Christmas 2008

As usual, our holidays are pretty hectic, so we split things up a little bit and spent Christmas Eve at my step-dad's house in Santaquin. We had a good time with food, drinks, games, presents & just hanging out. I won the word find game :) I'm really glad we split things up because we were able to spend a lot more time with my family that I don't get to see very often and John is so comfortable with my "Weight" family than anyone else. He likes talking with my dad "Papa Kent" :) I also had fun talking with other Twilight lovers :)

Amos & Homer J sleeping on Christmas Eve

Christmas Morning we slept in, opened our stockings only, and then went to John's parents for breakfast and presents. We didn't stay too long since we knew we would be back later in the evening. (I'm glad his parents only live a few blocks from us).

John & the boys with their stockingsMe & the boys

We went home to relax for a little bit and opened the rest of our presents. We do a good job of keeping our presents a secret from each other so that we are all surprised on Christmas day. John spoiled me as usual. Afterwards we headed to my mom's house for the afternoon. Because I'm so special (and her baby) my mom still gives me a stocking :) After my mom's we went to my dad's house. But before opening presents at my dad's, I had to help my brother Mike wrap all his presents!! Mike has a tradition that he does ALL his shopping on Christmas Eve and every year he never gets all his gifts wrapped & I end up having to help him. When we left my dad's, we went back to John's parents for dinner. I'm so grateful that John's family is SO flexible & they are always SO willing to work around my 3 families crazy schedule. We had a really good day and also had pretty good timing since we seemed to dodge traveling in the worst parts of the Christmas Eve and Christmas Day storms. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

John & his mom

Christmas morning mess (No we didn't get another 50" tv, I had to wrap one of john's presents in the tv box because he likes to shake his presents to guess what they are.)

InfiniTeam Christmas Eve party

Christmas Eve fell on a Wednesday this year, so my work had a party instead of really working. It was potlock so I brought an Artichoke & Spinach dip that I made that morning and chips. It was gone before I left the office :) We also do a "White Elephant" game where everyone brings a gift. The day before the party I still had not bought my gift. On the way back to the office from the Christmas Box House, Destini & I were brainstorming for what I should get, when we saw a lingerie store. We got the same idea...but it would only work if one of the guys chose it. So of course us girls had to make a plan. Everyone in our office is pretty competitive, so the gift stealing usually goes on for quite a while. It was pretty late in the game, but as luck should have it, someone stole my gift and I made the choice to steal Marshall's gift so that he would have to either steal someone else's gift or pick a new one. He chose to pick a new one and chose MY gift!! He opened the box and immediately closed it shut! Just as I suspected, no one would let him get away with not pulling it out so he had no choice but to pull out the nightie :) It actually was a very cute nightie that most girls would not have mind keeping. I also put the movie "Sleeping Beauty" with the lingerie to keep with the theme. Marshall was such a good sport and even put the nightie on! It was HILARIOUS and everyone was almost in tears from laughter!!

Mine was the blue one on top with the blue blow.

Jason & Dave helping Marshall into his nightie ;)

Marshall is such a good sport!!

Christmas Box House Quilts

For the past few weeks, my work has been working on making quilts for the kids at The Christmas Box House. Barb, Destini & I went to Joann's and picked out all the fabric. We chose fabrics for 5 boy and 5 girl quilts. We set up a quilt frame in an empty office for everyone to go in and work on tying a quilt whenever they wanted or could. We also had been successful in getting a few of the guys to do some ties and Monday the last quilt was done!! Thanks to everyone who helped with the quilts! They turned out to be SO cute and a few of us were tempted to keep some of them because they were so adorable :) On Tuesday afternoon, Barb, Destini and I went to The Christmas Box House to deliver the quilts along with a nice cash donation. They were thrilled and said they would let the kids who would be staying there for Christmas pick one for their gift :) That made me feel so good!! I have loved being active in this Charity that we've chosen this year and doing all I can to help out.

I chose this one....its one of my favorite boy ones. I love the monkeys :) My favorite girl quilt. I think Destini picked this one. I love the purple, pink & green together

Halona 'Ugly Sweater' Xmas Party

Last Sunday we had my family Christmas party at my dad's house. My brother Mike put himself in charge and chose to do an "Ugly Sweater" party. So we all had to find the ugliest xmas sweater we could find and purchasing the sweaters proved to be the most embarrassing part of all. I remember the look of my cashier wondering if I was serious or not, LOL. It was a lot of fun to see what everyone came up with and in the end, my oldest brother Shane won the prize by wearing a grandma, sparkly, black Christmas vest with a turtleneck. I wore a very adorable mint green sweater with sparkly snowflakes across the front & sleeve, and a built-in turtleneck that was embroidered at the edges. I got John a sweater that had the 'Kansas City' lights on the front AND back. It was truly gross and not too mention it shrunk in the dryer and was a little tight! But he matched my sister Gia's husband, Tim, who had a light blue sweater w/snowflakes that was too small as well! Even my little baby nephew Hurley wore an ugly Mickey mouse sweater with ears but he's so darn cute that it didn't look ugly :) We all had a blast teasing each other, eating mutton stew & frybread, and playing a very funny & somewhat embarrassing game of "Boxers & Briefs". We all laughed until we cried and now we REALLY know what we think of each other...LOL! I love my family and love hanging out with them....even if we do look ridiculous in ugly sweaters :)

InfiniTeam Xmas Party

Saturday night we went to the Millcreek Inn which is up Millcreek Canyon for my annual work Christmas party. It was fun to get all dressed up and the setting at the Inn is so beautiful with all the snow. I was so happy there was no snow blizzard like last year so we actually made it to the party on time. We had a fun social hour with cocktails and fancy h'ordeurves before dinner. The food was absolutely delicious and after dinner we danced and listened to the "School of Rock" bands. The "School of Rock" is a music school for kids, and my boss Steve has a son who plays the drums. They are actually amazing and its hard to believe they are just kids. There was a 15 yr old singer who I swear could have won American Idol, he was that good. We all had fun rockin' out and letting loose. I'll post more pictures as soon as Courtney sends them to me.

Favorite Things...

8 Favorite TV Shows
1. House
2. Clean House (Style channel)
3. Gilmore Girls
4. Friends
5. HGTV
6. Food Network
7. Kitchen Nightmares
8. Numbers

8 Things I did Yesterday
1. Slept in (kind of)
2. Dishes
3. Went to my Grandpa's Xmas/Bday party
4. Went Christmas shopping with my mom
5. Got dressed up
6. Went to my work Xmas party up Millcreek
7. Danced w/co-workers to the School of Rock kids band, they're amazing!!
8. Watched Dark Knight

8 things I look forward to:
1. Christmas
2. More snow in the Mountains for snowboarding
3. Traveling
4. Time off work
5. Summer
6. More time with Family
7. A house
8. Quitting my job...someday

8 Favorite Restaurant
1. Tiburon
2. Benihana's
3. Bohemian
4. Macaroni Grill
5. Outback
6. Porcupine
7. Market Street Grill
8. Mimi's Cafe

8 Things I wish for:
1. Patience
2. More free time
3. A House
4. Energy to do the things I want
5. Money to do the things I want
6. To see Graceland
7. To see the World
8. To stay 29 forever

8 People I tag:
1. Destini
2. Courtney
3. Re'
4. Gia
5. Sara
6. Morgan
7. Shannon
8. Melissa

Italian Sausage

Sunday we went to John's parents for our annual Italian Sausage night. John's dad side of the family is Italian and every year during Christmas time we freeze our hands and make Italian Sausage and scones :) We had a good time and John even got to have his birthday pie and a few presents early.

O' Christmas Tree...

This year I put up 2 Christmas Tree's. This one is our main tree and his been up since the week after Thanksgiving and is in the living room. It's the same tree we had last year, kind of "woodsy" and has a lot of snowmen. I really like our tree, but because I like so many different styles, I think I'm going to change things up and do a different one next year. Destini is right, the picture never does the tree justice. I promise its better looking in person. Here it is all lit up...

This tree is a new addition this year. I've been collecting Elvis ornaments for the past couple of years, but there's not enough for a big tree and as much as I LOVE Elvis, I honestly did not want my main tree to be all Elvis. So I bought a little 4 ft tree and put it in our bedroom :)

Festival of Trees - Auction Night

Yesterday, Lynzie & I did our annual volunteering at "The Festival of Trees". It was auction night (by invitation only) and all the trees, wreaths, gingerbread houses & playhouses are auctioned off. We work in the invoicing area and we get to see how much the trees are sold for. We always write down the ones that sell for lots of money so we can go look at them afterwards. Lynzie's mother-in-law (Marq's mom) is on the board and so a lot of her in-laws, "The Rasmussen's" help out. Grandma Rasmussen (Vera) and his Aunt Cheryl, always help out in invoicing as well. Every penny raised goes to help children in need at Primary Children’s Medical Center. We had a good time hanging out and after we were done invoicing, we went and looked at some of trees. Thanks Kae (Marq's mom) for letting me help out! (We were so busy we didn't have time to take a pic :)

Christmas Box House Tree

Yesterday, a few of us from work went to 'The Christmas Box House' (CBH) to decorate their tree for December. They have a tree that is up year round and its the first thing that a child see's when they are brought to the CBH. The tree is surrounded by stuffed animals and when a child comes to the CBH, they get to choose an animal to keep. Each month it is decorated by different people and/or organizations with different themes. We had signed up for the 'December' tree a few months ago and I was so excited to do it. Last week Barb, Courtney & I went to Target and bought all the stuff for the tree and then we ordered some things online. I helped Courtney come up with the 'theme' of the tree which was "Santa's Workshop". We got bright colored ornaments of red & green, wooden block toys, a sparkly santa hat for the topper, and filled little bags with small toys for the kids to keep after Christmas. A few of the guys went early to put up the lights and then Barb, Courtney, Christy, Julie, Ryan and his brother-in-law and I decorated the tree. It was a lot of fun and it turned out really cute! We were all so happy to be able to do this for the kids and we hope they like it! Merry Christmas to the kids at The Christmas Box House!