Baby Jensen's Imminent Arrival Celebrated With Baby Shower!

Baby Bump:



Elegant Table Decor:


This last Saturday, August 6th, Amy's awesome friends celebrated the imminent arrival of baby boy Jensen with a fantastic party at the lovely home of Mandy Ream. Here are some of the photos. Many thanks to Rachel Hiveley for her artistic photographic talents. Thanks to all the ladies who attended! Thanks too to those who could not attend - I missed you. Also, many, many thanks for all the gifts. We feel "showered" with love and support!
love, amy & co.

Group Shot:

Big News!

The Lakewood Jensens received a very big surprise for Christmas - we're PREGNANT!

It was a surprise because we weren't trying to get pregnant. Actually, we were pretty sure that we were done having babies. Considering it's been 8 years since Lauren joined our family, we had purged our home of all things "BABY." Right down to the step stool in the bathroom.

So we are starting fresh and it feels exciting and a bit scary; especially, in the beginning of the pregnancy when we weren't sure how the whole "cancer thing" would affect the health of the baby. Also, my age is a factor - so much so that I am seeing a high risk doctor, called a Perinatologist. We are currently 22 weeks along (about 5 months) and the baby looks very healthy and all the tests are negative for birth defects. Also, we know it's a boy! The due date is August 31st. Yes, I know - ONE HOT SUMMER!

Please keep us in your prayers as we continue this journey - we so treasure the support our friends, family and community have given us.

Blessings and love,
amy, jeff, ben and lauren (and baby boy, yet to be named)

Lauren fractures elbow while playing soccer in slippers

Greetings friends and family,
Lauren fell on Saturday night. Although I did not see the fall, Ben did and can recreate it (minus the fractured elbow part). What I did witness was the primal scream that followed the crash. Her arm did not appear broken; we thought it was a sprain or a sore elbow that would heal on its own. On Monday, I got a call from the school nurse. With a doctor's appointment made, I picked up the kids. A very long day insued from this point. By 8pm, she was home with a neon green, glittered cast. With the exception of itchy complaints, Lauren is handling it well. We hope she can keep a relatively good attitude for the whole 3 weeks. Please keep her in your prayers.

love and blessings, amy (along with the usual suspects)

Jensen Update
Hello everyone.
We have been very busy this summer and fall and can't believe that Christmas is just around the corner. We have a movie for you all - it's our Summer Vacation Movie. A bit late, I'm afraid, but worth the wait! Please enjoy.

On the cancer front, I had an MRI last week and the scans show that the tumor "Thigh Meat" is not attempting a comeback. "Die Thigh Meat, Die!" By the way, if you don't know what I am referring to, we named my brain tumor, "Thigh Meat," because I hate dark meat and that is what I visualized my tumor looking like.

At dinner tonight, I realized that this January, it will be 4 years since we found out about Thigh Meat. It's so weird to think it's been that long but when I think about how Ben was five and Lauren was 3, it's a world away. Especially since they are growing up so quickly. For example, Ben has to wear deodorant now (yikes, I hope he doesn't find out that I am sharing this). It's just that he is so active and therefore sweats a lot and pretty soon he starts to smell like a homeless guy. At first, we couldn't believe that a nine-year-old would smell like that until we took a closer whiff. Oooooooh-wee! So, all that to say that "Old Spice" has a new customer. Hey Corporate America, if you are reading this, you need to start marketing Deodorant to tweeners.

We hope you are all well and wish you a wonderful Thanksgiving.

much love, amy (jeff, ben and lauren).

p.s. I forgot to mention that we adopted a hamster named Svetlana. Photos of her to come. Freddy and the fish are still in the mix as well.

Baseballer Ben

Ben just finished his baseball season. It was fun - so fun that I went out and bought my own baseball mitt! I thought, "how hard can it be to play catch?" Having very little baseball experience, I should have known better. Ben did. When I asked him to play catch with me and my new mitt, he said he would, just as long as we did it in the back yard. I said, "Are you embarrassed that I may be horrid?" "Yep," he said. He was right. As you all know, I don't give up - also, the mitt IS stiff (mostly, the problem, I think) so it will have to be beat into submission with a baseball - even if it takes all summer!

Please watch this iMovie of Ben's baseball season.

Much love to you all!
amy, jeff, ben and lauren

The Final Reveal!

A few years ago, I posted a video on this blog about a long overdue decorating project that Jeff and I were working on. Yes, our cave of a bedroom. We lived with that dark, nasty pine-paneled room from May 2003 to 2007. During that period of our lives, we had a baby (Lauren) and updated (slowly) whatever parts of the house that two parents can while taking care of young children (which meant, that our bedroom was at the bottom of the list). Unfortunately, I was to later spend a huge chunk of time in the dark pine cave while recovering from brain surgery, radiation and chemo. All the more reason to finally give our bedroom its well-deserved makeover! One thing you will notice while viewing the movie is that we have 3 desks in our room. What's up with that?! I have many hobbies and a few cottage industries so I pretty much have to make the most of the space we have. Sorry, Nate Berkus.

Much love to you all!
amy, jeff, ben and lauren

Remember the quilts?

Hello,
A few posts ago, I mentioned that I was part of a quilting group that makes small quilts for sick babies and children. On May 7th, our group donated 14 homemade quilts to the Miller's Children's Hospital at Long Beach Memorial. Within a few days, Linda, our leader, received this photo and a very gracious letter of thanks. I know this photo is grainy - it's a scan of a digital photo printed on office paper. It shows a baby girl in the pediatric ICU covered with a quilt I made! I just melted when I saw it. Originally, I assumed that we would be handing the quilts out ourselves and was a bit disappointed that we were "just dropping them off," perhaps never to know what came of them. It was a real blessing to see and hear how grateful the parents were to receive our little quilts. Our group is taking the summer off but will resume in the fall, so if any of you out there feel your talents with a needle and thread could be utilized, let us know.

love and blessings,
amy