Merry Christmas!!

I love this time of year. I love having time set aside for family and friends to gather together. I love all the Christmas parties that bring us all a little closer to each other. I love celebrating the birth of the Savior and remembering what a miraculous gift he was to each of us from our Heavenly Father. I love that Ty is old enough now to participate in the Nativity at family parties... even if he is the first one to run to mom and dad in his cute little angel costume.

I hope that you all have a great Christmas. I am so grateful to have such wonderful family and friends to surround me. And for a husband that I love unconditionally and for my little Ty that melts my heart.

Ty's Nativity

It all started with this little dog... my mom spotted it in a children's play Nativity set and had to have it... had to have one for each of her grandchildren. My parents have 3 Boarder Collies... and love them!

So here's Ty's favorite toys these days... he loves the angel because if you push her it plays Away in a Manger... and he totally rocks out to it.

He loves giving all the characters kisses... and then wants you to give them kisses too. His kisses are so funny cause they're fishy lip kisses.

If you don't have one of these sweet kids Nativity Sets I highly recommend it! Ty has gone crazy over it. I plan on packing it up with our Christmas stuff so that he can only play with it at Christmas time... this way it will be Special for him.

29 years

Here I am one years old.

Has it really been that long?
I love birthdays and I always have. But I have to quote a great quote from a great movie... Pretty in Pink... "Ohhhh why can't we start out old and grow younger?"

Why can't my hair still be naturally that blond?

I have great memoies from great birthdays in the past. This picture is of me on my 5th birthday. It was my first time on an airplane flying by myself. When each of us grandchildren would turn 5 my grandma would fly us to Disney Land and spend the week just the two of us... very awesome grandma.

Some other great birthday memories:

1.Having a birthday dance in my partents barn with the entire 7th grade.

2.Having a prep rally on my birthday as a sophmore and the entire school singing to me

3. Having a huge dance party with DJ Dave in Cortland Ridge on my 20th birthday

4.Eating meat for the first time in 8 years on my 21st birthday and opening my mission call

5. The Elders in my district and my companion throwing me a fun little surprise party on my 22nd birthday

7. My mom always making me candy cane cake and eating it with yummy candy cane ice cream

8. And oh yes... my sweet sweet husband on my 24th birthday... hid my presents around the apartment and told me I had 5 minutes to find them... if I didn't find them all I was out of luck... but I would get an extra 10 minutes to look if I searched the house in the nude... so after 5 minutes was up... yes he had me running around the house completely naked searching for my presents. He loves remembering that birthday too. :)

Today has been a great memory as well. I woke up to Drew sending me off to get a message. Yummy Cheesecake Factory with friends for lunch... and if you haven't tried the Chocolate Tuxedo Cheesecake... it's to die for good!
Getting a new camera that I've needed for a long time!

Years go by so quickly... but I am greatful for the ones I've had! Here's to 29 more great ones.

Santa's little helper

I love the holidays...I love hearing Christmas music on the radio and Christmas decorations in all the stores and thinking about Christmas gifts for family and friends.

We had fun setting up Christmas this past week. I had been putting it off because of Ty. A one year and Christmas decorations didn't seem to mix. But we did it and he's loved all the new lights and shinny things around the house. Ty has been so fun with the tree. Surprisingly he hasn't been as bad as I thought he would be. Every now and then he takes an ornament off the tree and carries it around. ...But mostly he likes to crawl behind the tree and sit and play. ...I'm just hoping he doesn't knock it over.

He loves the wrapping paper :)

This little puppy is Ty's pal these days. You squeeze his paw and it sings and dances to Jingle Bell Rock... Ty loves it and loves to dance with him.

This little snowman is supposed to be on our front porch... but Ty is so cute... we tell him to give the snowman kisses and he runs over and kisses him... it's so cute I can't take him out of the living room yet.

I am so happy about this! The last few years I've been collecting the different pieces to the Willow Tree Nativity set and this year I am lucky enough to have them all. ...Thanks to my mom and sister for birthday and Christmas gifts I now have it and I love it... yes I realize it is sitting on top of DVD player ... but I have no where else to put the DVD player... or Nativity scene.