Christmas Weekend Part 2

So the day after Christmas, my mom and sister and I headed down to my Uncle Jedd and Aunt Kaycee's house for my Grandma Pat's Christmas party.  Josh was getting sick so he didn't want to go and get everyone else sick.  Brian and my dad had to work but Jade, Brit and the boys met us down there.
We met our new baby cousin, Zane, when we got there.  Oh my, he is cute and so cuddly!

The kids were downstairs playing Just Dance on the Wii.  It was so funny watching Ashlin, Sierra and Keaton dance!

Once everyone got there, it was time to eat!  My uncle Jedd is a chef at Thanksgiving Point and makes amazing food.  He made prime rib for everyone.  I'm not much of a meat eater but I did have a slice and it was pretty good!  The rest of the food was also yummy.

While we were eating, Branson fell down the stairs.  He cried for a minute but was fine after that.  I took him down the Jedd and Kaycee's huge playroom and got out the dinosaurs and zoo animals out for him.  He and Gavin just thought that room was awesome!  They played and played pretty much for the rest of the day in there with Bennett and River.

Corby and Jade got in on trying to put the Lincoln Log train track together while Gavin took it apart.

We all moved down to the entertainment room for the presents.  The kids did their white elephant game and then the adults did theirs.  I got a Febreeze candle that smells amazing!  It was lots of fun.  Then it was time for the real presents.  My Grandma has been working on a labor of love for her kids since the beginning of the year and gave it to them for Christmas.  It's my Great-Grandpa Nielson's missionary journal while he was in Sweden.  She had been typing it up all year and had it printed into a book for them.

She gave up older grandchildren a disc with the pfd file on it.  Tears were shed by mom and I.  It is such a neat thing to have.  It's amazing to see how many places he served and to read his thoughts while he was out on his mission.  I loved looking through his pictures, he was such a handsome guy!  This one cracked me up!

It is something that will be cherished by all of us forever.  Thank you Grandma, it was such a wonderful present.
Me and my baby sister.  Oh how I love her!

It was starting to snow so we got on the road to come home, luckily we missed the storm.  It was such a fun day with our family, I love them!
I hope you all had a Merry Christmas!

Christmas Weekend Part 1

On Christmas day we went up to my parent's house for the day.  My mom had all the good munchies out for us to eat all day and she made pumpkin pancakes, they were so good.  We ate and waited around for Jade, Brittiney and the boys to get there to open our presents and while we waited Roxy and Buddy got their stockings.  Roxy gets an orangutan every year and loves it!

Then the boys got there and chaos ensued!  But it sure was fun!  They were so excited to see all their presents.  Branson loved his dinosaur and was making dinosaur noises.

Gavin loved playing with the critter punch ball and the little baseball and basketball.  I love his little teeth!

After all that was done, it was time for us big kids to open our presents from our parent's.  My dad got us each a cooler to take in the car when we go on road trips in the summer and they gave each money to go buy whatever else we want.  But my mom was sneaky this year and bought us something else.  We all had a clue as to what it was.  She had been talking about how much she wanted one for the last month or so.  I got to open the big present and it was a...

Wii!!

My parent's haven't bought a game system in a long time, since we all left home.  The last one they bought was a PS2.  So she bought this for her because she loves Mario and for us kids to have a game to play when we come over.  My mom and Mario go way back to 1985 or 1986.  I remember my brother and I watching mom play the original Mario.  We sat in our banana chairs and watched her save the Princess.  We couldn't touch the TV until my dad got home from work so she could  show him that she beat the game and we've been a video game family ever since.  

We all had so much fun playing for the rest of the day.  We did a lot of bowling and some golfing while everyone was there so we could take turns.

It was a very Merry Christmas with our family!

# 9

Number 9 has been our number for lots of reasons and today it's because it's our 9 year anniversary of being together.
I remember working at the Day Center in 2001 and Julie, the nurse, was trying to set us up.  I really liked him and had liked him since I started there in July but I had a boyfriend at the time who I  later broke up with.  We went Christmas shopping for our families together that year, just as friends, but we both liked each other.  I introduced him to my family on one of our Christmas shopping nights together.  Then Josh told us he was moving to Springville.  I was sad I wasn't going to see him anymore.  We had become really good friends in the course of those few months so I wrote him a letter (which he still has) telling him how much I  was going to miss our Mt. Dew runs in the middle of the day and how happy I was that I got to know him.  I told him I would like to come down and visit him since some of my family lives down that way I  could stay with them.
I was working at the Day Center on Christmas night because someone was there for respite and Josh came to see me.  I was so excited he came to see me!  He looked so cute in his baby blue sweater, baby blue hat and those sparkling baby blue eyes.  His eyes, they melt me.  He was leaving for Springville in the morning and asked if I wanted to help him move down.
So we drove his little purple truck down to Springville and unloaded some of his things and headed back home.  I told him I would come down that weekend to see him.  I did.  I got there Friday night, and we just hung out in his house for the night and we've been together ever since.  I got so attached to him so quickly.  I opened up to him so fast.  I drove all the way down there every weekend to see him.  I brought my old dance tapes down for him to watch with me (now that's just embarrassing!) which he politely did.  He showed me all these new songs and artists he found.  We spent lots of time in that house in the short 3 months Josh lived there, just the two of us getting to know each other.
The beginning...

I love you my love.  Thank you for 9 wonderful years.  As long as I have you, I have all I'll ever need.  I'm so grateful to have you.  I hope we have an eternity together!

Christmas Eve

I went to my Grandparent's house in Brigham for the annual Christmas Eve party.  Josh had to work, again, so I went over with my parents and sister.  Almost all of our family was there, we were just missing a few cousins.  The house was packed, we ate yummy food and had a great Christmas Eve.

My dad with his dad and siblings.

My cute Grandparents.

After the craziness of opening presents, Jade and Brittiney took Branson and Gavin downstairs where the toys and movies were.  The boys fell asleep on the way over to Brigham and were not happy when they woke up.  We introduced Branson to the thing that entertained us when we were kids going to Grandpa and Grandma's...the pool table!

Our cute family minus Josh and Brian (who would have made it cuter!)  And the boys are obviously happy!

Branson was loving little Baby Addi!  Oh, those cheeks!!

It was a great party full of family!  And here's a shot of one of my Grandma's beautiful Christmas trees.

New 'Do!

I have been trying to grow my hair out a little but it was driving me crazy.  I hated the way it looked, it had so much bulk to it.  I felt like my hair looked like Rick Moranis's helmet in Spaceballs...

not cute.

Tara has been wanting to cut her hair off for a few months now but she was going to wait until spring to do it.  She decided to do it now and asked me if I would come take pictures of her doing it, then she asked if I would want to get my hair cut, too.  So Thursday night after work we went to  Hannah at Hair Studio 170.  If anyone is looking for a good stylist in Cache Valley, go see her!  She did a great job!

Here's Tara before...

Then she cuts it off!

Then it was my turn, me before...

cutting...

all gone!

And we had lots of fun and lots of laughs!

Then she straightened it for me.  I only straighten it when I get my hair cut because it takes so long for me to do it and my straightener isn't very good.

LOVE IT!!

Here's the finished cuts.  We both went for an A-line cut, mine is more dramatic than Tara's.  I am not one to experiment with my hair.  I always just get the same cut and maybe if I'm feeling crazy, I get some highlights.  But I haven't done that since I don't know when, it's been a long time.  I'm so glad I was daring and went for  the A-line, I love it and Josh likes it too, so that makes it even better!

 This is the shortest I've ever gone, I let it be curly this morning to see how short it would be.  It's really short so I straightened it again and went and bought a good flat iron.  It'll be straight a lot more now!

Thanks Tara!!

Merry Christmas Eve everyone!!  I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas full of family, food and love!!

Christmas Lights

I wanted to go look at the Christmas lights around town so since Josh didn't have school Monday we decided to do that as FHE.  We went and got some hot chocolate and donuts and drove around town listening to Christmas music and looked at lights.  Sadly not many people really decorate for Christmas anymore, at least not like they used to when I was little.

This was the one house that actually had more than one string of lights.

 Even though there weren't many houses decorated we had so much fun being together on our little adventure.

Go Elf Yourself

It's that time of year again...Enjoy!!

Josh and I wish you all a Merry Christmas!!

Grandma Lowe's Christmas Party

Tonight was my Grandma Lowe's annual Christmas party and Josh wasn't able to come with me this year.  So I met my mom and dad at their house before we all headed over to the party.  My brother couldn't go either since he was at work but my sister and her husband were there to keep me company.  We ate dinner and then went to pick up Branson and Gavin who were at home with Brittiney to open presents.  We played a white elephant game and the blue slinky, coloring book and crayons saved us!

After we were done opening our gifts Branson really really wanted to go outside and look at the lights.  He loved looking at them and kept saying "Hi Reindeer" and was digging in the snow.

I put my gloves on his hands so he didn't get frostbite and he wanted to have a snowball fight with me!

We played outside for a while in the snow.  Branson was having so much fun!  He didn't want to go inside to warm up but  I finally got him into my car and turned the heat on for him.  We had so much fun playing though and the party was great!

Tara's 30th!

Today Tara turned the big 3-0!  We went over to their house for dinner and then had the cake and ice cream party.  Since her birthday fell on Sunday she just wanted to stay home.  We had brisket for dinner, I've never had it before and it was pretty good.  Then it was time for the cake and ice cream.

  Happy Birthday Tara!!  I hope you had a great day.  We love you!!

Girls' Night Out...With The Boys

We had a med student at work during the summer and we all got to be good friends with her.  She lives down in Salt Lake and had been inviting us to come down and hang out with her.  So we all decided on a date.  Saturday morning came and it was super foggy and 2 of the girls decided to bail on us.  Tara and I decided to wait til a little later to let the fog clear out and since it would just be the 2 of us going, we took Atty and Josh.  Cody was in Denver so he couldn't go.

We got to Uyen's house and decided where to go to dinner.  We settled on Rodizio Grill.  We have never been there but have heard lots about it.  We got there just in time to beat the dinner rush.  Tara and I decided on the salad bar while Uyen, Josh and Atty went for the meat.  The salad bar was big and had lots of yummy things.  We all got a coconut lemonade that was de.lici.ous.  Heaven in a glass.

The first meat stick they brought around was...chicken hearts...ewww.  Josh and Atty tried one.  Josh said it was really quite gross and gristley.  Atty tried a quail egg from the salad bar.

We thought they would have more exotic meat than they did.  The only weird thing was the chicken heart, other than that it was pork roast, steaks and chicken.

There was an empty chair at our table for Cody.  We all missed having him there, I think Josh and Atty especially!

After dinner, Uyen took us to get some gelato.  It was so good.  I got pineapple and it was so yummy.  Then we went back to Uyen's house to hang out for a bit.

Then we went to Temple Square before heading home.  I love going there at Christmas time.  I love seeing the lights and just the feeling down there.  The Salt Lake temple is my very favorite of all the temples.

 It was such a fun night and was so fun to see Uyen for a while.  We need to do it again!