December Fun!

Family Pictures

Alot of the folks who read my blog already know this but I thought I should put it in writing. We just had our family pictures taken by an amazing photographer who lives in Utah but grew up in NorCal. She came home to visit and we were lucky enough to get some time with her. If you click on the link that says Amy F photography on the right side and look for the post labeled Northern California, you can see a few of our pics. If you live in Utah, contact her. It is more of a demand than a simple request. She is so worth your time and $. The memories are priceless. I would recommend her to anyone who wants someone with a great artistic element to their work. She is so talented and as sweet as they come.

Trip to Utah

The crew at temple square

Our little family

Me and "The Grammie"

My friend Melissa who I miss everyday

Me, Brando, Mom, Dad and Uncle Danny

Friday we left at midnight to drive to UT for the blessing of my sister Corley's baby boy. Asher is so sweet and such a good baby. Jonathan gave him a great blessing and we were grateful to be there for it. It was great to see my family. We also got to take the kids to temple square to see the lights and hear a performance in the tabernacle. I am bummed though that I didn't get ANY pictures of my handsome nephew. I will make up for it at Christmas!

Apple Hill

Friday after Thanksgiving we took the traditional drive to Apple Hill for pony rides, apple doughnuts, and caramel apples that cannot be duplicated no matter how hard you try! I missed out this year as I had to get ready for our drive to UT but they had a great time.

Thanksgiving

Brandon's parents Mark and Jill


The Ladies

Cousins Scott and Jessica with their little girl Savannah

The Turner Family

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with the extended family all staying at our house. Brandon's mom Jill always does a beautiful job creating a lovely atmosphere with a perfectly set table and great food. This year was especially nice at their house as they have just finished a long anticipated remodel. The house is more cozy and inviting than ever!

Picture day

We had our family pictures taken by a very talented photographer who was visiting from UT. We don't have the pics yet (keep your fingers crossed for a good one for the x-mas card!), but these pics show what the kids looked like. I made some flower bows for the girls, and as you can see Tess had a flower the size of her head! Some may call it excessive but I love it!

Mikey and Sharla came for a visit

Our wonderful longtime friends came to visit for a few days with their little boy Noah who is almost 2 and the cutest thing you have ever seen. It was fun to have them stay with us. The visit was great except for the low point when Brandon took Mikey to play "flag" football and ended up tearing his ACL! He has been a great sport and joked that he was happy it was him and not Mikey or Sharla would never let him come back! Our great friends Jim and Shana came with their darling little Mya to meet us for dinner one night, here are a few pics from the visit.

Park Day

Last week I asked Eli what he wanted to do and he said he wanted to have a picnic at the park, which made me laugh because we haven't had in a picnic in months! So off to the park we went and I took a few pics.

Retaliation!

Although I don't have Erica's password to sabotage her blog myself, I certainly have the ability to show her that 2 can play this game! The following pics are some of my favorites. Enjoy!This is how I remember Erica when we first met, we were 6 and my family had just moved back to GA to live near Granny and Papa and the cousins.

Is it sad that I remeber being envious of this dress-looking hot!

Erica hates this pic but I had to!

There are no words to describe those bangs!

Chillin on the couch in our lovely floral prints-Erica's storebought, mine homemade-I love you mom! My sewing machine is dusty and after seeing this dress I am now inspired :)

How could I play the guitar without my band. The tambourine is a nice fit for you, where do you have it hidden? Is it under the bed? Do you pull in out for special occasions?

P.s-Really what were we thinking? And where were our parents?

Our senior trip to New York.

Myspace pics for sure!

Halloween at BYU-What's up Baby Spice?!

Although the pictures I have of Erica are many and varied, unfortunately many of them also include rather unfavorable images of myself as well. . so I have chosen several to showcase our friendship through the years, as well as a few for revenge. Love you E! Thanks for making me laugh this morning and for giving me an excuse to go through old pics and relive some great memories!

Hijacked!!!!

This is Erica coming at you live from the Hardy Party. I committed a small offense of stealing Hillary's password (ok, she gave it to me to view a private blog). Still, the offense is probably somewhere lower down than stealing junk mail. Good thing I have a lawyer on retainer at all times. Now what can I embarrass Hillary with? Hmmmm.....





This is Hillary helping me with Math. I didn't like it and she was "Gifted."
I swear I do love you in spite of putting this on your blog but I had to.
Now this gets tricky because to incriminate Hill I have to expose some bad choices of my own. Hill? Do you still play cherry red electric guitars? Inquiring minds probably want to know.
Where do you think we were headed that night? It was Sophomore year so it wasn't the Omni. My bet is Fall Fling because we only lived in King Henry with ONE bathroom for one semester.
We are too old to have had Myspace in college but if we had, this for sure qualifys as a "Myspace Face." "Who me? You have a camera? I am just sitting here looking cute and inquisitive."

Aunt Gina's in town

Aunt Gina came to visit Erica and after seeing her a few times during the week, Brando and I went on a double date with them Friday night :)! Mike, it's your loss for being at scout camp! We went to eat sushi at Kokyo's-(so good!) and then went to a movie. If you haven't seen "Dan in real life" yet, you have to see it. It was so good! Steve Carrell is awesome, his dead pan expressions cracked me up, and Erica and I were laughing and crying all at the same time. Definitely the best movie I have seen in a while. It was great to see her. Love you Aunt Mimi!

Soccer Party

We had Blythe's soccer party last night so here's a pic with her trophy.

Fire pit

We wanted to go camping last week but it didn't come together, so instead Brando bought this fire pit and had a camp fire outside with the kids. They loved it and so did I because I got to sleep in my own bed that night and not in a tent with a grumpy Tessy! And yes Eli is in fact wearing Blythe's purple fleece.

The year of a million costumes

Eli was our difficult child this Halloween as he was not satisfied with his costume choice for any extended period of time. It all started when for his birthday we got him the Leonardo ninja turtle costume thinking that it would serve a dual purpose as a fun dress-up, and could be used as his outfit for Halloween later on. . .we were SO wrong.

Eli was not excited about the idea of being a ninja turtle after having already played with it for 2 months and instead became obsessed with being Tarzan. The idea of our 3 year old half-naked on Halloween did not seem like the most responsible choice we could make as parents, so the search for a costume to satisfy both mother and child continued. Brando took the kids shopping while I had a girls night at the house a few weeks ago, and came home with the blue power ranger for Eli. Not my favorite, but Eli loved the fake muscles, so great. . .I was done.

Little did I know however that on the way to the ward trunk or treat Eli would fall asleep in his costume and have an accident, leaving him one very soggy and bad natured power ranger and now in need of another new outfit for the night. I must mention that what better time for your first accident than while zipped into a blue power ranger suit, right?

While I was very tempted to wrap a towel around him and just let him be Tarzan, I used my better judgement and threw on a rash guard and board shorts quickly turning him into a "surfer dude" like daddy. I then proceeded to wash his power ranger the next day to have it ready for music class.

On Wednesday morning we started to get ready and out of the blue Eli threw a fit and decided that he needed to be a pirate like his friend Joey and in no way could attend music at Joey's house dressed as a mere blue power ranger. My sweet husband being the accommodating man that he is, upon hearing of Eli's unhappiness, tells Eli that OF COURSE he can be a pirate. WHAT? Was I just supposed to snap my fingers and have a pirate costume magically appear? So I became the bad guy as I forced him unwillingly to wear his power ranger to music class because what 3 year old after being told that daddy would make him a pirate would settle for a second rate power ranger? Finally we left the house with the promise that dad would follow through on turning Eli into a pirate for the main event. Dad did come through and Halloween night Eli happily dressed as his beloved pirate and finally smiled for the camera.

This my friends is why I call my saga the year of million costumes and FYI, I would not suggest to anyone allowing a 3 year old so much input into what should be a very easy decision!

And just for fun I will also inform you that Brandon let Eli wear his pirate hat to the mall today, what a lucky kid to have such a pushover for a dad!

Bacon. . .

Tess was an adorable little piggie this Halloween and Brandon cracked us all up as he kept calling her bacon and threatening to take a bite out of her!