Happy New Year!

Invites

Last weekend Suz and a friend from church threw me a baby shower! Suz and I though of the theme "Baby It's Cold Outside" and made these invitations together.  I also hosted a party for the young women at church and made these invitations.  I really liked the way they both turned out.

Basketball Belly

 29 weeks

 30 weeks

 32 weeks

33 weeks

I haven't posted a pregnancy post in a while, but there doesn't seem to be too much new going on as far as my pregnancy goes.  I only have about 7 weeks left now, which seems crazy!  The time from Halloween to now has flown by, and I hope after Christmas until the baby comes goes by fast too.  I cannot wait to meet my baby boy.

Since my last post my bad symptoms are pretty much the same.  My back hurts pretty often now and most nights I have trouble falling asleep, and occasionally have heart burn.  Besides that I really do feel great!  I've still been loving milk and drinking a lot of it, and lately have had cinnamon toast crunch almost every day.

I'm around 15 pounds total gained so far.  I haven't noticed any weight gain besides in my stomach from baby and my extra fluffy love handles :).  I feel like my thighs may have gotten a little bigger too, but I might just be imagining that.  My stomach really does look like a basketball when it's not covered in clothes.

Christmas Photo Garland

Anyone who knows me knows I loooove Christmas and Christmas decorations.  Almost every flat surface downstairs in my home has Christmas decorations on it.  My sister had a great idea of making an easy Christmas photo garland.  I wanted to bring a little holiday cheer into my bedroom so I made this today to hang above my bed.  Besides choosing and printing photos it only takes a few minutes to put together.  It's a great last minute DIY decoration if you want a little more cheer in your home.

All you need is some bakers twine, mini clothes pins, and Christmas photos.  I printed photos I found on Pinterest, but this would be great to use your own Christmas photos, and would make it a little more personal too!

Just clip your photos evenly spaced on the twine and hang up your garland!

Here's my photo sources if you're interested: merry and happy, wreath truck, snowy cabin, merry and bright, deer with garland.

And here's a few more beautiful Christmas and winter photos: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Temple Square

Every year Jensen and I have been together we have gone up to Temple Square to see the Christmas lights.  This was our 5th year going.  We went with the youth in our ward at church, so we didn't get any pictures together.  It was a lot of fun though, and freezing cold!  I'm hoping Jensen and I will have time to go again this year with just the two of us.

The Most Wondeful Time of the Year

Even though it still feels like the beginning of December, Christmas is only a few weeks away! So far this Christmas (and Thanksgiving) season have been great.  We have already gotten two pretty big snow storms, which I love, and I have gotten to do quite a few Christmas activities.  I hope all the snow we've gotten is a sign of an extra snowy winter, and a white Christmas!  Even though I can't go snowboard, and Jensen won't even let me go sledding, I still love the snow.

- I went to see the Christmas Carol with Suz! A friend from work was in it, and I was able to go see it the same night as a lot of them.

- Puppies at uncle Jimmy's

- Snow buried my car while I was at work. 

- A small peak of some new decorations I got for my mantle

- Suz and I skeet shooting

- My Christmas mantle! I'm kind of in love with how bright and happy it is

- We got a space heater to help keep us warm and lower our bill, Pigeon has discovered how nice it is

- Lights for our tree

-Jensen and I went to see Trans Siberian Orchestra Christmas concert and it was so much fun! I've been wanting to go for a while now, and even though it was kind of expensive we decided to splurge since this will be the last Christmas before a baby joins our family.  I'm really glad we went.  Some of the concert we were both laughing so hard.  All of the men in the band seemed like wanna be 80s rock stars. Most had long hair and were head banging to their music.

 -Jeeping in the snow!  Usually I hate going off roading with Jensen, but the snow makes it difficult enough that he doesn't go on any crazy trails. Plus I loved driving through all the snow so it was a ton of fun!

- Kiki moved to Texas after graduating from BYU so I haven't seen her in a while and she came up to visit for a family reunion. She was able to meet me for a quick lunch together.
- Pigeon enjoying the heat again
- Snowy trees!

Suz and Jordan

Suz and Jordan needed pictures taken for their family Christmas card so we went out at Jimmy's and I took some for them.  Not too bad for about 10 minutes out in the chilly wheat field.

Thanksgiving Day

My uncle Jimmy has 10 children, and half of them are married now so between marriages and grandchildren his family grows and grows.  There was about 30 people there for Thanksgiving. (Jimmy, Rosie, Carla, Amaris, Matt, Matt's grandma, Mya, Cooper, Westley, Ali, Tim, Nicole, Oakley, Jackson, Spencer, Shalise, Porter, Nathan, Claire, Natalie, Jessica, Katie, Megan, Rick, Mama, Suz, Viv, Jordan, Catherine, and two of Jessica's roommates.)

Jackson, Katie, Ali, and Suz

Natalie and me

Ali

Oakley, Natalie, Jackson

Uncle Jimmy and my mama

Catherine and Amaris

Megan, Jessica, and Katie

Skeet Shooting

Most visits to Uncle Jimmy's involve hunting trips or at least going shooting.  Every Thanksgiving on Black Friday the boys go bird hunting while the girls go shopping.  This trip also included skeet shooting a few times. 

Cooper even went with a broken leg.

You're never too young to learn to shoot if you're part of Uncle Jimmy's family ;)

We played Annie Oakley while shooting. Suz and Natalie were both so good! The final round with just the two of them took a long time to finally get a winner.  They both hit almost every shot.  I need to practice my shooting skills so Suz isn't so much better than me. :)

Thanksgiving at Jimmy's

Suz, Jordan, and I headed up to Idaho for Thanksgiving week to spend some time with my uncle Jimmy and his kids. My mom and Rick also came up from California to spend the week there!  Before Thanksgiving the first stopped by our house to spend a few days.  It was really nice to have her see where Jensen and I live now and to spend some time with them.  It had been a full year since I saw them last!

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun, but I did feel a little guilty.  Jensen had to work the day before and day after Thanksgiving so I left him behind.  I did make a few meals and buy lots of snacks for him to eat while I was gone though so he didn't go hungry.  And of course made sure he had somewhere to eat Thanksgiving dinner. :)