Merry Christmas!!

I just thought I'd tell everyone Merry Christmas with this adorable picture I snagged of Rachael this morning in her adorable Christmas jammies my mom made for her. How cute is she in her "wee little bonnet?" (Thanks for the phrase, Britni!) Hope everyone had a great Christmas and you continue to enjoy the rest of the season!!

Bowling

Nate and I had another free two nights stay in Mesquite, NV, but this time no babysitter was available so Rachael got to (had to?) tag along. As stated in the previous Mesquite post, there is not much to do in the city. We went to McDonald's a few times so Rachael could frolic in the playplace while we ate $1 sundaes, but we also took her bowling for the first time. She was really excited to hold one of the huge balls and she lasted a good five frames, taking turns very nicely. In the end, she even got more points than me! (I will say though, that with the last few frames of me and Nate bowling for her, her score was significantly increased) and Nate spanked us both, surprise surprise. I don't know when we'll take her again, but it was a fun new experience!

I don't know where my camera is (huge problem considering we leave for Rexburg for Christmas tomorrow!!) but I managed to snag this adorable picture with my phone. She would "assist" daddy in throwing the ball, then pop a squat right there and watch it roll. Pretty cute!

I was more or less obsessed with our matching shoes. I guess this was a good time for Rachael to have huge feet because they happened to have her size. Well... they were slightly larger, but not too bad.

Post

This is just a short post because I'm assuming my gramsicle is chomping at the bit waiting for a picture of her beautiful great-granddaughter. Well Grams, here you go. My mom snagged this picture with her phone a few weeks ago and I personally love it. It should be in a magazine or something. I don't know when I'll be posting for the next week at least, then the holidays come and life gets crazy. I'm heading to Vegas with my sister to visit our cousins for a few days, and since Nate is done with his semester I'm leaving the babe with him. :) Love you, Nate! Then Nate and I are going to do another two free nights in Mesquite, but Rachael will probably be coming with us because she's had some sleep issues lately, and we don't want to thrust that upon anyone else. Then, next Thursday we are saying bye-bye to So. Utah and hello No. Utah for Nate's cousin, Makenna's, wedding. Then, next Saturday, Nate's little brother, Jordan gets home from his mission in Leon, Mexico. Weird! I can't believe its been two years!! I'm excited for the next couple of weeks, it is a much needed break from the boredom. I'll see you when I see you!!

Mary

Today in Relief Society our lesson was on Mary. It was a really good lesson, and I learned a lot of things I didn't know before. I felt the Spirit really strong and just wanted to share some of the feelings I had, and have been having all season long.
Ever since I was a little girl, the song "Breath of Heaven" by Amy Grant (and only Amy Grant, in my book) has been a favorite all time Christmas song, and since I've become a mother, even more so. I love thinking about how Mary was feeling, how scared she was, all the responsibility placed on her shoulders to raise the Son of God. "Breath of Heaven, hold me together... lighten my darkness... pour over me Your Holiness."
Another song that I LOVE is "Mary Did You Know?" (my choice? Clay Aiken, weird, I know). My favorite line of that song is, "When you kiss your little baby, you kiss the face of God." When I kiss my little baby, I'm still kissing a child of God, my daughter of God that I have the responsibility to raise. Just as Jesus Christ had His mission on Earth (saving every person to ever live and giving them Eternal Life), my own little daughter has her own mission in life, and it is my calling and responsibility to help her find that.
I like to think of Mary as a person, not as a Saint as some Religions have made her (not that I think that she was under qualified to become a Saint, I just don't personally worship or pray to her). I like (is that weird?) to think of her going out of her mind with her crazy children in their crazy toddler years, because I don't believe that the toddler Jesus just sat around, I think he had a personality and liked to play and be (innocently) mischievous, just like my toddler. I like to think of Mary going out of her mind with worry when she couldn't find Jesus on their way out of the city because He was teaching in the temple. You may recall my own panic mode when I lost Rachael in Wal-Mart and my desire to punish her, I bet Mary, as a mother, wanted to punish Him, but obviously He told her that He had been teaching His Father's words.
I hope you take the time to listen to this song, especially if you haven't ever heard it before. I could take every single line in this song and apply it to my life, but I won't, you'd probably get bored. It makes you think of Mary as a person, which is what she was. Just an imperfect mother with a high calling, but she knew the importance of that.


(I just watched the video, its kinda weird, so just listen to the words.)

Christmas Decorating!

Our Christmas decorations are going to be very minimal this year. With our big move to NYC next year, we're trying to sell all of our Christmas decorations before Christmas. How is that going? Not so good, so if you or anyone you know needs some cute but cheap Christmas decor, let me know. But I couldn't let this season pass by without some decorating!
Our tree this year (first time we haven't had a real one) is a loaner from my sister, about 4 feet tall, and is decorated with the decorations we got our first Christmas from the Dollar Store. I actually love these few tiny decorations and have decided not to sell them.

I got a little crafty today! My sister-in-law, Laura, gave me this idea at Halloween to use candy corn, but I neglected my creativity until now. I just used tulle and peppermints on a dollar store Styrofoam wreath. I am obsessed with the way it turned out, and it only took me like 20 minutes! (Minus, the unwrapping of the candies) I just wrapped a long piece of red tulle around the wreath, hot glued the candies on, whipped up a tulle pouf, and tied some more tulle for the bow. UBER cute! And good thing its out of Rachael's reach, she wants to "L, L, L lick" these candies!

MERRY CHRISTMAS SEASON!!

Adam.

I'm finally going to post about this. Rewind the last few posts and insert this one after our picnic in the mountains.
We came down the mountain and went to Wal-Mart for some supplies. Well it was a pretty crazy day at Wally World, crazier than usual, and Rachael was stuck in the cart. We went to the back annex of the store to meander through the Christmas stuff. We figured it was more or less closed off so we let her out to run around, of course keeping a watchful eye out. Then, she bolted. "Nate," I said, "Go grab her please." So off he goes, and 20 seconds later comes back empty handed. "Where did she go?" "I don't know." So we each go our separate ways, in panic mode. I go to the fishy section where we had spent about 20 minutes, Nate went to the toys. After about one minute of looking, I truck it up to the customer service desk, cut in line, and tell them I can't find my daughter. They asked me to describe her. "Two years old, curly hair, black shirt, purple pants." One the intercom comes the announcement, "Attention Wal-Mart associates, we have a Code Adam." Then goes on to describe Rachael. Nate said that as soon as the announcement was made all employees he could see immediately stopped what they were doing and started looking around. About a minute and a half later, some sweet angel wearing a blue shirt brought my little stink bug back to me, still clutching her huge roll of Thomas the Train wrapping paper. She had been hiding in the Men's clothing racks. UGH!! I kid you not, people, she literally bolted across the store in a matter of 20 seconds. I was so scared I had a break down as we walked to find Nate.
Afterwards, as we're driving home, Nate brought up a few thoughts he was having. "I wish she was older so we could punish her." Haha, me too honey, never the less, she is only two and thought we were playing a game. "What if that had been the last time we'd ever seen her?" SO SAD!! But really, to be honest, if I HAD to choose a time, that would be pretty close to my last perfect day with her. A beautiful picnic in the mountains, and then she was pretty dang cute looking at the fish in Wal-Mart. "Shishie!" Obviously I'm glad to have her back, but we'll definitely be leaving her in the cart or on her puppy leash from now on.

Interesting things on Code Adam we learned after we got home:

1. Named for the son of the America's Most Wanted host who was kidnapped
2. Started by Wal-Mart
3. If a child is returned by anyone other than a store employee the police need to be called (so if you ever hear a Code Adam and see the child, maybe don't take him/her up, find an employee. I don't know how strict they are on it...)
4. The exits need to be sealed until the child is found or for ten minutes, then the police are called and Code Adam is lifted (I don't know if they sealed the exits in our case, it would have been interesting to see)

Thankful for Code Adam and thankful to have my princess back!!

Picture taken on Sunday while playing dress up

HARRY!!

We're off! Nate and I are going to sit outside of the crazy theatre for four hours and hope hope hope to get good-ish seats! I'M SO STINKING EXCITED!! I always get like this before an HP premier, because I feel like I've already seen the new movie, cuz I've seen the others so many times and read the books, but then I realise that this is going to be a completely new experience and I can hardly contain myself. I'm not looking at this movie as the beginning of the end like some people, I'm just looking at it as another experience for me to get the chills when I hear the, "dum, dum, dah dum dum, dum duuum dum" as the smokes makes the WB sign appear and the magic BEGINS!!!

(This is all a joke, I don't really like Harry Potter.)
(That was a complete and utter LIE!)