mini marilyn

Indie, my cousin's little girl, found this air vent at my parents house and just couldn't resist how cool it was that it blew her skirt up. She was channeling her inner Marilyn Monroe.

SLC 1/2 marathon

On April 17 this will be me. Yes, the time has come that I am half way fulfilling one of my life goals. So my 3 life goals are:

1. learn to speak another language fluently
2. learn to play the piano good enough to play in church
3. run a marathon

I will be running the Salt Lake City 1/2 marathon with Megan!!! She made me do it and now I am so excited. I have been training every week, I bought some awesome running shoes (it feels like running on clouds) and really I am just overall pumped about it. I hope to see you all at the finish line cheering us on. Megan's really good friend from Vegas, Holly Weaver, is coming to do it to and so is our cousin, Emilie! We are so excited. Emilie and Holly are like professionals though, so this is weak sauce to them..........they will be our moral support.....We can't wait!!!!

nyc apartment

Man Jim and Melissa are living the dream. Look how cute their apartment is. It is a 5 story walk up building that is over 100 years old. They live on the 4th floor. I was just dying with how much fun it would be to live in New York City and this would be your apartment. It's like out of a movie!

We can't thank Jim and Melissa enough for letting us stay with them! We had such a good time and we were so appreciative of them letting us crash on their new couch. I kind of felt bad to be the first to break it in. I'm just hoping I can visit again and again in the coming years that they live there!

Mom's Birthday

Happy Birthday Mom! I love you!

i'm jealous

You have to read my sister-in-law's, blog about living in New York City. They just moved there about 2 weeks ago. They are LIVING THE DREAM! It is absolutely amazing the cool things they get to do and experiences they are already having! We can all live virtually through her :) Check it out here!

good ole' canada

Welcome to Alberta! Here are some of the pictures I took while in Canada. Unfortunately I did not take too many pictures, so these will have to do!

This is the back of their house. For some reason, I never took a picture of the front of it. Monet was LOVING the backyard. So much room to run around and play!

This is the view from Monet's window. Isn't Canada flatter than you expected it to be?

Here we are at the grocery store. How smart is the Canadian version of the kid shopping cart. The kids are up high so they can't get out and run away. Megan was loving it.

Then we got to the baby food aisle and Megan couldn't get over the big bottles. They had little bottles too, but only the big bottles for Scarlett's age. She was dying over how Scarlett would finish one. It was funny. They only had one brand and slightly different versions of the food. They had a very appealing beef stroganoff which I thought she should buy.

Good ole' Canada! I can't wait to go back and visit again! I already miss Megan so much.

canada

The car ride to Canada! Here is how Monet started out the journey. About 4 hours in, she switched into the U-Haul with Clayton and LOVED IT. She was in the big rig with all the windows to look out of. It was cute!

We came over a bend and there was Canada. Very desolate looking I realize. The border was right ahead. Megan did start crying at this point. She was feeling very patriotic :) You know, leaving her homeland behind!This is while we were inside and they were immigrating to Canada. How funny is that!?

Monet really wanted some candy out of the vending machine, but we had one small problem....we had no Canadian money!

They let them by and we didn't even have to unload the trucks for inspection! They were officially Canadian!

moving day

Megan and Clayton left from my parent's house to go to move to Canada. I went with them to help Megan in her car so she didn't have to drive plus take care of the kiddo's. And to keep her company for 15 hours. Especially during the part when Scarlett decided she didn't want to be in her car seat anymore and cried for 2 1/2 hours straight. It was soooo sad! She was just so tired and miserable to even go to sleep!

scarlett's earings

Little cutie patootie Scarlett got her ears pierced when they were here visiting for Halloween before their big move to Canada. It was the saddest little thing I have ever seen. She was so sad and Megan had to hold her hands down so she could pierce the ears. They looked so cute once they were done. I think I may have to have my mom hold my first little girl when she gets her ears pierced because I would probably cry.

walk through riverwoods

Demi has been in town this week for the Thanksgiving holiday. We have sure had fun hitting up the Provo hot-spots. Five Guys, In & Out, Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory. It was so fun when we got this hot chocolate. We just left my parents house and walked to all the shops in the Riverwoods and looked at all the pretty Christmas lights! They live at such a cool location!

megan, eat your heart out

As many of you know, my sister Megan recently moved to Canada. Well the biggest complaint she has is that butter is only available in 1 lb. bricks. So they are not quartered like they are here in the states. Well my mom just bought this box of butter with not 4 but 8 sticks of butter. ha ha ha! Each stick was 1/4 cup. Looks like Megan will just have to bring a cooler across the border and hit up Costco every time she visits!

halloween

Megan and Clayton were in Provo on Halloween, so we had chili and then went trick-or-treating with Monet. My dad stayed home since Scarlett was asleep. It was really funny seeing that there was 7 adults all with 1 child trick-or-treating. She is just so loved :)

I of course provided a Halloween inspired cake for the occasion; seeing that cake decorating is my new best friend. I tried to recreate a cake that I had from RJ Goodies (my favorite bakery ever in Houston) that I had for a birthday party when I was little. I was proud of myself, but I'm sure my cakes will improve over time!

Monet was Fo-Fa from Yo Gabba Gabba. She is just checking herself out in the mirror. So cute!

Aubrey and I just hanging out. For those of you who haven't seen my parents new house they bought, her it is. It is really modern so they did a ton of work to it and are tweaking it to make it more "home-y" as my mom says. It is really awesome!

segway of orange county

Check us out on our Segway's. While we were in California last month we decided to try out a segway tour of Newport Boardwalk. I was there with only my parents because Ryan and the rest of the family that was able to come this summer weren't there yet. I kept jokingly saying that I liked being an only child because of all the stuff I was getting to do with my parents alone..... :) but by the end of the week I was thinking how boring it would be to have no siblings......ha ha, but really, thank you mom and dad sooo much It was so fun!

First of all we had a quick training in the store on how to ride these bad boys. It was kind of scary for the first 15 seconds, but then it was SO EASY and soooo much fun!

You have to try them out the next time you are in a tourist spot.

newport beach

Last month I went with my parents to Newport Beach, California, for a little fun in the sun. The picture above is Corona Del Mar. I always tell Ryan that one day we will retire to the flower streets there. I swear that is my dream in life! Ryan, Carly, and Megan and Clayton came later in the week to join us. It was sad because Jim and Melissa and Hilarie and Robert couldn't come this year. We missed them.

This was a delicious little italian resturant that our segway tour guide showed us on Lido Island. It was FANTASTIC....espically the artary clogging sausages stuffed with cheese........soooo good! mmmmmm yummy!Also, here is Conca d'Oro. My parents have been coming here since they were little (well at least that is what I think). Well I know at least since Hilarie was a baby. They would drive there and eat with Hilarie asleep in the booth. We always have to eat here for nostalgic reasons!

blue bonnet fields

When my mom was visiting us in Houston, we took a little trip to the Blue Bell Ice Cream Factory in Brenham, Texas. We took the tour and got our free scoop of ice cream. The funniest part was when my mom bought her first ever "senior citizen" priced ticket! We had to caputre the moment. Then we went and took some pictures out in the beautiful blue bonnet fields.

little burrito

Look at this cute little pa pus burrito! This is my new niece Scarlett. She is wrapped up all snug as a bug in a rug! I just want to go pick her up and snuggle her!

the alamo

I'm catching up on all the blogging I haven't been doing. I have a lot of post coming your way. This is from the quick day trip we took to San Antonio, Texas while we were living in Houston. We drove out to visit the Alamo and the River walk. We had SO MUCH FUN! Parker and Carson got some Davey Crockett Guns while they were there. I can't remember why but there was a festival going on and the Alamo was all lite up at night. It was actually pretty cool. That is why there is a red projection all over the face of it if you were wondering.

Here we are getting out of our cars in the parking garage.

I'm sure glad Carson had his "puppy back pack" while we were walking next to the river. He could have fallen in so easily. I was in charge of 'walking' him part of the time!

We had such a great time we can't wait to go back. When we are Texans again this is where we can take all of our visitors! Oh ya!