Four Christmases!!

We had a wonderful Christmas time this year. Of course, I forgot my camera, so I keep stealing all the pictures that everyone else took! We started our Christmas celebration at Alex's Grandma's house on Christmas Eve. All of his family was over there and we exchanged presents and had a wonderful dinner.Then, we went to my parent's house and waited for Santa to bring Mark and Jake their presents. After we opened presents there, we went over to my Grandparents house with all of my family. We opened presents there and ate our traditional Christmas dinner of pasties. It was a lot of fun! Alex and I decided to do a Zelda scavenger hunt for my brothers to find their present. I made them scrolls for their clues and uniforms to wear. Alex made them each a sword and shield and "bad guys" that they had to fight with their swords. At the end, they found a Wii game. It was really fun for us to watch. I will edit this post and post some pictures of it when Cindi sends some to me... Here are a couple pictures of the "bad guys" Alex built.

Christmas, evening we went to Alex's parents house and opened presents there with his family. We stayed in Arizona until the end of the weekend relaxing and having fun with our families. It was a great trip.

Our First Christmas

We have a pretty busy holiday season planned. This past weekend Alex planned a bachelor party for his friend in Arizona and I got to go visit my family. The boys went to Lake Pleasant to camp, gamble, ride quads, and go shooting. We both really had fun weekends and then we drove back to New Mexico. We are going back to Arizona on Christmas Eve and bringing my brothers back with us to New Mexico after Christmas, only to turn around and come back for Alex's friend's wedding on New Years...there will be a lot of driving!

Because of this, Alex and I got to celebrate our First Christmas a little early. We celebrated it before we left for the bachelor party. It was nice for us to have our own Christmas together. And to appropriately celebrate the birth of our Savior, we ordered Panda Express to go and came back to our house to open presents. : ) We both loved our presents and had a great time. It could not have been a better First Christmas for us!

It Snows in New Mexico

It has snowed a few mornings since we have been here. It is absolutely beautiful and I keep meaning to take pictures, but by the afternoon the snow is all melted away. Well it snowed all day yesterday and I finally got some pictures. Then, it kept snowing all night and Alex did not have to go into work until 9:30 today because of the snow. As of right now, I love the snow! I am sure I won't be saying the same thing after seeing it everyday : ) It is suppose to snow for the rest of the week...I just hope it stops before Friday, so we don't have to drive back to Arizona in the snow.

Alex's Work Christmas Party

On Friday, Alex had his first work Christmas party. There is a lot of people that work in his building, so there was quite a turnout and there was great food (which is always a plus). We played games during the party like The Price is Right. Alex's name got drawn, but we didn't win : ( It was at a casino and one of my friends, had never gambled. So, we went and gambled a little after the party. Alex and I won $2 and unfortunately she learned that gambling isn't as fun as people make it out to be. We had a lot of fun and it was a great experience for our first (and I am sure not last) work Christmas party.

Silly Pictures

I was looking through pictures and saw these of my brothers. They are just too cute not to post. They have such fun personalities! I miss not being able to see them everyday! On our last trip, Jake and Alex were joking around and Alex said he was going to throw Jake through the window. Jake, very smugly, replied, "No you won't because I will tell your wife." We both thought it was hilarious.

Cooking, Cooking, Cooking

When Alex and I got married, I realized that I only knew how to cook a few meals. So, every week, Alex and I try to each pick a new recipe and then I make it. It has been a lot of fun and there has been a lot of desperate calls wondering how to cut up certain foods and what the recipe means when it says certain terms, but we are getting through it. I have made homemade chicken pot pie, sweet and sour chicken, honey glazed stir fry, pot roast, etc. I have realized that it is way easier to bake, then to cook and that we both love desserts over real food (which is not a good thing). I have actually added many new meals to my repertoire. Hopefully, I will continue to add more in the future, so if anyone has any good recipes, please send them our way! We are always looking for something good to eat!

Arizona Vacation

Well, we have been pretty busy these past couple weeks. We went to Arizona and took turns staying with our families. It was an eventful week. Alex spent all his time with my brothers playing Zelda. We went to the Airport with Alex's family to pick up Josh and his girlfriend, Nichole. It was the first time his family got to meet her so we all wore shirts that said "I love Nichole" to welcome her.I went with Lauren, Diane, and Nichole to go and see Twilight! We had been waiting forever for it to come out and I am pretty sure Lauren might have killed me if I didn't wait to go see it with her. Alex is planning to run the Bataan Death March (a marathon with a 35 lb. pack) in New Mexico with his brother and dad. He actually is in charge of training for it in his squadron at work. He is running and hiking all of the time, which includes our vacations. He ran with his brother and dad while we were visiting. On Wednesday night, Kevin got married. So, we got to go to his wedding (which was beautiful). The next day, we split our Thanksgiving with both families. First, we went to my Grandma's house. It was a nontraditional Thanksgiving because of Kevin's wedding. We had Ham and baked potatoes and it was delicious! I don't know why we ever started the Turkey tradition...I definitely prefer Ham. Then, we attempted to eat our second Thanksgiving meal at Alex's parents new house, which was also delicious! We had turkey and lots of different casseroles. By the end of the day, we were both so full! The next day, Lauren and I decided to experience our first Black Friday. We went to Lowes, WalMart, Ulta, Old Navy, Staples, Kohls, etc. I got most of my Christmas shopping done in 1 day. It was a great experience and I will be doing it again. We really enjoyed all of the time with our families and we cannot wait until Christmas to see everyone again!