Texas Time!

Well, here we are, approaching September and you haven't gotten a real update on our lives since Christmas. It's typical Sabrina behavior. Updating our blog with our end of 2011 and all of 2012 happenings have been on my to do list for a very long time. It's just not something that rises to the top of the priority list very often. I finally got some motivation to start. I am sure it has nothing to do with getting 5 points on my Feel Great in 8 Challenge for doing it :).

I am just going to pick right where we left off (besides that photo shoot we posted in March). We had a wonderful Christmas and fun family visitors. That very same Christmas day, after saying our goodbyes to the family, we packed up and started our trek toward Houston to visit Brett's sister, Carla, and her family. We made it to Van Horn, TX on the first leg of the trip and drove the rest of the way the next day. So really, the fun began on Dec 27th.

That is the day we headed to Galveston. We had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe and then spent time on the beach. It was a beautiful, clear day, The water was as clear as any Carla and her family had ever seen. Lucky us! We then headed to Moody Gardens and went to their aquarium and rainforest exhibits. They also had a big Christmas lights display that we walked through. The kids had such a great time catching up with their cousins.


The next day we stayed mostly at Carla's home, going to the local park, playing in piles of leaves and hanging out with the Kindreds. They got to meet Parker and then we went to dinner. It was soooo great to spend some time with them.


Because we can't sit still for long though, the next morning we packed up and headed to Dallas to watch BYU play in the Armed Forces Bowl. I love that we took this little extra vacation with Carla's family. We had a blast dressing up in BYU gear and cheering on the Cougars. It was a great game and as you can see from the pictures, our seats weren't too shabby - 2nd row if I remember correctly. I can't say I remember the final score though. I do know BYU won and it was an exciting game, so that's what counts.


We spent a lot of our time in Dallas just hanging out at the hotel, swimming, eating, playing with cousins. Adie's cousin, Amberlee, introduced her to the wonderful world of American Girl dolls. Before leaving Dallas, we took a trip to an American Girl store. It is insane and amazing in there. I remember reading the American Girl series and drooling over the AG catalog as a child, so it was even fun for me to walk around. Since that time, Adie has been working and saving all her extra money to buy herself her own AG doll. She is very close.


We made a trip to the Fort Worth Zoo on our final morning with the Gutkes. We did all the standard zoo stuff - saw animals big and small, rode the train, etc. Again, more than anything, it was just fun to be spending time together as a family. We went out to lunch and then said our goodbyes.

It was a whirlwind trip, spent mostly in the car, but the memories were priceless and the kids were champs as travelers. I think we've just subjected them to so many road trips they have given up even trying to complain about them. Carla and Jeff were wonderful hosts, their home is beautiful, their kids are so fun and we are so glad we were insane enough to drive to Utah and Idaho for Thanksgiving and then Houston right after Christmas. With those 2 trips we were able to see all of our siblings, parents and grandparents. This sentimental girls always loves the opportunity to do that. I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

The kids, circa March, 2012

It's been a while since we have printed pictures of the kids for the wall, almost 2 years to be exact (it's also been a while since we blogged about anything). It was high time we changed that. The weather was beautiful here in Arizona, so we packed up the kids and headed out for a photo shoot. Here are some of our favorites.

Family Pics

Before Christmas our cute neighbor took some family photos for us. It's been a while and we wanted something to put on our Christmas card. Our kids were being typical young children which means it was hard to get a decent picture of all of us at once. And then there is the issue of me still wanting to lose a few (or actually a lot) of pounds before doing much documentation of this time of life (the extra poundage from the third child is a bit more stubborn and I am a bit more tired and lazy about doing something about it). Despite these challenges there are a few we liked. She 'shopped a few of them in vintage style which I thought turned out pretty cute. I am so glad we don't have to do this too often.

 

This is the second best family picture that didn't quite make the Christmas card cut.

 

Adie may have gotten those awkward posing genes from me...we just can't seem to be able to look relaxed and normal in most photos, but we still think she is a cutie.

 

Here is our pensive-looking Chase who is actually just holding on for dear life because it freaked him out to be climbing on a train car. He really loves trains but apparently doesn't love climbing on them.

 

I think Brett looks great here. Yay for being married for 7.5 years!

 

And here is the winner. We put a black and white version on the Christmas card (and on my FB profile).

We didn't get a picture of Parker that day because it was rainy and there wasn't really a soft location to put him as we were in an orchard and then near train tracks. Now, Brett just needs to bust out our camera again and get some updated pictures of this kid because he is growing up so fast.

Oh Yeah, We Have a Blog

Now that we've gone almost 3 months without posting anything here, I guess it's high time we do. I was already unmotivated to take the time to blog before, but after rejoining Facebook and getting a smart phone, it's been really hard. It takes me less than a minute to throw up a picture with a small caption on Facebook. Let's just say it takes me forever here. Anyway, I am doing a quick wrap up of the year and thanks to Picasa's collage feature, this shouldn't take too long for you to scroll through.

 
In the middle of November my dad came for a visit. The kids adore their grandparents, so his visit was a very welcome event. He was here for a week but for some reason I only took out my camera one day. Luckily, it was the day we went on a random scenic drive to a very beautiful lake a couple hours from our home. I didn't know places like this existed in Southern Arizona. We all had a wonderful time spending time with Grandpa Savage and he was he even willing to brave driving back up to Utah with us when his trip was over, which brings us to our next set of pictures...


 
We spent Thanksgiving break in Utah and Idaho. My dad drove with the kids and me up to Utah the weekend before Thanksgiving and Brett flew in on Thanksgiving day where we met him in Idaho. We packed in as much family time as we could during that week and a half. The kids got to see all of their grandparents, great-grandparents and almost all of their cousins and aunts and uncles during that time. We played lots of games, stayed up too late, ate lots of good food, rode the Trax train, saw the Temple square lights and made many wonderful memories.



 

Since we were with so much family, we took advantage and blessed Parker while up in Idaho. Some of Brett's cousins and an aunt and uncle were even able to come, which was so nice of them. I wish we had gotten a better picture of Parker in his dapper little outfit, but he seems to be sleeping or kicking or being held in all sorts of awkward positions in most of these photos. You can barely tell from the photos, but Parker is wearing the cutest of shoes made by his own talented Aunt Camille. They were his early Christmas gift and a perfect addition for the blessing outfit. My favorite photos in this collage though are the ones of us trying to get some sort of normal family picture. As you can see, it didn't happen, but at least Brett and I are smiling so we must have been having a good time.



After Thanksgiving was busy, busy, like it is for practically everyone. We had some sad moments saying goodbye to a little friend who left us way too soon. We had lots of happy moments decorating our yard, Christmas trees and cookies. We made neighbor gifts and Adie learned to weave potholders. The kids jumped in bounce houses, acted out the nativity at preschool and at home just for the fun of it. Adie and her friend were Suzie Snowflakes, dancing ballet and tap for their winter performance. Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year, even if it stresses me out a little.

 

This year we were so fortunate to have visitors at our house for Christmas. One of my cousins married a lovely lady in the Mesa temple a couple days after Christmas (congrats, Daniel and Lisa!) so his family was down here for the holidays, as were my mom, stepdad and grandparents, and though their stay was short, we packed in the fun. We ate lots of food (as always), played cards, saw the lights in our neighborhood (we have a lot of fun impressive displays here) and just spent time together. I am told it is nice to have little Christmas celebrations with just your immediate family. I am sure that is true, but in our 7.5 years of marriage we have yet to celebrate Christmas with just our immediate family and, truth be told, I am okay with that. I love having as much family around as possible. After a wonderful Christmas sacrament meeting in the morning, lots of gift-opening and a yummy brunch everyone packed up. My extended family headed to Mesa to get prepped for the upcoming wedding and Brett, the kids and I started our trek to Texas. More on that in another post...

The best of times...

To begin with, as a general disclaimer to what follows, everybody is alive with no long term side effects from anything that will hereafter be discussed. I also warn you that there are plenty of pictures in this post.

Sabrina asked me to blog today about our last month or so. She suggested I do it in a highlight/lowlight fashion.

Highlight: Grandma came to visit for a few days.

Happy Family! 

 (guess who took this picture)

Picking beans at a local farm 

 Sucking on honey sticks

Corn, who knew it came in brown too? 

Adie picked her own pumpkin this year 

 Chase loved seeing the tractors

We promise we have more in our family tree than just Adie. 

Lowlight: We've all been sick off and on over the last month. Lots of fevers, runny noses, and a trip to the ER. Adie had a febrile seizure, scared us all badly, and ended up spending a couple of hours in the ER until they determined she didn't have anything more serious.

Highlight: it's football season.

This is a common sight during games. I stay connected. 

 Sabrina made delicious cookies for some woman get together. They were good and she was quite pleased with how pretty they looked.

Lowlight: Sabrina forgot to put the car in park when dropping Adie off for preschool. 

Highlight: Sabrina's mom was in the passenger's seat and stopped the car before it got more than 6 inches into the garage door.

Highlight: Halloween.

 Apparently we do gingerbread houses for Halloween now

 Adie was Cinderella and Chase was Tigger.

 Sabrina cooked us dinner in a pumpkin the Sunday before Halloween. Not the same one we carved for jack-o-lanterns.

 Jack-o-lanterns.

 Our kids seem to go through this phase where they think smiling requires them to scrunch their face up and close their eyes.

Adie likes to pose these days.

Lowlight: Parker goes to bed late. Chase wakes up early and during the middle of the night. This doesn't add up to much sleep for the rest of us. Fortunately Adie somehow sleeps through Chase waking up, turning the lights on, and playing with the toys in their room. I wish I did too.

Highlight: Grandma was here (ok, I think we already said that, but we still have more pictures). Adie's also quite the little artist. 

For quiet time, Adie does crafts. It's really pretty amazing what she comes up with. She's showing off a rose that she made. She did all by herself except for rolling up the flower she cut out. She also likes to give people her art. Keep it folks. She'll be famous one day.

 For Grandma's birthday, we made a pumpkin pinata. And when I say we, I mean Sabrina and the kids.

Our kids loved having Grandma come visit.