2010 Christmas in warm Arizona...

Cade and I traveled to Arizona to spend the Christmas holiday with Cade's family. We had so much fun there; getting away from lots of responsibilities, just relaxing with each other, and especially spending time with Cade's parents, siblings, grandparents. We spent lots of time chasing babies around, eating great food, playing Rummy and Quiddler, going out to movies and shopping, and just relaxing around the house.

Christmas Eve we spent with Cade's mom's side and ate dinner all together, had a small program of singing and reading the Christmas story in the Bible, and opened up gifts from each other. It's always great seeing them!


Aunt Cindy:

Al & Debby:









Then on Christmas day, we woke up before 6:00 (I know, who does that after their 12 years old? Well, we had places to be!), and opened up presents with just Cade's immediate family. It was so fun...we actually woke up Emma to open presents though...ironic, I know. We enjoyed that time together. Then we had to hurry and get ready and head to Phoenix for a Christmas breakfast on Cade's Dad's side. It was a perfect 72 degrees Christmas day! They had every extended family member on that side there! It was amazing. It was fun to see so many people and catch up on their lives. We really had a great time!







Cade's whole extended family on Dad's side:


Cousins Kristin & Mkayla, Tara, Cousin Tammara, and Me:


Ashur is our Christmas Day baby! So the day after Christmas, we celebrated Ashur's Birthday (they were with Johnny's family on Christmas day evening). Yay for turning 1!!! Look at this DARLING boy! Don't you just want to squeeze his cheeks? Oh, I love him :).






Fun pics of Emma and Ashur:

Bathtime! They both LOVE their baths!

I caught them holding hands in the car :)

Emma likes to play peek-a-boo....when she has food all over her hands!

Christmas Sweaters :)

For Cade's work party, we always have a dinner and each year everyone dresses up. Well, this year they announced that people could come in whatever they wanted to. Well, you open it up like that, so we'll run with it! :) Jennie (Bryan's girlfriend) and I went to Saver's to find some great attire (mine was from the kids section). We found a couple things, but nothing too great for the guys. When I got home, I remembered I have a cute little old lady as my next door neighbor and everyone over 70 has Chrismas sweaters, right? I asked her if she had any I could borrow...I hit the jackpot! So Cade and I, and Jennie and Bryan went in our Christmas Sweaters. It was awesome! The best part is that Bryan dressed in the parking lot of the event and couldn't see all the wonderful detail of his old woman's sweater until we got into the party :)! It was great...hopefully they'll make it a Fishbowl tradition...

Kristen and Andrew are married!

We are SO SO SO happy for Andrew and Kristen! I have never seen a happier couple than they were on their wedding day (and I've seen many couples get married :)). They were both beaming so much in the temple. Can't you see in this picture how happy they are?! Here are the events of the day:

I woke up and went over to the reception hall at 8:30 a.m. and started decorating. We had to get the ceiling up before any of the other decorations could go up later on in the day. I was a little worried about the ceiling because I had never done it before and also cause I had called the event planner that usually puts up the fabric ceilings at this event center and she told me it takes about 3-4 hours to complete!!! (She also charges $700 dollars, so there was NO WAY we were about to use her!) So Katelyn, Laurel and Rachel (friends), and Andrew and some of his family all came that morning to help out. We used plastic from Costco that was less than $50 and some white lights...$700- rediculous! After a few scary moments (the electrical went out that almost ruined the whole thing, but we prayed...HARD...and all was good!), and only 1 1/2 hours, everything turned out beautiful! We were happy with the way it turned out.




After setting up the ceiling and decorating the arch, we went back to hurry and get ready for the sealing. We had to be to the Draper temple at 12:30 and their ceiling was at 1:00 p.m. The ceiling was wonderful (and funny too...it just fit both Kristen and Andrew great). Like I mentioned earlier, they were so extremely happy during the ceremony. Afterwards, I got to be in the brides room with her and my mom to help her get ready. I was very excited about that! Her dress had a lace-up back and so that took 20 minutes alone to get her into the dress :). It was worth it though- SO beautiful! Then we took pictures with all our family at the temple (I wish I had pictures of the whole group, but I don't. The next few pictures...courtesy of Stephanie).







After the temple, Cade convinced me to let him take me to get some food. He knew if I didn't eat then, I probably wouldn't. We ate some food then, he went home to take care of Emma and I went to Noah's (the reception center) to help set up. We had lots of people helping with the set up as well as serving cake and drinks the whole night. It really helped having so many people for the night to go smoothly. Kristen didn't care at that point how everything turned out...she was married! But nonetheless, I think it turned out beautiful!

Beadboard frames!

I made some frames for my house and love how they turned out. I found this idea on craftyit.blogspot.com and loved them! I changed a few things about them to fit the idea I had in my head. I bought the beadboard at Lowe's and my Dad helped me cut them and drill holes in the top. I spray painted them ivory and used brown paint down the beadboard lines. It took FOREVER to find square frames that were just the right size, but finally bought some and painted those ivory and brushed the edges brown as well. I printed some of Emma's cute one year old pictures and put those in the frames. I love finishing a project! It feels so good to create! If I had all day, I would love to just make crafts all day....maybe when Emma's about 25 we can do that together :), right?