Mr. Grumpy

This is Drake's new angry face. I tell you, he's hard to stay mad at for very long because he's just too darn cute!

Awesome

So, my cousin Ashley has a new website and you guys have to check it out! She's an awesome photographer! http://ashleythalmanphotography.com/

Sorry, I've run out of Title name ideas.

Well, December went by WAY faster then I thought it would. I thought I would be able to enjoy Christmas but it felt kind of rushed and hectic this year. CJ was working a lot of overtime so maybe that's why I feel like we missed out on the whole "feeling of the season". We still had a great Christmas though. Lots of great food and lots of even better family.
Drake got spoiled (again) this year. Not by us, but by his Aunts, Uncles and Grandparents. I realized after Christmas Eve that I should return the few items that we got him and get our $50 back. I thought about telling Santa to do the same. Instead we watched Drake open his Dinosaur books and Disney movies on Christmas morning. He had a lot of fun, and he got a lot of great things.

I bought CJ some new camo and a Coyote call and CJ bought me a camera. He won "Husband of the Year" award! He had been saving up, on his own, for about 8 months now in order to surprise me with it. I love him! CJ is not the romantic or thoughtful guy so this was very awesome of him to think of something like this on his own. Way to go babe! It's so dang cool, and I have been doing a lot of reading to figure out all the manual settings. YAY! Next item to purchase: Editing software.

CJ had me open my gift first because he knew I'd want to start taking pictures right away, so all our Christmas pictures are on the new camera and I'm still playing with it so I'll upload the pictures as soon as I get around to it.

I hope you all had a great Christmas and a fabulous New Year! I'm excited for 2011 and I have some very important goals to look forward to.

Fun Filled Weekend

Can you believe Christmas is right around the corner? I can't! We've been busy and I feel like we still have so much to do. We still have Christmas parties to attend and gifts to think of, buy and then wrap. Drake now believes in Santa, so me and CJ no longer get to talk about what we're going to get him in front of him. We end up texting each other while we're sitting on the couch. LOL.

This last Saturday we went to Temple Square to see the lights with my parents and some of my siblings. It was fun and not too cold either. It was not as impressive as it has been in past years, we were all a bit disappointed by the lights, or the lack there of.





Before the lights, we stopped by the Grand America Hotel to see the Gingerbread House display. They were so cool and very elaborate.




Not a surprise to find out that Drake's favorite Gingerbread house was the barn. He kept telling me that the horses were in there sleeping. What a kid!


Before we left the hotel we stopped by the Teddy Bear Suite on the 23rd floor. The room runs anywhere from $2500 to $5000 a night. RIP OFF!



The only thing impressive in the room were the bathrooms, they were so NICE! Me and CJ got a better view and a cooler room in Jamaica for our Honeymoon for that price, and we were there for a week!

On Sunday my dads good friend stopped by my parents house for a bit to play Santa for the grand kids. We, along with some of my siblings were there for dinner. It was so fun to see Drake's face! He LOVED Santa! As soon as Santa came in the door Drake kept saying "I want presents, I want toys" It was funny.






My mom and Dad even got to sit on Santa's lap :)

Life Goes By Fast

I feel like life has been zooming by me and I can't grab on tight enough. I have so much to do around my house and so many projects that I'd like to complete. I've only started a couple of these projects but I have lots planned! I try not to think of them very often or else I just feel overwhelmed. Not to mention my work load at work has been increasing, but not my pay check. mmmm weird. I really like my job though and I'm very grateful that I have one so I won't complain too loud.

CJ and I celebrated our 4 year anniversary! YAY! We didn't do anything very eventful and we wanted to stay close to home because Drake came down with a runny nose and a bad cough. We're so lucky to have lots of family that are very willing to watch him for us whenever we want/need to get away for a bit. CJ and I went to dinner at Bucca di Beppo. DELICIOUS! Real, fresh, and authentic Italian food. It's CJ's favorite. Before dinner we went and saw a movie, it was CJ's first time in a movie theater in 3 years, wowza. We enjoyed ourselves. After dinner and a movie we picked Drake up and went to Cold Stone for ice cream and a carmel apple from Rocky Mt Chocolate Factory. The ice cream and apple were wonderful but not $18 wonderful. I about died when the dude told me how much my total was. No wonder we never go out for dessert anymore. What a rip off.

I forgot to take a picture of our food before we ate it, so here are our leftovers lol It still looks so dang good!

apple pie carmel apple

Raspberry cheesecake ice cream

I truly love CJ, and dinner and a movie was a perfect night out for the two of us. I don't want to sit and type a bunch of stuff on here about how "perfect" my husband is because he's not and quite frankly I hate it when people do that. CJ is perfect for me and would not be perfect for anyone else. Lets be clear, no other woman on this earth today would let their husband go hunting as much as I do. period. Oh and he's not romantic, that part about him sucks sometimes. A short list of some great things about him are:

He's funny.
He's quiet and I'm not, so we even each other out.
He has a very kind heart and looks for something positive in everything/everyone.
He's a great hands on dad.

Bottom line is that I love him. You know who else I love?

THIS KID! (and his turkey that he hasn't let go of for the past week)

Tis The Season To Be Thankful

I am thankful for everything in my life. The most common things that come to my mind are my loving and wonderful family. I have 3 incredible sisters who I call my best friends and I have an awesome brother who I look up to and am able to call for big brother advise. And a great set of parents who I believe have raised me well. I'm grateful for my husband who has blessed and enriched my life. He makes me laugh and I know he loves me with all his heart, I'm not so sure that I need to ask for much more. He has also helped bless us with a beautiful little boy whom we call Drake. Drake is awesome and such a joy to have in our home. I had no idea how deep love could go until I had Drake. Serious. Some might think that is cheesy but I'm serious, he is my life! In other words, I simply love family! Oh oh and FRIENDS! I love my friends, and I think I have some pretty dang good one's too!

Enjoy some pictures of my family and my friends.


























I'm grateful for a warm place to lay my head down at night and a place that I am able to be my self in. I'm not sure how I would survive if I were homeless. I always have a sigh of relief on those late nights that I get home from work when it's windy and storming outside, my husband and child are asleep and I walk in the door to a dark and quiet home. I feel safe and I love that feeling!

I'm grateful for America. I have never traveled far from the USA so I'm sure I'm a bit naive. I do however know that we are blessed here and we have got it good. I can be creative, speak my mind and pick my very own path in life and for that I am grateful!

I'm grateful for mountains. Oh the beautiful mountains! I love being outdoors. I love nature (not yard work, just raw nature). I love the canyons and the wildlife. And I'm grateful that I have a husband who shares that same love.









p.s. I hope that wasn't picture overload.

Another Month Down

My little sister had her baby! Whitney was induced early because of high blood pressure (among other reasons I'm sure but I'm not the doctor) Rekker was born on October 15th weighing in at 8 lbs 7 oz.



O my goodness he's cute!






We carved pumpkins for the first time as a little family. Drake loved it (he usually loves everything we throw at him, except the quiet game, he hates that game nor is he any good). My brother Zac gave us some pumpkins out of his garden, and I thank him for that. Pumpkins are expensive! If you buy one at the store they are almost the price of 8 cups of cheese (the bag of cheese that I buy from the store says approx. 8 cups, so a pumpkin is almost as much as that bag of cheese that I buy). So thank you again Zac for saving me some dolla dolla bills yo!







Check out his smiley face, no no no I meant smile on his face (Dang that sister of mine for drawing yet ANOTHER face on my son's stomach. Jess I will get you back as soon as you deliver that baby boy) He thought those pumpkins were so cool.
Quick story. When I cut out the first eye for the pumpkin. I looked at Drake and said "whoa Drake, look it's an eye!" And he just stared at the pumpkin and said "Nope, that's a triangle." That ended the conversation.


Halloween was lots of fun! We have WAY too much family to visit though. We're going to have to start drawing around 3 to 5 names out of a bucket each year to decided who to go visit. We were only able to visit at each stop for like 15 mins. And ya'll know me, that's not long enough.
CJ and I rocked the 80's with some awesome clearance stuff we found at walmart



Drake was a little lion. RAWR!




Why can't children have normal smiles? When we tell Drake to smile, he cheeses it too hard that in the picture his lips end up looking like clown lips, like we've put lipstick on him. Oh, how I love him to pieces!!!



These are all of my parents Grandkiddo's. As you can tell, they are thrilled to have yet another photo snapped of them :) Man they sure are cute!!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful October!