New Years Resolution #1: Update Blog More :)

So since one of my New Year's resolutions is to update my blog more, I thought now is as good a time as any to start! We just got back from a very long Christmas trip which was SO much fun but also very exhausting! We started out going to my parents the day before Christmas Eve and staying the night before making our way to Pima. I won't go into presents this time because I think I would like to do a whole other post on all the AWESOME stuff we got! Christmas was definitely kind to our little family this year! So for now I'm just going to post some pictures from our trip. We didn't take a whole lot of pictures this time because we were just having so much fun! I feel like when I try to take pictures I'm missing out on all the fun! But here are a few we got:

We went up the mountain to play in the snow and since this was Ayden's first snow trip we were curious as to how he would take it. He did okay, although unless he was constantly being played with he would start to throw fit's. He LOVED going down the hill on the tube and being pelted with snowballs (I know, what a weird kid I have! :)). He was SO cute all bundled up and waddling around!

Brian about to take Ayden and Nicholas down the Hill, with Karen.

Once Ayden figured out the snow was somewhat edible he was pretty excited!

Ayden getting into my Mom's birthday cake. Before we cut it Ayden stuck his finger in the frosting and said Yum! It's a good thing Grandma's thinks these things are funny :)

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Wow, it's already been four years! In some way's it feels as if we have been married forever but at the same time it seem's like just yesterday we were posing for wedding pics! What a wonderful four years it has been! We have been so blessed these last four years and have some amazing memories. And then there's the squirt! What an amazing kid we have! I'm pretty much in awe every day that Brian and I made such a cute kid! :) It's so funny to see little bit's of each of us in him.

I have been thinking a lot lately of our wedding day and I wanted to record some of the things that I remember about that day (while I can still remember some of it!)

• I remember getting my hair done at Ric Erickson's the morning of my wedding. The nail woman who worked there (and had just done my nails the day before) was fired that morning. Let's just say she didn't take it well and had to be escorted out by the police! In her defense it was like the week before Christmas and it was a pretty crappy time to let someone go! Don't get me started on that....
• I remember going to the bathroom in Burger King, veil and all, on the way to Mesa and a little girl called me a princess :)
• I remember being about a million pounds thinner :)
• I remember hiding out in the bathroom in the temple trying to get mascara out of my veil!
• I remember sitting in the room they make you wait in before you go into the sealing room scared to death. I was NEVER nervous about getting married at all until then. I think they stick you in that room to weed out all the one's who really aren't ready!
• I remember going into the sealing room crying. Then out of nowhere I started laughing uncontrollably. I also remember Brian's face of stone, showing no emotion which made me laugh harder.
• I remember a gunfight
• I remember my dad showing a REALLY humiliating slide show of me with about 50 different poses that I did while trying to get a good picture. I remember there being braces in the picture, not good!
• I remember stuffing cake in Brian's face, and him being the gentleman that he is stuffed it right back!
• I remember going to my grandma's house after the reception to open some wedding presents. While we were getting ready to leave I realized that I left my purse in my dad's car. It took him till around 1-2 in the morning to "find" my Grandma's house. Coincidence, I think not!
• I remember the AMAZING hotel room Brian got for that night, which we only stayed in for a few hours :)

What a great day that was! It was perfect! I couldn't have asked for a better and a better four years! I hope our year's to come are just as good!

John and Emily Memorial Auction

The other day my friend posted on facebook about an auction she was taking part in. I went to the blog and found out about John and Emily Jones. They were in Provo celebrating Thanksgiving, when John went with some friends and family to explore some caves. While John was exploring one he became stuck. He was stuck for about 24 hours before he tragically passed away. You can read the family's statement on what happened HERE. John left behind his wife Emily, their 14 month old daughter, and the couple had just recently found out they were expecting another baby. The auction that is being held is for Emily and their family. This whole situation left me totally heart-broken and wanting to help in any way, so I'm auctioning off a sling. The sling is the one pictured below, so if you or anyone you know want's to bid visit THIS site. Click on the A Daily Scoop banner at the top of the page to see other items up for auction. There are some really neat things and you could get a good deal on something and help out at the same time! Please spread the word about this auction so that it can raise as much money as possible! How stressful must money be for this young wife of a med student on top of her grief! If you don't want to bid on anything and just want to donate some money you can do so by going HERE.

Thank You, and please pass the word on!

Marie

Tiffany modeling the sling I'm auctioning off! THANK YOU Tiffany for getting this picture!

Hotel Rwanda

Do you ever find yourself worrying, stressing, and obsessing over things that seem so important to you only to have something happen that put's your mundane worries into perspective? That's exactly what happened to me. I have been stressing about something completely out of my control and finding myself sad and angry when it isn't happening the way I want it to. I was feeling extra sorry for myself this past weekend when I watched Hotel Rwanda. I had no idea what the movie was about and was just one I picked up from the library. What an amazing movie it was! I think things like this happen for a reason, we are given event's and situation's in our lives that help to put thing's in perspective. This movie made me remember how lucky I am to have the life that I have. How lucky am I to have a wonderful family, a nice place to live, and all the other wonderful things that I take for granted!

This movie was SO good and I encourage anyone who hasn't seen it yet to watch it! It isn't very gruesome (the idea's of what happened are gruesome, but the movie doesn't have much blood and gore in it) at all, and is a time in history that everyone should know about (I had no clue that this had even happened!). This movie makes me realize how little I know about the world we live in today, and makes me want to learn more. What a great reminder this was to me, especially during this season, of what things are really important in life!

The Stage of Cheese

So we have officially entered the stage of cheese (or geese in Ayden's case). Ayden now say's geese whenever he see's a camera and pull's out an extra cheesy face. I suppose it's better than what the last 2 1/2 years have been, trying EXTRA hard to avoid the camera at all costs. It's pretty cute (for now :)) though, and I'm glad to get some easy shots of him! He sure has become spunky as of late and I'm really loving his funny personality. He sure can make us laugh! Can't wait to hear all the crazy things this kid has to say once he start's talking more!

*Don't know why the picture quality is so bad, their quality goes way down when I upload them on here! Sorry!

Some pretty cheesy faces!

Bad Luck Cluff's

So, many of you already know but Brian was in a motorcycle accident Thursday. He ended with a HUGE gash in his arm and got 25 stitches and 21 staples. He was pretty banged up all over and even had a broken toe! Poor guy! I know a lot of you don't like gross bloody pictures, but for those interested you can go here to read more about his accident and see some pics (I gave plenty of room before the pics if you just want to read about it).

http://briansgrossbloodyarm.blogspot.com/

So if that wasn't enough, we were going about our day today when I walked by our kitchen to see a TON of water! Our kitchen and laundry room had totally flooded and was about ankle deep with water! We realized it was coming from our washing machine and quickly shut it off and started throwing every towel and blanket we own down to try and soak it up (which didn't do much). We called the front office and they had someone come over with a wet/dry shop vac. (one of the REALLY good things about living in apartments!). But they weren't able to come for about a half an hour. In which time we were frantically trying to get rid of as much water as we could. It was a pretty stressful, messy situation but eventually we got it all cleaned up. Afterwards we checked out our washing machine (I was so scared it was broken and I'd have to use the quarter machines again!), and the knob that say's the load size was stuck between medium and large and we think it just couldn't sense when to stop adding water. So it seem's to be working fine now, which is good because I have about 10 loads of blankets and towels I need to do now!

So let's hope for a little bit of a calmer next week!

Halloween

I'm finally posting some Halloween pics! We spent Halloween with my family in Tucson. It was a lot of fun and Ayden enjoyed spending time with his cousin Sydney. Those 2 are so funny when they get together, both are so shy but always seem to end up having a blast and my family's poor ear drums will never be the same!

The whole weekend was pretty much a huge battle to keep Ayden away from the boys XBox area. This is where we could alway's find him, he wanted to be just like his daddy!

Ayden was Superman for Halloween! It wasn't very easy to get him to look at the camera!

Except for about 2 seconds where he randomly put his hands on his cheeks and said cheese! Don't know where that came from and have yet to see it since!

Here is my adorable nephew Easton as a skunk! He is SO cute and was so good while we were there (even though his mommy would probably disagree), I thought he was such a quiet, sweet little baby!

My beautiful niece Sydney as Belle, she is SO into Disney princesses and was so cute in her costume! She doesn't like all the scary stuff about Halloween, but getting to be Belle for a night was probably well worth all that!