'Ode to MHPC'

As I was cleaning out some old boxes, I found a few keepsakes that took me back to a more silly day. I found the chains we used to wear around school, I know what you are thinking, "THAT IS SOOOO COOL!!!" and the sash we wore to graduation. WSC and MHPC we fellow members salute you. How awesome are teenagers? I hope all of you never forget the quirky things you did during the teen years.

New Year's Eve & Jared's Birthday!

For New Year's Eve we always go to the cabin & celebrate Jared's birthday. Here we are sledding down the road & you get going really fast & end up having to drag your feet the whole way down. One time when I was going down a ways behind Megan & I saw a boot on the side of the road so I grabbed it as I sled past it & saw Meg with a bootless foot & a wet sock at the bottom of the hill.

Right before we went sledding, Megan looked out the window & noticed something out there. It ended up being about 60 Elk working their way up the mountain. Later that night they came back down. We usually see lots of deer & an occassional moose so this was quite a sight!

Jared turned 28 on the 31st of Dec. so even though he has the 2009 glasses on, this picture was taken in 2008. This year he had his favorite banana cream pie instead of a cake.

(Long story behind this special homemade pie.)

Everyone willingly wearing their "New Year" tiaras during dinner!

First day of the year & we got to see this beautiful rainbow! Thanks to everyone who made it up this year even though it was a quick trip!

Ugly Sweater Party

Lindsay & Aleena were successful with another one of their dress-up parties.

Jared found 2 sweaters for us at Savers but I decided to wash them before the party & his wool sweater shrunk of course & mine wasn't dry in time so we had to design our own.

Here's the guys having a jolly time.

Of course they managed to fit in some football.

We had a lot of fun! Thanks!!

This was the sunset before we left to go to the party. Too bad I took it through the screen. duh

Snowmobiling

The day after Christmas we went on a fun ride in the new powder & the freezing cold.

We got stuck a few times but Jared & Brady took care of getting us back on track.

We saw this moose sitting in the snow!

New Years Bash!!!

For all of you who need a reminder of how great the celebration is at the cabin over New Years, I thought I would post some previous highlights.

Melting snow for water.

Snow shoeing.

Derek and me plowing snow!

The double sledders. Pretty Scary!

The Luge!

Snowmobiling.

This is going to be a get together to remember. They always are, so schedule some time to come from the 30th to the 1st hope to see ya there.

Our Tree

This year we kept finding good looking trees but none of them were tall enough for Jared. Then we came across this cute tree & brought it home with us.

Wyatt in shock from so much whipped cream!

And so far Lucy loves the tree. It's her one chance to pretend like she's outside I guess.

We're excited for Christmas!

I can't wait to see what Lucy does when we get our tree up. Right now she enjoys laying on the tree skirt.

Turkey Trot

Jared & I haven't been running much since it got cold but after finding out about this race on Thanksgiving morning we had something to try & train for. It was 4 miles & proved that we are not in as good of shape as we once were.

Santa came out of his housein his p.j. bottoms. I'm pretty sure he's the real thing.

Here's Jared & Ryan showing their excitement at the beginning of the race. After the race Jared went & played football & the rest of the day kept complaining how sore he was & kept saying "Gary's a big guy."

Orlando! sorry, it's long

Jared & I bought plane tickets several months ago to visit our friends, Derek & Chelsea, who were suppose to be moving to NY. They ended up moving to UT instead so we kept our tickets & decided to go to Orlando to visit Jared's brother Kevin & his wife Amy & their kids. Since we kept our tickets with Jetblue we had to go to NY then down to Orlando so here is the only bit of NY we got to see.

We LOVE Walt Disney World & have been there every year since we've been married. This year we were adventurous & tried a lot of new things we'd never done before. Now we have some new favorites.

Jared was sad we only got to do this one once becuase the line was always so long. It was like a 3-D Carnival video game. Tons of fun!!

Yes, I won! That's another reason Jared wanted to do it again, is to see if he could beat me :)


Another favorite was the character animation class. It's in Hollywood Studios (MGM) & they teach you how to draw one character each class. It's about 20-30 min. long & it's amazing how easy they make it.


Here are the results of the class. We did it twice in a row right before the park closed.



It was so great to see everyone. Jared & Boston got to bond in a special way. We went to see HSM 3 and at the end of the movie Boston crawled on Jared's lap & was squirming around like he couldn't get comfortable then ended up throwing up all over him. It was crazy but luckily we were on the front row so only Jared got covered :)

We got to meet our new little nephew Van! Only makes us wish even more that we got to see them more often.

One day we went to Sea World & Avery was so brave & went on this log ride with us. It was a very humid day so my hair was poofy. The kids dressed up & went trick-or-treating around the park.

Before we left we were able to go to Cocoa Beach. It made it even harder to come home to the colder weather. I could hang out at the beach all day if Jared would let me.

We had a wonderful time! Thanks Kevin & Amy for letting us stay once again & for taking care of us!!
Unfortunately Jared was sick on the way home with a cold so during our layover in Pheonix he got to take a quick nap before getting to SLC at 11:30 pm. Isn't he cute?

St. George

Many thanks to Jeff & Lindsay for letting us stay at the condo & to Derek & Chelsea for driving with us to St. George. We had fun soaking in the sun, golfing, & playing tennis.

This is hard to see but the guys in it are Jared, Ryan, Nick & Derek. They went golfing in the morning then Jared & Derek went again with the rest of us.

Conference Weekend

For Conference Weekend we went to Logan & stayed with Casey & Melanie. Melanie took us to a fun miniature golf course one night which was decorated really cute for Halloween.

On Saturday we went (without Jared) to the last day of the Farmer's Market & got an adorable wreath for only $10, & some earings for $5. It was great!