Monday, January 25, 2016

Auf Wiedersehen Amanda!

This past week, we went to Utah for my little sister's farewell and to see her off to her mission to Frankfurt, Germany.  It was amazing and sad and I became an emotional wreck at the end, but it was so, so good.

This time when we drove out, we stopped a little more than halfway and stayed the night at the Marriott in Elko.  It was nice to not drive the whole way in one sitting and the promise of getting to go swimming really helped the girls.  We've never stayed in a hotel, all four of us, and it was actually super fun!  The girls loved swimming and thought it was so cool that they got their own bed and that the hotel gave us toothbrushes since I left theirs at home on accident.  Hannah was bouncing of the walls,  she was so excited (or at least the bed) and all Hazel wanted was to cuddle up with a pillow and blanky.  The girls went right to sleep (thank you swimming pool!) and so Aaron and I stayed up and watched a movie.  Thankfully, we all slept well until Hazel fell off the bed at about 6 a.m., poor thing.  It was a little snowy on the rest of our drive, but luckily we made it to Utah safe and sound.  We were all very happy to be out of the car and I was very excited to not hear "Mom..." literally every five seconds.


We spent Saturday afternoon helping my family get ready for the farewell.  We made cookies and Hannah was a good helper and helped Grandpa Kevon clean.  It was fun to just hang out and talk and catch up.  That night, we had dinner with the Bytheways.  We went to Zupa's (man, I miss that place) and I was in Nuts About Berries Heaven.


The next day was Amanda's farewell.  She gave a great talk and also played a song on the cello, which was gorgeous. #showoff  Jk, Amanda, I love you.  I loved hearing her testimony and excitement about sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Afterward, we had lots of family and friends over, ate way too much food, played Octopus 8 and Mafia with the cousins, and talked and talked.  I love big family gatherings like that.  It's one of the things I miss most about Utah - everyone getting together and not really doing anything, but just having fun.



That night, we stole over to the Bytheways for a bit.  It was Trish's birthday a few weeks ago, so we got to participate in our tradition of saying something we love about whoever's birthday it is.  I just love Trish!  She is the world's best mother-in-law and I'm so grateful for her.  Here's a picture of her that shows exactly who she is - an amazing grandma making all of the kids feel special by letting them help her with everything.



Some time after this, we went back to my parents and randomly made fried pickles with our favorite love birds, Steven and Emma.  We even made our own Cajun seasoning for the dipping sauce.  I'm going to go ahead and call us fried pick pros.  I feel like whenever we're in Utah, we stay up way too late but its always worth it.

Monday morning we were able to go to the Provo Temple Open House.  I've been dreaming of going to this since this temple was announced - I went to stake conference in the tabernacle before it caught fire, I watched it burn on my way to work in 2010, and I lived just blocks away from it while it was being rebuilt - so it was a real treat to be able to see the gorgeous finished product.  It was also so neat to be there with my family and to be able to share what the inside of a temple looks like with Hannah.  She was especially excited about the sealing rooms where people get married.  :)  Her other favorite part was the umbrellas that they let us use.





On our way back from Provo, we stopped to see Brooke and Scott, their new apartment, and their new puppy Maslow!  Hannah and Hazel loved eating all of their food.  :)  Thanks to Brooke, I now know how to train my children.  Whenever I want them to listen to me, I've been having them pretend that they're Maslow and they're much more obedient that normal...





Monday was also the day of selfies where we came up with this gem.... (and some cute ones)...




Monday night we celebrated Trish's birthday with pizza benders from Italian village.  Again, it was just a laid back night of hanging out and being together.  Somehow I didn't even get a picture of Trish blowing out the candles though.

Tuesday was a low key day, which was nice.  Aaron went snowboarding with his dad and Allie, Brooke, and Scott. So Hannah went to preschool with my mom and Hazel and I helped Amanda pack and ran some errands.  It was good to get a little sister time in before saying goodbye.  




In the afternoon, we went up to Siegfried's for some Deutsch essen.  We tried bratwurst, weisswurst, spaetzel, saurkraut, fried potatoes, etc.  The best part was definitely the German Chocolate cake. Yum. Here's our girl with her German food:


Amanda's setting apart was amazing and it was my favorite part of our trip.  Her stake president invited all of us to say something if we wanted to so it kind of just turned into a family testimony meeting.  I'm convinced there is nothing better than being with your family and hearing their faith in and testimony of Jesus Christ and His Atonement.  I just wish Heidi and Dave could have been there.  Before Amanda's setting apart, I had been worrying about a lot of things - our house that still hasn't rented, upcoming Turnaround at Aaron's work, saying goodbye to Amanda for 18 months, etc, but while she was being set apart I could not feel anything but peace.  The doubt and fears and worries were cast out and the Spirit was so strong. It was a beautiful experience I will never forget.  There was a lot of ugly crying.  :)


I'm so grateful that we were able to go out to Utah and be there this week.  This was one of my favorite trips back to Utah.  Aaron and I are so blessed to have such wonderful families.  I'm especially grateful for Amanda.  She's always been my buddy and its going to be hard to not be with her for the next year and a half.  But I know what she is doing will bless our family, will bless her own life, and will bless the many lives that she will touch as she teaches the gospel in Germany.

I know the gospel of Jesus Christ brings us real joy.  I am grateful for His Atonement that allows me to change and grow and become more like Him.  And I know that any sacrifice we make for Him and His church will never compare to all that He's done for us.  I feel pretty lucky right now.


Sunday, January 3, 2016

Happy New Year!

Wow, 2016 really snuck up on me!  As in, I think I only blogged twice in 2015.  Oops.  Good thing I am setting a goal to blog more this year.  I'm hoping it can become an every Sunday afternoon kind of thing.  

For New Years this year, we celebrated with a little party.  I almost let it go by as no big deal, but I remember being a kid and our neighbors always threw a FABULOUS New Years Eve party and wishing that my family could be like that.  So I decided we needed to be that family.  Not to say that our party was fabulous, but at least we had one.  I came up with a few last minute games (a picture scavenger hunt, picking up marshmallows with straws, saran wrap ball, and the flour game), we had our friends over for chocolate fondue (or "ondue" as Hannah kept calling it), and finished off our late night at 7:30 p.m. with a balloon drop.  And then Aaron and I fell asleep on the couch watching a movie during actual New Years because we're really exciting like that.  It was fun and simple and I'm glad we did it.  Hopefully next year, I can make it a little more fabulous.






Something we did though that I really liked was writing down some of our favorite parts of 2015 and what we're looking forward to in 2016.  Here's what we came up with:

Favorite Parts of 2015
  • Getting presents in Utah (Hannah)
  • Eating gelato (Hazel)
  • Getting a raise (Aaron)
  • Our cruise to the Bahamas
  • Utah trips
  • Visits from family and friends
  • Moving to our new house
  • Chuck-E-Cheese runs
  • Our first full year in California
  • The beach
  • Baby Wren and Baby Sammi being born

What We're Looking Forward to in 2016
  • The balloons! (Hannah)
  • The beach
  • Camping
  • Amanda serving a mission
  • Our new nephew Milo to be born
  • Steven and Emma getting married
  • BBQs
  • Turn Around being over for another year....maybe.
I am excited for 2016!  I am grateful we are in our new house, that my sweet little family is happy and relatively healthy, and that we already have so many good things to look forward to this year! Happy New Year!