Friday, January 14, 2011

Gingerbread Men

Before Christmas I made some gingerbread cookies with my mom and sisters.  I really enjoyed decorating them. 
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I tried to make every one different and was quickly running out of ideas.  Then my mathematics knowledge kicked in. 
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And my family thought I was just weird.  Becky said “you should add squiggles”  and I let her show me what she meant.  You see, it’s rather difficult to do minute details with the larger hole I cut for the icing bag and I knew it wouldn’t look good.
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Hers is on the left, while mine are on the right.  Love you Becky!

P.S. I am just giving Becky a hard time.  She knows I'm kidding, and poking fun at her.  And if it would upset her I wouldn't have posted it.  I was just so excited that FINALLY I am starting to be good at this kind of thing.  Growing up (a decade younger) and trying to paint or scrapbook or make cards with my family was frustrating because my stuff was ALWAYS the worst.  It was hard to keep going when there was such a difference in quality.  It's just nice to see that the tables have turned ;)

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Trip to Utah

Right before Christmas we were able to go to Utah for Stephen’s mom to get married.  Unfortunately I didn’t take any pictures of the wedding or of any other time that we were with his family.  Stephen has plenty of pictures and video from his mom’s wedding and they will be on his website at some point in time.  But as for this blog, it’s like it never happened. 

I’m bummed that I didn’t even take a picture of when all the sister-in-laws and our mother-in-law went to get mani-pedis before the wedding.  It was so much fun and will definitely have to be a tradition. 

Nor did I take any photos wedding dress shopping with Stephen’s mom Mitzi.  See, we arrived Thursday night for her Friday wedding and at around 11 pm she showed Stephen the dress that she was planning on wearing.  It was just a normal dress and certainly wasn’t very flattering and immediately Stephen said it wouldn’t work.  So the next morning instead of a relaxing day at the spa she went to find a dress for her wedding that evening.  Kellee and I came with and luckily the first dress at the first store we went to was PERFECT!  And SO much better than what she was planning on wearing.  But no, you don’t get to view any of that. 

Instead I have pictures from our 5 hour escapade out to Tooele.  Enjoy.
First up is my adorable son and myself.  This was the first and only time we let him play in the snow on our trip.  He doesn’t even have a snow jacket.  We’re such Arizonans.
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He LOVED the snow, but he just enjoyed stomping around in it.  He had no desire to actually touch the stuff with his bare hands.
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This is what Tooele looks like.  It’s where my Grandma lives and where my dad was born and raised.
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Here’s my grandma’s house!  I love it with all the snow.
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As I was trying to get this shot the tree dumped TONS of snow on me.  Lovely.
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Stephen has his own rocking horse down here and he immediately got on this one at my grandma’s.
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My grandma was the first to hear the little guy awake from his nap and she quickly scooped him up before he realized I was there too.  So cute.
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I love that in this picture is a picture of me just barely older than him.  I’m in the black, white and red if you can’t tell.
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This is the wall of our family photos.
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I love this picture of the early family at Memory Grove in Salt Lake City.  This is where my parents had their wedding reception.  We have soo many family photos taken here and I was lucky enough to have my engagement photos taken here too.
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My dad drew these pictures of my three eldest siblings.  That man has sooo much talent.
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These are some photos of my grandparents. 
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And this is the infamous height chart.  Both of my Stephens are on here.
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Unfortunately this picture is so dark, but the second dark line down is my son!  From this trip.  Then move a dark line down to the first light line and that one is mine.  These two lines are a good two or more inches apart.  The crazy thing is I was two for that line, and my son isn’t there yet and already he’s two inches taller!  CRAZY!  I LOVE being able to see that stuff.  I WILL have one of these in my home.
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These next two are homes that my family had in Tooele.  There on 200 West which used to be called James Street which is the family name.
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And here’s how Stephen was kept occupied on the trip.
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Haha.  Seriously though I was so proud of myself.  I came up with all these different things for him to do on the long drive.  I brought a mini cookie sheet which fit in his lap and some magnets (which he hadn’t used before) and some coins and pencils and paper.  While those certainly kept him occupied for a good while on the trip, my genius husband’s idea was the winner.  He downloaded episodes of The Backyardigans for IV to watch on the IPad.  Winner.  And now we ALL have the theme song memorized.  And yes, we burst into it at random.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Modern Family

I LOVE the show Modern Family. It never fails to make me laugh. Oddly enough, the couple I can relate to the most is the gay couple. Mostly it's just because they have a daughter one month older than our son. A few episodes back they were dealing with her biting things (and more specifically people) which she isn't supposed to. Now my son has started this disastrous habit as well. He gets so mad when we don't let him do what he wants and he bites whatever is nearest. Sometimes it's my shoulder...ouch! But mostly it's random inanimate objects close to him. My favorite is when he gets mad at me for not paying attention to him while I am cooking and so he will try to bite the kitchen counter. Mind you, he is much shorter than the counter and so he has to do a semi-pull-up just to reach the counter and try to bite it. Hilarious! It's really hard to try and teach him not to continue these bad behaviors when I am laughing at his crazy antics.

P.s. I need to post pictures from Christmas but I'm sicker than death right now. I've basically got a cold with lots of extra symptoms added in. As soon as I kick this sucker to the curb I will add photos.