Great News

1. A fellow teacher at my school has a little girl who is a Brownie...which means that I get to buy Girl Scout Cookies from her. When she told me they her little girl was selling those delicious cookies it made my day. I quickly signed up for 3 boxes of Samoas and Tagalongs (or whatever they are called--the peanut butter ones). Not a huge Thin mint fan. I like em' but not my fav.

2. Over the weekend Adam and I went ice skating with the Alders. The great news is that Adam and I didn't fall once!

3. Saw Ghost Town and Loved it! Hilarious movie.

4. Adam and I are going to the SL Temple to do a session. We were married at this temple but have never been through it for a session before. I am excited for the live reenactment instead of the movie--but I hear it is longer.

A new Car!

A few days after Christmas Adam and I bought...A NEW CAR! ( I hear the voice of Bob Barker when I write that). We had been looking for a new car for a few months and finally found one. We bought this car:

A Subaru Legacy. Even though this is a stock photo, we got this same dark silver color. I didn't talk a picture of our actual car because the snow is in the way. It is not the car you think to buy right away but after researching it and driving it we knew it was the car we wanted. Good thing we bought it too because it is amazing. Next time you hang out with us we will take you for a light spin of Subaru enjoyment if you desire.

Adam's Humor

We all do it... You know that you do...Even when you think nobody is watching....You pick your nose in your car. Admit it. Well, Adam and I falling into this trap in our car occasionally made notice of it the other day. So, I asked Adam.

"Why did Heavenly Father give us buggers?"
"I don't know. So that we would have something to do in our cars."

I started laughing so hard. Adam pulls out these one-liners all the time and makes me laugh. I hope you enjoy this insight we had together.

Swollen Jaw

Just in case you were wondering why my lower right jaw is swollen I'll fill you in. A couple days after Christmas I started having the worst tooth ache. Turns out a previous crown (root canal) was infected. I was in so much pain I called my dentist on his cell phone so that he could call in a prescription of antibiotics for me. This all leads to my swollen jaw because I had to go into the Endodontist on Monday for an emergency root canal...so I thought. Turns out, the Endodontist instead made an incision on my lower gum line of the said infected tooth, drained out the infection, put some other stuff back in, and gave my three stitches to put me back together. Lucky me, I get to eat soft foods on one side of my mouth and swish some blue fluid instead of brushing my teeth for three days. After I told my students that I had surgery on my mouth, they looked at me and said, "Oh yeah, I can see that your face is a little fatter on one side." Thanks...I prefer swollen.

Fun with Family at Sundance

My mother, and my youngest brother Parker, and I went to Sundance onFriday. I love skiing/boarding with my family. One of my goals over the 2 week break was to go boarding. We had a little bit of overcast, but when we got to BackMountain we had this increadible view of Utah Valley below with the sunset on the horizon. Parker is an excellent snowboarder and it was fun to watch him do his is fancy tricks while my mom and I happily made our way down the slopes. I can't wait to go again this season.

After skiing Adam and I met up with our friends Jamie and Shaun, Chelsea and Burke and played games all night. Adam and I ended up winning the first game. We don't mess around.

Babysitting and the Flu

Adam and babysat some of our nieces and nephews over the break. So, Saturday after Christmas my brother and sister-in-law took off for Cancun and suddenly Adam and I had three kids to watch for 5 days. We stayed at our in-laws to watch the adorable kids because that is where they are living right now due to the situation that they are building a house right now.Honestly, it was nice to have the help from the mother-in-law and sister-in-law (also staying at my in-laws over the break). Adam and I are a little biased but we think we have the cutest nieces and nephews. Below are the three kids we watched. Brynlee 4, Jett 2, Paisley 1.

little Paisley has so much personality. I loved having her all to myself for 5 days.

Brynlee, Paisley, and Jett (thanks Heatlher for letting me barrow your pic)

We made sure that we kept the kids busy by doing a lot of fun activities like going to Kangaroo Zoo, playing in the snow outside, and bowling. The kids got better scores than I did in blowing but they had bumpers and a ball roller-thingy. Anyway, we had fun with the kids. Our plan was to wear them out during the day, not give them a nap (except Paisley) and then they would sleep better at night. I think we succeeded.

Right after we went bowling I started feeling realy sick. I kept saying, "my stomach feels sick". By the time we reach home, I threw up all my Costa Vida lunch. I officially had the 24 hour flu. I eventually threw up about 12 times and even threw up my stomach acid. No fun. I haven't thrown up since 9th grade so I think I made up the time for the years passed. At one point during the night I looked over at Adam and said, "I have the flu, a tooth ache (I am getting a root canal on Monday), and three kids...How did this happen?" He just laughed and kept holding back my hair as a puked.

I missed all the New Years Eve parties because I was so weak, had a fever, and my body ached to much to do anything. So, instead, Adam and I played Barn Yard Rummy with his parents and sister and brother-in-law. We did watch the ball drop though.

While I was sick, Adam was so good and took work off to watch the kids.

Now than we are done babysitting I look back on the experience and have come to the realization that it was hard to watch three kids, enjoyable at the same time because they are so dang cute with lovable personalities, but I am grateful Heavenly Father only (usually) blesses us with one child at a time.

Christmas

Adam and I spent Christmas with the Nelsons. It was my first Christmas away from home. Yeah, I know my family is only in American Fork but we did almost all the Christmas festivities with the Nelsons. So, even though I am not away from home, I feel like I am because I wasn't home for Christmas. However, Adam and I had a wonderful Christmas. The Nelson's have great traditions and I really loved being with the Nelson's on Christmas morning and Christmas Eve.

Adam's family doesn't put any gifts out until Christmas Eve when all the children are asleep because they used to open present up and guess what they are. Instead, everyone wakes up Christmas morning to "their Pile" of presents. Here is Adam sitting by his pile of presents--which we didn't open till 9:00 because all the kids slept in and we had to wait for them. Crazy! I am used to 7:00am present opening but I will admit that it was nice to sleep in a bit.

My pile of presents. Adam brought out one more after I was all done opening my pile. It was a very large picture of the Salt Lake Temple. Adam does such a great job of surprising me.

Here is the full view of the piles of presents and all the family that we enjoyed Christmas with. It was fun to celebrate Christmas with children who still believe in Santa. They were so cute. Every gift they opened their eyes would get wide and their mouths would open big and they were so excited--even if all they opened was a pair of socks.

Adam's big gift was an iTV and a GPS system.
Brittany's big gift was the picture the SL Temple and a fossil watch.
Lucky for us, we got tons of emergency preparedness too! Yes, just what we wanted for Christmas! Thanks mom and dad.