Landen meets Santa

We had our ward Christmas party a couple of weeks ago, and of course Santa came. He was a pretty good Santa. Even though most of the kids in our ward are pretty young (young enough to either scare them, or they don't really know or care who he is), he did do a good job of entertaining the adults with good stories of the elves and reindeer. Landen was able to get some pictures with him, and Santa even gave him a Christmas bell, since a candy cane wouldn't have been such a good idea. So, I hope you get as much a kick out of the pictures as we did!

Tagged

So, I was tagged, and it's been awhile, so I'd thought I'd post this one. It ended up being really fun to think about anyway!


8 Shows that I enjoy watching:
1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Private Practice
3. House (noticing a trend?)
4. American Idol
5. Dancing with the Stars
6. CSI: NY, Miami and Las Vegas (I'm not picky)
7. Smallville
8. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (that should really be #1)

8 Things that happened yesterday:
1. If 1:45 in the morning counts as yesterday, then I began my day with feeding him
2. Did laundry
3. Fed Landen
4. Made baby blankets for girls in the ward
5. Fed Landen
6. Went shopping
7. Fed Landen
8. Played with BJ (my day was pretty lame because Brian was in Pocatello for drill)

8 Things I am looking forward to:
1. Christmas (whenever we get to celebrate it since I'm working that day)
2. My birthday (same thing as #1)
3. Going down to Utah between Christmas and New Years
4. Brian to graduate and start working in April
5. Going to Vegas in the summer
6. Brian completely graduating in April 2010
7. Moving out of Rexburg
8. Finally being done with the whole school lifestyle

8 Things I love about Winter:
1. The snow (but not as long as it lasts in Rexburg!)
2. Christmas
3. Hot chocolate with peppermint ice cream (you should try it..yum!)
4. Soup
5. My birthday
6. Sweaters
7. Christmas songs
8. Christmas lights

8 Things on my Wish list:
1. To be completely debt free (house paid for and everything!)
2. To be able to stay home more with Landen
3. To be stationed someplace warm for 4 years (like San Antonio!)
4. To move back to Kansas permanently someday
5. To have healthy children (and be able to have more children)
6. To be a good mom, someone that my children will like to come home to
7. To always stay completely in love with my husband
8. To live closer to family

8 People I tag:
1. Amy Royer
2. Danielle Gurr
3. Quinci M.
4. Morgan Hillman
5. Melanie West
6 Laurie Wilcox
7. Kim Hannon
8. Karie Strong

Back to work

So, I kept hearing from so many moms how hard it was to go back to work after having a baby and how much they cried...I haven't cried, which strangely enough really bothers me! Is there something wrong with me? So, I've come up with a few reasons why I guess I'm handling the transition pretty well:

Option A: I have a cold, cold heart
Option B: Since I'm leaving him home with Brian and not sending him to a sitter, I don't feel like he's being neglected (not that he would be with a sitter either).
Option C: Since I had to leave him in the hospital for his first 25 days of life, I got used to idea of separation
Option D: All the above

Family Pics...finally!

I've been meaning to post these for the past few days, but with going back to work, I haven't really had time. So, enjoy, these are are few of our favs!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

So now that I'm no longer sicker than a dog (where did that saying come from really?!), I can finally post again. We've been getting excited about Christmas around here. On Thanksgiving, Brian hung up the Christmas lights on the house all by himself and did a wonderful job. We went shopping for a Christmas Tree the Saturday after Thanksgiving (yes, we have a real tree, because I love the smell, and no I don't want to just by a tree smelling candle!), but didn't get it decorated until yesterday for Family Home Evening. I don't think we're quite done with decorating the tree, because it still looks pretty bare, but it's a start. I think we're going to invest in a star/angel this year and maybe some more decorations, because the lights and ornaments that we have just don't do it justice, but none the less, we love our tree! Oh, and it's finals week, so Brian will be all done by Thursday, and I'm back to work tomorrow...boo!

The before shot

The after shot...see, it still needs something!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was a different experience for me this year, a lot of firsts. I am proud to say that I made my first Thanksgiving turkey and am quite proud with how it turned out. Some of Brian's family was able to be here for the holiday, which always makes holidays better. Unfortunately, Brian's mom was sick the whole day and didn't even venture out of her room, I felt so bad for her! Hence, that is why I was flying solo with making a turkey. I have to say, without the help of my sisters-in-law, the meal wouldn't have come off as well as it did. There was a slight mishap with the oven not being turned on when we thought it was for a couple of hours while the turkey was supposed to be cooking, but all that did was set meal time back a couple of hours...it still turned out OK. We also had a couple of friends over for dinner (thanks again for the yummy food!). Landen did great and let mom get a lot of cooking done. It was nice having the extra hands to help with food and watching Landen.

How Landen felt about the day
Landen's favorite place to sleep

West Yellowstone

We went up to West Yellowstone for a couple of days this week just to hang out. Unfortunately, pretty much everything was closed because it's "off season", but it was still fun to hang out with family and walk around town. It still surprises me how nice it still is out here!

Some of the beautiful scenery on our drive
Watch out for the bear....oh, it's not real

Getting ready to walk around the town, yes, that's Landen bundled up under there with aunt Mamy

Dad and Landen doing what they do best!

Warming up by the fireplace