Utah trip

We had a great time visiting family and friends in Utah, it had been two years since I'd been out there!  We had a relaxing time with Chris' parents, got to do some Christmas shopping, and got to visit with Chris' grandmother.

Playing in the snow trying to get a cute Christmas card picture

Our niece and nephew's puppy Noel looking so cute for a treat!

Having lunch with one of my college roommates, Heidi

Look at me, posting two days in a row!  And this one just happened yesterday, even more impressive!  Someone told Thomas, my youngest brother, that star fruit was sweet and he should try some.  He's spending the weekend at our house, so Chris bought some star fruit for us to try.  By the looks on our faces I'm sure you can tell it was NOT sweet.

Highlights from Jamaica

I know, I know, I should have posted these pictuers a long time ago!  What can I say, I'm a slacker when it comes to blogging!

Anyway, we had a great time in Jamiaca.  We were there for five days and felt like we got to do pretty much everything we wanted to.  We stayed at a Sandals resort, which was really the way to go.  The only time we left the resort was to go to Dolphin Cove, which was way overpriced and not quite as fun as I'd expected.    I'd been a little worried about the food because I'm such a picky eater, but they cater to Americans, so I had plenty to eat, I even tried Jamaican jerk chicken, which was pretty good.  I will say they don't know how to make hot dogs! 

Most people there were on their honeymoons, so we felt a little old!  There was one couple we met who had gotten married at the resort and came back for their ten year anniversary.

We were both pretty diligent about putting on sunscreen so we wouldn't get burned, unfortunately that meant we came home as white as we left.

They had all kinds of water sports to try, and we tried most of them, my favorite by far was the windsurfing.  It's pretty hard, but I got going a couple times, we had a lot of fun laughing at each other as we fell.

This is the view from our hotel room, not too bad!  There were a couple mornings I woke up before Chris and I would sit out on the balcony in hopes of seeing dolphins swimming, but no such luck. 

The resort had like eight restaurants, most of which were casual, there were two fancy ones and this is one of them.  We enjoyed getting dressed up and trying their version of Asian food.  Our waiter was really nice and asked if we could take him back to America in our siutcase.

This is us snorkeling at Dolphin Cove, this was by far my favorite activity while we were there, we went twice - once at Dolphin Cove and once at the resort.  At Dolphin Cove it was an enclosed lagoon with a couple stingrays, at the resort they took us out in the ocean, which was much cooler.

Here I am holding one of the stingrays at Dolphin Cove, it was pretty weird, and very heavy.

This is also at Dolphin Cove, there was a little jungle you had to walk through before getting to the beach and all along the way there were animals and birds you could take pictures with.  We also had to walk under a canopy of spider webs, yuck!

There were lots of random things around the resort, like this giant chess board.  We also played shuffleboard and talked to a parrot.

Right outside our section of the hotel was a little pond with this enormour fish who liked to have his head pet! Every time we walked by we'd have to stop and pet the fish, it was so funny!

So, that, in a nutshell, was our trip.  We had a lot of fun and I survived my first flight over the ocean! I'm already planning our next Caribbean vacation!

4th of July

I know this is way overdue, but I figured I would still post because the pictures are so cute! We're lucky enough to live within walking distance of the parade route so we don't have to deal with parking. My dad and brothers stayed at my house while my mom, grandmother, Chris and I went to watch the parade. Of course we found the Washburns and sat near them.

My mom and grandmother enjoying the parade.

Bekah loves to have her picture taken so we ended up with what looks like a very cute family picture!

Briella sat me with me for awhile during the parade, which is always amazing and I love that she's getting to like me! I couldn't quite get her to smile for the picture, though.

This is Bekah posing, what a ham.

I had just gotten new Pampered Chef decorating tips so I was so excited to decorate a cake with them, I think it turned out really cute!

Cat-size Steak

When we got married and Chris started cooking, I started gaining weight, which, needless to say, I didn't like. After six years, we found a solution - a Cat-sized steak! It looked pretty funny, so we had to take a picture!

Howard The Duck

For those of you who don't know, I grew up with an amazing variety of animals, mostly injured animals that we took in for a few days until they were well enough to be released or sent to a wldlife refuge. The most recent may be staying for awhile. A domestic duck came running up to my parents at the park one day, obviously starving, and within reach of a fox, so he came home. They named him Howard and they say he's going to a sanctuary, but we'll see how that goes. He's very friendly and likes cuddling on laps and following us around the yard. They did some research and found out he's an Indian running duck, which is why he stands almost completely erect, unlike most ducks. So, of course, I had to take a trip down there to play with him!

T'was the Night Before Easter

We decided to have some friends over to dye Easter eggs, we thought it would be a little boring by ourselves. We all had a good time and got some creativity going. Afterwards we played some games and cringed and laughed at Dave's stories from the E.R. Oh yeah, and I got a new haircut! I know the pictures are small, but hopefully you can at least tell that it's a lot shorter!

Dave's masterpiece - he has kids so he's had a lot more practice than we have!

Got some puffy paint and had fun trying to draw on eggs. Carlos discovered for us that it takes a really long time for the paint to dry.

Bob Evans

So, I really really enjoy going out with the girls. I love my husband and we have fun together, but there's nothing better than a night out with the girls. A couple weeks ago we tried to go bowling, but that fell through, so we took some games and hung out at Bob Evans enjoying endless hot chocolate. Now, that may not seem like the most exciting thing to most of you, but we had a blast! Sometimes I wish I was still in middle school having slumber parties (oops, did I say that out loud?!?! haha). Hanging out at Bob Evans playing games is a pretty good substitute! And luckily I got to go in to work late the next day!

Homemaking Tag

Here's a really cool tag that I'm excited about!

The first five people to comment on this post will get something made by me! My choice, for you. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!

2. What I create will be just for you.  You have no clue what it's going to be.  It may be a story.  It may be poetry or an article on properly cleaning your face before a masque.  I may draw or paint something.  I may bake something and mail it to you.

3.  It will be done sometime in the next 12 months.

4.  I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you must re-post this on your blog and offer the same to the first 5 people who comment on your blog.  Be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it!

Happy Homemaking!

Catch Up #3 - Melissa's wedding

On Valentine's Day I got to be a bridesmaid for my friend, Melissa, who I've known since we were about 12. I'd never been a bridesmaid before, so it was a lot of fun. I barely knew anyone else, and Chris had never met them, so it was a little interesting, but still a lot of fun. I can't wait for the proffesional pictures to come back!

This is all of us girls on the way to the church, on the way to the reception we had to fit all of the guys in the limo too! Some of them were related, so they sat on laps, and I got squished in the corner, luckily it was only a two minute ride!

This is me trying to show off my front and back at the hotel before the wedding, can you see my cute curly hair?

Catch Up #2 - Chris' Birthday

I tried to make this birthday really fun for Chris, so every night I did something different. The first was the bowling on Saturday, Sunday we had a big dinner with my family, Monday I had a cute candy and balloon bouquet thing sent to him at work, Tuesday we went to one of our favorite restaraunts, Wednesday (his actual birthday) I had his best friend and wife come down from PA for dinner, it wasn't a total surprise, but Chris had fun. And, of course, there were presents. This is his face after opening his eyes to see his big present............................. His other presents were some cool accessories for the grill, whenever the weather warms up enough to use it again!

Catch Up #1 - Bowling

To kick off Chris' birthday week we went to dinner and then bowling with some good friends' of ours, Marley and Carlos. It had been years since either Chris or I had bowled, and it showed in our scores! We played two games and I didn't even break 100! We also had to go out and buy a new microwave that night, ours up and died suddenly and we discovered very quickly we can't live without one!

Playing Big Sister

Ever since Bekah spent the night at my house while her parents were out of town she has been begging me for another sleepover.  Since I had Monday off, I invited her and Kamberlynne over on Sunday night.  We played Wii and watched movies, it was pretty fun! People laugh at me that I get excited to have a 3 year old and a 12 year old come over, but I don't have any younger sisters and I really enjoy it!