The Best Christmas Ever!

This year was my first Christmas of being married and it was amazing! My entire family was together-no one was missing. This year a total of 16! My entire family all agreed that it had been the best Christmas we've had so far, and I think even the husbands had a lot of fun this year too. My parents always amaze me every holiday. Honestly the older we get the funner they make it. Its always hard to keep all of the kids entertained so this year my parents (my dad;) decided to have each family come up with an activity/thought/devotional/musical number that everyone could do or that everyone would enjoy and we would spread it out throughout the day. Now I know everyone that is reading this is going to do this every Christmas eve now! So in order of what we did, Whitney and Wess came up with a totally awesome Christmas scavenger hunt around the neighborhood and house, mine and Scott's was pin the carrot nose on the snowman (lots of cheaters in this one), Misty and Scotts family was a musical number by Kenzie and Misty and Once There was a Snowman performed by almost everybody. Sams was a devotional he had learned in seminary about Gratitude that was very humbling. Then Melinda and Harris' family took us all on a ride on the Polar Express...our favorite movie (not really!) The Polar Express if you dont know is actually a 15 passenger van with happy children all around. The train took us to see some amazing Christmas lights and even had popcorn!It really was an amazing Christmas and I am so grateful for my family. I am really lucky to see them as much as I do but it makes it harder being away from them sometimes. I'm so excited that we are all now living a little bit closer and will get to see eachother even more often. My family is so amazing. I am seriously the luckiest person to have a family like I do! I love them!!

The cutest kids you'll ever see!

resting before some more festivities

half of us in the Polar Express!

The whole family

Deck the Halls

This was my first time every decorating my own home for Christmas. Scott had a hard time getting into the Christmas spirit, but it could have been since I started decorating before Thanksgiving, but thats his problem. I wanted to at least enjoy my decorations for more than a month!! So what I did was hung some lights around my window, yes me, but that will change when we have a big house (Scott says we'll ask his sisters boyfriend to do them...he does literally everything a handy man does!), then I printed of some HO HO HO's and framed them, made Scott pick out some stockings, and no these were not the ones he picked out. He picked out his nasty soccer socks, but I said "No these are worth it, they are a lifetime investment!" so I got the ones we both eventually agreed on. Then I borrowed a tree from my awesome sister Misty who has EVERYTHING! She helped me fluff it up, cuz actually I'm not very good at that, last (this was actually the first thing I did), I hung some lights and garland down my staircase, which is probably my favorite part. I seriously love Christmas. I think it was because my mom always had our house decorated so beautiful. It really just brings a Spirit into your home and brings happiness. I cant wait to be together with ALL of my family for Christmas! Oh and the pictures really dont give it any justice. I promise my house is a lot cuter than it looks.

Our Stocking Holder

The Charlie Brown Tree

The Stairs

Some Ornament Decorations!

THANKSGIVIN'

This Thanksgiving was the first holiday I had EVER spent away from my mom and dad. I was a little nervous and I didnt know how I would handle it, or even how my mom would handle it. I think we both managed because we both survived! I was so lucky to have been spending it with my amazing husband and his family. I'm glad that if it wasnt my family it was theirs. It was the biggest Thanksgiving I had ever had (mine is just usually my family). We had tons of friends and tons of family a total of 30+ people. Plus it was Scotts Mom's Bday and boy did she cook a lot on her birthday. I of course forgot my camera and forgot to steal some pictures from Scotts dad so I downloaded a few from facebook, so all of the picture credits go to Scotts dad. On friday after attending the Newport Beach Temple as a family we went out to dinner and did a fun service project...yes fun! We all split up into "random" teams and were each given two missionaries or service men in the family and got them all Christmas packages. We had $20 for each guy. It was really fun. I personally think my team got all the best stuff. We had Scott's little brother Patrick who is on a mission in Canada and his cousin Dustin who is serving for the military in Iraq. It was amazing to be able to do this for these boys since they will be missing their families on Christmas while they are all giving of themselves and serving us. I think that we were able to give them a little bit of Christmas!

This lady is usually the one keeping me sane when going to California ;)

My group: For Patrick and Dustin!

HALLOWEEN

This Halloween I didnt dress up... I know I'm lame but it was still a fun Halloween. Of course Scott had to work month-end so I didnt get to spend it with him but I made a fun Halloween dinner on Sunday and then I spent Halloween at Misty's house and did some crafts with Kenzie and then got the kids ready for trick-or-treating. It was so cold I only lasted outside for about 30 minutes and then I traded places with Scott Stoker and passed out candy. Let me tell you that is the most boring thing I've ever done in my life! I told my Scotty that in the future I'm taking the kids out trick-or-treating and he's passing out the candy...of course he was fine with that.

Our dinner: Pumpkin Casidillas, Mummy Dogs, and Orange Pop

Princess Ariel, Puppy, Kitty

Doesnt this just make you want to squeeze his belly!

Conference Weekend!

Scott and I decided to go to Utah conference weekend. His parents were going to be there and a lot of his other family was there as well. His cousins were nice enough to score us some tickets to the Sunday Afternoon session. I love going to conference its so nice to be there but sometimes I miss watching church in my pjs. Oh well who can pass up the opportunity to go to conference. My favorite talks were Elder Neil L. Andersons and Sister Daltons. I posted the links at the bottom so you all can have a chance to read them!

http://lds.org/general-conference/2011/10/children?lang=eng- Neil L. Anderson
http://lds.org/general-conference/2011/10/love-her-mother?lang=eng Sister Dalton

Lake Powell Fun

So this was a while back but I feel that I should blog about this and get all caught up so I can start doing things in order! After mine and Scotts honeymoon we stayed in California for a couple of days then went to Lake Powell with his family. It was so fun and I love boating, probably one of my favorite summer time things to do! I have only wakeboarded a couple of times but I feel the three times I've done it I am pretty good and I finally made it back over the wake! Wooo! Then as most people in my home ward know I am a professional tuber. Scott doesnt appreciate my screams though. Then we all tried a little something new, surfing. It was sooo much fun. I'm not very good but my very talented surfer husband and father-in-law were actually really good at it. We definately need to go more so we can all get better at it.

Cute Carter!

Shreddin' the plume

Ha! I love tubing!

The fam - Julieanne and Patrick + Rachel and Dan

ANNOYED

So this blog isnt about Scott and me. Its just about me. And how sometimes I just get super annoyed. Especially today. I want to start off with yesterday though. Yesterday Scott was telling me about all the things that had really ticked him off and that were annoying him. Now he's not usually like this so I told him he just needs to relax but today the annoyance bug bit me. I decided though before writing this blog that for whatever annoyance I wrote down I would write something totally awesome! So here we go.
Annoyed:
1. Work- not my job but some of the silly questions people ask
2. Financial aid still hasnt given me my MONEY!!!
3. I called the Bursars office because they sent me an email saying that if my tuition isnt paid then I get a late charge well when calling them the girl was a total *&^*#! At least when people ask me silly questions I smile and answer them kindly because thats just the person I am
4. In my class the speaker told me I could have an Emphasis instead of a Minor if I just change the catalog. WRONG!
5. My super cute new shoes are really hurting my feet...and yes they fit.
6. My phone wouldnt let me view the Hunger Games trailer this kid posted on his phone so I had to go all the way upstairs to my computer just to find out it was one I had already seen. I was hoping it was a longer one!
7. My nephew is 6 today. When the heck did that happen.
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AWESOMENESS!
1. I felt super smart when in my Econ class I started the assignment about 10 mintues after everyone in the class and finished way before half of them!
2. Everytime I eat Berry Colosal Crunch I think of how much better it is than Capt Crunch because it has MORE berries then that yellow stuff so I have another bowl.
3. The Hunger Games trailer still about made me pee my pants cuz I'm IN LOVE with that book.
4. I felt pretty funny when I asked my nephew to send me some cake in the mail and all he did was laugh with a big "NOOO"
5. Earlier I got on my computer and didnt even log into facebook which means I'm not TOTALLY addicted.
6. I had 2 candy bars today! (shhh dont tell Scott- that wont make this awesome)
7. I'm pretty impressed that I came up with this much awesome stuff in just one day

I'm sorry to burden you all with what was annoying me- trust me there is actually a lot more I just cant think of more awesomeness to cancel it out. Scotts not home till late tonight and I know it would annoy him if I talked about all this stuff. So thank you, thank you for your time if you are still reading this.