A few pictures from Christmas and our trip to Utah

We had a great Christmas and New Year. I wish I had taken more pictures but here are some that tell of some of things we did this season. I started by making some cute monkey dolls for some of my nieces. I got the idea from someone else but I think they turned out super cute.

Sam had a hard time staying away from the presents under the tree and carried them around everywhere. Good thing I didn't put them out until Christmas Eve.

Sam's Christmas dance. I thought I'd see how long he would keep his hat on, that's why the pictures with the hat. He left it on for at least an hour.

Christmas day up at a mountain resort in Virginia (Massanutten), with our friends the Pooles. Playing some DDR. I'm glad there was no picture of me doing it. I'm terrible at it. I guess I have no hand-eye-foot coordination.

The girls did rock on guitar hero though.

Sam and Jared playing fuseball with the Cattens.

We got to see a lot of family and friends while we were in Utah unfortunately I only took a couple of pictures with a few of them. This is the only one with friends, the Vera family.

Sam cheesed it up for a picture with Papa Mel, sandwich in hand and mouth.

We had a great Christmas and New Year season and feel blessed we were able to spend time with so many people we love.

Jared started a new rotation this past week, surgical oncology (it's a part of his general surgery requirement). We had heard that this rotation could be brutal so we decided to take a last minute weekend getaway up to the mountains before he started this rotation. There's no snow yet but it was fun to get away. The drive up there was beautiful and we had fun walking around, going to the pool and hot tub, drinking hot chocolate and watching movies.

UVA football

It's been over a month now since we went but it was Sam's first footbal game ever so I thought I should post these pics. Jared got some free tickets so we called up the Pooles and asked them to come along and drove down to Charlottesville. I think Sam is addicted already. He loved cheering and did pretty good, for a 2-yr-old, staying in our area. It had been kind of cold for a few days before the game but that Saturday turned out to be a beautiful, a little warmer than we expected, day. We got there right after half-time and I think we had Sam's shirt off somewhere in the 3rd quarter. UVA lost in over-time but we still had a good time.

I was taking some pictures of Sam playing in the leaves today and I fell in love with this one so I thought I'd post it. I have more that hopefully I'll get to later.

Happy Halloween

I probably let Sam watch a little too much Mickey Mouse Clubhouse...he calls Mickey Mouse "Toodles" so this year he was Toodles for Halloween. Once he found out that he got candy for saying Trick or Treat he was yelling it before he before we would get to the next person at our ward's Trunk or Treat. On Halloween Jared was able to take Sam trick or treating.

"Toodles"

The ward Trunk or Treat.

He loved carrying his pumpkin.

Woody and Mickey Mouse.

"CARS"!!!!

Sam is two. We had a "Cars", or as he says "Trucks" themed party for him yesterday. I made his cake the night before. As I was taking it out of the fridge and putting on the table in the morning I almost dropped it and scattered some "dirt" onto the "grass". Oh well, at least I didn't drop it. From the time I put the cake on the table until his party, Sam kept sneaking into the dining room to take Lightning McQueen and Chick Hicks off the cake.

We played a few games, of which I didn't get any pictures, fishing with Mater for cars, custom paint jobs with Ramone (they got to color pictures of Lightning McQueen) and driving with Doc (they all took turns driving a power wheel around the yard). I think the power wheel was the big hit of the party. We also did a Lightning McQeen pinata.

Singing Happy Birthday to Sam and Shelby.

Sam blowing out his candles. He did a pretty good job of not spitting on the cake.

As soon as he blew the candles out the cars were his.

Let's have some cake.


Sam enjoying his cake for a second. He only took a bite or two before he was ready to move on and play with his new cars.

All the kids enjoying cake and ice cream.

Opening presents. Sam would not let go of his two new cars from the cake to open his presents. He held onto them the entire time. He really enjoyed watching the other kids "helping" him open his presents and was so excited about each and every new present.

His new dump truck from Papa Mel and Grandma Paula. He fits inside. *Note: he's still holding on to 2 cars.

Down to the last presents and still he's clutching his 2 cars. He has since let go of those cars and really does love all the presents that he got. He lines up all his cars several times a day and puts them in his dump truck, he also likes to drive his cars on his "Cars" rug. He loves all the books, we've read stories from all of the them. He was also super excited to discover that his new markers make animal noises.

He had a super exciting day and had fun playing with all the kids.

The big 2 9!

Happy Birthday Jared! We love you!
We celebrated Jared's birthday yesterday with a barbeque and cake. We had a great time celebrating with friends. We feel so blessed to be surrounded by so many wonderful people that have really helped us in our short time here (although we still miss CA and home and love all you guys).

I think because Jared's birthday is in October I associate his birthday with Halloween so I made him a Halloween themed cake and I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself. I don't consider myself crafty or creative but I think I did okay on his cake.

The witch is made from fondant icing. I found a recipe online that only called for marshmallows, powdered sugar and water so it was super easy to make.

I think a post wouldn't be a post with out a picture of Sam. He turns 2 on Saturday so I'll have pics of birthday next week. Can you believe it?