUBBA BUBBA you are one HOT TAMALE. Truly my LIFESAVER, you make my STARBURST! No SOUR PATCHES for us, I SKOR'd big . When PAYDAY rolls around you provide GOOD AND PLENTY. You're a WHOPPER of a man, and EXTRA special SWEETTART. You and the girls are my THREE MUSKETEERS. But it's you who makes me RED HOT. You're no FLING, you are forever. Lovey, Ali

Here Ben presented me with our own domain name. You can now visit our blog by entering http://www.benandalexjacobson.com/ much simpler, and he is so thoughtful!

Then we headed to Spiro's for lunch with my folks. Our plan was to geocache and use our new digital camera to remind ourselves of what we did for our Valentines Day gift to each other.
They truly are best friends, it is such a blessing to spend time with them. My Dad is not feeling to great these days but he was still game to walk the clear creek trail and geocache with us!

On our way into the trail, on the trailhead near the hosptial.

"The birthing center" sign pointed right at the park bench. Alex's Mom Wendy is illustrating our thoughts. HAHA!

The men.

The women.

We were without an actualy GPS device, which makes this much harder, so we were trying to use my dad's cell phone and google maps.

My Dad and I spotted it!

They were disappointed it wasn't them who found it this time!

The cache!

Then off to Global Bean for coffee and cards. We played Phase 10.

It was a great day!
We got this card from Alex's folks. They are so enjoying having a son.

This was Ben's card to Alex. Yes he truly is a cake making fiend.

Beautiful flowers too!

That night we picket up a dessert (mocha flan) and appetizer (goat's chesse and marinara) from Burata Bistro - a new favorite spot. Along with some sushi and then ate around the coffee table, just the two of us. So fun!

What a special first married Valentines Day!

Geocaching Adventures

We love to geocache! Below are some adventures we have had with family. For those of you who have yet to experience geocaching yourself - I explain it has "high tech treasure hunting." You use clues and coordinates (on a GPS device) to find caches that are planted all over the world.


When you find a cache it is usually in some kind of container and you can leave something in it for the next geocachers to find. You can also take something from the cache and move it to another cache.

We like to use travel bugs (again a high tech piece of treasure). We usually leave and take a travel bug when we geocache because then you can enter the travel bugs number online and watch where it travels. Some of ours have traveled the world! We also often leave behind a pink ribbon or breast cancer pin in honor of my Auntie Toni and others who have or are fighting the terrible disease.

Here we are selecting a travel bug to move to another location. This was a fun cache found right in our hometown. Tonie was the one to spot the cache on her first time out!

She was SO excited. Ben is the veteran geocacher, he has been doing it for years with friend Brandon and sister Emily. They like to go at night, especially to cemetaries.

We headed off to find another cache nearby. We were using the car GPS which made it quite a bit harder.

AGAIN, Tonie found the cache. This time it was a micro cache. When they are are micro you just write your name on a slip of paper that is contained in the film cannister or other small container. It's fun to read names (we use a team name) of others who have found it and to see when they found the cache!

We can't wait for more geocaching. Alex's parents just discovered it in the past year and have had so much fun treasure hunting. They have been burying their own treasures for several years now as time capsules that mark their love story. Someday we will get to go unearth them! In the meantime we'll unearth other's treasures!

New Digital Camera! And a date to celebrate.

Just before we went to Miss America in January we got a new digital camera so we could document our trip. The camera was our Valentine's Day gift to each other so on Valentine's Day we also went geocaching (blog ot come soon) to remind ourselves (by using our camera that day) of what we got each other for Valentine's Day.

Ben picked up a few of our favorite things for lunch... and we walked the Clearcreek Trail. It was a great day with our dogs and each other!

Ben brought my favorite salad from Fred Meyer - it's a gorgonzola, chicken salad with grapes and walnuts! So delicious.

He also got Jalapeno chips and fruit - again some of my favorite things!

YUM! We then headed out on a walk and what a day this was. I love being married to my best friend.

Our Journey with Janet to Miss America.

I was lucky enough to attend Janet's send off from the airport! What a turnout there was.



We were able to attend the 2009 Miss America pageant in Las Vegas, at the Planet Hollywood. It was incredible to see the pageant so promoted, Kirsten Haglund, Miss America 2008's, face was everywhere as were all 52 contestants. We were so impressed with the show and had a wonderful time cheering on our Miss Washington, Janet Harding. She represented us so well. We are so proud of her. Check out her blog at www.misswashington.org called "Janet's Journey" for more of her take on her experience and life beyond the show.


We traveled with dear friend Mitchell and luckily he was more than willing to help us document our trip.We landed in Vegas late morning, got checked into our hotel and made the most of our first day on "the strip." What fun!

















This is our first day in town seeing the sights.






The M&M factory was a favorite.

This was the night we got to see of preliminaries - Thursday when Janet did her swimsuit and evening gown. She was phenomenal.

On Saturday we spent the day seeing sights and being ever so anxious for the final night of competition. What a day! We also got some great shopping done.



The three of us ate at the Spice Market buffet and wow did we eat! Janet would have been proud. We all love to eat!



We tried all the desserts in honor of Janet.













Then we were off to see The Beattles Love - Cirque de Sole! Simply amazing.
Waiting for the show to start - such anticipation

She's coming home to us!

Ben gets a warm hello from Jan! We missed her so much and were lucky to spend the remainder of the evening with her!


The Miss Whatcom County Legacy is a strong one. Janet was well supported by our director Carol Starcher and her Miss Whatcom County Sisters!

On our way home. Let's just say that this trip was filled with a lot of cribbage! :)


What an adventure!