DeCembEr iN a NuTshElL...

Wow. December was crazy busy and I did not post at all! The month really went by sooo fast! We just had a couple of short weeks here before we took off to AZ for Christmas. Luke has LOVED all the neighboorhood lights here in TX and we have taken tons of drives to look at them all... I think this house has been my favorite.

I guess just because it depicts my all-time favorite Christmas movie. I don't know who lives there, but we drive by all the time. Nice job people! We put up most of our Christmas decor after Thanksgiving this year. Luke has been preoccupied with watching his fingers glow when he grabs the tree lights. Too funny.

Our AZ trip was crazy and fun! We spent time with both sides of the fam although this was the Smith side year for Christmas. For Christmas we were in Scottsdale at the Villa Mirage. Great place to be with 27 people running around! Lots of room for everyone and fun facilities. It was entertaining seeing all of the little cousins interact with each other! Jake and I got in a few dates while we were there and an over-nighter at the Phoenician for our anniversary. Woo woo! I can't believe we've been married 3 years already! Thanks a bunch to family for watching Luke for us! Babysitters that Luke cooperates for in TX are hard to come by... Here are some pics from December!

Christmas family pic... thanks to Kristen who took it for us this year...

luke's favorite chair at my parents house...

My awesome bro in law, Joe, and his singing group MC6... we got to see them perform. Nice job guys!

One of my best friends sent this cute dog to Luke for Christmas and it's his favorite... when I put it away he's always asking "a did da dog go?"

We got in lots of Guitar Hero and Wii sports... even the babies joined in on the fun :)

grandpa and luke playing outside... he got in lots of time with the grandparents this trip!

Christmas Eve...

Smith kiddos born in 2006... First picture of them all together! Luke, Austin, Lucy, Laney, Logan, Seth, and Gunnar

the new and improved Victorias Secret models...

...the guys....

All the grandkids... kids were having a rough day! haha

Buddies...

Caden and Luke loving grandpa's cookies!

A bird got into the condo! Poor thing eventually ran into a sliding glass door though and we found him on the floor like this. I will have to upload the video sometime! It was quite entertaining watching Davey, Jake, and Ben trying to get it to fly outside...

Me and my sis!

and... Dinner with the Gift fam at Pizzaria Bianco... YUM!! I had been wanting to try their pizza ever since Oprah and Gayle King talked about what a good restraunt it is. Tasty!

Luke had fun picking oranges from my parent's tree. He refused to give these two to me and fell asleep holding them. haha.

We had a girls day out... just the Smith ladies. This was a long awaited event and we had fun! The guys watched the kids for the WHOLE day. We got massages, nails done, some shopping, and of course Cheesecake Factory.... mmmm. Heavenly.


On to other things... Our anniversary at the Phoenician!


It was the first time we have been away from Luke overnight. So great! Arizona winters are the best. Where else can you swim and have such sunny days in December?? Happy Anniversary to us! The hotel was sooo gorgeous and there is so much to do there. This place really has it all. Our room, the grounds (9 pools!!), and everything was so nice.
We ordered room service and could not decide what dessert we wanted... so we tried 3. All were very pretty to look at but the brownies were sick. Ice cream and cheesecake were so good!!!
Aaahhh... the pools.
Then here are our brownies. They look so appetizing right?... Hard to believe they taste gross. Really gross.









The view from our room. Big thanks to Matt for helping Jake with our Phoenician arrangements! We had a great time! I highly recommend this place!


Such a fun trip to AZ other then the days we were sick (almost everyone was sick at least one day!)... I guess that's what happens when you get so many people together from different places though! ugh. There were some funky viruses going around the fam! Anyhow, we had a good month! This is probably my longest post ever and I'm tired of writing. See ya later :)

Thanksgiving...

This past week has been soo nice! Jake has had a break from school... aaahhh... so great. Seems like he's at school so much lately. We got just about all of our Christmas shopping done... in record time for us!! There were some killer deals at the stores Friday. I love sales! Also, Jake's brothers came to spend Turkey Day with us. We had lots of fun. Luke loved having his uncles around to tease and play with him! Big thanks to Daniel and David for making the long drive to TX! It wouldn't have been the same without you guys! Aaron and Kristen and kiddos joined us for our Thanksgiving dinner too, so it was a fun little group.

Luke and Uncle Boon

MMm... Yep, we're good cooks ;)

Smith guys seem to gather around TVs and computers...

Luke was impressed with Davey's tower building skillz...

Yeah!! Sweater weather finally came to Texas...

Downtown Running :)

This morning I ran my first official half marathon. Woo hoo! Ya, maybe that's bad to do on Sunday but that's the only time marathons are held outside of Utah.... or at least I haven't found another state other then Utah that holds them on Saturday. Ha. I love running with lots of people. The energy is so awesome, and there are so many great runners. It's inspiring, really. There were over 3000 other people running. The majority of them were running the half marathon and others continued on for the full marathon. We started at the Alamo and ended at the Alamodome. The course took us through different missions and historical sites. I was planning on running it in under two hours and everything was going perfect until the end of mile 6. My back started hurting, and looking back I probably should have stopped. Hopefully it's not messed up for a long time now! I've NEVER had a problem with my back. Ever. Even on the long runs I've been doing over the last few months. So, this was weird and new to me! Well, to make a long story short my back spasms continued getting worse through the end of the race and I had to slow down a lot. I finished in around two hours and twenty minutes. Ugh... so frustrating to feel great and have annoying pains slow ya down! Oh well.. I'm glad I know now what these events are like. Next time will be better! :)

Sunny Day...

Elmo and his friends came to Texas! We took Luke to see Sesame Street Live "Elmo Makes Music" on Saturday morning. It was so fun. Jake and I even liked it. Luke has loved Elmo since he was tiny. Elmo's world on Sesame Street was the only thing for so long that he would watch on TV.
The show was a couple of hours long and I think it's the best behaved Luke has been in public in a long time. :) He was so excited to see all the characters. There was even an "Elmo's World" segment with Mr. Noodle. Funny!

Almost Halloween...

Tonight we dressed up for the annual trunk-or-treat.... after washing my hair 4 times to get this pink stuff out, I think I'm done dressing up till next year!

Who's that hot bald guy with horns?


Little linebacker...

Our "trick-or-treating goblin" jack-o-lantern made it throught the nights events! Our other pumpkin fell apart... :(

So, I'm it.

I was tagged by my sis-in-law Jenni (http://hootieshowl.blogspot.com/) ...very crafty and fun blog!! Anyhow, now I get to tag 7 people on their blogs ...

So, here are 7 fabulous facts about me:
1. I love to sit and look at things that are arranged by color! Weird? Like when you go to a store and see containers full of coordinating Jelly Bellys, ribbon on the wall, or folded T-shirts at Gap... stacked according to color of course, shelves of paper (like at a scrapbook store or Kinko's) , towels at BBB, how crayons are arranged in the box when you first open them... you know, those kinds of things! :)

2. I fall up the stairs more often then down... super clumsy. I'm sooo glad we don't have stairs in our house right now so I don't have to experience this very frequently. Ask my little bro Dak... he's seen me do this a lot! haha

3. I'm very unlucky when it comes to cars. In high school, a car I was in was completely totaled. While I was at BYU my car was hit twice while parked in parking lots. Another time, a drunk driver hit and severely damaged my car while it was parked in front of my grandparents house. In yet another car incident an old lady ran a red light and into the side of my car. Talk about bad luck... poor cars. At least I come out of the scene unscathed!

4. I was a cheerleader in high school... Ya, I can be loud! ... most people think I'm always quiet...

5. I want to run a marathon!!!
... would be more fun with a running partner... Jake's not up to it... anyone else? :)

6. I snack all the time so I'm never really hungry for meals.

7. I get sucked into kids TV shows and movies... and you thought that Blues Clues was on for Luke...

Here's who I tag:

1. Karalee http://chrisandkaralee.blogspot.com/
2. Kajsa http://www.kipnielsonfamily.blogspot.com/
3. Melissa ... well, there are a couple Melissas... you both should do it! :) http://www.jessopadventures.blogspot.com/ http://melis-aaron-life.blogspot.com/
4. Michelle http://www.measton.blogspot.com/
5. Joe ...I guess this is your "welcome to the blogging community" initiation :)
http://flavor-of-the-day.blogspot.com/
6. Shauna http://whowouldntwannabeshauna.blogspot.com/
7. Lyssa http://joe-lyssa.blogspot.com/

1-Link to your tagger (like I did with Jenni) , and also post these rules on your blog
2-Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird
3-Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs
4- Let them know they are TAGGED by leaving a comment on their blog

I love October!

Yesterday, we went with Aaron and Kristen and the kids to Love Creek Apple Orchard. It's such a fun place to go for fall festivities! We went on a hayride, the kids ran around in pumpkins and got to hang out with farm animals, we ate apple ice cream, and participated in a crazy cowboy sing-a-long thing. Fun times!

Our little cowboy!
Cute Gunnar on the hayride...

He wants a donkey for Christmas... hint to the cousin who drew his name ;)

little chick...

Friday night... Luke went on his first ride at Sea World!

Robbing the dead...

The mess can go!!... for now :)

I posted some scrap layouts in April and said that my goal was to be caught up by Luke's first birthday.... Well, that didn't happen. However, thanks to BYU taking forever to grade my last few projects, I have had time for two marathon scrapbook sessions over the past couple of months. Caught up... for now! Scrapping is really a never ending project, but I can at least put everything away and pull it all out for another marathon in another few months! Ha. Thanks Jake for putting up with my junk all over the table! We've been eating dinner on the couch for the last few nights while my stuff has been everywhere. What great dinner etiquette. ;) Just a few pages....

Luke and my dad last Dec.
Luke meeting my little bro for the first time...

Little stinker in Utah this past summer... the paper really is all white in the background... I guess my scanner had issues with this one. haha

Having fun with Grandpa Smith...

4 Generations...

At the cabin!
With Great Grams...

First b-day!!