Christmas

Travis was flying Christmas Eve to New Year's Eve, so we had our Christmas Eve on Monday and Christmas the Tuesday before the 25th. We did such a good job faking it, we didn't feel like we were missing anything by not actually being together on the 25th.

On OUR 24th, we woke up and had little smokies for breakfast, a tradition from my family (the little smokies are actually for my mom's birthday...yup mom's birthday is the day before Christmas...but this tradition that now feels like part of the Christmas routine really is in honor of her. Hope she doesn't hate hearing that too much!) We made cookies that day, maybe a tradition we will continue together. And ended the day with a family movie (The Tales of Despereaux), a tradition from Travis's family.

This is our glowing Christmas tree...or should I say trees. If I had to buy a fake tree, it better have been super cute! (I grew up surrounded by a Christmas tree field, fake trees were never an option!)

This is us on OUR Christmas morning.

After opening presents, we headed to the doctors for our sonogram. It was so nice of them to open up their office for us on Christmas! hehe! This is how excited Travis was...

...and this is how excited I was!

We finished off the day with a delicious Christmas dinner. I think we probably spent the entire dinner trying to think of boy names we liked. We've had girl names picked out for probably 5 years, but never any boy names...and we're still wondering...what will we come up with???

What a wonderful Christmas!

Pregnant Pics

Why I'm doing this to myself, I'm not sure! This is what I looked like at 21 weeks 

Some clothes are definitely better looking than others. So far this is probably my favorite sweater. On my last trip to Oregon, my nephew was playing with The Bernstein Bears figurines, and I've decided Mama bear and I look very similar...nice round belly, nice round bum! Nobody warned me my bum would expand at the same rate as my tummy! Oh well, you can only control so much of what your body decides to do I guess.

The Results

A very healthy, cute, little boy!

I wish we could watch him all day! It was amazing to see just how developed he really is! He is 5 1/2 inches long, and apparently likes to take very good naps at about 2:00 in the afternoon. We got to see a few wiggles, but he was very sleepy.

We are very happy and grateful to have such a healthy, normal baby boy! We were kind of hoping for a girl, but figured it was probably a boy. I thought I had prepared myself to be just as happy in case it was a boy...well, maybe I wasn't quite as prepared as I thought. I'm not at all sad it's a little boy, but I must admit, I'm a little heartbroken to have to wait longer for the little girl I've always envisioned. Regardless, I know I will (and do) love him just the same :)

Wishing You A Very Merry Christmas

From Travis, Cynthia, and little baby coming in May

We're finally spilling the beans about our new little baby! We told our families at Thanksgiving time, but have otherwise kept it a secret. It's been fun to get used to the idea of actually being parents, and getting more and more excited together. We didn't realize how fun it would be to share the news, and see how excited others are for us too!

Since weeks change more often than months, that's what we've been keeping track of :) I'm 19 weeks (I think that is well into the 4th month), and just about half way. The due date is May 14th, and we get an early present this year...Tuesday we get to see how our baby is doing and find out the gender!!

Christmas Party

Earlier this month we had our Enrichment Christmas Party. I am on the committee and was asked to be in charge of the decorations. It was a huge, stark white room and I worried for months that I would be able to come up with enough stuff to fill it. Thankfully I had tons of help! Some people waited to decorate there home until after this party so we could use a lot of their Christmas decorations. As you can see, it turned out pretty cozy and very nice (if I do say so myself).

Aside from the folding chairs and tables, we brought in everything...couches, comfy chairs, extra tables to decorate, lamps, trees, trees, and more trees!

My half-elf friend helped me wrap all these boxes to use as part of the centerpieces, and under trees. The green and gold balls were something my mom had that came from grandma. The branches are REAL and they came from Oregon. My mom and dad cut them for me when we were there for Thanksgiving, we put them in a big box and I brought them home on the plane.  They lasted better than I expected and everyone loved them!

I can't take any credit for the food, but I can say it was delicious. Not to mention these are my new favorite rolls!

After dinner we had a few speakers, a gift wrapping demonstration, and a service gift exchange. I offered to design someone's Christmas cards, and I received 2 batches of sugar cookies. It was a fabulous night and I'm pretty sure a good time was had by all!

Family Photos

We got to have our pictures taken by my new favorite photographer. She did a great job, didn't she? If you need some pictures taken, let me know, I'll give you her number.

We had so much fun! The hardest thing about it, of course, is deciding which ones to print and hang on the walls. Here are some of our favorites...both serious and silly.

Early Thanksgiving

Since Travis will most likely be working on Thanksgiving this year, we decided to take advantage of a couple of his days off earlier this month. We went to Oregon for an early Thanksgiving dinner. The boys had fun shooting, we all had a picnic in the park in Portland (funny, there weren't too many other picnicers that day...maybe because it's November...I'm really not sure though), lots of games, and of course good food! Surprisingly we forgot the camera most of the time, but here is a traditional family photo and a picture of our Thanksgiving food.

Happy Halloween

Saturday night Travis and I got to go to a Murder Mystery party with friends from our ward! We had lots of fun and good food. Although the best part may have been just getting dressed up for the occasion :) Oh, and don't worry, neither Travis nor I were the murderer! 

Eve L. Dedd - Actress and Watt Madaxman - Film Set Carpenter

The crazy cast...also known as our friends!

TCU vs BYU

It's that time of year again...BYU FOOTBALL! This year BYU played at TCU, which is in Fort Worth. If you missed this game, consider yourself lucky! It was nothing to cheer or even really get excited about. But it was still fun to get out and see some blue. 

Better luck next time Cougars!

Lots of Travis's family was at the game, although we all sat in different sections. At the end of the game we met up for a picture to go down in the books.

Alliance Air Show

Something fun on a Saturday afternoon. The air show came to an airport just a few miles from our home. We decided to park it across the freeway from the airport, right next to Cabela's. 

This is us with our bowl of popcorn and popsicles...waiting for something to happen.

This is everyone else...waiting for something to happen.

Finally, something happens! It was really fun to be close enough to have them flying right over our heads and to be able to see so much detail on the planes. Travis thought it was very cool, but doesn't feel the need to pursue this direction of aviation. I was happy to hear that :) Those guys do some pretty crazy stuff!

After the show, since we were so close to Cabela's we stopped in for a bite of fudge to top off the good weather, the entertaining show, and the great company...each other!