Christmas 2014

To sum it up we did a TON of driving and had good and bad experiences for our Christmas :) Pat and I went to Arizona for a couple days right before Christmas. Funny story, Thursday night before we left we watched World War Z and then we left to Arizona Friday and slept in our minivan that night. Well we were looking for a good place to sleep when we got there at 2 in the morning, and it turns out we found this place that had a motion light in the parking lot so it was nice because it would alert us, but wouldn't keep us up all night. It just so happens that it was the parking lot of a morgue ha ha ha. Now that's ironic.

We are all loaded up and ready to head out! Yes that is a mattress in the back of our van ha ha
And oops I cut Pat's head off. Sorry honey

I woke up in the middle of the night freezing!

We did get a hotel for the next 2 nights yay!And yes, I am a little obsessed with palm trees

I'm outside in a t-shirt in December. It was Perfect weather!

This was a delicious place we ate lunch at one day. Mmmm

 We got to go to a NFL football game while we were there. Cardinals vs. Seahawks. Yay the Seahawks won!!

Monday morning we were heading back to Utah and we were driving down the highway and saw this awesome Christmas tree so we had to stop.

Merry Christmas from us and this 115 ft tall real Christmas Tree!

I'll put the star on top!

After leaving the awesome tree, we had about 10 hours left of driving when our good old van decided to smoke and die and blowup the transmission 10 miles outside of Flagstaff :(

Luckily we were 1 mile away from an exit and made it safely to the side of the road, and we even had cell phone service where we were. We were blessed in that way very much!

The last time seeing our Ford Windstar minivan.

So we got towed to Flagstaff, paid a bunch of money, paid more money for someone to diagnose our van even though Pat was pretty sure it was the transmission, waited 5 hours and then was told it was more money to fix our van than our van was worth. So we sold it to a junkyard for $300 and had to leave it there ( with our mattress in the back still ha ha) and we had taken out the 2 back seats before we left, so we still have those lol. Then we rented a rental car transferred all of the stuff we could into it, grabbed some food and headed to Utah much later than we had planned.
 It was a long day. During the drive back we had to take an hour detour as well because they closed part of a road and didn't give any advance notice. But we made it home around 2 or 3 in the morning and were super glad to have just made it back and be able to finally get some sleep.
So we got 2 hours of sleep and went and saw Pat's family and had breakfast in Park City.
Then we drove to Rexburg later that day and got Paige and some of her stuff and brought it back. So basically we got 2 hours of sleep in like 40 hours ha ha. But it was kind of worth it. :)

Then we got to have Christmas with our families and look around and hopefully buy ourselves a new car for Christmas that we were not planning on ha ha.

Of course we did our Christmas Eve tradition as well, we get together with some good family friends and have a white elephant gift exchange and go around and talk about everything we were grateful for this year and bear our testimonies of Jesus Christ and the beautiful Christmas season and read the story of Christ's birth in Luke. Then we gather around a piano and sing Christmas hymns. It was joyful and triumphant.

Blessed, and spoiled, this looks like my childhood dream

Paige and Grandma :) 

Yes that is a machete

Pat has been wanting a GoPro forever. I just couldn't bring myself to buy one though cuz they are ridiculously expensive, but I found this cheaper one! I hope it works great :) 

Pat got me a 104 piece painting kit!

Pat got some snowshoes from my Mom and Dad

Paige got a puppy

We got my dad a blanket with pictures from Alaska on it. I think he likes it :) 

Merry Christmas!

Paige got to come stay with me after Christmas for a couple of days and we played with my kitty and painted and watched movies! It was fun.

Kitty seeing it's first bubbles

 And we had to watch this classic, I took a picture at the perfect time ha ha

Does someone need a hug??

And yay Pat found us a great deal on a car on Saturday thank goodness!!! We are no longer mini van drivers.

Three Thanksgivings

Pat and I were spoiled this year and had not one, not two but THREE Thanksgiving dinners. We had Thanksgiving with my family the Saturday before Thanksgiving, then we had our own Thanksgiving dinner on actual Thanksgiving. Did I mention that Pat came home with a 21 pound turkey one day? Yes we will compile a cookbook of the 80 meals we will eat that all have turkey in them ha ha.

Sooooooooooooooooooo grateful for this guy and all of his hard work :) 

That is a lot of Turkey!

Check out the size of that turkey leg

Then Pat and I went for a nice little walk around Adams Park. Since it is like 50 degrees in Novemeber we might as well enjoy it right? :) And we saw some squirrels playing and jumping from tree to tree at the park, they were pretty fun to watch actually, one of them almost didn't make a jump lol.

We also got to have Thanksgiving dinner at Pat's parents the Saturday after Thanksgiving. It was wonderful, and I am super grateful for all of the family and food that we have :)  We are extremely blessed!

My mom and I got to go Black Friday shopping on Black Friday as is a tradition of the past couple of years. It was super fun as always, we saved a ton of money, I got most of my Christmas shopping done,  and we did not run into any crazy shoppers either, so that was a definite bonus. Everyone was actually pretty nice that was around us, and people would hand other people stuff they wanted or asked for and everyone was saying thank you. 

Although Pat and I went to Wal-mart Thursday night and there was this one dvd I wanted and it was the last one and this other lady and I grabbed it at the same time, and I had been looking for that dvd for about 20 minutes and she was like oh I want this one! So I was nice and let her take it. Then the next day shopping with my mom I found the same dvd and it was still a really good price. So it really does pay to be nice :)

The following weekend my dad had to go to the hospital unfortunately. So Pat and I went down just for one night so we could help out. Pat installed a new washer and dryer while we were there and I cleaned and helped put up some of their Christmas decorations. My mom and dad were at the hospital the whole time we were at their house so they came home to a welcome banner and Christmas decorations and a newly installed washer and dryer. I am glad we could help out, but sad we had to hurry back and didn't have time to actually see you mom and dad! Love you!

Super grateful for all of his hard work building a platform and installing a new washer and dryer :) Isn't he brilliant?! 

 I wanted to hide in this box and jump out and surprise my parents when they came home, but that is probably not a good idea to do when welcoming someone home from a hospital visit.

Other than that we are just keeping busy! Pat has finals this week wahoo! I think this is one of the first years finals have not been on his birthday yay!

One night we made way too many sugar cookies!

Oh and we may or may not have adopted this little rascal! :)

And even though it doesn't quite feel like Christmas yet I still love love love this time of year and the joy of the Christmas season and I hope we can remember the true meaning of Christmas and remember our Savior Jesus Christ, and all He did and still does for us, and to love and serve others and enjoy every moment :) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzjFEMmM0Xs